In this final chapter of the Phantasy Star Saga, you finally get to destroy the root of all evil. Thanks to the absence of random battle, heavy luck manipulation and the use of a roll over bug, this game is completed in less than 1,5h!!

Game objectives

  • Emulator used: Gens 11a
  • Aim for the fastest completion
  • Manipulation of luck
  • Take damage to save time
This TAS is my second one. Although it is much shorther than BOF 2, PS4 was actually harder. In effect, the AI for this game is utterly unpredictable. During battle, pressing A at the same frame can yield difference results. The number of times I had to restart to find what I was looking for...
Anyway, here are general tricks to save time
  • •Random fights can be totally avoided
  • •Macros can be used to pre-determine actions. However, they are only useful if they can be used more than once (except for making combination attacks or specific orders, like the psyco-wand macro against Zio). Many people have claimed that targets can be pre-determined when using a macro; I have yet to find evidence for that.
  • •When useful, combination attacks use less frames than two individual attacks
  • •With luck manipulation, there is no need to hunt for treasures. Chaz uses only 2 swords during the whole game; I also shop only twice
  • •The target in front is most likely to get hit; it can save a few frames
  • •Having turbo A and B pressed is a (real)-time saver and an in-game saver. Since my characters leve-up during boss fights, they can gain quite a few levels at the time
  • Thanks to Fresh Feeling, I found a way to make boss fights after Juza much quicker. In effect, in Zio's tower, an ennemy drops a shadowblade. It does reduce stats like dexterity and mental power... but it can't be negative. Instead, it goes back to 255. So, Although Chaz can only cast tsu 3 times, the damage it causes shortens the battles by quite a bit. Also, with 254 dexterity, he never misses his target AND hits critically 100% of the time.
And now, for the bosses...
  • !!Iglannova 1 and 2 : no change
  • !!Juza : Tsu takes care of things. Also, since Rika gained a doubleslash, it makes things even quicker
  • !!Zio 1 : I never realized I could try to escape instead of making a defense macro
  • !!Gy-Laguish : I take full advantage of tsu. Also, I can manipulate him so he kills people with his attack rather than his fire breath
  • !!Zio 2 : One of the only fight that required healing AND resurection. This way, Rune and Rika and Demi can take Zio down without dying prematurely.
  • !!Chaos wizard : no change.
  • !!Darf Force I : Tsu made all the difference. At over 650 damage per hit, he goes down quickly.
  • !!Xe-la-Thoul : with a dopped up Chaz, the fight gets so much easier. It could be quicker if I could have casted blizzard, but no such luck in this fight...
  • !!Lashiec : the trickiest fight. Although Kyra has higher defense (thanks to the plasma shield), she still has to survive until the very end without healing. And when Chaz gets resucitated, his tsu is useful again.
  • !!Dark Force II : 3 rounds of tsu are still useful. Otherwise, shift to Rika gives a good boost
  • Dark Force III : healing takes too much time, so I tried sleeping instead. I saved 10% of the frames from the original publication
  • !! De-Vars : he is tricky. Not only is Chaz's dexterity very low (he gets the plasma sword; shadowblade only does 1 damage, but he is very quicl. Rika still gets shift, but saner is also necessary so Rune can get healed
  • !! Sa-Lews : much easier than de-vars. He responds well to tsu, and a shifted RIka does more damage.
  • Profound Darkness : Demi's attack are quite consitent, so it's always 150 damage. When Chaz can hit, his attack can near 250-300 damage. Against PD 3, Demi's medical power resurects every human in one hit. And since I didn't use deban, only Wren can get hit and withstand it. Finally, because the attacks are so consistent, I only need 4 macros.

adelikat: Accepting as an improvement to the published movie


TASVideoAgent
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This topic is for the purpose of discussing #2572: janus's Genesis Phantasy Star IV in 1:28:43.40
NitroGenesis
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Wow ! The bosses were freaking creamed. RPG Tases are cool, and you are like the best RPG TASer out there. Yes vote from me. If you're wondering how I watched it so fast, I watched it while repeadetly hammering Tab, and slowing down for the boss fights. I'll watch it normally later.
YoungJ1997lol wrote:
Normally i would say Yes, but thennI thought "its not the same hack" so ill stick with meh.
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This TAS sounds epic. I'll have to check it out when I get the chance. ;) Congratulations for saving 7:15.4 from your previous run!
Joined: 8/13/2005
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If anyone wants a more detailed breakdown of time saved, I've got a comparison spreadsheet here. There were two full-game test runs completed between the last submission and this run - janus works very quickly! I'll be voting yes on this, and would love to record a commentary if janus doesn't want to do it himself (I've been discussing this with him).
Joined: 10/3/2005
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FreshFeeling wrote:
If anyone wants a more detailed breakdown of time saved, I've got a comparison spreadsheet here. There were two full-game test runs completed between the last submission and this run - janus works very quickly! I'll be voting yes on this, and would love to record a commentary if janus doesn't want to do it himself (I've been discussing this with him).
Skype? Two commentators are better than one for a run of this length.
Joined: 1/12/2009
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At last it's out. I've been keeping up with the updates on this run, and sometime along the road it jumped from yet another RPG TAS to something amazing. Definitely yes. Good job.
Joined: 7/21/2007
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Location: Austin, TX
First off, the run is great - incredible to see a seven minute improvement on this already super fast run, considering the game in question! It was awesome to see the discovery of the ShadowBlade thing and then see that it turned out to be useful! Also - I think that commentary would be excellent, I really hope Janus gets involved with it so we can hear his thoughts on how he made the run while we're watching the game. I wonder if Let's Play style commentary will catch on (meaning, more humorous style) or if it will be more documentary style? Either way, any time commentary can be added, it should be, in my opinion! I hope more runs get commentary in general and I think having one this long with commentary would be a great way to encourage more people to comment on their own runs. Man, that was a long paragraph, but I think it's a really good idea. (EDIT) And I agree with Dromiceius - in my opinion (mostly formed from watching Something Awful's Let's Plays), in a longer video, you definitely want 2 commentators. It makes it a lot easier to come up with stuff to say, it seems like!
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Gohanks wrote:
(EDIT) And I agree with Dromiceius - in my opinion (mostly formed from watching Something Awful's Let's Plays), in a longer video, you definitely want 2 commentators. It makes it a lot easier to come up with stuff to say, it seems like!
Just this week I recorded one for the run this would obsolete and I'd say I managed to do pretty well! My babbling skills are amazing. I sent that one to janus for review a couple days ago. But yes, if janus wanted to do a two-person commentary over Skype that would be awesome.
sgrunt
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FreshFeeling wrote:
Gohanks wrote:
(EDIT) And I agree with Dromiceius - in my opinion (mostly formed from watching Something Awful's Let's Plays), in a longer video, you definitely want 2 commentators. It makes it a lot easier to come up with stuff to say, it seems like!
Just this week I recorded one for the run this would obsolete and I'd say I managed to do pretty well! My babbling skills are amazing. I sent that one to janus for review a couple days ago. But yes, if janus wanted to do a two-person commentary over Skype that would be awesome.
thanks for the offer, but I'm gonna pass. English is not my first language. Plus, I chose Janus as an ID for a good reason :P
NitroGenesis
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I have just watched it normally and it was still very good. Good work! Since it's an improvement it should be accepted already.
YoungJ1997lol wrote:
Normally i would say Yes, but thennI thought "its not the same hack" so ill stick with meh.
juef
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What a nice surprise! Awesome work Janus, I can't believe how fast you can restart and improve runs!
Twisted_Eye
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Sad that this isn't getting more responses, this is a very good run for an awesome game.
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Twisted Eye wrote:
Sad that this isn't getting more responses, this is a very good run for an awesome game.
We're all just transfixed anticipation for FreshFeeling's commentary. ;) Presuming that a commentary is forthcoming, I hope the encoder(s) will add it as a second audio track to the publication.
Joined: 8/13/2005
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Sorry for the delay. I haven't checked it in much detail and it's still uploading, but my commentary for this run will be at http://www.wrftpb.com/psiv/janus-phantasystariv-v2.mp3 . I had some technical difficulties in the middle this time. And if anyone wants the commentary for the previous run, it's at http://www.wrftpb.com/psiv/janus-phantasystariv.mp3 . Sorry about massive sizes, etc. I'm not that audio-savvy. If anyone wants to do something to/with either file, knock yourselves out.
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I just finished watching, and I have to say, that was fantastic— both the run and the commentary. I really got a sense of how much work must have gone into the run, and I appreciate the effort you put into recording this. Yes vote.
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Excellent. I haven't played this in a while and for some reason I was entranced by the imagery of strong women. The writers and artists definitely have some sort of fixation on this. It starts out with a big sister figure for the hero. Then there's a super-strong bio-engineered chick who tears enemies apart with just her claws. There's an android chick with a bazooka. To top it off, the most powerful final-final-final version of Dark Force has a feminine body after every previous incarnation was male.
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Christ, I almost forgot to vote... Last Friday me and two friends ended up sitting down and watching this video. One was the guy who introduced me to this game last year; I told him there was TAS of someone beating Phantasy Star IV in an hour and a half and he demanded I bring it up on the laptop. The other guy had never seen the game before. Surprisingly, the three of us enjoyed it enough that we actually sat there and watched the entire thing. Since we all had variable knowledge of TAS's and the game in general, it helped that we had a lot to explain and comment on; well, that and rants about the awful technique names... So yes vote for a great way to spend a Friday night, even if it does make me feel socially inept somehow.
To top it off, the most powerful final-final-final version of Dark Force has a feminine body after every previous incarnation was male.
I don't know, it's kind of hard to gender giant pulsating masses of deformed flesh and claws with heads that look like fanged helmets with evil glowing eyes. Besides, the first of the Profound Darkness's forms could easily be seen as a reference to the vagina dentata...
BigBoct
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NitroGenesis wrote:
...I watched it while repeadetly hammering Tab, and slowing down for the boss fights.
I think that's the best way to watch RPG TASes, perhaps in combination with also slowing down for the storyline moments. I could have sworn I voted on this before, but apparently not. Yes vote for certain. I was mildly disappointed to not see Raja in the final battle using Ataraxia to refresh Chaz's TP for more uses of Shadwblade'd Tsu, but oh well.
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I was glad I watched this again with FreshFeeling's commentary, it was really insightful. He answers boct's question and noticed the same thing as me about the final boss's final form being female. But mostly his explanations of the battle tactics, glitches, strategies etc was very interesting. Probably more interesting to a TAS addict than a casual player though. By the way, the recommendation to turn on the input had me noticing that turbo was used on dialogs. So another improvement would be to optimize that. After hearing all of the details I'm even more amazed at how prolific Janus has been. His runs are quite high quality especially given that he isn't disassembling RNGs.
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Myself and another guy on GameFAQs found that the commentary had sync issues with the encode; anyone else have issues like this? I was kind of considering recording commentary again, because I said "Gumbious Tower" instead of "Garuberk Tower", had a weird interruption or two, and missed a couple of talking points I had planned.
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FreshFeeling wrote:
Myself and another guy on GameFAQs found that the commentary had sync issues with the encode; anyone else have issues like this?
I haven't seen the encode, but I watched the run with emulator while your mp3 was playing on the background. The commentary seemed to be playing slightly faster than the movie, so I had to occasionally speed up the emulator to catch up with the commentary.
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I was mildly disappointed to not see Raja in the final battle using Ataraxia to refresh Chaz's TP for more uses of Shadwblade'd Tsu, but oh well.
unfortunately, the Raja run was longer. Just for the resurection, it took me 3 rounds to get everyone standing. PLus, he»'s not that useful for attack in the fight.
arflech
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Aqfaq wrote:
FreshFeeling wrote:
Myself and another guy on GameFAQs found that the commentary had sync issues with the encode; anyone else have issues like this?
I haven't seen the encode, but I watched the run with emulator while your mp3 was playing on the background. The commentary seemed to be playing slightly faster than the movie, so I had to occasionally speed up the emulator to catch up with the commentary.
I had a similar issue trying to sync it with the YouTube video; I had to pause the MP3 so that the video could catch up.
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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. ---- [1488] Genesis Phantasy Star IV by janus in 1:28:43.40