Please note that the credits are removed from the encode to avoid copyright conflicts.
Reverse/Rebirth is the second story of Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories. This time, it's about Riku, a dark and lonely boy who tries to fight his darkness and Ansem, the Seeker of Darkness. Oh, and there's also a big mouse that can use Light. And a mysterious man called Ans... DiZ.
You need to finish
Sora's Story in order to unlock this mode.
Because of an error, you must use the japanese debug BIOS (hash : sha1:AA98A2AD32B86106340665D1222D7D973A1361C7). I'm truly sorry but, otherwise, you'll get a de-sync.
- Emulator used : Bizhawk 1.11.1 (VBA-Next core)
- Aims for fastest time
- Takes damage to save time
- Heavy luck manipulation
General
This mode has some specificities :
- Decks are defined by the game for each world (it means no farm of attack cards).
- This also means that CP are useless. In exchange, you can boost AP (Attack Points). You can do it on level 2, 5 and then each 5 levels (up to 20 AP). AP is literally the amount of damage you deal : if you have 10 AP, then each hit will cut 10 HP.
- Riku can use the power of Darkness with Dark Mode (I'll use DM). This is unlocked after the first fight with Ansem. Under the HP bar, there is a counter of points. Each time you do a cardbreak, you gain the difference between the 2 cards (or lose it if the enemy cardbreaks you) and each time Riku gets hit, you gain 1 point. Once you get 30 DP, Riku changes his clothes and uses the power of Darkness.
- DM boosts attacks by 50%. This makes Riku moving faster and allows him to dodge up and down and even do a double jump.
- You must know that boosts from DM and enemy cards (such as Overdrive and Berserk) are both counted by the game. As an example, let's say you have 15 AP. If you use Overdrive or Dark Mode, you'll deal 22 but if you use both of them, you'll deal 33 : 15 + 15/2 + 22/2. Yes, the game rounds to the lower number.
- Riku has only 3 sleights : Dark Break, Dark Firaga and Dark Aura. These can only be used under DM.
- Once you're in DM, you can lose it if your Dark Points (DP) reach 0. Each time you get hit or cardbroken, you lose DP. You can boost your DP each level. The third option is still HP's boost.
- In this mode, you have more attacks, too. For example, if you do a double jump followed by an attack, Riku attacks with the move of a combo's last hit. It's the most efficient way to hit an enemy because it can touch the enemy each possible frame. And the game totally works when you press a button one frame, so the inputs look like : B|.|B|A . As you can see, it's really fast to do and it does a lot of damage (especially if Berserk is activated).
World by world
Hollow Bastion : 80615 frames
It's basically the world of farm : 93 cards are got here. Actually, it's the only world where they aren't just boss fights (yes, 93 cards mean all cards). And yes, almost half of the movie is just farming.
In Strong Initiative rooms, if you hit the Heartless on the exploration field, you can damage the first Heartless to pop on the battle screen. One of the possible battles is just 2 Wizards and they're almost dead by doing this (you only need to hit them once to kill them).
There are also two boss:
- Maleficent Dragon (I couldn't find her HP inside the memory. The wiki says it's 600 but I think it's too much) : Since we have no good Enemy cards nor Dark Mode, everything we can do is combos.
- Card : Overdrive (Sacrifices reload speed to power up attack cards.)
- Ansem I (400 HP) : Overdrive is used. Getting hit is 1 frame faster than dodging. I manipulated him not to use his sleight.
- In reward, we get the Dark Mode.
Monstro : 6359 frames
From this world on, it's just running from boss to boss.
Parasite Cage (603 HP) : Overdrive and DM. The only reason why this boss is done so soon is that it makes the GBA really laggy (almost half of the frames are lag).
Agrabah : 9526 frames
Two boss :
- Jafar Genie (597 HP) : I manipulated the platforms to reach Iago more easily. Doing a single attack on him was the fastest way to get it.
- Vexen (1120 HP) : DM and Overdrive. I got a cardbreak but it was the fastest way to end the battle because otherwise Vexie would have stayed too close of the wall (and he has a big shield).
Traverse Town : 5895 frames
Guard Armor (280 HP) : I tried to hit as much limbs as possible without losing time.
Neverland : 9861 frames
- Captain Hook (556 HP) : He can use All Zeros card. Of course, when you have 9 cards, you can get DM really quickly.
- Riku Replica (1120 HP) : DM is once again used. Do you need a tip to see which of these Dark Riku is the playable character ? It's easy : our Riku is the only to attack.
Olympus Coliseum : 7824 frames
Hades (595 HP) : Even if Berserk can't be used on him (well, because he's the boss who gives that card), I took enough damage. For the rest, it's just Dark Mode and Overdrive. This old god doesn't give enough EXP to level up. Oh, and he also lets his enemy card (Berserk : doubles attack when in danger (less than 25% of HP) ).
Atlantica : 6690 frames
Ursula (634 HP) : And Berserk is used! Getting low HP on Hades is only 10 frames faster.
Wonderland : 7017 frames
Trickmaster (841 HP) : Of course, Berserk is used. This boss doesn't give enough EXP to level up, so there isn't any HP recovery.
Halloween Town : 13068 frames
- Oogie Boogie (890 HP) : Using only the first two hits of a combo is faster. This is true only because the game gives a lot of cards in this world.
- Lexaeus (1680 HP) : The only battle where you can see Dark Aura and Dark Firaga. This Nobody is resistant against physical attacks and has a normal resistance against Special attacks (for example, Riku's sleights). I moved Riku to a specific position to get Berserk (without dying, of course... I mean, Riku has only 1 HP left). This time, we get 4 levels.
Destiny Islands : 8278 frames
Darkside (1127 HP) : Riku can jump high enough to reach its head. So, we don't have to wait an attack.
There is a graphical glitch before the fight : it's an emulation bug of VBA-Next (but that's funny anyway).
Twilight Town : 10127 frames
Riku Replica II (1680 HP) : Well, guess what I did... DM and Berserk!
The final level is 29 (AP = 16).
Castle Oblivion : 5564 frames
Ansem II (2240 HP) : Once again, it's DM, Berserk and double jump attacks. Sleights are completely useless on him : he's resistant against Special attacks.
Two more cutscenes and that's it!
Final words
As for Sora's Story, it's possible that different choices about RNG stuff would lead to a faster movie... But we can't sure without doing everything over.
Now, I'll be looking forward to being able to TAS PSP or PS2 games (with good tools) to keep working on Kingdom Hearts.
Thanks to It's Because, dudewithtude42 for their support, InfamousKnight/fastrun14 for his support and advices, Samsara for the guide to make a proper encode and, of course, Ghostwheel for all his advices and his immeasurable help.
Walking this road without you to remake forgotten promises and meet you at road's end.
ars4326: Hi again, Doc Skellington. Good work, once more, on putting together this second run! Aside from the repetition in the beginning (due to necessary farming), this was a nice boss-rush in watching Riku tear his way through the various worlds, and onto Castle Oblivion. The fights, notably, also had more of an action element to them over Sora's, due to Riku's superior abilities. Very nice job here, overall. Looking forward to your next TAS!
Accepting for publication, as a separate branch, to Moons!
