It's been quite a while! Coincidentally, when Sonikkustar bumped the topic, I started working on this again on the very same day (and all this time I haven't made any progress because I didn't know how to use the RAM searcher very well. Seriously. >:( ). Anyway... here's a few notes (which includes some already posted here):
Values:
s01D22,2s,X Speed (Kirby)
s01922,2s,X Position (Kirby)
s01D24,2s,X Speed (Gooey) (This value is delayed by one frame.)
s01924,2s,X Position (Gooey)
s01D4A,2s,X Speed (Nago/Kine/Chuchu)
s01D4C,2s,X Speed (Rick/Coo/Pitch)
(I'm not sure if these two are correct, though.)
Fastest ways of traveling (without Coo):
Stay running, of course. Letting go of forward while at speed 512 and pressing forward the frame your speed drops below that number will raise it higher than 512.
Follow these patterns:
- = Don't press left/right, > = Press left/right
While on the ground, every time you're on/hit speed 512, follow this pattern:
->->->->->- (512-472>520-480>528-488>536-496>544-504>552-)
(Repeated: ->->->->->-->->->->->-->->->->->-)
Note: This gives you an average speed of 512. Use only for the tiny period of when your numbers are high (preferably past 528?)! Otherwise, there'll be no gain, or even the loss of pixels.
While in midair, every time you're on/hit speed 512, follow this pattern:
->-->-- (512-496>536-520-504>544-528-)
(Repeated: ->-->--->-->--->-->--)
Tricks:
- Kirby and Gooey's X position stay on their same values while with a partner.
- About getting powerups:
> Every time you get a powerup, you get 2 or 3 lag frames. If you get rid of that powerup, no matter what you do (beside resetting the game), eating an enemy with that same powerup will not produce lag frames. Gaining a different powerup from the one you last had will produce lag, and so will going back to that first powerup after gaining the second one.
> Kirby and Gooey have their own "memory" for powerups. For example, if Kirby gets a powerup and Gooey gets that same powerup, Gooey will still cause lag frames.
- Find as many cliffs as you can. Near their edges, time it right and slide to get ahead for a few frames. When you land, immediately start running again.
- When spitting something out while on ground or landing during the spitting animation, press the jump button to immediately cancel the automatic ducking, so he can do things earlier than before.
- At the beginning of every world, reset at the cutscenes, so you can skip them. Use L, R, Start, and Select to reset instead of record resetting.
- By sucking while falling at the right time, you can fall faster.
- To manipulate what you will land on at the end of the level, randomly press buttons during the transition of entering that room.
- Grab partners at the exact frame you enter the next room, so you don't have to wait for the pose they do.
- When you eat an enemy for a powerup, swallow it at the same time entering a door so you don't have to wait for the "power showoff" animation.
- To manipulate what you'll have to pick at the minigames during levels, change your input two rooms before the minigame.
- Before the end minigame, get rid of Gooey so you don't have to wait for him to go.
- For any door you can do this, spit Gooey ahead Kirby next to a door, so he can enter it earlier.
- During a room transition, hold the left or right button before you're actually seen, so you'll immediately walk forward. Once you see yourself, you can press left or right again so you'll be able to run right away.
- When flying with Coo, hold down forward. If something is in the way, hold down up/down for only 1 frame; every time you hold up/down while moving forward, your speed drops to 512.
Because of the way lag frames are with powerups, playing around with them too much wastes time. We can't do that anymore... :(
Here are two movie files I've made to compare:
Normal (Constant 512 Speed) (763 frames)
Midair Speed Cycling (753 frames)
While cycling, you can't suck in or spit out anything, or your speed will be stuck for the whole animation. Because of this, you need Gooey to be used all the time.
Finally, here's a WIP using the tricks so far! It only goes up to the end of the first room of 1-1. Not very far, I know...
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/694060125/Kirby%27s%20Dream%20Land%203%20TAS.smv
For those curious, compared to only the first room of 1-1, this is about 22 frames faster compared to WaddleDX's latest posted run here (but compared directly, so I may be kinda off).
This whole cycling speed thing just made this game three times harder to run. I'm very sure I won't be continuing it... =(
I used
SNES9x 1.51+v6 for all of these movies.