• Aim at the fastest completion
  • Aim at the best ending
  • Use death as a shortcut
  • Take damage to save time
  • Use manipulation of luck
  • Some entertainment trade-offs
In this epic RPG, you have to fight an evil religion that tries to take over the world. Normally, this quest would require hours upon hours before you could hope to conquer evil and its many spawns. Put thanks to luck manipulation, this quest can be completed under five hours.
This submission is my very first one. Boy was that hard! It took me over a year to complete it. Mainly because is always found ways to make the movie shorter. Here are just a couple I found over time
  • Using the turbo function for text makes it scroll faster without bothering to find when to press a key
  • Fighting enemies can be reduce to a certain level. Entering/exiting a room resets the count (like inside Mount Maori)
  • Although dragons do elemental damage when appropriate (ice on fire, e.g.), I only used it on the guard eyes. Otherwise, I used the thunder dragon, the one with the shortest animation (about 540 frames)
  • During frame lagging, moving/opening the status menu can save some time
  • Calculate exactly what the shortest way to complete a fight is. If it's by keeping characters alive, I do it. Otherwise, they die.
  • Inside the Tunlan Queen's body - the most annoying part -, you don't actually have to fight. Fights can be manipulated so that you only confront enemies that flee. For my part, fights had to be made because scary monsters didn't come...
  • When there is a message during a battle (like when Katt is taunting), pressing A after the 46 (?) frames delay of after can change the outcome (critical, how much damage, counter)
  • Predict which character goes where in the marching order. This way, I avoid moving the team around (uses 70 frames)
  • Minimize trips to the dragon shrine
An entertainment trade-off I took was finding Bleu, the best magician from BOF I. Her high level is more than sufficient to help my crew (with warp, mainly), which doesn't level up.
Another was showing all dragon powers and other magic spells (hence using bomb against Deatheavn)
Inside the Sky Cave, I though I found a glitch (look at my progress in the appropriate thread). However, its happening looks sporadic...
And just so you know : the last battle frame is 1031901. The rest is just showing the best ending

Baxter: This longest TAS to date had a good viewer response. Accepting for publication.
Claimed for encoding by DeHackEd


Player (36)
Joined: 9/11/2004
Posts: 2630
The sound doesn't desync, at least not in my player, I always make extra special sure of that. :) Just to make sure, I checked for you, first battle is synced and so is the last battle.
Build a man a fire, warm him for a day, Set a man on fire, warm him for the rest of his life.
Joined: 4/29/2005
Posts: 1212
Cool. After watching the first hour and a half, I believe I have seen enough to give this a yes vote. And thanks for making the mkv, Omni. Helped out a lot. :3
Post subject: Movie published
TASVideoAgent
They/Them
Moderator
Joined: 8/3/2004
Posts: 15585
Location: 127.0.0.1
This movie has been published. The posts before this message apply to the submission, and posts after this message apply to the published movie. ---- [1377] SNES Breath of Fire II "best ending" by janus in 4:55:16.22
Joined: 12/30/2008
Posts: 45
Location: Bubbling nearby...
Published at last~ I've been waiting for this for months. You did an excellent job, Janus. Well done! I am currently watching it, and I'm almost an hour in. It's incredible so far. I know the battles won't be nearly as interesting once you get the dragons, but meh. Gotta do with it. I have two questions, and one comment. First of all, why did you save at the Ruins/Township (after the Coursair arc, before the Joker arc) before going back to Hometown to get Nina? You did not use death to escape faster from the Joker Clan cave (forgot the cave's actual name...), so why did you save there? Edit : Never mind, I got it before you even got there. To get back to the Ruins with Ray, after defeating Terapin. When walking from Wyndia to Capitan, why didn't you stop by the house (where the Owl Woods are) to reset the step counter rather than getting into a battle? At first glance, it seemed slightly faster. I might be wrong though. Yeah, I probably am wrong. And finally... you did something I spent a long time trying to do when I was younger, and never managed to achieve. Avoiding the Creon on the small island before Terapin. I was like, "OMG!" Edit : Two more questions. At 1:03:05 into the video, you had Rand attack himself for 1 damage (38 HP -> 37 HP). Then, Katt attacked him for 40. So he clearly did not need to attack himself, wasting a few frames for the attack's animation. Unless doing so manipulated luck to make Katt crit. Was it the case? Also, when in Wildcat Restaurant, you have the party change its leader two or three times while going through the rooms where you leave the equipment. Now, I don't remember if anything special happened if you did not do that (it's been so many years since I last played and can't remember such a detail for sure), so could you tell why you did that?
I lurk, okay?
Active player (285)
Joined: 9/1/2008
Posts: 900
So he clearly did not need to attack himself, wasting a few frames for the attack's animation
hmmm... Unless it was because defending would have made it impossible for Katt to kill him, i should rework that. I do intend to make another version. That is, if getting the Meow staff saves frames. I might try to work the skycave glitch also...
Also, when in Wildcat Restaurant, you have the party change its leader two or three times while going through the rooms where you leave the equipment
so KAtt receives chop chop. I think it's slightly advantageous this way, I think; after attacks, changing positions seems to take more frames
Mastania
He/Him
Joined: 5/30/2009
Posts: 135
Location: Top of the pops
I get the feeling it might be faster to switch positions by going into the menu rather than using L/R, or at least be faster than switching two positions.
Waddle Waggle Wattle
Active player (285)
Joined: 9/1/2008
Posts: 900
switiching position takes 70 frames. changing twice in the menu (i need to go to simafort) would probably take longer
Joined: 12/30/2008
Posts: 45
Location: Bubbling nearby...
My mistake. I forgot that in BoF2 (as opposed to BoF1 and most turn-based RPGs, really), defense happens right at the beginning of the turn, regardless of the character's turn in battle (which is a system I always liked, and more RPGs should be like that). Anyway, I finished watching. It was amazing. Good job! I'll keep following your progress in the BoF1 run too.
I lurk, okay?
Joined: 2/13/2010
Posts: 2
Question, BOF2 has a run effect. I can understand not using it in several areas so it doesn't trip battle RNGs (at least, it always seems to affect the RNG with the same seed values), but why not in 'safe' areas? Was that so you could maintain your RNG flow properly, or what?
Joined: 12/30/2008
Posts: 45
Location: Bubbling nearby...
Ryushikaze wrote:
Question, BOF2 has a run effect. I can understand not using it in several areas so it doesn't trip battle RNGs (at least, it always seems to affect the RNG with the same seed values), but why not in 'safe' areas? Was that so you could maintain your RNG flow properly, or what?
Are you referring to running instead of walking in... well, all areas? On the SNES version, there was no run button, you could only walk. The run feature was added in the GBA version.
I lurk, okay?