• Emulator used: dega-1.16pre1-win32-z80jb MAME core
  • Aims for fastest time
  • Takes damage to save time
  • ROM used: Kenseiden (UE) [!].sms (the (J) ROM desyncs right after the first boss)
About the game
Kenseiden stars Hayato, a samurai that has to fight against warlocks and evil spirits that plague 16th century Japan. The warlocks stole the five secret scrolls and the sword of the Dragon Lord. Hayato, who has dragon blood in his veins, must recover the scrolls and sword and enter the castle and kill Oda Nobunaga.
In the original Japanese version, Hayato is blond. In the Western versions he has black hair.
About the run
I really suggest that you don't read any of this before seeing the TAS itself.. o_o
Decided to use all my Kenseiden experience acquired on the 100% run to improve the any% run a little, turned out I could change route and improve it by more than one minute.. could even improve parts that can be applied to the 100% run in the future.. =P
Tricks and glitches
Hayato moves 1 pixel per frame when walking right, left or jumping right, but on left jumps, we can press left once more and he will be faster than this, around 1,0625 pixels per frame, this saved around 12 frames per going left screen.
The game only accepts input on half the frames, and that depends on the scene we are in. It's odd or even, can change a lot, but not during the same scene, the game has no lags at all.
There are two types of floor in which Hayato can walk: platform, that recalculates his Y position while keeping the X speed at 1, and ground, that recalculates his Y position but sets X speed to 0.
Landing: when the floor is ground, we can land on good frames, which are the ones that set our Y position to the same one as the floor. Example: we're falling at speed Y 3 and 255 for subpixel, which goes 4 pixels per frame. Y floor being 127, if we're at 123 on the frame that accepts input, he will fall directly on 127, which will make we not lose frames, other values, 126, 125, 124, 122, 121, 120 .. make him lose 2 frames. 2 frames per jump made me gain around 170 frames in the end. 119 makes him lose 1 frame, which leads the game into making us lose the other one on a screen transition.
Attacking in mid-air is preferred, because Hayato keeps going right or left depending on the situation. This attacks had to be made 16 frames before landing, or else he will pose there, with 0 X speed and lose 2 to 14 frames.
Jumping on ladders: Hayato actually climbs up ladders a little faster and is recalculated for 3 pixels of gaining in one frame when we press up on the ladder at a good situation.
Taking damage: when we can't take an enemy out without losing frames, there is the trick that makes it possible to go through them, we just have to be hit by an enemy that cames from our back. Tests indicate that this is faster than going back for 10 frames or more to gain space to jump over something.
Some enemies walk with us, that being said, I don't need to attack them, they just go with me, walking together. This saved frames in 1 situation or 2.
Snakes are ground enemies that can hit us with their heads or tails, but their bodies are not considered, so we can walk inside them, only when they are striking. (same speed) =P
Luck Manipulation
Random variables have little use in this game, but enough to not being a good idea to hex-edit, these are the moments that can change completely: falling rocks can change direction randomly, blue fiends can jump right or left, flying bubbles are harmful and can change speed, and the final boss' shots change their flights' directions. (but now I can manipulate the final boss into not shooting anything after the first one)..
Data dump
- "faish" is done in air, up+1 after defeating the second boss. 20 frames in air, not a problem except we have to do it 20 frames before landing, or else Hayato gets stuck there until the attack is done. (Actually used the stuck time in my favor when fighting one of the bosses)
- "kaoshi" is not in this run, but I should mention that it is a weaker, wider crouch attack. 1/2 of the usual crouch damage, not really wanted on a speedrun, in my opinion.
- "pling" is the frame saving attack in many situations, we just have to start holding 1 after any attack or landing, and then crouch. After a pling, we have to jump front to avoid losing 4 frames, as the game recalculates our crouch position and our standing one.
- Standing and crouching attacks are only used in bosses.
- Taking damage cost 24 to 26 frames of non-moving Hayato, with 3/4 of speed, which means only 8 frames lost if you're pushed front.
Memory Watch on MHS got these good memory positions that made the calculation of good frames to land very easy:
00D44153- X position subpixel, made me realize that sometimes I was losing frames when turning, and it was fixed.
00D44154- X position on screen (stops when it's moving), helped me because it changes on bosses for better positions.
00D44155- Y speed subpixel, that was on the formula, button 2 changes it by summing less Y speed each frame.
00D44156- Y speed, it's negative when we're going up, and positive when we're falling.
00D44157- X speed subpixel, the reason I discovered that left jumps are faster.
00D44158- X speed, it's 1 when going right, 255 when going left, 254 (with subpixel 240) when jumping left.
00D49F4C- Y position, not the only one, but one was enough to make calculations, even if it gets weird numbers when Hayato is taking damage..
00D44151- This one changes during jumps, but it didn't help at all =P
Level by level comments
Level 1
The new strategy was to not take damage at the end, leading to having to deal with that final enemy differently. Frames saved so far: 8
Level 2
This is where jumping left shows how weird this game was programmed, I still think that the jumps to right are the glitchy ones. Frames saved so far: 38
Boss 1
Didn't change much, but walking inside two flames looked nice to me, so I went with that. Between 7th and 8th attack it looks like a gap, but the boss has to die closer to the floor, really. Frames saved so far: 40 (2 for having more HP after the boss, actually)
Level 3
Tried to have all jumps on good frames, and.. I did it \o/ (even the damage one, that made me gain around 24 frames alone) ..and I could replicate the previous run trick that consists in stepping on a skull and taking 0 damage. Frames saved so far: 78
Level 6 (oops, I mean 4)
Nothing to say, it's a new route. Frames saved so far: 1373
Level 9 (oops, I mean 5)
There is one improvement here comparing to the 100% run, when I jump up to the stairs right before the boss room, it saved 8 frames comparing to that. It was just more attention... Frames saved so far: 1878
Boss 3 (oops, I mean 2)
Had to think of a new strategy for the larva fly, but it is faster than the two-headed one (too). Frames saved so far: 2216
Level 11 (oops, I mean... nothing!)
Skipped one entire map scene and level with the new route. Frames saved so far: 3939
Level 12 (oops, I mean 6...?)
New path, new enemies to dodge, simply decided to change things to more action, since the game has no in-game lag at all. Frames saved so far: 3949 (snake riding actually saved frames, look at that..)
Level 16 (oops, I mean, final one)
All more careful jumping, and actually had to skip one perfect landing here because of 4 enemies in a row, it's right before the final ladder.. Frames saved so far: 4038
Boss- Yonensai
Not having Benkei's scroll made me use the helmet smasher technique more (it's the 'faish') ...not sure if this one is Yonensai, but, actually got better jumps and X speed managing.. much better actually. Frames saved so far: 4756
Final Boss
First I tried to copy the 100% run's battle, but when I redid it, it got even better, I can manipulate the big guy into not shooting anymore, this means more attacks and less time ... this one is a pain in the ass, anyway... Final count: 5728 frames faster
Conclusions
Many thanks to AngerFist, and Neofix, Mklip2001, Keirden, Adelikat, Klmz, and whoever else that helped on the TASing work, I think the rerecord count is getting bigger, that sure means the planning was good .. just used again the formulas to land in good frames, and the formula to attack and not lose frames landing too soon, ...
Anyway, I hope people enjoy the work and if you can do better, try to obsolete it, I bet it will be tough.. XD unless, of course, you discover a different new trick that saves some big amount of frames >_>
Suggested screenshots: 5081, 11109, 12487, 13072, 17511

Mukki: Judging...
Mukki: Very impressive improvement. Accepting as an improvement to the currently published run.


TASVideoAgent
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This topic is for the purpose of discussing #3319: Jungon's SMS Kenseiden in 05:16.32
sgrunt
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Emulator Coder, Former player
Joined: 10/28/2007
Posts: 1360
Location: The dark horror in the back of your mind
Encodes coming right up, for your viewing pleasure. EDIT: 512 in the submission text; downloadable here. EDIT2: I took the opportunity to capture the suggested screenshots: I think the third of these is probably best without being too spoiler-y.
Joined: 5/30/2007
Posts: 324
While I find this crappy game very irritating to watch (TASs included), this was an outstanding improvement over the previous published movie. Yes vote.
Joined: 2/26/2011
Posts: 98
I think it looks like a cool game, and this TAS is pretty entertaining, so I vote yes.
Editor, Experienced player (570)
Joined: 11/8/2010
Posts: 4038
This was entertaining and a BIG improvement over the published movie. Yes vote! And I like the third and fourth screenshots.
Jungon
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Joined: 4/2/2009
Posts: 376
Location: Porto Alegre - Brazil
sgrunt wrote:
I think the third of these is probably best without being too spoiler-y.
The third one was my personal favorite when choosing.. I think I chose the frames "onebefored" (??)... I remember choosing the first one where the character was ducking.. and the fourth one, the enemy was in front of the rock.. ? x_x
*Jungon*/*Johnnyz* smilie weirdo =P ^^ o.o @__@ +D
sgrunt
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Emulator Coder, Former player
Joined: 10/28/2007
Posts: 1360
Location: The dark horror in the back of your mind
Jungon wrote:
I think I chose the frames "onebefored" (??)... I remember choosing the first one where the character was ducking.. and the fourth one, the enemy was in front of the rock.. ? x_x
Might be a timing difference between what the emulator is reporting and what my video tools are reporting.
Lex
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
What a badass. Alone, he travels across half of Japan to save the day without anyone knowing probably just because he wanted to test his skill as a samurai. I voted yes because I enjoyed it thoroughly.
mklip2001
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Editor
Joined: 6/23/2009
Posts: 2227
Location: Georgia, USA
Great work. You TASed this quite quickly, even with all the redos. The final battle looks especially great with the boss shooting his blue shots only once, and the larva fight is also sexy. Yes vote.
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically. Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.) Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html) Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature! Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
Jungon
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Player (51)
Joined: 4/2/2009
Posts: 376
Location: Porto Alegre - Brazil
sgrunt wrote:
Jungon wrote:
I think I chose the frames "onebefored" (??)... I remember choosing the first one where the character was ducking.. and the fourth one, the enemy was in front of the rock.. ? x_x
Might be a timing difference between what the emulator is reporting and what my video tools are reporting.
I think if you subtract all numbers by 1, the screenshots will be exactly as I saw in the emulator ... but maybe that third one is already good enough, or other number around 12475-12500 would give equally good screenshots.. +D
*Jungon*/*Johnnyz* smilie weirdo =P ^^ o.o @__@ +D
Joined: 2/23/2011
Posts: 21
IronSlayer wrote:
While I find this crappy game very irritating to watch
You're crazy! This is a fun game and I enjoyed every second of this run. This run gets my Yes.
sgrunt
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Emulator Coder, Former player
Joined: 10/28/2007
Posts: 1360
Location: The dark horror in the back of your mind
Jungon wrote:
I think if you subtract all numbers by 1, the screenshots will be exactly as I saw in the emulator
I still think the third of these makes for the best shot.
Jungon
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Player (51)
Joined: 4/2/2009
Posts: 376
Location: Porto Alegre - Brazil
Maybe a little closer to the snake, but not on floor yet... +D 12488? 12489?
*Jungon*/*Johnnyz* smilie weirdo =P ^^ o.o @__@ +D
Player (71)
Joined: 8/24/2004
Posts: 2562
Location: Sweden
Not the best game I've seen around... Not even bad enough to be good neither. Nevertheless it is a good improvement, and hence I give it a yes too.
Active player (437)
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 3517
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Good work my friend. Easy yes vote! Now please finish your teddy boy run. After that, feel free to finish that wonderboy that hasn't been finished yet.
Nitrogenesis wrote:
Guys I come from the DidyKnogRacist communite, and you are all wrong, tihs is the run of the mileniun and everyone who says otherwise dosnt know any bater! I found this run vary ease to masturbate too!!!! Don't fuck with me, I know this game so that mean I'm always right!StupedfackincommunityTASVideoz!!!!!!
Arc wrote:
I enjoyed this movie in which hands firmly gripping a shaft lead to balls deep in multiple holes.
natt wrote:
I don't want to get involved in this discussion, but as a point of fact C# is literally the first goddamn thing on that fucking page you linked did you even fucking read it
Cooljay wrote:
Mayor Haggar and Cody are such nice people for the community. Metro City's hospitals reached an all time new record of incoming patients due to their great efforts :P
Post subject: Movie published
TASVideoAgent
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This movie has been published. The posts before this message apply to the submission, and posts after this message apply to the published movie. ---- [1896] SMS Kenseiden by Jungon in 05:16.32
Jungon
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Player (51)
Joined: 4/2/2009
Posts: 376
Location: Porto Alegre - Brazil
Does this sound desync happens to all SMS TASes on Youtube? =_=
*Jungon*/*Johnnyz* smilie weirdo =P ^^ o.o @__@ +D