X-Men: Wolverine's Rage in 11:31.19 by Noxxa
Surprise, another TAS! I've mostly been working on this as a shorter, simpler and easier alternative to my recent Game Boy Mega Man TASes (and faster paced to boot). This game is not as technically complex as those, so I've been able to create this run significantly faster than my recent other runs.
Game objectives
- Emulator used: BizHawk v1.5.2
- Aims for fastest time
- Takes damage to save time
About the game
X-Men: Wolverine's Rage is, naturally, a licensed game starring Marvel Comics' Wolverine. The game (which is the third X-Men game for Game Boy Color, after X-Men: Mutant Academy and X-Men: Mutant Wars) was developed by Digital Eclipse and released by Activision on May 15th, 2001. It plays like a standard run-of-the-mill platforming game, with Wolverine jumping, climbing and hacking his way through 16 stages and 4 bossfights against foes such as Cyber, Lady Deathstrike and Sabretooth.
Yeah, it's just a...really average platforming game.
Tricks
Notes about physics:
- No acceleration. On both the ground and the air, Wolverine accelerates to running speed immediately.
- Jump height is fixed, regardless of pressing or holding A for any amount of time.
- Landing takes horizontal movement away for 1 frame. Thus, for horizontal movement, jumps have to be minimized.
- Wolverine can't jump-slash after dropping off a ledge. This is why I sometimes jump off edges (to slash an enemy below) when it would otherwise be faster to fall off.
- After falling for a certain amount of time, Wolverine becomes unable to horizontally adjust his position in the air anymore, until landing on ground. This may be noticed during some long falls.
Object boost/Enemy boost
Attempting to land on destroyable objects or enemies causes Wolverine to zip off to the side of the object or enemy. This is used everywhere throughout the run to zip Wolverine forward slightly.
Air slash hitbox
Doing an air slash in the air causes Wolverine's hitbox to change in odd ways - it seems to become smaller and further down. This allows Wolverine, for instance, to pass through enemies in a 4-tile high area. Generally, when an air slash is done that doesn't hit anything, it's done for this reason.
Ceiling clip
Doing a regular jump into a ceiling sometimes causes Wolverine to clip into the ceiling and zip down a few pixels. This is sometimes useful to make a jump shorter and land on the ground earlier.
Edge grabbing tricks
There are a few different actions Wolverine can do while hanging from a ledge; jump up the edge by pressing up or A, do a lunge from the edge by pressing away, or letting go of the ledge by pressing down; if Wolverine grabbed the edge from high enough, he can actually regrab the ledge at a lower point immediately afterwards.
The fastest way to go up a ledge depends on whether Wolverine needs to jump immediately after getting up the ledge, or to move forward. Under normal circumstances, the fastest way to move forward is just by jumping up the edge (up/A). To jump afterwards, the fastest method (to land on the ledge floor as soon as possible), the fastest method is to grab the high point of the ledge, press down and regrab (grabbing the edge about 8 pixels lower), and then doing a lunge up the edge. This allows Wolverine to land 1-3 frames sooner, depending on the vertical position where Wolverine catches the edge.
Rage buffer
Normally, Wolverine's special Rage ability is executed by mashing the B button, causing Wolverine to slash about repeatedly before executing the special move. However, pressing forward+B or down+B on the same frame causes the slash not to come out, so doing this movement repeatedly allows Wolverine to buffer up B presses and execute the Rage at once without slashing beforehand.
Stage by stage comments
Chapter 1 - New York City
Stage 1 - Street
- This first level is really short compared to the following levels, basically serving as an introduction to the game. Not much to say about it.
Stage 2 - Alley
Stage 3 - Docks
Stage 4 - Subway
Boss 1 - Cyber
- Cyber is a bit of an unique bossfight. He has 4 hit points, but once they reach zero, he doesn't die. Instead, he changes his attack pattern and starts running around. During this state, letting him jump off the building into a bottomless pit will win the battle.
Chapter 2 - Tokyo
- Tokyo in general is defined by quite long stages, compared to the other three chapters. The stages are also a bit laggier compared to the others.
Stage 5 - Busy street
- This stage is unique in that it has no grabbable ledges.
Stage 6 - Building
- The samurai at the start has to be killed in order to be able to grab the ledge.
Stage 7 - Forest
Stage 8 - Dojo
Boss 2 - Lady Deathstrike
- Lady Deathstrike has 8 HP, though she can only be hit twice every "round". After hitting her twice, she'll back up to the upper platforms (where you can't reach her) before coming down again.
- I let Lady Deathstrike land as close as possible to the spot where she'll jump up to the upper platform (otherwise she'd run over to there, or to the other platform on the right side of the stage). I also let Lady Deathstrike land on Wolverine, so the collision clipping will put her a few pixels closer to the jump spot.
Chapter 3 - The Savage Land
Stage 9 - Jungle
- Best theme of the game, in my opinion. It's a shame both stages with this theme (this one and the next) are so short.
Stage 10 - Village
- Midway through the stage, I do a quite tricky jump which I think isn't even designed to be possible. This makes this a rather short stage.
Stage 11 - Waterfall
- Second best theme of the game.
Stage 12 - Swamp
Boss 3 - Sabretooth
- Sabretooth has 8 HP. This boss battle is very straightforward. Just hack up Sabretooth before he hacks up Wolverine.
- This is the first time I use Wolverine's Rage technique (which is performed by mashing B). It's the most lag-free way to defeat Sabretooth during the second half of the fight.
Chapter 4 - Secret Lab
Stage 13 - Entrance
Stage 14 - 1st floor
- This stage is fairly short, but really annoying with all the bottomless pits.
Stage 15 - 2nd floor
- One of the shortest stages in the game is immediately preceded by the longest one in the game.
Stage 16 - 3rd floor
Boss 4 - Sabretooth & Cyber
- Sabretooth and Cyber are fought consecutively as the final boss. Sabretooth has 8 HP and Cyber has 5 HP and is defeated like normal this time. Other than that, they both fight exactly the same as last time. (Cyber pilots a laser beam from above until Sabretooth is defeated.)
- I use Wolverine's Rage on Cyber because it's again the most lag-free way to defeat him. And because he's a wimp who dies from full health after just one use of it.
Other comments:
Recommended screenshot:
Thanks for reading this, and thanks for watching!
Nach: While this run seems to be pretty solid, the game is rather bland. The music is annoying, and the levels are overly simplistic and repetitive. Reception has been lukewarm. So while it was cool seeing Weapon-X in this kind of game, and a rather interesting set of final credits, accepting for vault.