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Friday, August 8, 2014

Ganon Face Punch as I Ride My Flying Duck to Victory!


This run through of Legend of Zelda: a Link to the Past took me roughly a month to get through. My play sessions were limited and I found myself going days between sessions. I also spent a good deal of time watching record holding speed runners work their magic and researching methods for making the magic happen on my own. That being said, I'm pretty pumped to get into actual speed running trials of my own. 

Thursday, August 7, 2014

Misery Mire & Turtle Rock: Dungeon Finale


By this point into the journey, I've abandoned my original route, I'm ready to wrap up this play through and dig into some serious speed running in addition to the next game on the list. Misery Mire and Turtle Rock. Two pain in the rumpus dungeons. Misery mire is first.


Pictured above isn't really a time saver, but more or less a sequence break. When you first enter the dungeon, you are greeted with a gaping hole in the floor with blocks on either end. The intent is that you need to hook shot across. Not necessary. Get as close to the edge of the pit as you can, turn, and run dash into the block. The impact of your face on the block has enough force to send you rocketing over the abyss to safety.


The room with the big chest containing the Cane of Somaria is another that "implies" that you need the hook shot to traverse the space. Once you enter the room, you have a few seconds to get to the bridge before it begins to collapse. The hook shot enables you to do this very easily. It's not needed however. As soon as you enter the room, just execute a few careful and controlled dashes to get over to the block then just run normally up the bridge. You have a small window to do this, but it is not a difficult trick to pull off.

You will need to get the cane here before advancing to Turtle Rock. That dungeon is not possible without the cane on a legit in bounds run through.

Sunday, August 3, 2014

[TMNT] Cart Photo


A brief deviation from posting about LoZ: aLttP speed running..

A cart in my personal collection I've never beaten, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Definitely is on my list of games to be dominated. For the sake of actually beating the damn thing, I'll eventually do a play through via an emulator so I can take the cowards way out and save as I go. This is one of those games that requires a near perfect play through with next to zero margin for error. This is a game birthed from an age where game devs were unrelenting and heatless towards the lack of eye-hand coordination possessed by the average 8 year old.

I haven't taken a run at this cart in years. Maybe even a decade or so. From run throughs as a wee whipper snapper, I recall making it past the dam level and not too much farther with MAYBE two turtles still intact. The thrill of the challenge is calling me back. Soon my pretty... SOON.

Friday, August 1, 2014

Swamp, Skull, and Ice Palaces: Vanilla, Vanilla, BOMB JUMP!


My runs through the Swamp and Skull palace were largely vanilla. At this point, I'm not super familiar with any massive time savers that can be done in the Swamp Palace beyond just knowing your route and being able to run it quickly. Skull Palace is a breeze, you just need to acquire the master key for the dungeon, bounce over to get the fire rod from the big chest, then proceed to the final leg of the Palace and the boss fight. There is a neat skip that can be done to get at the fire rod while skipping a few rooms and the act of blowing up the wall behind the chest. 


You can utilize the bomb jump technique to blast over one of the holes and get instant access to the big chest. I failed to try it this time through, but you can see a video of it being done HERE (AGDQ 2013, LoZ: aLttp Speed Run by Cyghfer). This video was actually one of the first speed runs of this game that inspired me to dive into the mechanics myself. Most speed running is done on the Japanese version of the game, and on version 1.0 to boot. The text boxes pass faster in the JP version, and there are a few "features" that were later removed such as item dashing