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This is the DOS version of Prince of Persia, the classic 2D platformer originally released for Apple II in 1989. This version is the most popular among the RTA runners of the game.

Game objectives

  • Emulator used: JPC-RR r11.8-rc2
  • BIOS used: The BIOS and VGABIOS that come pre-bundled with the emulator was used as instructed in the emulator description page.
  • The objective of the run is to complete the game, which is this case means saving the princess from the evil Jaffar.
  • No major glitches are to be used in the run, see below for more details.
  • The only notable "programming error" taken advantage of in the run is the jingle skip at the end of few levels. Killing an enemy at the end of a level before entering the final door "replaces" the long end of the level jingle with the the much shorter enemy kill jingle.
  • We control only one character in the run - the kid (who becomes the prince at the end of the game).
  • Hits are taken at some parts of the run if that's how the RNG is, it neither gains nor loses any significant time.
  • There are exactly two restarts, one skips a short jingle and one is just faster in terms of movement. No deaths.
  • Ruleset of this run is completely derived from the RTA No Major Glitches runs, which is as follows:
    • The following things are considered glitches:
      • Screen-wrapping
      • Guard-clipping (guard-jumping)
      • Falling or clipping through floors and closed gates (specifically corners)
      • Fall damage crouch cancel
      • Inactive chomper glitch
      • Guard through-gate lure glitch
    • Here is a guide that explains these with GIFs showing examples - https://www.speedrun.com/pop1/guide/m4j3u
    • Sound & music must be enabled at all times during the run.
    • Ctrl+A to restart a level is allowed, except for situations where it would cause a glitched advance to next level instead of restarting.
    • You can skip cutscenes between levels.

Comments

This is a "No Major Glitches" run of the game which is more movement based. Almost all the inputs can be buffered in this game. The biggest trouble of the run is dealing with guard RNG. They can not only mess you up when trying to cross them but also affect prince's positioning which is super important for the movement section that follows right after. The main way of manipulating the RNG used in the run is waiting for a few frames. In most of the cases waiting for 1 frame was sufficient but there were places where I had to wait for more. The biggest potential to improved this run is doing more research into RNG manipulation and making things stuff line up more perfectly. Jumping is the fastest movement when in flat terrain, however depending on the layout of the room, various other movements are done to gain time. The most common way to deal with enemies is to stop as close to them as possible and switch sides with them. After that we either get further away from them, put away our swords and continue, or strike them and put away our swords and continue. The latter is preferred only when it allows for an extra jump to be possible. I also tried a lot to set up soundblaster but for some reason the emulator used PC speaker sounds for SFX, luckily atleast the jingles played in soundblaster.

Stage by stage comments

Level 1

This level is a simple one but it already does something unintended. We lure the guard into the a specific spot and then we are able to take a path that gets around him without having to pickup the sword and killing him. This saves about a full minute. Aside from that several small movement optimizations were done, the bunny hops to skip the slow "getting up" animation, using the "turnaround" to bonk into walls faster, carefully spacing jumps to travel minimum distance and hence making maximum use of the "snap" feature to grab ledges to name a few. The good thing about this level is that its completely RNG free.

Level 2

This is the level where the RNG Gods strike first. I had to wait 1 frame for the first guard. I got hit by the second guard. The orange guard was surprisingly nice and I used the last guard to set-up a really precise chain of jumps that involves barely avoiding some spikes. The rest of the level is just movement and thanks to the massive "hitbox" of the final door we are able to get a massive snap and enter it to finish the level.

Level 3

This level is actually again one of the completely RNG free levels, despite containing the most infamous skeleton enemy. The entire level is full of movement optimizations, mostly the ones mentioned previously in level 1 description. We are able to jump over the skeleton avoiding having to swap places with him and just run away without having to deal with him, which is a really cumbersome process as he has infinite health and the only way to be rid of him is to push him into a pit. The rest of the level is straight-forward.

Level 4

This level starts with a movement section which involves a precise turnaround to make a loose tile open a door that needs to be opened to progress. It becomes even more precise if we need be in a good position to be able to jump and grab a ledge on the way back. Proceeding further we deal with the first enemy. He didnt pose any problems although he managed to push us one unit further than where we need to be but thanks to the snap feature it doesnt lose any time. We proceed an meet the enemy beside the door, we temporarily spare him and proceed to the section where the final button is. After some precise jumps back and forth through a chomper and going through the mirror that suddenly spawns and creates a friendly shadow of us, we return to the enemy and kill him to skip the end level jingle.

Level 5

This level is both heavily RNG and movement based. There is nothing special to talk about this level other the fact that I got pretty decent RNG from the guards.

Level 6

This is the shortest level of the game, it contains the "mini-boss", aka the fat guard. We dont have to kill him so we just ignore him and jump through the final pit to trigger the next level.

Level 7

If you played the casually, you know that this is exactly where the hard part of the game starts. There are few guards in the level who actually gave the perfect patterns that can be expected from them. This is also the first level where we continuously step away from an enemy till we reach a pit to skip the sword put away animation. After some precise platforming the movement section and dealing with the next guard, we take the floating potion to reach the bottom of the level and exit it.

Level 8

This level has quite a few guards and some cool movement sections. The way we deal with the first guard is the first major difference from RTA runs, we throw him into the spike pit instead of switching sides with him so that we can clear the next jump without having to grab the ledge and also preserving the momentum. After traversing the long corridor and dealing with some guards on the way, we reach the final section of the level. The final orange guard was not behaving and marks the first instance of having to wait multiple frames to get the required result. And then we finish the final corridor and exit it without having to wait for the mouse to come rescue us and proceed to finish the level.

Level 9

If I have to pick one level that I am least happy with despite being happy with the overall result, it will probably be this one. The RNG I got was below decent and were such that it forced me to certain movement sections without making full use of the snap. But as a reward we get to do the most satisfying movement section in my opinion perfectly. And then we proceed to the final guard and again use the backing away continuously to skip the sword put away and enter the final door.

Level 10

This level again has a lot of guards and also a lot of variety in the way we deal with them. This is the first level where were are forced to kill a guard that is not near gate (atleast in order to be fast). We also kill the final guard to skip the jingle. Despite all this, I surprisingly got really good rng and had wait very few frame throughout the whole level.

Level 11

Most of this level is fully consistent, other than the last guard, and he decided to give the worse pattern unfortunately. But as a redemption, we lure him near the end of the door and throw him off the edge and enter the final door while skipping the jingle.

Level 12

As a reward for all the things we did so far, we are presented with a RNG-free level. After some platforming we climb the tower and and the end we meet our friend shadow again and merge with him. We have to wait for the merging to completely finish or else the invisible bridge in the next room wont spawn.

Level 13

Two things in this level. Falling tiles and Jaffar. The former was luckily nice and I was able to get around without having to do any sort of manipulation (yes they dont fall in a consistent pattern). With Jaffar we are able to do a running jump from a very specific position to get as near him as possible and stab him before he wakes up. This is actually slower in IGT which is used to time the RTA runs of the game but faster in TAS timing thanks to fact that we can chain two jumps on the way back. The IGT is already stopped at this point.

Level 14

This level is a nice, charming reward for completing the game and we get to reunite with the princess at the end of the corridor. The only thing notable about this level is some carefully timed jumped to get under doors without losing momentum. And this final cutscene is considered to be the end of the game.

Final Thoughts and acknowledgements

I had quite a lot of fun making this and I hope you will watching this as well :D. I am happy with the result I got but I may return to this in the future to try make some improvements, especially in terms of RNG. I would like to specially thank 7eraser7, eien86, higlak for helping me in routing certain parts, timing the strats and in general the whole RTA speedrunning community for being supportive and providing very good feedback whenever I asked for it.

feos: Embedded the encode.
feos: Fixed formatting.
slamo: The quality of this run is obviously quite good. The routing and the overall use of tech is well done. Unfortunately, as outlined in this post, this run uses a cracked version to skip a copy protection sequence and therefore does not meet our standards for game authenticity.
There was much discussion about the game category. There are still things that might be considered glitches such as the jingle skip, and trying to draw the line between "major" and "minor" glitches is always going to be arbitrary. When you come up with a goal other than any% or 100%, please make sure the goal is very well-defined and constantly adhered to. The goal should offer some different content than any% and 100%, and it should also be entertaining enough; my impression from this run and its feedback is that a pure glitchless run would check both boxes, if you can indeed prove that no glitches are being used.
It's pretty clear that you know how to make a good TAS, and I hope you do pursue other TASes in the future; so much of the DOS library is untouched!
Rejecting for modified game files.
slamo: Revisiting this for Playground, and I think it fits. The goal is somewhat arbitrary but well-defined, and we know that it syncs with a known cracked version. This cracked version isn't eligible for publication but these should generally be ok for Playground, as long as the version isn't too obscure. Moving to Playground.

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This topic is for the purpose of discussing #7096: GMP's DOS Prince of Persia "no major glitches" in 18:50.82
GMP
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Hi guys, I am new to TASing and this is my first fully finished TAS, even though I have messed around with TAS tools for a while now. I have always been fascinated by TASes and am super happy to have completed one myself. And ofcourse feel free to ask any questions :D, I will try to check this page as frequently as possible but if for some reason I fail to respond quick enough, feel free to ping me @G M P#0177 on discord :)
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Welcome. I'm not quite sure how to evaluate your efforts, seeing that another un-submitted video exists. The video below is also a DOS run, but seems to take advantages of all the tricks that are not present your TAS. From your submission, you've stated that you avoided glitches. Unless glitches are game breaking...I'm not sure that your run is any different that the video posted below....which is minutes faster. Can you elaborate more on the differences? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfOocUkxJ08
I recently discovered that if you haven't reached a level of frustration with TASing any game, then you haven't done your due diligence. ---- SOYZA: Are you playing a game? NYMX: I'm not playing a game, I'm TASing. SOYZA: Oh...so its not a game...Its for real? ---- Anybody got a Quantum computer I can borrow for 20 minutes? Nevermind...eien's 64 core machine will do. :) ---- BOTing will be the end of all games. --NYMX
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nymx wrote:
Welcome. I'm not quite sure how to evaluate your efforts, seeing that another un-submitted video exists. The video below is also a DOS run, but seems to take advantages of all the tricks that are not present your TAS. From your submission, you've stated that you avoided glitches. Unless glitches are game breaking...I'm not sure that your run is any different that the video posted below....which is minutes faster. Can you elaborate more on the differences? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfOocUkxJ08
Hey nymx, thanks for the welcome and for taking your time looking into my submission. Yeah I am aware about that video. The main timesave of that run comes from the fact that it skips the first 3 levels with a cheat code that is present in the game. It is what we call as the Any% Level Skip category in RTA speedruns, which is not the primary Any% category. Glitches and tricks have actually improved quite a lot since that TAS that actually RTA runs of that category are faster now. We (specifically eien86) are. actually working on the Any% with glitches TAS currently and should be able to finish soonish. Now coming back to my run, yes it specifically avoids glitches that skip a lot of the game, which contain satisfying platforming sections. These sections also contain a lot of precise speed strategies performed without the use of glitches. The glitchless category is equally as popular as Any% among the RTA runners despite being arguably more arbitrary and my main intention was to show what a really good run of this category would look like. Hope this information helps a bit. More information can be found about the glitches, gltichless rules, other categories, etc. here: https://www.speedrun.com/pop1 And ofcourse further specific questions here are welcome!
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GMP wrote:
The main timesave of that run comes from the fact that it skips the first 3 levels with a cheat code that is present in the game.
Ok...great. In regards that unpublished TAS, the movie rules of this site prohibit the use of passwords to make progress towards the end...as it is desired to beat the game "In Full". So you have taken the correct approach. I don't know much about optimization, but this is a really good game and I personally know how hard it is to TAS it. Yes vote.
I recently discovered that if you haven't reached a level of frustration with TASing any game, then you haven't done your due diligence. ---- SOYZA: Are you playing a game? NYMX: I'm not playing a game, I'm TASing. SOYZA: Oh...so its not a game...Its for real? ---- Anybody got a Quantum computer I can borrow for 20 minutes? Nevermind...eien's 64 core machine will do. :) ---- BOTing will be the end of all games. --NYMX
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Thank you, yeah personally I love this game so much, more specifically this entire franchise, glad to see someone who shares the same opinion :D Regarding difficulty in TASing, the main difficulty was that this is kind of a unconventional type of system to TAS in. And since this game runs at 12 fps, one frame in-game passed only once 5-6 snapshots of the system, that was a little weird to get used to. But once I set up stuff and settled in it was nothing too different from TASing in a traditional console system.
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Yes vote, I've played this in my childhood, and how! Only 14 levels! I didn't remember that game was too short. But part of me think is possible do some improvements, even in DOS version (skipping the guard without get the sword or lure him). PS. I loved the "Final Fight" XD
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Hikaruon wrote:
Yes vote, I've played this in my childhood, and how! Only 14 levels! I didn't remember that game was too short. But part of me think is possible do some improvements, even in DOS version (skipping the guard without get the sword or lure him). PS. I loved the "Final Fight" XD
Thank you. You might have played the SNES version which contains 20 levels and also gives 120 minutes to complete the game (as a sidenote, someone mentioned they would do a TAS of that version soon :D - https://www.speedrun.com/pop1_snes/thread/mnqfw). But yeah this version is the classical one, it has quite a lot of ports some of which have some quite unique elements. Regarding improvements, I am sure the guard RNG can be manipulated better to gain time, but I am fairly confident that the overall route of each level cannot be improved more especially in glitchless category. I am a fan of "never say never" but I cant help but say the scope is less. In any% you can jump straight through that level 1 guard (which is considered a glitch) but here this is the most optimal way as far as we know. And yeah the final fight lol. It is actually 4 frames slower compared to the strat used in RTA runs which measured are with in-game time which stops as soon as Jaffar is killed, but I used it because a) its cool and b) its faster in real time haha.
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I always wanted to see a TAS of this version, since I haven't TASed any DOS game yet ;) First of all, although I haven't studied this version so much (and the SegaCD port has a similar collision detection and same glitches), this run looks well optimized. Second, normally that second guard from level 10 is supposed to turn around before the prince reaches the gate (it prevents you for climbing directly to the point above), but you can avoid that with some crouching jumps. This isn't actually a glitch? Third, some stuff are new for me, like skipping end level jingle, level 3 reset and OHKO Jaffar. Nice finds.
My homepage --Currently not much motived for TASing as before...-- But I'm still working.
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Challenger wrote:
Second, normally that second guard from level 10 is supposed to turn around before the prince reaches the gate (it prevents you for climbing directly to the point above), but you can avoid that with some crouching jumps. This isn't actually a glitch? Third, some stuff are new for me, like skipping end level jingle, level 3 reset and OHKO Jaffar. Nice finds.
Crouch-jumping to avoid alerting guards is indeed considered to be an intended mechanic, atleast in the RTA speedrunning community. What I did do differently however is absolutely minimize the amount of crouch jumps required by carefully positioning my jump, if I start crouching one frame late he indeed turns. And yeah all of those tricks you mentioned are indeed fairly recent finds, thanks for looking into the run :D
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GMP wrote:
Hikaruon wrote:
Yes vote, I've played this in my childhood, and how! Only 14 levels! I didn't remember that game was too short. But part of me think is possible do some improvements, even in DOS version (skipping the guard without get the sword or lure him). PS. I loved the "Final Fight" XD
Thank you. You might have played the SNES version which contains 20 levels and also gives 120 minutes to complete the game (as a sidenote, someone mentioned they would do a TAS of that version soon :D - https://www.speedrun.com/pop1_snes/thread/mnqfw). But yeah this version is the classical one, it has quite a lot of ports some of which have some quite unique elements. Regarding improvements, I am sure the guard RNG can be manipulated better to gain time, but I am fairly confident that the overall route of each level cannot be improved more especially in glitchless category. I am a fan of "never say never" but I cant help but say the scope is less. In any% you can jump straight through that level 1 guard (which is considered a glitch) but here this is the most optimal way as far as we know. And yeah the final fight lol. It is actually 4 frames slower compared to the strat used in RTA runs which measured are with in-game time which stops as soon as Jaffar is killed, but I used it because a) its cool and b) its faster in real time haha.
No No XD I only played Prince of Persia in DOS only, I didn't got the SNES here, only Genesis XD and I didn't have played both versions until now XD
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Welcome to TASVideos, GMP! I love seeing the old DOS games get TASsed, and this is certainly one of the most famous ones. Thanks for all your hard work putting it together. I finally got to watch it, and it looks very well done. Yes vote from me for both entertainment and publication. I'm looking forward to the any% w/glitches run!
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c-square wrote:
Welcome to TASVideos, GMP! I love seeing the old DOS games get TASsed, and this is certainly one of the most famous ones. Thanks for all your hard work putting it together. I finally got to watch it, and it looks very well done. Yes vote from me for both entertainment and publication. I'm looking forward to the any% w/glitches run!
Thanks a lot for the kind words c-square! I am looking forward to the any% w/ glitches TAS just as much as you :D
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GMP wrote:
Thanks a lot for the kind words c-square! I am looking forward to the any% w/ glitches TAS just as much as you :D
If you have plans, there's a TAS of SegaCD version I've mentioned before. Most of the gameplay was based on a old DOS run from 2007, and while there are some mistakes, some strategies can be useful.
My homepage --Currently not much motived for TASing as before...-- But I'm still working.
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Challenger wrote:
If you have plans, there's a TAS of SegaCD version I've mentioned before. Most of the gameplay was based on a old DOS run from 2007, and while there are some mistakes, some strategies can be useful.
Will certainly check it out. I must make it clear that my role in the glitched TAS is going to be very very minimal, but they actually use a bot to pretty much bruteforce through the rooms (while giving some general route/directions), so its going to be a very very optimized TAS when it finally comes out I hope.
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Just found a run of this version w/glitches today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWJBsOalD-k That was even more unexpected than I thought. I should have put bruteforce when I was TASing that other version.
My homepage --Currently not much motived for TASing as before...-- But I'm still working.
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Challenger wrote:
Just found a run of this version w/glitches today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWJBsOalD-k That was even more unexpected than I thought. I should have put bruteforce when I was TASing that other version.
Yeah! That is the prototype to the glitched TAS I have been talking about!
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No glitches are to be used in the run, these include: screen warps, guard jumps, clipping corners while falling, etc.
I am wondering if it would be good to actually specifically list all known glitches that are known, and avoided in this run. Also, if possible, techniques that are allowed but which might perhaps be interpreted by some to be "glitches". I ask this because this kind of would have to be a requirement for any run that intends to obsolete this. Anybody making a run intending to obsolete this would need to follow the exact same restrictions, or else it wouldn't be comparable, and we would enter this whole problematic issue of what counts as "glitchless" and what doesn't. Maybe someone makes a new run that's faster than yours, which abuses a glitch that you merely collated into that "etc" part. If you didn't specify it, who's to say it can't be used? (Of course even then there's the question of what exactly is the "official" list of banned glitches for the "glitchless" category of this game.)
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Warp wrote:
No glitches are to be used in the run, these include: screen warps, guard jumps, clipping corners while falling, etc.
I am wondering if it would be good to actually specifically list all known glitches that are known, and avoided in this run. Also, if possible, techniques that are allowed but which might perhaps be interpreted by some to be "glitches". I ask this because this kind of would have to be a requirement for any run that intends to obsolete this. Anybody making a run intending to obsolete this would need to follow the exact same restrictions, or else it wouldn't be comparable, and we would enter this whole problematic issue of what counts as "glitchless" and what doesn't. Maybe someone makes a new run that's faster than yours, which abuses a glitch that you merely collated into that "etc" part. If you didn't specify it, who's to say it can't be used? (Of course even then there's the question of what exactly is the "official" list of banned glitches for the "glitchless" category of this game.)
Sure, I followed the same ruleset that the RTA glitchless runs follow, I will paste it here:
The following things are considered glitches: Screen-wrapping Guard-clipping (guard-jumping) Falling or clipping through floors and closed gates (specifically corners) Fall damage crouch cancel Inactive chomper glitch Guard through-gate lure glitch Here is a guide that explains these with GIFs showing examples - https://www.speedrun.com/pop1/guide/m4j3u You can skip cutscenes between levels. Sound & music must be enabled at all times during the run. Ctrl+A to restart a level is allowed, except for situations where it would cause a glitched advance to next level instead of restarting.
As I said the jingle skip is the only thing that some may consider a borderline glitch, but we had an extensive discussion about in the RTA community and decided to allow it. Edit: edited the submission description as well
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I'm curious why guard-clipping while holding a sword isn't considered a glitch?
GMP
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Kenttsu wrote:
I'm curious why guard-clipping while holding a sword isn't considered a glitch?
You mean swapping sides with him? Because it's just an intended mechanic in the game. It's even mentioned in the manual if I remember correctly. Its nothing special, you just press the direction to do it. Guard jump (without a sword) on the other hand is a very specific trick that is frame perfect in most cases.
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Makes sense. I guess it's just the lack of animation frames that makes it seem iffy.
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Kenttsu wrote:
Makes sense. I guess it's just the lack of animation frames that makes it seem iffy.
Yeah that is correct. Pretty understandable why it looks like a glitch even when done normally haha.
Post subject: Re: #7096: GMP's DOS Prince of Persia "Glitchless" in 18:50.82
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I love this game and played the heck out of it when I was a kid, so this looks like a great run to me... ...but the goal strikes me as rather arbitrary. Why exactly is it that jumping through guards and turning off chompers are considered "a glitch", whereas walking on air, turning away from guards in mid-combat, and one-shotting Jafar are considered "not a glitch"? All of that appears more-or-less equally plausible in RTA conditions, and none of it is as weird as the various warp glitches. And I'm a bit surprised this is only marginally faster than the speedrun.com record (18:50 vs 18:56). Frankly I'd probably prefer a glitchful and/or no-damage run.
Post subject: Re: #7096: GMP's DOS Prince of Persia "Glitchless" in 18:50.82
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Radiant wrote:
I love this game and played the heck out of it when I was a kid, so this looks like a great run to me... ...but the goal strikes me as rather arbitrary. Why exactly is it that jumping through guards and turning off chompers are considered "a glitch", whereas walking on air, turning away from guards in mid-combat, and one-shotting Jafar are considered "not a glitch"? All of that appears more-or-less equally plausible in RTA conditions, and none of it is as weird as the various warp glitches. And I'm a bit surprised this is only marginally faster than the speedrun.com record (18:50 vs 18:56).
Hey Radiant, Thanks for checking out the run. The reason they are considered a glitch is because even though they tend to look "normal" even compared to other intended mechanics, their execution is so precise and specific that it's obvious they aren't meant to happen at all. It is only marginally faster than the RTA record because the emulator that is used to do the RTA record runs the game quite faster in real time. It also varies from machine to machine, hence why we actually use the in-game time to compare the runs. But obviously here I have to use the TAS timing. Comparing in in-game time, the RTA record is 18:08 and this run is 17:40.