Mega Man ZX in 1:09:14.29 by Noxxa & Rolanmen1
Goals:
- Emulator used: DeSmuME 0.9.6 with Advanced Bus Timing OFF
- Aims for fastest time to reach the credits, on Normal mode
- Takes damage to save time
- Manipulates luck
- Abuses programming errors
Other info:
In-game time: 1:04'32 at final hit, 1:08'40+ after credits
Rerecords: 41930
Note: Several rerecords are lost due to hex editing, especially between the two different authors.
About the game
Mega Man ZX, released for the Nintendo DS in 2006, is the successor game/series of the Mega Man Zero series, and is the third spinoff series of the Mega Man franchise. Unlike the previous series, you don't directly select your stage and teleport there, but you accept "missions" and find the area yourself in a Metroidvania setting, where almost all areas are connected.
Instead of being a badass robot, you play as a human, either male or female (chosen at the start of the game), who can do badass-robot-like things using Biometals, which transform (Megamerge) into suits armors and come from ancient heroes from earlier series. Mega Man ZX contains Models X, Z, H, F, L, P and W, which are based on Mega Man X, Zero, Harpuia, Fefnir, Leviathan, Phantom and dr. Weil, from the X and Zero series, respectively. The player uses Model X, which can Double Megamerge with Z, H, F, L and P to form ZX, HX, FX, LX and PX respectively.
Tricks used:
When the player uses an attack while in wall climbing motion, he'll regain directional control sooner. This allows the player to kick wall faster, making you climb faster.
In addition, Model HX also has the ability to air-dash in between the wallkicks, eliminating the 1-frame short downwards movement in between wallkicks. This allows you to wall-climb even faster.
When your X is just right when moving towards a spike wall, there's an one frame gap to jump off it. Because your X becomes inconvenient for spike walljumping after doing this, you can only do it once on the same wall. Except for HX, which can hover to change speed and thus X value into something you can use to walljump with.
This can also be done off a corner boost (see below).
Airdashing as Model HX lowers your character's height. If you're under a ceiling near a wall when your airdash ends, you will be ejected about 20 pixels max towards the wall, away from the ceiling. This is especially used in Area M-2, where it's used under a spike ceiling.
Area A (intro stage, boss: Giga Aspis)
Pretty straightforward stage to start with. Aile was chosen at the start of the game, because she crawls just a bit faster, saving a few frames. Unlike Mega Man ZX Advent, there's very little difference between picking either.
For the intro boss (Giga Aspis), ALAKTORN's TAS of the boss on YouTube was used for comparison purposes. In the end, both TASes of the fight tied in speed.
Area C (Pass the Test)
This section is boring.
Area B (Locate Giro, boss: Rayfly)
Going through Area D to Area B2 from the end of Area C2 is fastest, which is why Pass the Test is done first and this mission second. The boss event at the end of B2 triggers when one collects one of the Computer Chips. For the boss, we tried to use as little delay as possible while also manipulating it to move as little distance as possible.
Area D (Fight the enemies, boss: Giro (Model Z) )
Finally, something which actually resembles a full stage. Damage is taken a few time at the fly minibosses to save time.
Area E (Search the Plant, boss: Hivolt the Raptoroid (Model H, part 1) )
We chose this stage first, because Model HX's superior movement abilities such as faster wallclimbing, airdashing (both sideways and upwards), as well as even being superior to ZX in beating neutral-element bosses, not to mention killing fire-elemental bosses in just a few hits using the Overdrive Invoke System.
Even with just model ZX, Hivolt got beaten pretty quickly. We tried to avoid hitting his weak spots as much as possible where avoiding it didn't cost time, and ended up with bossfight level 2: just enough to manage throughout stages (although with lots of weapon energy refilling).
Area G (Fight the Mavericks, boss: Fistleo the Predatoroid (Model FX, part 1) )
Now that we have HX, we can take care of this level and the boss pretty quickly. In the building where we have to save the people, we save as little civilians and Guardians as necessary to move on, and we picked the optimal ones to rescue. Fistleo fight... yeah, don't blink, otherwise you could miss the fight.
Area F (Find the Survivors, boss: Lurerre the Abysroid (Model LX, part 1) )
Model FX is used in this stage for the most part to destroy the ice enemies and ice without wasting time. Model HX is used for a slight amount of time to skip a part of the stage.
Area I (Save the People, boss: Hurricaune the Wolveroid (Model HX, part 2) )
There's a shortcut that requires Model FX here, and it basically allows us to skip most of the stage. What remains of the stage is done pretty quick.
Area X Intermission (boss: Prometheus)
Model FX basically destroys the enemy containers almost instantly, before they can release enemies. Likewise, Model HX defeats Prometheus almost instantly.
Area K (Attack the Excavators, boss: Flammole the Moleroid (Model FX, part 2) )
Model HX is used for the entirety of the stage, including the miniboss and the end boss, all of whom are destroyed very quickly. Not much to say about this one.
Area J (Recover the Disk, boss: Leganchor the Gelroid (Model LX, part 2) )
Model LX is the only main model that doesn't slow down from being in water, so we're pretty much forced to use that one here. LX is also used on the miniboss.
Not much is noteworthy about this stage, other than a giant Metool miniboss ripped straight from Mega Man 4 and ripped to shreds here by HX. Model HX is used on the main boss as well. Despite not having an elemental advantage over it, HX is faster anyway.
Area L (Protect the Lab, boss: Protectos the Goreroid (Model PX, part 2) )
Model FX is used here, because we were going to blow lots of giant containers up here. Again, HX is used for the fight despite not having an elemental advantage.
Area M (Stop the Dig, boss: Pandora)
Model FX is used for the first part, to blow stuff up, like always. Then we switch to HX for the water section... except we're not going through the water, but use the ceiling instead. Even though it's filled with spikes. On Pandora, elemental weaknesses work differently than on any other boss, and she doesn't take extra damage from fire and ice. So we use HX to defeat her instead.
Area O (Repel the Army, boss: Prometheus & Pandora)
Since the same enemy container section from the intermission is pasted here, we switch to FX again. For the bosses, Prometheus & Pandora sharing a bigger life bar, we use HX to abuse Prometheus' weakness. But unlike last time, he can't the same move he used last time because there are no walls here now. He's defeated quickly anyway, by use of tornado.
Slither Inc. / Serpent Company (Destroy Model W, bosses: all 8 Pseudoroids, Serpent)
A boring autoscroller elevator stage for the final stage. We tried our best to make something entertaining of it during the elevator sections, while basically murdering the 8 Pseudoroids like last time. We need to use HX for both final boss fights, so we had to have a full weapon energy bar when we reach Serpent, which needed some pretty intense manipulation in the final corridor before the boss. The final battle is primarily plagued by the limited weapon energy bar on Model HX, but we manage to finish off both phases of the final battle quickly anyway.
Noxxa's comments: Well, that went quick. Where the Mega Man ZX Advent run took me nearly 6 months to get done, this run took less than one month. I guess that's what you get when you have a partner like Rolanmen1 to work alongside with. It's really convenient when you come back from school/work and you see another stage done in your PM box, or when you find yourself in a tricky situation in the TAS and you find that situation done in your PM box the next day.
Rolanmen1's comments: Working with Noxxa realy saved me some pain in the ass. It is convenient, because he already has experience from his Megaman ZX Advent TAS, and we have 7 hours difference, wich helps when one is busy or sleeping. I would personaly like to work with him again.
Enjoy the run!
GabCM: Transformed that video list into a single YouTube module. You can still access to each video separately by clicking on the link under the YouTube module.
DarkKobold: Good audience feedback, good run, easy accept.
