Castlevania III is the final game of the NES trilogy and introduces different characters you can play as and a stage select screen that gives you a choice which path to take. This run aims to complete the Grant path as quickly as possible, saving roughly 19 seconds over the previous run.

Game objectives

  • Emulator used: FCEUX 2.1.4
  • Takes Damage to Save Time
  • Abuses Programming Errors
  • Manipulates Luck
  • Genre: Platformer

Comments

Most of the time savings come from a couple of different strategies, more optimization, better heart management and a couple of new tricks. Grant is an absolute beast when used properly, and I try to show that off as good as I can.

Tricks

Canceling Attack Animations

There are multiple ways to skip the attack animation of thrown weapons, allowing the player to keep moving and throw weapons at a considerably higher rate. All of these need to be frame-precise. It works by pressing the attack button...
  • ...immediately after crouching (Grant's throwing dagger only)
  • ...on the frame before you land from a fall
  • ...on the frame you're walking off a ledge
  • ...at a specific frame while you are jumping into a ceiling (Grant only)

Falling downward quickly

If you let go for one frame while walking off a ledge, Grant will immediately fall at his maximum speed. This is faster than jumping when descending ledges that are one block high. Anything more, and the game begins forcing you into crouching mode

Canceling crouching mode after a big fall

You can do this by attacking at the correct frame.

Slowing enemies down by hitting them

This is more effective on some enemies than on others

Manipulating moving Platforms (New!)

By scrolling moving platforms, such as the swinging pendulums in the last level off the screen, I can spawn them in such a position they move away at exactly the right moment.

Pulling yourselves through corners (New!)

If the blocks are arranged in a certain way, Grant can pull himself through by approaching the wall correctly. You can see me doing this at a couple of places.

Entering walls (New!)

Another one that only works with Grant. If you jump into a ceiling, 32 subpixels are added to your position, regardless of whether you are touching a wall or not. By repeatedly jumping in the proper spot, you can add enough subpixels to your position to roll over, adding a full pixel. This in turn allows you to enter the wall. You have to align your subpixels carefully while approaching the wall to minimize the amount of jumps it will take.
What you can do while in the wall depends on your exact position and the blocks around you. You can either begin climbing the walls as usual, or, if you're in deep enough, jumping immediately zips you upward a block.

Other comments

I'd like to thank samhain-grim for his great Castlevania 3 runs that I used as a base, and Bablo for an unfinished WIP, which helped me a lot while making the run. Also, I'd like to thank everyone on #tasvideos for putting up with my constant rambling about the run. I may elaborate on the submission comments later, but, for right now, I hope you enjoy the run.

Nach: Very nice improvement, accepting.

TASVideoAgent
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Guga
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Waiting for encode. EDIT: Well, I will do the temp encode. EDIT2: http://youtu.be/VJMmeU-cUP0 Still processing. You are fast, antd.
Dwedit
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For comparison, the previous published run is 28:57 in length.
Post subject: castlevania 3: youtube
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Yes vote due to the awesome final boss fight.
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Ho-o-o-ly shit. This is fucking outstanding. The end.
Warp wrote:
omg lol this is so fake!!!1 the nes cant produce music like this!
Noxxa
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Nice. Castlevania III is one of my favorite games from the series, and Grant is my favorite character from the game. Nice improvement too. Yes vote.
http://www.youtube.com/Noxxa <dwangoAC> This is a TAS (...). Not suitable for all audiences. May cause undesirable side-effects. May contain emulator abuse. Emulator may be abusive. This product contains glitches known to the state of California to cause egg defects. <Masterjun> I'm just a guy arranging bits in a sequence which could potentially amuse other people looking at these bits <adelikat> In Oregon Trail, I sacrificed my own family to save time. In Star trek, I killed helpless comrades in escape pods to save time. Here, I kill my allies to save time. I think I need help.
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Is Grant related to Ryu Hayabusa? Awesome improvement, yes vote.
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Excellent run! Quick question (and I hope it isn't a stupid one) on the second screen of BLK 8-02 is it possible it enter the blocks above you and to the left of where you enter the screen (next to the staircase out of the room)? I wasn't sure if this meets proper conditions, or if it takes too long to set up, or do the axe knight and the slime prevent this since they would be attacking you?
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Impressive how so many rooms could be effectively skipped just by a quick jump-ceiling crawl-mantle maneuver. It's a shame Grant's so far out of the way; if he could be picked up where Sypha is then I wouldn't be surprised if he were the fastest available character. It's telling that you never switch away from him once he's acquired.
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Absolutely incredible how much time you saved and the new tricks! Definitely a yes vote on such a big improvement on one of the best Nes games! Mr. Kelly R. Flewin
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phunqsauce wrote:
Excellent run! Quick question (and I hope it isn't a stupid one) on the second screen of BLK 8-02 is it possible it enter the blocks above you and to the left of where you enter the screen (next to the staircase out of the room)? I wasn't sure if this meets proper conditions, or if it takes too long to set up, or do the axe knight and the slime prevent this since they would be attacking you?
Unfortunately, you need a solid wall right next to you for the trick to work - the edge of the screen won't cut it
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Sweet run. Voted yes.
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Very nicely done. Question: In BLK 7-0A you delay for a few seconds to avoid getting hit. Is it really worth the time loss to avoid the health recharge at the end of the level?
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c-square wrote:
Very nicely done. Question: In BLK 7-0A you delay for a few seconds to avoid getting hit. Is it really worth the time loss to avoid the health recharge at the end of the level?
You mean the second room where I mess around a bit before jumping at the wall? That's actually subpixel manipulation, because I need to get as close to the wall as possible without actually touching it. The more subpixels I have, the fewer jumps I need.
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Voting YES.
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Yes vote based purely on music alone.
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scrimpeh wrote:
c-square wrote:
Very nicely done. Question: In BLK 7-0A you delay for a few seconds to avoid getting hit. Is it really worth the time loss to avoid the health recharge at the end of the level?
You mean the second room where I mess around a bit before jumping at the wall? That's actually subpixel manipulation, because I need to get as close to the wall as possible without actually touching it. The more subpixels I have, the fewer jumps I need.
Yup, that's exactly the part I meant. Thanks for the explanation. Take a 'yes' vote for your troubles. :)
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Loved it, yes vote.
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scrimpeh, have you tested those glitches with switching the character on ladders?
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Awesome run! Thank you for creating this run! Yes vote.
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I've been through this TAS a couple of times now, it truly is a masterpiece, however, I noticed that you had to give up a couple of frames when picking up the axe as Grant, was this the most optimal place to get the axe, seeing how it isn't exactly over-abused in the Clocktower?
Warp wrote:
omg lol this is so fake!!!1 the nes cant produce music like this!
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Dang, when I watched this in FCEUX 2.1.5, it desynced for me in 2-3 when Trevor climbs the stairs in a laggy area with Medusa heads. (I didn't watch any encodes yet.) What I saw until then was really awesome, though. I'm quite impressed to see the totally new strategy in Stage 1 using the holy water! In fact, how do you make it so that you keep throwing holy water without stopping motion? I didn't realize animation cancellation could work even with Trevor's subweapon :-)
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically. Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.) Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html) Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature! Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
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You have to put the PPU "New PPU" to make it sync
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Thank you, ThatGugaWhoPlay! The submission comments should mention New PPU was used. I'll get to this run a little later. EDIT: It was old PPU. I accidentally had my emulator at New PPU from watching another submission. It works now, thanks!
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically. Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.) Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html) Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature! Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.