Well, it's been a week or two, hasn't it? ._.
To be honest, I kinda... um... forgot I was doing this. But I remember, now, so progress begins anew.
Wish I could post a WIP, but my file hasn't been touched for the past... oh... five months or so, so instead I'll talk about some stylistic choices.
Speed/Entertainment Tradeoffs
Anyone who's played the game knows that it's very, very dependent on grinding. One or two extra strength points is the difference between doing hardly any damage to a boss, and doing massive damage to a boss, which could end up saving a *lot* of time if the amount of grinding is minimized effectively.
On top of that, there are... I believe four STR Potions scattered throughout the game, each one permanently raising your STR by one. I intend to pick them all up, since the detours I need to take to get them are nothing compared to how much I have to grind for those extra STR points.
I'm going to safely assume that the lot of you would not be entertained by the amount of grinding one would normally need to do to advance in this game. There's a few choices I could make here:
1. Do as little grinding as possible, but spend a lot more time fighting the bosses/necessary enemies. While it'll cut down on repetition, it'll be rather boring to watch several minute long boss fights due to having a low STR stat.
2. Say "Screw entertainment!" and grind normally. The boss fights will be entertaining, but there will be a lot of repetition during the grinding phases.
3. Blend the two above choices in the best way possible, making some speed/entertainment tradeoffs. This is the choice I'm going with.
Both real-time runs (the segmented SDA run and Saturn's single-segment emulator run) strayed toward the second option, but they both used the quickest sections to grind in, and I can honestly say I'll be there myself, though I'm keeping my time there as short as possible by taking some extra time to kill some slightly out-of-the-way enemies. Aye, that was a long sentence. >_>
The EnbuPike
It seems to be that the detours I need to take to get the EnbuPike would outweigh the time it saves, although it seems to me that taking the EnbuPike would end up saving a good chunk of time in the long run. I'll test both "routes", so to speak. Sure, it may seem like a LOT of hassle, but there are some workarounds. I'll have an answer as soon as possible, it really shouldn't take longer than a couple days to figure out.
A Bit More on Grinding
Most speedruns just blindly plow through the towers, but I'm taking a couple strategic moments to grind early on, in hopes that it'll reduce grinding time later in the game. The room in the first tower with two Living Statues is my first quick-grind area. 10 EXP a pop, so I'm using it to level a bit early.
One of the earlier places where I'll be grinding is on the Parasite boss. One of his attacks is throwing out 6 small enemies that combined, give you 66 EXP. Parasite can be manipulated to throw these out more often, so if you notice a few odd movements or hits during that battle, chalk it up to manipulation.
I'm getting a bit wordy, so I'm gonna stop and plan my Towers grinding. I'll have a WIP up (seriously this time) in a week or two, even if I'm not done with the Towers.[/list]