Submission #1647: primorial_soup's SGB Pocket Monsters: Green in 04:24.53

This is a TAS of the Japanese version of Pokémon Green, one of the original games before they were translated into other languages. This game is significantly different than the later releases, in that it contains many glitches which are absent in the newer versions. This run uses one of these glitches, the so-called "Doko Kashira Door" glitch, which allows a player to warp to arbitrary points in the game by carefully planning the number of steps they take. This run was recorded using VBA 1.7.2 re-recording v20.0, and will not play on older versions. This run is 236 frames (3.93s) faster than LagDotCom's submission.

Approximately 10 months ago, a video appeared on youtube demonstrating a glitch which allows one to warp to various points in the game early on. The number of posible warp points is nearly limitless, although some are more useful than others. Although gocha made the TAS community aware of this some time ago, until recently it did not work on VBA due to an emulation error which has been fixed in version 20. There exist several routes which lead to the end very quickly; this run utilizes the currently fastest known.

The glitch is activated by attempting to switch the second item in your inventory with your first pokémon. The ability to switch pokémon by using the select button was removed from later versions; this is how the glitch was "fixed". Afterwards, your pokémon can still battle, but it's total experience is reduced to zero. If it gains experience, an odd visual glitch will occur; the health bar will extend beyond the edge of the screen and wrap around to the next side. This is because it has more hit points than the assumed maximum.

More interesting than the effects on the pokémon are the effects that it has on the game map. Within an area, several squares (usually a block of four) may become jumbled, losing or gaining wall status and/or changing appearance. These four squares in Pallet Town can be seen outside the eastern wall as I walk by, and of the four near Snorlax, I walk through two of them, which is fortunate, because there would be no other way out otherwise.

The doors to various buildings also change their destinations, although it seems to be limited to one per area. In Pallet Town, this is the Rival's House, which serves as a good starting point. Through some sort of anomaly, the destinations change according to how many steps you've taken, and switch every four steps. This allows one to control where they warp to. In certain other instances, when the door was not actually visible (on the side or back of a building), the actual location of the door may change as well. This run warps to the secret house north of the cycling road, enters a door which should be about 20 tiles to the right, and walks to Celedon before teleporting directly to the hall of fame.

Other things become glitched as well, such as the location and movements of NPCs.

Given the current route, I claim this run to be within 13 frames of optimal. This is the total amount of time I waited for manipulation purposes, plus one frame lost to a frame rule. The majority of the manipulation occurs during the Rival battle, and I've done my best to ensure that wait frames were minimized as much as possible. Below is a table of where and what was manipulated.

Bisqwit: Author sent an updated submission file; updating submission.

adelikat: Good viewer response, and seems tightly optimized. Accepting for publication.