Zelda II is a video game. I made a TAS for it. Even though Rising Tempest had no direct involvement with the run, I did reuse some small sections from the old published movie. I feel it's only fair to leave him as an author.

Goals or Whatever

General Stuff

This movie is 7824 frames faster than the previous run by me and Rising Tempest. This movie uses damage to save time in better ways. It adds death to save time to bring it in line with the forced game overs we've been using since the very beginning. It is smarter about what levels it takes. It uses up&a to bring up the save/continue screen at smarter times. The play is also tightened, but improvements from better play are very minor across the whole run, this is largely simply strategy improvements.

Neat Things

Whirlwind
As long as Link's sword is out, whether he is on the ground, in the air, standing or crouching, if he changes direction every other frame, he can hit enemies each time his sword intersects with an enemy's hitbox.
Jackhammer
Downstab can be spammed very quickly. Each time the down button is pressed, another hit can be dealt. Downstab has no cooldown period. This means that Link can theoretically deliver 30 strikes per second. In practice, this doesn't work out, because of knockback, but keeping a close eye on Link's speed and enemy knockback, many many hits can still be delivered very quickly.
Forward-Downstab
If down is pressed on the final frame of a sword strike, you will have a frame of attack that is a hybrid of a normal strike and a downstab. Link will bounce as if he's done a downstab, however the hitbox of the sword strike is used to see if he connects or not. This allows Link to find jar drops, break falling blocks, and deal with enemies in creative ways.
Jumpturn
Pressing A and B on the same frame will instantly set your speed to zero, and you will be in the air, which allows you to start moving again immediately. If Link ever needs to turn around, it is faster to walk up to your target, jumpturn, then accelerate back up to top speed in the opposite direction. If you just use the D pad for this, it will take extra time no matter when you start your turn. An extension of this is if you stab a wall while turning in the air, it will set your speed to 12 in stead of 0, allowing for a much sharper turn.
Move after having 0 health
I didn't think up a name for this. But Link doesn't actually die until after his hurt animation ends. If Link is a fairy, he can continue moving for a brief time after taking a killing blow. If Link is just Link, he can be knocked into items to get the pickup and skip the celebration for finding a hammer. This can also be used to make link a zombie, if he's knocked into the edge of a screen to load the next area, but that's not particularly useful.
Fairy through doors
Doors do not behave like walls in this game. Walls just set your speed to 0. Doors however allow you to walk slightly inside of them, then they eject you out. If you press against a door as Link, you can see him vibrating slightly. Fairy doesn't have acceleration, however. Fairy either does not move, or moves at Link's usual top speed. The door isn't able to eject the fairy. This is possibly an oversight.
Fairy through doors
You can also go in the other kind of doors as fairy. The ones in towns. This allows you to learn downstab without having to use the jump spell.
Free Time
During the fanfare after placing the crystal, you can pause the game for "free". It only costs the 2 frames to pause and unpause. This is because your life and magic refill at the end of the song, which keeps playing in the menu. This allows Link to queue up his next spell without wasting time later.
Fast Levelup
The sound that happens when you get into a random encounter overrides the ~3 second level up fanfare song. I wasn't able to find a good use for this, but it's a fun fact. So here it is.

Overworld Encounters

There are two types of overworld encounter spawns that can happen. One spawn is based on steps, one on time.
The timer for random encounters counts down, and when it reaches 0 enemies spawn. If you are on a path, it stays at 0 until you step on terrain that can spawn enemies.
The timer is set to 8 ticks upon exiting a side scrolling area. If you are standing on the overworld when it reaches 0, it resets to a new number of ticks. The number of ticks is based on what terrain you are standing on when the time encounter is spawned.
  • Grass, Swamp 32 Ticks
  • Desert, Forest 24 Ticks
  • Graveyard 9 Ticks
  • Lava 3 Ticks
The ticks are counted on a global timer, and every tick besides the first takes 21 frames. The first will be variable depending on where you are in the global timer when it starts counting down.
The step counter for random encounters counts up from 1 to 255, increasing by 16 each step. When it rolls over 255 it resets to 1 and monsters spawn. This means every 16 steps there will be an encounter spawn. Terrain does not affect steps-- the path also counts as a step, so if the 16th step is on a path, no encounter will spawn for that cycle. Resets to 1 upon exiting a side scrolling area.
In northwest Hyrule, the area around north palace and palace 1, the step counter isn't active and as such you can never get a step encounter there.

Save the Frames

In advance of this section of the comments, let me apologize. My notes are a bit rough, since I would periodically go back and fix things but I would not always update the frame counts. As such, please consider every number I list here as approximate.

Hammer Run

As usual, we start by collecting the hammer. However, the jump spell is skipped. This saves 5,073 frames. Some of that time is given back over the course of the run, as there are 3 situations where using jump would save time. It is far less than the time saved from skipping the spell.
The first place where jump would save time is, of course, the jump cave. 425 frames are lost getting the bat into position.
112 frames are lost refilling health in Saria. I attempted to do the hammer run without beam sword, but small amounts of time are lost from not having beamsword in almost every room. Overall, refilling is better. This means that so far, skipping jump has saved 4536 frames.
Compared with previous runs, more dairas are skipped during the hammer run. Only the ones that are directly blocking the path are killed. It is possible to skip all but the red daira at the bottom of the elevator, however the two oranges that are killed would have to be stunned twice, so very little time is given up killing them. This helps define the leveling strategy for this part of the run.
383 frames are saved taking a death at the hammer.
In total 4998 frames are saved during this section of the run.

Palace 1

In the past, palace 1 has been done after palace 2. However, in this case the leveling worked out in such a way that palace 1 needed to be first. We need to get to level 5 magic before palace 4.
While collecting downstab, fairy is used in stead of jump. This means a bit of extra walking. 536 frames are lost compared to what having jump would save. This means that so far, skipping jump has saved 4000 frames.
A small amount of time is lost to horsehead from having a lower sword level.
~700 frames are saved overall, though, from using up&a before the gem bonus in stead of after.

Palace 2

Palace 2 maximizes exp because having sword 2 in palace 3 would waste quite a bit of time.
169 frames are saved from taking a death at the glove.
77 frames are saved on helmethead from having sword 3.
671 frames are saved from using up&a before the gem bonus.
918 frames are saved in this section.

Palace 3

Some time is lost in this palace, since we need to slow down a bit to kill enough stuff to get to magic 5 in time.
137 frames are saved from taking a death at the raft
887 frames are saved from using up&a before the gem bonus.
Time is gained and lost throughout the palace because of enemies, however 80 is gained through the level route and other minor things.
1108 frames saved in total in this section.

The Kid & Reflect

Death is not used when collecting the kid, since the lizalfos takes too long to get in position.
33 frames are saved from better overworld manipulation in this section.

Palace 4

398 frames are saved here, almost exclusively from the leveling plan, but also from very minor optimizations.

Palace 5

We return to the old route of taking the flute first, then fighting gooma, then walking out to the river devil. The alternate route of fighting gooma first, then using up&a at the flute and walking from north palace winds up being slower in this case. The main reason the old route is faster is taking a death at the flute and not having to refill magic somehow winds up saving just enough time.
256 frames are saved in this section, though it is hard to directly compare with the old movie. This is probably entirely from the leveling strategy, with minor improvements and a slightly slower gooma from having sword 5 balancing out.

Palace 6

14 frames are saved from better overworld manipulation :O :O :O
All the leveling changes come to a head here, and we are forced to take a level which is not relevant to the route. Since no matter what happens, we have to take a level at the gem, some extra enemies are killed to have sword 6 in time for barba.
Some time is saved inside the palace from optimizations, most notably 63 frames from skipping one cast of fairy.
However, 29 frames are lost in this section overall.

Valley of Death

34 frames are saved from better overworld manipulation

Great Palace

Some time is saved from not needing to look at the menu for reflect or jump. However, time is lost picking up a red jar and the final room in the game where jump would save time.
91 frames lost here compared to what having jump would save. This means that total, skipping jump has saved 3909 frames.
Overall, 60 frames are lost in the Great Palace

So Yeah.

That's it. I hope you like watching video games done fast. I intend on recording a commentary track with a Z2 speedrunner or two, and will post that whenever I get to it. Hopefully a few days. Just want to get this sucker off my plate and submitted. I started working on this improvement Thursday, ‎March ‎07, ‎2013. So I'm glad it's over.
It's likely that the leveling plan and play isn't perfect yet. But for now, I am happy with the state of this run.

Noxxa: Judging.
Noxxa: Very nice. Accepting as an improvement to the published movie.
Spikestuff: Muffins.

TASVideoAgent
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First! I think I added Rising Tempest as an author wrong I don't know how to tasvideos :(
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Looks great! Your manipulation of the Carock fight was really impressive. Syncs for me in 2.2.2.
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Sorry, this isn't the route Nintendo Power tells you to take, this can't be optimized. Honestly, probably the best TAS I've seen all year. So many awesome tricks. I definitely said "wooooooooooooow" a little too loud at least four times while watching. One minor correction to the submission notes, you have sword 3 against helmethead, not sword 2.
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I'll try verifying this later, but I'm still intrigued as to why I couldn't verify other runs, but others could. There doesn't seem to be a PRG1 for NA unless there was and I have it? Or some value in SRAM is being used somewhere, and that value is different on my cart? Maybe with less glitching around than others this run will sync fine...
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Tristal wrote:
One minor correction to the submission notes, you have sword 3 against helmethead, not sword 2.
Ah, that's correct. In fact, I gain 77 frames on helmethead from having sword 3. This is the only boss where substantial time is saved. This is why you need to keep good notes. edit: I added a temp encode to the submission. I probably should have done that to begin with, so that people could actually watch the thing. Link to video
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Easy yes.
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Woah, a Zelda 2 run with actual gameplay!
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Was glad: A Zelda II TAS that lets me see the actual game. Watched YouTube video, became sad at 10:20 when the video title says "no glitch" and yet you fly through a locked door. Read submission message... I see. I'm kind of leaning towards "meh" now. I would still probably publish it.
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Wait, I thought flying through locked doors as a fairy was an intended feature and from what I remember necessary at some point to complete the game. Guess I've always played it wrong.
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Nice run. I voted yes. less annoying than mine
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Cpadolf wrote:
Wait, I thought flying through locked doors as a fairy was an intended feature and from what I remember necessary at some point to complete the game. Guess I've always played it wrong.
If I recall correctly, it becomes necessary in palace 6 if you haven't yet found the magic key, since there simply aren't enough keys to complete the palace otherwise. As a kid I never managed to find the hidden town and thus had to use fairies to finish palace 6. As for whether or not it's intentional, I'm pretty sure it's unintentional but was played up as a feature back in the day. Something about fairies being able to fly through keyholes or something like that. EDIT: okay, watched the run. It looked good, though I do have to wonder if walking on the top of the wall, especially in the Great Palace, counts as using an "unintended exit". It's certainly not how the Great Palace was intended to be solved!
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I agree that it was intentional; I believe a townsperson clues you into it. I was certain that it was also in the manual, but I just dug out my copy and it's not.
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I've seen the game completed without "Fairy-through-doors" before, for what it's worth. No time to watch right now, but very much looking forward to it when I get home.
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I will concede that fairying through doors was probably unintentional but I won't call it a glitch. Just a weird thing that happens from every mechanic working as intended in unison.
Derakon wrote:
I do have to wonder if walking on the top of the wall, especially in the Great Palace, counts as using an "unintended exit". It's certainly not how the Great Palace was intended to be solved!
I thought somebody might! I am still using the intended exit (side of the room) just on the ceiling in stead of on the floor. For the sake of absolute clarity, a run that uses unintended exits would look like something like this. This completes the game in 18 minutes. So, if I casted fairy while I was up there and skipped the thunderbird fight, that would be an unintended exit. "unintended exit" is a really bad name for this kind of glitch but names are really hard to think up.
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Inzult wrote:
I will concede that fairying through doors was probably unintentional but I won't call it a glitch. Just a weird thing that happens from every mechanic working as intended in unison.
Emergent behavior? Also what's with the burger preview pic along with the semi-misleading "no glitch" name? :o
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it is a video about burgers
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Bisqwit wrote:
Was glad: A Zelda II TAS that lets me see the actual game. Watched YouTube video, became sad at 10:20 when the video title says "no glitch" and yet you fly through a locked door. Read submission message... I see. I'm kind of leaning towards "meh" now. I would still probably publish it.
i'm voting yes for publication but also toward the "meh" as right before the last boss you use an enemi to jump out of bound and it warps you back in bound on the next screen (clearly an unintended way to exit the room ) otherwise it's a great run, i felt heartbroken as you reseted thru the free xp but there was no aparent slowdowns due to the sword underleveling so i guess it's ok... ( still heartbeaking )
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I'm not a gambling man, but I would guess the developers didn't intend for you to get on the ceiling there, this is true. However the exit is functioning as intended-- your y position when you use a screen transition on the side of the room isn't considered. Would it be better if I just called what this run avoids doing to exits "wrong warps" in stead? There seems to be some resistance wrt the word "intended". Like, I don't care what it's called. It could be any% no pizza pockets.
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Question. Is it faster to use a key or to pass through as a fairy?
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Depends on how out-of-the-way the key is and what your magic reserves look like. I suspect that the actual act of moving through the door as a fairy (plus pausing to re-activate the spell) is faster than stabbing an en-route key and then unlocking the door, but a lot more goes into planning that makes the two acts basically impossible to directly compare except on a case-by-case basis.
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Tristal wrote:
I agree that it was intentional; I believe a townsperson clues you into it. I was certain that it was also in the manual, but I just dug out my copy and it's not.
I'm fairly sure it was unintentional. I believe you can't do it at all in the PAL version.
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Pokota wrote:
Is it faster to use a key or to pass through as a fairy?
Derakon wrote:
I suspect that the actual act of moving through the door as a fairy (plus pausing to re-activate the spell) is faster than stabbing an en-route key and then unlocking the door
This is correct. But it is surprisingly close. If the key can be gotten with 0 delay, it is only a matter of frames. And it's also true that the planning isn't always a simple comparison. For example, if a door must be passed twice, it is faster to unlock, but only if there's a convenient key. I can't promise the route is perfect, but a lot of time was spent considering these seemingly minor things.
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Definite yes vote! I am probably biased because I like Zelda II but I was thoroughly entertained for the whole run. Its always fun watching runs take the unintended route. Unfortunately now I am having nightmares of Mayor McCheese but otherwise great job!
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Inzult wrote:
any% no pizza pockets.
good for me :) great job anyway, seeing the game with a no jump route is refreshing