(Link to video)
I found a trick right after my “all instrument” run was finished that boosted link several pixels, but I wasn’t sure how I specifically did it and if it worked on the DX version. This run started when I verified that the trick worked and worked its way from there.
  • Emulator used: VisualBoyAdvance re-recording v22
  • Aims for fastest time
  • Abuses glitches
  • Manipulates luck
  • Takes damage to save time

Tricks used

Up/down + A or B combos

This allows link to do a variety of glitchy things with items such as the sword, shield, shovel, etc… Using up/down/b allows the owl text near the sword to be skipped.

Corner Boosts

When you walk past a corner you can move into it slightly to push Link a maximum of 2 pixels forward. Often you can only save 1 pixel due to the sideways walking mechanics.

Screen Transition Boosts

This is the new trick I found. First off, this trick only works when Link is traveling vertically between screens. By clipping as close as you can into a wall that leads to the next screen and pressing the direction you’re headed plus the direction of the wall (for 1 or 4 frames depending on diagonal movement mechanics), Link gets a “boost” when he can first start moving on the next screen. This saved around 2-3 pixels. Ideally, you want to just press the direction for 1 frame, because you usually loose a frame if more are held, but it can’t be avoided in some cases. An area where this doesn’t work in this run is after killing the 2 enemies and walking back to the house when exiting the screen with the 2 kids playing since Link can’t clip the few pixels into the wall getting him as close as possible.

Useful memory addresses

0000FF9A – x speed (in subpixels)
0000FF9B – y speed (in subpixels)
0000FF98 – x coordinate (in pixels)
0000FF99 – y coordinate (in pixels)
0000DBB5 – number of enemies killed in the area below town.

Improvement list

Obtaining the Sword

-Using a transition boost while entering the screen with the kids playing saved 1 frame. (1 saved)
-Using another transition boost saved 3 more frames. (4 saved)
-Lost 1 frame right before entering the screen with the first damage boost (either from screen loading lag or subpixels). (3 saved)
-Saved 3 frames by moving on certain frames while pushing the enemy. (6 saved)
-Lost 1 frame during the sword text? (5 saved)
-Lost 1 frame while bringing up the save menu from a frame rule (I tested delaying finishing the text by both 1 and 2 frames and it ended up being the same time, but waiting 3 frames lost 4 frames). (4 saved)

Stealing stuff and setting up the doghouse glitch

-Saved 1 frame stealing the bow from a better shopkeeper cycle or something. (5 saved)
-Saved 10 frames boosting off Bow-wow. Link was 1 extra pixel higher since this was the best manipulation I could get during the Bow-wow boost. I don't actually know if this lost time due to how I'm comparing the runs. Also manipulating bow-wow was a pain. I resorted to testing random shield inputs on the prior screen until I got movement that looked decent, and worked off that to find if it was. (15 saved)
-Saved 1 frame due to a transition boost. (16 saved)
-Saved 2 more frames from another transition boost. (18 saved)
-Saved 3 frames killing the enemies since the lower enemy starting moving towards the left sooner (the only reason I can think of why this happened is since I got there faster). (21 saved)
-Saved 5 frames due to a transition boost and possibly less loading lag. (26 saved)
-Saved 5 frames by shield bouncing off Bow-wow (with <v>) after the slash boosts. (31 saved)

Getting to the Boss

-Saved 4 frames by having better randomness on the glitchy tiles on the screen where the little Bow-wow lives. I believe the randomness had to do with Link's subpixel values which I believe changed a bit during the shield boost. (35 saved)
-Saved 1 frame on the next screen, not sure how. (36 saved)
-Saved 4 frames on the screen where the tiles start by pushing link backwards a bit. No idea why I saved some here either. (40 saved)
-Saved 1 frame right before entering the boss battle from having better pixel placement. (41 saved)

The good ol’ Boss fight

-Saved 3 frames on the "blob" form of the boss for some reason. (44 saved)
-Saved 1 frame after killing the worm form due to better manipulation of where the worm died. (45 saved)
-Saved 1 frame around the 3rd sword attack or so on Ganon somehow. (46 saved)
-Saved 2 frames because the eye form opened 2 frames earlier. (48 saved)
-Saved 8 frames from lucky eye manipulation. This was the part of the run which I wasn’t looking forward to, and with good reason. Manipulating the eye form is so random from what I’ve tested. Anyway, on my first go, somehow I was able to make the eye “blink” after the 1st damage wave. By blink, when the eye closed, it only closed for 1 frame (verses 9-14 or so in the last run). After that I had terrible manipulation and when I finished I was only 44 frames ahead total.
I redid playing with the boss before the eye first opened and got it to close for 13 frames. After that I got lucky and got it to blink which saved some time. It MIGHT? Be possible to get the boss to blink twice, saving like 12 frames, but I had no luck.
Total frames saved was 56, almost a second.
Possible improvements include finding some way to manipulate the eye boss so that it only closes for 1 frame each time. I was unable to do this, but it theoretically should be possible. Another thing that might help improvements is if there is a way to watch Link’s current subpixel address. I tried finding it, but had no luck.

Nach: I was a bit shocked to see such a run, as I don't think there's a place for it on the site. I was even more shocked to see that there are past glitched runs for LADX that have already been accepted. I don't think this branch has a right to exist under our current structure and rules, and don't even know how there was such an oversight when the previous runs were accepted.
The precedent seems to be that if a run is a good improvement to an existing run, and the audience likes it, it is accepted despite the issues. Since this is indeed a nice improvement to an existing run, and the overwhelming majority of the audience seems to want the run, I will be accepting it. However, at some point in the future, we'll be needing to clarify our rules and consolidate these runs into a single branch, or reorganize them according to a new site structure.

Brandon: Publication underway.

TASVideoAgent
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Link wakes up, gets his sword, steals a shovel, steals a bow then decides to beat the final boss.
When TAS does Quake 1, SDA will declare war. The Prince doth arrive he doth please.
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I don't get why we have both glitched runs for LA and LADX. Seems very redundant to me. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the only thing different about LADX here is that the select glitch is not available, so other glitches are used to reach the final boss, but other than that everything is the same?
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
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Most of the differences between the games that I can think of off the top of my head are no select glitch, certain text cant be skipped by bringing up the save menu, certain text can't be partially skipped by pressing b, and some of the text is longer. So they are very similar, but I think it's still interesting to have a glitched run on the DX version since it was a remake which they tried to remove tricks and all.
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Nice improvement, bobmario511! And thank you for providing an encode. Yes vote.
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Bobmario511 wrote:
So they are very similar, but I think it's still interesting to have a glitched run on the DX version since it was a remake which they tried to remove tricks and all.
The glitches are removed in LA 1.1 and 1.2 too. I'm finding having glitched versions of both to be a tad silly. What does everyone else think?
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
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I dunno, the route and boss in both are pretty different. Like, the only parts that seem the same to me are the parts where the player isn't playing. I don't really see the problem I guess.
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Nach wrote:
I'm finding having glitched versions of both to be a tad silly. What does everyone else think?
Having a GB and GBC version with the same glitches would be silly. Different glitches make significantly different gameplay.
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Under the above logic, we should have an unlimited amount of submissions, each using a different route through the game, since you know, they're different gameplay.
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
NitroGenesis
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Here are my two cents.
Nach wrote:
I'm finding having glitched versions of both to be a tad silly. What does everyone else think?
I agree with Inzult. Pretty much the way to glitch the game is different, especially when you consider that they tried to remove all the glitches so you can't break it.
Nach wrote:
Under the above logic, we should have an unlimited amount of submissions, each using a different route through the game, since you know, they're different gameplay.
The above logic works when comparing LA glitched to LADX glitched, because the gameplay is totally different.
YoungJ1997lol wrote:
Normally i would say Yes, but thennI thought "its not the same hack" so ill stick with meh.
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Nach wrote:
Under the above logic, we should have an unlimited amount of submissions, each using a different route through the game, since you know, they're different gameplay.
If they're entertaining, like BLJless M64, sure, why not? In this case it isn't an artificial restriction, but a matter of different glitches being available in the different versions of the game. Each is the fastest route for that version of the game.
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NitroGenesis wrote:
I agree with Inzult. Pretty much the way to glitch the game is different, especially when you consider that they tried to remove all the glitches so you can't break it.
Except they removed the glitch from LA 1.1 and 1.2 way before LADX. Should we accept runs with every revision of every game because they have different allowed glitches?
NitroGenesis wrote:
The above logic works when comparing LA glitched to LADX glitched, because the gameplay is totally different.
And the same applies to just changing routes. The TAS here can also be done with the original LA. Something here is redundant. In essence we have two glitched runs, just one makes use of the select glitch, and one makes use of the reverse door glitch. If we have both of these, why not a third run which uses some other glitch?
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
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Nach wrote:
Bobmario511 wrote:
So they are very similar, but I think it's still interesting to have a glitched run on the DX version since it was a remake which they tried to remove tricks and all.
The glitches are removed in LA 1.0 and 1.1 too. I'm finding having glitched versions of both to be a tad silly. What does everyone else think?
Being relatively untrained in Zelda games I would have to agree. I just watched the two runs back to back and they appeared to be identical runs except one had an extra minute of walking around in the middle. I am sure there is more to it than but I didn't see anything that screamed publication. The one benefit I would say for publishing this is the far better visuals, but since there is already a full run of this version published I don't see why both glitched runs are necassary.
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I think that if a Reverse Door glitch run is made, it should done on LADX, because better visuals and less lag. I voted yes anyway.
YoungJ1997lol wrote:
Normally i would say Yes, but thennI thought "its not the same hack" so ill stick with meh.
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The one benefit I would say for publishing this is the far better visuals, but since there is already a full run of this version published I don't see why both glitched runs are necessary.
Only the fastest run is necessary. If the faster run was on the GBC then I think the GB version should be dropped. But as is, I think both have merit. Just being in color is a large plus to entertainment/watchability for many.
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nanogyth wrote:
The one benefit I would say for publishing this is the far better visuals, but since there is already a full run of this version published I don't see why both glitched runs are necessary.
Only the fastest run is necessary. If the faster run was on the GBC then I think the GB version should be dropped. But as is, I think both have merit. Just being in color is a large plus to entertainment/watchability for many.
But if the big draw to the GBC is that the color than you can direct people to [1462] GBC The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX by SwordlessLink in 1:00:02.68. I feel that it works to have the three categories for this game. The first is fastest regardless of version which would be the GB version that is currently on the Workbench. The second would be a non-glitch run which again could be on either version but currently is on the GBC version. Finally there could be a playaround that would show off all that the game has to offer. I feel those three categories represent all the positives that could be found in these runs and place a second glitched, but still slightly slower, run in the category of entirely arbitrary and not necessary. Now, if the full playthrough was on the GB version rather than GBC than I would recommend a new playaround on the GBC to obsolete the current GB playaround to show off the GBC advancements but otherwise I stand by my current position.
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Nach wrote:
Should we accept runs with every revision of every game because they have different allowed glitches?
If the revision is significant enough and the run is different enough, while both still make sense as good runs by themselves, I don't see why not. Like if a LA v1.1 run and a LADX run would look exactly the same, except for color, then you probably only need one. But since LA and LADX look different in a lot of ways I don't really see the harm. If you want, you can pretend like these are different consoles or something.
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Nach wrote:
Bobmario511 wrote:
So they are very similar, but I think it's still interesting to have a glitched run on the DX version since it was a remake which they tried to remove tricks and all.
The glitches are removed in LA 1.0 and 1.1 too.
Do I have a bad dump? Because I have one labeled as 1.2 and I can still do the screen warp glitch without any issues. Also, in 1.0, I go through the dog house and end up a few screens away from the Bottle Grotto. Even if the glitches were fixed in a different LA GB version and this run could be done on a GB version as well, it wouldn't make any difference. The average gamer doesn't check to see the version numbers of their games, nor even know that they exist. All casual gamers can tell the difference between an obvious remake of a game, especially when it's in color, and the original in greyscale. For those who know the game well but not as well as us TASers, they know that the most known bugs are taken out of the DX version, so when they see the DX run can be completed in a mere 5 and a half minutes, it makes them stop and say "Huh? Let's see..." If Super Mario All-Stars was in a similar boat, I'd support a publication from it. You need to consider these to be two separate games and not a mere recoloring because that's what they are. Voting an easy yes. Don't obsolete this with the new LA run. On a side note, why not have a run that completes the DX exclusive Color Dungeon? I figure that's a significant enough part of the remake show off somewhere, although it'd probably have to start from SRAM as I doubt anyone wants to include it into the main run, though there might be some way to corrupt a save into getting you in the right place (I'm pretty sure you can start the game off with all of the items if you turn off the GameBoy while deleting a save with the game completed or something like that).
All the best, Brandon Evans
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Brandon wrote:
Do I have a bad dump? Because I have one labeled as 1.2 and I can still do the screen warp glitch without any issues.
But is it actually 1.2? My brother bought the game for himself a few years after I did, and I'm unable to do the glitch on his cart, while I can do it on mine without an issue.
Brandon wrote:
Also, in 1.0, I go through the dog house and end up a few screens away from the Bottle Grotto.
Where you end up depends on how many enemies you killed.
Brandon wrote:
Even if the glitches were fixed in a different LA GB version and this run could be done on a GB version as well, it wouldn't make any difference. The average gamer doesn't check to see the version numbers of their games, nor even know that they exist. All casual gamers can tell the difference between an obvious remake of a game, especially when it's in color, and the original in greyscale. For those who know the game well but not as well as us TASers
I pretty much knew this game inside out well before 2003. Yes, they colorized it, yes they added a secret dungeon, yes they changed some text, yes they added the stupid camera man, it's still obviously the same game as the last regular LA game.
Brandon wrote:
they know that the most known bugs are taken out of the DX version, so when they see the DX run can be completed in a mere 5 and a half minutes, it makes them stop and say "Huh? Let's see..."
Yes, just like I know they're taken out of the later versions of the regular one.
Brandon wrote:
If Super Mario All-Stars was in a similar boat, I'd support a publication from it. You need to consider these to be two separate games and not a mere recoloring because that's what they are.
There actually are some programming differences from SMAS from their NES counterparts. I know because they use slightly different level formats, and the engine in SMAS is rewritten and has less limitations. SMAS also fixed a bunch of bugs that existed in every NES version. For example in Super Mario Bros, you can touch bowser and the ax at once in the NES one, which screws up the game for a while, but you can't do it AFAIK in the SNES one. In any case, we've rejected every SMAS run which had an NES counterpart.
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Nach wrote:
But is it actually 1.2? My brother bought the game for himself a few years after I did, and I'm unable to do the glitch on his cart, while I can do it on mine without an issue.
Make a test video.
Nach wrote:
Where you end up depends on how many enemies you killed.
bobmario511 said that there are other differences with the glitch in LA GB, which perhaps he can elaborate on.
Nach wrote:
Brandon wrote:
they know that the most known bugs are taken out of the DX version, so when they see the DX run can be completed in a mere 5 and a half minutes, it makes them stop and say "Huh? Let's see..."
Yes, just like I know they're taken out of the later versions of the regular one.
You aren't the average gamer. I didn't even know about game revisions until I came to TASVideos. At the same time, I knew about the warp glitch and how the DX fixed it since the late 90s / early 2000s, and I did this before I had ever used the internet and without a strategy guide. Even the most hardcore LA players who don't do crazy homebrew / TAS stuff like us wouldn't know a thing about version numbers.
Nach wrote:
In any case, we've rejected every SMAS run which had an NES counterpart.
SMAS doesn't fix any game breaking glitches, so actually comparing the two is pointless. I was just being hypothetical.
All the best, Brandon Evans
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Brandon wrote:
bobmario511 said that there are other differences with the glitch in LA GB, which perhaps he can elaborate on.
What I noticed when trying to do a no screen warp run using the doghouse glitch using the GB version was that the underworld tiles had rather different behavior than that of the GBC underworld (I had a kill count of 2 when testing this and had the same items as this run). Some tile differences are that the tiles that shoot link upwards in the GBC game just act like water in the GB. Another interesting thing is that you can't even enter the pit that leads to the nightmare boss because of the pit tiles being different (link just stands on top of them).
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re: revisions I'd say use the latest revision for publications because it's the "official" (most complete) game & shows more of it, and use previous revisions with their glitches for playarounds. re: b/w vs. color While the b/w version was released much earlier, sold more carts and is my favorite, I'd publish the color version for the same reason as above.
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creaothceann wrote:
re: revisions I'd say use the latest revision for publications because it's the "official" (most complete) game & shows more of the game, and previous revisions with their glitches for playarounds.
Except our TASs aren't like that. Players generally go for revision 1.0 DKC is notable in this regard.
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
creaothceann
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Just declare them invalid in the rules and don't publish them then?
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creaothceann wrote:
re: revisions I'd say use the latest revision for publications because it's the "official" (most complete) game & shows more of the game, and previous revisions with their glitches for playarounds.
All published revisions are official. More recent also isn't necessarily less glitched - sometimes game-breaking glitches only exist in the latest revision. There's also funny cases like Commander Keen 1 where 1.34 was only released in the UK, 1.32 was part of a special Gravis deal and the most commonly encountered version is 1.31. What would be the preferable version in such a case?