See #9499: eien86's NES Lunar Pool in 22:53.62 for a detailed explanation of the TASing process for this game.

See #9501: eien86's NES Lunar Pool "no friction" in 31:58.29 for an explanation on the "no friction" category.

Although I had found Lunar Balls movies impressive in their attempt to reach the end as fast as possible, something didn't feel quite right. That is because, in order to reduce frames, they had to dump the cue ball into the pockets (or otherwise play suboptimally) to reduce the score multiplier 'rate". This made sense then, since it reduced score tallying time. After all, TASVideos was all about reducing frames back then and there was little place for alternative categories that pushed in-game goals instead. Things have changed (for the better) now, so I know there is a place for goals like this one.

In this movie, I play each stage trying to find a way to it with the minimum number of strikes possible. In cases where there were many equivalent solutions, I chose the one with the least number of frames. I hope viewers will find this enjoyable due to the bot's ability to find the right move every time, even when interrupted by unending score tallying.

This is actually the first movie I finished for this game. The reason is this is the simplest of all possible goals to bot. Just let the bot evaluate strikes based on how many balls it scored and nothing else. Adding frames to the equation only complicates the reward function and one needs to calibrate it to let the bot know more or less how many frames are worth one ball pocketed. After finishing it, I mustered the courage to go one further step and challenge Bisqwit's original movies.

Notable moments:

CoolHandMike: Claiming for judging.