3-D Battles of Worldrunner
This game by (pre-Final Fantasy) Square is an attempt at a 3D title on the NES. In a way, this game is a predecessor to the myriad of modern endless-runner games available on various platforms (primarily smartphones). The only primary difference is that this game (thankfully) isn't endless.
Basically you run forward; dodging enemies and pillars while jumping gaps in the floor all while trying to collect stars for points. There are eight worlds each with three to four subdivisions.
General Notes
- This video is played in Hard Mode
- The Hard-Mode code is entered on the demo screen (not the title screen) by pressing 'B' four times then holding "Up" and "Left" while pressing start.
- Enemies move notably faster.
- Making this game was more tedious than I anticipated given its simple premise.
- In the later levels you have to kill the final boss multiple times. Though the patterns between the successive boss snakes are very close, subtle changes were necessary to not die.
- In most cases I waited to the last possible moment when jumping gaps and tried to land at the first possible frame.
- If the back and forth movement in time with the music in World 1_1 is too jittery for you, just wait a few seconds. This is the only segment in which it is done.
- Most worlds have a bonus area to collect more stars.
- Worlds 2 and 8 have no bonus zone.
- World 1 has two bonus areas
- The "invisible" World-3 boss is not a glitch, it's just the same color as the background and blends in.
- Though it is not possible to attain all the stars in the game, this video attempts to obtain the maximum possible.
- In some situations you can't obtain some stars over gaps. Shortening the jump timing by just one frame to get the star results in a fall, while increasing the timing by the one frame to clear the gap misses the star.
- In some areas even when not holding up to run at top speed, you cannot run sideways fast enough to reach what appears to be an achievable star. This is primarily the case in World 7 and routing was chosen to maximize pickups even though it appears that some stars otherwise should be obtained.
Other Thoughts
- As the title suggests, there is a 3D mode available. The method is Anaglyph 3D requiring specialized Red/Cyan 3D glasses (Possibly Red/Blue. I'm not 100% sure which it is). Pressing select at any valid input frame after the title screen enables this mode which alternates frames between red/blue tints to produce the 3D effect.
If this video gets published, I can provide a copy with the 3D mode active so that viewers could watch in 3D!- As noted by Spikestuff, simply adding the input to enable 3D mode to this video's input causes a desync by the second world. This suggests enemy spawn points are RNG dependent and not static.
- I will not make a 3D run available, but you are welcome to!
- Perhaps 3D mode would be more entertaining. I do not have the appropriate glasses, so I haven't tested this theory.
- And lastly...the music annoys me.
- I recommend listening to something else while you watch. Sound doesn't add much to this game, and unfortunately can also be repetitive.
Enjoy! (Or don't...I suppose that's the point of the voting.)
Samsara: Judging.
Samsara: I took a look at the run and from what I can tell, the level of optimization is on-point, at least what little there is to be optimized. As stated in the judgement of the last submission of this game, it's mostly just an autoscrolling environment with some boss battles thrown in for good measure. It's on the verge of not being publishable, though I think it could be. This certainly looks tool-assisted, at least, with a lot of close calls and quick dodges that actually set it apart from what an unassisted run would look like.
I would also say that the "all bonus stages" goal is Vaultable as a 100% run, however one thing, one admittedly minor (but still major) thing prevents this run from being publishable: Stars. Ironic, isn't it. Pretend that's what irony means for a second. The collection of stars slows the run down considerably without giving any benefit apart from a higher score, as far as I can tell. Collecting them makes you stop briefly, and more time is added by the game counting them down after each stage. If they actually had some sort of use in the run, it would be a different story, but it seems like taking them was an entertainment tradeoff that doesn't do anything for this clearly Vault game.
I don't know if I want to officially count the game out as being publishable, but I do still have to reject this run for goal choice.