Share your test runs

Just figured id make this into a separate topic, eventhough I know some people might be reluctant to share this information, it`s still a fun ting to compare and see the ay of the land, also it might inspire some of us to practice more, or make for some early rivalry.


I`ll start things off with a couple of runs today, however you may feel free to add any Stage 1 or\and Stage 2 run before I do.

Edit : Here`s an online stopwatch for you btw for Stage 2 challenges, and I guess to a certain extent stage 1. http://stopwatch.onlineclock.net/

Edit 2 : If we get a few runs in , ill make a top 3 list for each game as well. Just to keep it zazzy.


Stage 1:

Ninja Gaiden : 15 points - WMJ

Stage 2:

F-Zero X : 00:40:11 - WMJ
.............: 1:05:61 - KVD

Zelda 3 : 6:39 - Sargoth
...........: 7:06 - Illu

Pilotwngs 64 : 50:34 - Illu
............50:86 Sargoth

Some attempts at Zelda 3 Stage 2 first.

1st attempt : 7:09
2nd attempt : phonecall
3rd attempt : 6:48
4th attempt : Died :S
5th attempt : 6:43 - Rat-key was not in optimal place, otherwise ok run.

Looks like the winning time should be around 6:30.

I`ll give it some more tries later tonight I think, as well as a few other games.

I've yet to figure out the strats for most games, I guess I'll just watch some speedruns, I watched a zelda 1 speedrun but I forgot the path hehe... not sure if it's too hard to pull of first try in competition what he did on the wr run.

I think I'll try an F-Zero X Death Race attempt later and possibly also some Super Mario World.

Illu wrote:I've yet to figure out the strats for most games, I guess I'll just watch some speedruns, I watched a zelda 1 speedrun but I forgot the path hehe... not sure if it's too hard to pull of first try in competition what he did on the wr run.

Yeah I feel the same way in many of the games myself, Zelda 1 definitely being one of them. For now im sticking to the games I somewhat know, and I`ll practice the rest once I get to holland ( next week )

Meanwhile, I`m at it with Zelda 3 again :

1st attempt : Died....
2nd attempt : Died.... decided to slow down a bit before the
3rd attempt : 6:39, bit sloppy near the end , unoptimal rat-key.
4th attempt : messed up the guard, then realized I was happy with the previous run for now, at least enough to go get some breakfast.

Having a few goes on Pilotwings 64 now, and I am glad I am, since I`ve realized im incredibly rusty.

1st attempt : 1:29...
2nd attempt : 1:19...
3rd attempt: 1:09 , hmm i see a pattern here
4th attempt: :59 , haha, i somehow doubt i can keep this up , seeing as the wr is 47 or so
5th attempt: ....fail
6th attempt: :56:83 , allright , finally getting near something that might be respectable in a tournament setting. Goal is to crack 52:00 though.
7th attempt: 57:85 , starting to think im finishing too many runs. More risk from here on !
8th atempt: died , was going really fast before i did though , thats something
9th attempt : fail\retry, got stuck..
10th attempt: died , sloppy run
11th attempt: died, very sloppy, might be the end of the session soon
12th attempts: 58:84 , sloppy yet again. I think ill take a brake now.

13th attempt: fail
14th : 1:03
15th : fail
16th : stuck
17th : fail
18th : 1:00:43
19th : fail
20th : fail
21st : 58:10
22nd : fail
23rd : 57:68
24th : SICK run - failed
25th : 1:01:49
26th : fail
27th fail - GETTING MAD NOW !!
28th : FAIL !!!!!!!!!!!!!
29th : fail .....
30th : fail
31st : fail
32nd : started wrong stage
33rd : 53:33
34th : fail
35th : epic fail
36th : faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaail
37th : 58:33
38th : 50:86



Jesus it is gorram easy to crash in this race. Keeping good speed is so hard during the main room and the downwards tunnels. Feels a tad out of my control.
Anyways , 50:86 is by no means a bad time. Too bad it took me 38 attempts though, seeing as I only get 3 during the tourney. Anything below a minute will do at this point I guess, which can be achieved somewhat safely.
Will defo practice a tad bit more on this. Need to be able to get effortless sub minutes.

Zelda 3 (PAL)

19min - first try ever trying to speedrun this, forgot some stuff on this run hahahaha
2nd attempt - 9min
3rd 7:54
4th - couldn't push the throne thing, maybe because I didn't have torch or because I skipped the boomerang.. or glitch.

I checked a speeddemos archive speedrun on youtube and seemed like I had the strat down pretty much, played on PAL though, I guess it's a little slower, the 7:54 wasn't exactly good either though. Started timing from when I select file and stop timer when speech begins on sanctuary.

5. 7:25 - pretty straight path, didn't take the boomerang though, maybe it saves some, can't be more than 5sec for picking couple keys though, can't see PAL going much faster than 7:00 heh, this was only my 5th attempt ever to speedrun this though. Hmm maybe the timer should stop as I enter the sanctuary though, or like just when the sanctuary appears instead of when the speech there begins, this was a 7:20 in that case I guess.

Zelda 3 (PAL.. still heh) to sanctuary - 7:06

Illu wrote:Zelda 3 (PAL.. still heh) to sanctuary - 7:06

Seems you are making good progess there Illu

I time from when you press start on a new save-file, and stop when the text appears after opening the sanctuary door.

I do drop the boomerang myself, as I never found a solid use for it. Perhaps the rat-key, but that part is random so it might work without and you might be screwed with.

Did 2 more runs myself, failed first one at guard ( it really sucks if the green patroller before the guard sees you ), second one I tied my previous run at 6:39. A little sloppy at the end, was looking like a 6:34 or so. 6:30 is doable, but I wont be able to do it, especially not in a tournament setting

Timing will be very important for this challenge, I suspect once everyone has this down it's gonna be decided on a second or two.

Illu wrote:Timing will be very important for this challenge, I suspect once everyone has this down it's gonna be decided on a second or two.

Id say within 5 seconds, but yeah , you are right.
On the very very bright side though, we seem to be the only people to be practising it

I'm pretty much still working on my stage 1 games to get some skills there. I think I'll go with Ninja Gaiden, SMB3 and Super Probotector but it may change. So far my best Ninja Gaiden run went game over in world 6 but I'm sure I can work out some good strats for the last levels as well. The only challenge with some results is F-Zero X Death Race which I tried for quite a while. My best time on PAL is 40"011 but my times vary between that and 1 minute (or instant fail when you fall of the track right at the start of it ).

I tried the F-Zero X Death Match challenge (stage 2) and I'm sure glad I did. Out of my first 25 attempts I died 22(!!) times.
I had to adopt safer strategies and eventually ended on finishing 16 out of 50 runs; still a miserable prospect lol.

So, I feel that playing it safe might be a very rewarding strategy here at the real tourno (with added pressure and all).

My finished times were ranging from 1'05"61 to 1'51"44, averaging around 1'30"xx. My PR of old is 50"142, which doesn't seem too bad at all.
Wouter's prospect of finishing all runs below the 1 minute barrier is damn next level from my viewpoint (anyway).

I used Wild Boar on accel settings round about 2 bars to the right of the middle, basically that's the only way I know how to play this challenge properly.

Seems I'm toast for FzeroX if I don't get hold of a cart real fast, I guess I could still practise hardcore the day before when I arrive but could be good to have time to practise other stuff aswell.

Are there differences between PAL and NTSC for FzeroX aswell btw?

EDIT: yea never mind, just found out there is clear difference between PAL and NTSC even on this game, I'm kinda surprised though, Goldeneye doesn't have that much difference (there's still some though) maybe because it's developed in EU by Rare. All stuff by Nintendo, Mario64, Waverace64, mariokart64, pilowings seem to be clearly NTSC advantaged.

I have tried SMB3 several times, but have yet to complete the challenge with full points. I usually die once, but that's once too many.

Also tried SMB1 today...and accumulated the grand total of 1 point! Just like at NLG 2008 I died at 5-2...and iirc it was at the same location...the trempolin. God I hate those in mario bros...I then died again at 6-3 (another trempolin fatality ) and met my ultimate demise through a bulletbill at 7-1 (as I desperately tried to get the mushroom, it had to get in the way first). This was because I lost my firepower at the boss of 6-4 through one of his flames.

Summary: I...am...not...ready.

Tried some SMW 20 lives challenge. I'm doing non of that trickery finishline business that MJ and SZ do, I'd rather get my final 1-up nice and safe at the moon.

Started timing from when I activated lvl1:

Try 1: 3.26 missed a life somewhere, so I had to go to the switch palace to get to 20
Try 2: I died, fell in the ditch after I collected the moon and descended to ground lvl again I should be finished at the moon though, missed a life again...
Try 3: Failed too, missed too many lives and was caught in no mans land at some point

Man, this challenge is gonna be hard to get into again. I wonder how many of us will do any good at this, it's definitely something that requires proper training.

EDIT:
Try 4: Died again, caught in no mans land again (1-3). Losing Yoshi in 1-1 is catastrophic.
Try 5: Died, the rebounding red shell at the start caught me (miss-timed my jump for the extra life)
Try 6: 3.13 A lot like the first try, I missed a life somewhere and got my final one at the switch palace

Try 7: Died, once again I lost Yoshi, this time at the end of 1-1, trying the P flag finish combo
Try 8: Forfeited, same situation as try 7
Try 9: 4.51 Missed the moonjump, collected the final life in 1-3 after the palace...

Try 10: 2.48. Finally an acceptable run. Finished at the 5th dragon coin of 1-2.
Try 11: 3.10 Finished at switch palace, several mistakes in lvl 1-1
Try 12: Failed, lost Yoshi trying the finish line P block trickery. SHOULD NOT DO THIS...especially since I've completely forgotten how to do it properly.

Does anyone have a video of this mario 20 lives challenge? I don't remember the route, I could maybe play it and I'd remember/figure out otherwise though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3SAqbPw7yQ

Here is SZ's video of doing it all in 1-1, but that's an extremely hard & risky strategy for a tourno setting. My advice is to drop the whole finishline with block thing, keep Yoshi and collect the moon in 1-2 (not sure if there is a vid of this more conservative strat, Sar?). But you will probably remember it anyway once you give it a go.

I was trying all my Stage 1 runs in sequence tonight.

Game #1 Super Mario Kart: 15 points. I purposedly missed all the zoomstarts to see in how much trouble I would get (missing at least 1 zoomstart in a given cup is a very realistic scenario, so I have to be ready for that event). I barely scraped a #1 finish at KB2 and VL2, but I'm of course happy with the final result.

Game #2 Super Mario Bros: 0 points. I died because of a brainfart at 4-3 (mushroom lvl with loads of ravine to fall into). I was panicking at some of the elevators and jitteringly jumped backwards into the abyss. Very painful.

Game #3 Super Mario Bros 3: 10 points. I made it through the flying fortress on the skin of my teeth, after losing my feather early on due to one of those pesky thrown projectiles (in combination with a flame I had to dodge). I eventually died at the maze castle (not the final one, but the one after the only proper 2 lvls). I fell into the lava at those conveyor belt platforms...they are usually not that hard to navigate, but I was taking things too slowly, lost my feather because of a fireball, panicked and hit lava.

Grand total: 25 points out of a potential...57. Meh.

FzeroX deathrace 6:28

played on emulator, I just found out how to attack and got this time after that, first I was just driving around and wondering why I can't kill anyone

not sure I even played the right mode though? if it's an untouched cart you can choose deathrace right away (thought it was something you needed to unlock) but is it this one? and I ofcourse didn't have all the ships, how crappy is the first ship, the blue one that I used?

Yeah you played the right race/mode.

The first ship aint all that great for this particular purpose. Ideally you'd want to use a heavy ship like the Wild Boar, the Black Bull or the Crazy Bear. Unless you're into gliding and all that jazz, like shown in this over the top vid: https://www.youtube.com/user/B4ZEoo7#p/u/20/npZZxxtZYDY

This is a more useful strategy to replicate I guess (not in potential, but realistically before challenge time):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1htxEd_lXg

alright thanks, got 2:56 with wild boar

Tried some Goldeneye 00a and only got to 8 points because of a death on Bunker2.. I improved my strategy some after this and decided I definitely need to use a dot and prefer to do this on PAL for slightly better survival odds for a few levels.

The safest strategies I have right now might not make me manage the timelimit of 1 hour, well if I get like 15 points it's still alot safer points than with most of these other games probably.

I think I was pretty lucky to beat this game last without any practice really (I've only played very little GE lately) Still that run didn't make the timelimit though since I was playing things as safe as possible.

I also had a really stupid death on control where a guard pulled a grenade and I happened to shoot it and blew up, after this I changed my strategy there so I won't ever have to face that stupid guard ever again

Apparently I need to practice even GE a little more, I was almost getting overconfident after beating the game like that on my first test run heh.