We've seen
"X, all items" TAS and
"X, no items" TAS on our site. In this category, X has the superpower to do unlimited Nova Strikes, beating the game about 2 minute faster than Zero (although it's hard to compare the actual time because of emulator differences).
The Ultimate Armor is a special armor that is obtainable by inputting secret code on the Title Screen. Regular speedrun and TAS don't allow this, but this TAS is meant for showing this special way of beating this game.
Warning: There will be
heavy abuse of Nova Strikes in this TAS, because it's usually faster than dash jumps, and it does the most damage with most bosses. If you don't like X abusing Nova Strikes, just don't watch this.
Game Objectives
- Completing the game in the fastest time, with in-game codes allowed.
- Movie stops after skipping the final animation. Since all the previous animations are skipped, I think I might as well skip the final animation, and get to the ending credits faster.
Boss Order
Cyber Peacock is picked first to get the Ultimate Armor. It's about 130 frame faster than getting it in Web Spider stage.
Storm Owl is beaten before Split Mushroom, because I need Double Cyclone (the most useless weapon) for entertainment during the screen scroll of Split Mushroom stage 2.
Slash Beast is beaten after Frost Walrus, because a new glitch "ice fast scroll" has been used to save 11 frames in Military Train (Slash Beast) area 2. Unfortunately it couldn't save time in area 1 because of the train framerule, but I did it anyway for entertainment.
About RNG Manipulation and Lag Reduction
A great amount of RNG manipulation has been used, often to reduce the lag during the "READY" animation. But I'm not for extreme lag reduction.
Some super rare RNG values can save about 8 frames per stage, they are almost impossible to calculate (some require planning way ahead), and very painful to manipulate; even if they are achievable, entertainment and other things need to be sacrificed.
In my view, I don't find lag reduction more important than entertainment, so for this movie, I think a decent amount of lag reduction is enough.
Suggested screenshot (frame #83616):
Special thanks to Awsiel for discovering "ice fast scroll", and M3 (previously named M4) for discovering a faster boss selecting method.
DrD2k9: This was an entertaining watch for me, and response was overwhelmingly positive on voting with 10 Yes, 0 No, and 0 Meh votes (at the time of judging). Not that any of that means anything from a judgement/publication standpoint, because...
In-game codes are allowed in Standard Class under certain conditions:
In-game codes that add gameplay are allowed for a separate branch, as long as such codes are used optimally. Codes that modify or disable in-game mechanics are not allowed, unless they unlock an in-game item or a skill that does that.
Some might say that the code used can be considered a cheat code in that it potentially makes the game easier by providing a more powerful Armor. So does the Ultimate Armor code qualify for the above rule?
First, the use of this code does not remove any gameplay (as in a level select code). Second, the code does add something to gameplay (the Ultimate Armor); which, from what information I can find, would not be otherwise obtainable through normal gameplay. So the "add gameplay" clause is met.
The code does modify in-game mechanics (i.e. unlimited Nova Strikes), but it does so via unlocking an in-game item/skill (Ultimate Armor) to provide those altered mechanics. So the rule is met here as well.
Finally, from my viewing, the run looks fairly optimized; so it appears the code is used optimally. Thus all aspects of allowing an in-game code are met with this submission.
Nice work HappyLee.
Accepting to Standard as a new branch.
I don't think Mega Man X4 is the type of game that deserves "10x" speed edit on loading screens in an encode, but whatever.
