The Ninja Warriors?
At least the game title promises TAS potential.
So, I made a
test run. (Oops, I did not play on the hardest difficulty level.)
And some
RAM watch.
Here are some notes:
Somersault is the fastest movement method.
However, the maximum screen scrolling speed seems to be 1 pixel per frame.
So, somersault only helps in the beginning of the level.
After doing two somersaults, the rest of the level is optimal as long as we stay on the right part of the screen and don't take damage.
Taking damage stops the screen scrolling for 1 frame, but having health causes longer score countdown after the level, so it might save time to take some damage from strong enemies.
After the screen starts to scroll, our time should be optimal until the level boss. Setting up the boss fight needs minor planning. We just need to be sure that there are no other enemies on screen, so that the boss spawns immediately.
Shuriken damage: 1
Sword damage: 2
Other moves: Are there any?
Shuriken attack speed: 11 frames
Sword attack speed: About 12 frames, but has lots of flexibility because the damage is continuous. Thanks to the screen scrolling, pretty much every enemy can be killed without losing time.
To minimize score countdown:
- Waste all shurikens
- Waste as much health as possible (Each hit taken costs 1 frame, so use only strong enemies for this.)
Other notes:
- Killing the flying batman enemies gives 5 shurikens. Probably useless.
- Are there secrets or power-ups or something?
- Can you find a glitch? I didn't find anything yet...
- I did not search for the screen position RAM address yet. Maybe it would be useful to have a Lua script that warns us when the screen stops scrolling?
All in all, seems very nice and easy. However, there are three boss fights where multiple bosses need to be fought simultaneously, so optimizing those will be a challenge. Teamwork might bring good results on the bosses, so feel free to join in.
Level 2 bosses: Normally there are three bosses here, but the first two can be avoided by having normal enemies running on screen when approaching the boss spawn triggers. The third one can be easily scared off with the sword. *puff*
Level 1 boss again: This is somewhere near the end of the game. Shurikens work here too. *puff*
This is all very good, because now there is only one unsolved part left in the game: The boss fight which has two fire breathing dudes simultaneously. In theory, the whole game is already solved except for those two guys.
Stage 1 done!
Interestingly, the player character has armor in four individual body parts: head, torso, hands and legs.
When one of the armor parts is destroyed, further damage to that body part deals double damage.
I begin with 128 HP.
This is how I took damage:
- 16 from rifle (hand armor destroyed)
- 32 from rifle (double damage to hands)
- 32 from rifle
- 32 from rifle
- 3 from collision
- 3 from collision
- 8 from punch
= 2 HP left
7 frames lost because screen scrolling stopped every time I took damage.
1 frame lost because of health bonus countdown.
This can be improved slightly.
There may be enough time to take damage just before the boss to save 2-3 frames in screen scrolling and health bonus countdown. This requires some good enemy positions.
All ideas and feedback welcome.
Feel free to join the project.
