This submission is for Break Time: The National Pool Tour. Of the pool games on the NES, this one is probably the worst. The physics are terrible, aiming can be ridiculous at times, and there are many unskippable "cutscenes." Sounds like a perfect Char TAS!
The main mode in this game is the titular National Pool Tour mode. You're tasked with beating 5 opponents across the country in a best of 3 9-ball match. Ergo, we only have to win 10 racks to finish the game.
The rules of 9-ball are simple. You must hit the lowest remaining numbered ball first. After that, everything is legal aside from a scratch. If you make a legal shot and sink the 9 ball off of that, you win instantly. On the break, the 1 ball is always in the first position so it'll be the first ball you hit. Should you sink the 9-ball on the break, you also win instantly. You can probably tell where this is going.
First off, we have to enter our name. You can menu to end and leave your name blank, but this is a time loss as the game will have to render your name numerous times as "PL-1" instead of "A" which actually would cost frames in the run, so picking a one letter name is optimal.
Secondly, we have to win a "shootoff" (also known as a "lag") to gain control of the break. A few frames are spent in the beginning to give us good shootoff RNG. The idea is that each player shoots off the far rail and tries to come as close to the near rail as possible. Ties in this game go to the player, which is nice, especially on the final opponent who hits perfect lags every time.
Thirdly, the shot. If we were to shoot straight at the rack, hilarious results would ensue due to the bad physics (try it sometime. It's awful.) So we don't do that. Luckily, the setup for sinking the 9-ball on the break is very short, and guaranteed to work as long as you hit it properly. Missing the aim, the english, or the power will result in occastionally bad, sometimes awful outcomes.
So we go forth and dispatch our billiard foes. After the final stage the game mentions going for a world championship but that doesn't actually exist in this game, and it makes me wonder if a sequel to this was planned at one time. Good thing THAT never came out.
Enjoy?
feos: Claiming for judging.
feos: I realized I know nothing about pool so let some other judge handle this.
slamo: Claiming for judging.
slamo: Replaced the movie file with the shoot-offs completed, and resuming judging.
slamo: Looks optimized to me, you can't get much better than winning the game instantly on every break. The gameplay is slightly on the non-trivial side because of the shoot-off manipulation, and it was probably not that simple to find the aim/english/power combination that sinks the 9 ball every time. Accepting!
