Aims to beat time of the published movie and does so by 1336 frames.
I know, I know--I'm one frame short of being leet.
No damage taken.
Strobing greatly reduced.
Luck Manipulated in both the bonus stages and in how the thieves appear on level 7.
AI exploited to make enemies fall in pits. (Contrary to the summary of the published movie, that's *not* luck manipulation. The AI's dodge/dash attack code doesn't take pits into account very well. Unlike true luck manipulation, I don't have to wait for the psuedorandom number generator to come up with a particular number--the AI is that stupid all of the time.)
Downthrust->Magic makes for a faster combo than Magic->Downthrust.
Brand new (and completely stupid) sport--Meat Slalom!
New trick--enemies knocked "the wrong way" by ordinary jump attacks.
There's no Level 6 magic this time. It's faster to use Level 5 Magic on Stage 6 and it's faster to gather only 8 pots on Stage 7. Sorry 'bout that one--I miss the dragon, too.
I ride the Chickenleg in Stage 1 briefly as Stage 1 ends. I do a tail-whip aimed at, well, nothing, because all the enemies are already dead.
See Stage 3. See the dragon run. Run, dragon, run! See the bottomless pit. Jump, dragon, jump! (1)
Almost all of the movie has been rerecorded. Only the title screen, a short segment of Stage 1 before the first enemies appear and the very start of Stages 4 and 6 have been copied from the previous version. However, since I used the very start of the previous movie, the rerecord count includes all of the rerecords from the previous version.
Is anyone else reminded of a certain scene in South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut when they see the Level 5 spell?
More wordy comments about this movie can be found here.
I'm pretty sure that this movie is beatable. I don't think it's beatable by much and I don't think that beating this movie will be easy, either. (On the other hand, I didn't think I'd find so many ways to improve the previous movie.)
(1) For non-U.S. readers, these sentences mock a particularly inane series of children's books called 'The Adventures of Dick and Jane'.
Edit--minor typo fixes, forgot that I had copied frames from the previous version's Stage 4, too.
Truncated: Accepted for being more awesome than the previous awesome movie. Bisqwit: Processing...
I did a bit more research. The final boss's hp is exactly 48 greater than the damage done by the level 5 spell. A level 6 spell does four additional points of damage. Downthrusts do 8 points of damage each and a back attack does 6 points of damage.
Therefore, you can kill the final boss with 6 downthrusts and a level 5+ spell or 5 downthrusts, one back attack and level 6 magic. However, since a back attack->magic combo is slower than downthrust->magic combo, I don't see a reason to use the second combination. (The downthrust takes some time to set up but it recovers quickly. The setup time isn't an issue as one must wait for the boss to rise off the ground before he can be hit again.)
The only other melee attack in the game that does 4 points of damage is an animal attack and animals aren't allowed in stage 8. Jump attacks (3 hp + forced knockdown), dash attacks (2 hp + forced knockdown) and basic attacks (1 hp each, 2 hp if the attack knocks the foe down) are all too slow for this situation.
Minor details:
* The screenshot is obsolete--I never hold 9 potions at once during this new run. Personally, I'd go with a screenshot of Tyris=Flare in midair as the second enemy of Round 2 throws himself off the cliff.
* The description has an error in it--the enemies go off of cliffs because of incomplete AI, not because of luck manipulation. Enemies advance towards the nearest target (either the player or a riderless animal although they will move up or down under certain circumstances to avoid potential player attacks). I cannot find anything random about where they go. If an enemy with a dash attack is within a certain distance from the player and the player is a within certain distance from a pit, the enemy will always charge. If the player is within a certain range and moving forwards, the enemy will move down slightly and, if there is a pit there, the enemy will always march into the pit.
Thieves are another story--they do move randomly and must be luck-manipulated for good results.
I like that term. I can just imagine the new tag now: "Abuses stupidity".
To be fair to the programmers, some of the enemies end up in pits for semi-legitimate reasons. The first two enemies in Round 2 are trying to use the pit to instakill the player. However, there are some cases, such as the first two foes of Round 7, where the deaths are a clearly cases of the AI being completely unable to detect the pit and react accordingly.
To whoever changed the screen shot: many thanks. I wouldn't have used a picture of stage 7--I thought that would be too much of a spoiler--but I must admit that is one strange looking frame. Nice choice!
It was fun watching so many suicides but I was annoyed at never seeing the stage 6 magic.
Just wondering - why do you skip collecting the potions in the first bonus stage?
I'm just some random guy. Don't let my words get you riled - I have my opinions but they're only mine.
Joined: 11/4/2007
Posts: 1772
Location: Australia, Victoria
The reason the magic was never full as to reduce the animation time of the magic.
The man at his maximum capacity has a longer animation, effectively reversing the point of the whole 'less magic' thing.
Joined: 11/4/2007
Posts: 1772
Location: Australia, Victoria
As far as I am aware, the only difference between characters physical wise is the weapon range.
This is based on real-time observation though, so take it with a grain of salt.