Essentials
- Emulator used: VBA-rr svn330
- Aims for fastest time
- No death
- Genre: Platform
About the game
"Ultraman Ball" is a strange platform game. The hero is Ultraman, but for
some reason, he transforms into ball form, "Ultraball". Essentially, this
game seems to have nothing to do with Ultraman, because it is said that this
game is based on an abandoned NES project, "Armadillo 2". Indeed, this game
is quite similar to
"
Armadillo".
I don't think this game is very nice, but I think it is worth TASing.
Basically, the hero moves fastest when he is in Ultraball form and in the
air. But the mechanics of this game is a bit complicated.
Tricks
Levitation
When you turns into Ultraball, any acceleration is disabled at the frame,
and Y-velocity is reset to 0. So you can virtually levitate by pressing <B>
rapidly in the air.
And, if you try to turn into Ultraman near the ceiling, you can't do it, but
any acceleration is disabled at the frame. So you can fall slowly.
Piercing breakable blocks
When you collide a breakable block from the side, the direction of
X-velocity is negated. This is annoying for TAS. But, when you turn into
Ultraman while you are rising in the air, X-velocity is set to
16*sign(previous X-velocity). This precedes the bounce by breakable blocks,
so you can maintain X-velocity by pressing <B> at the same time as you
collide a breakable block.
Vine boost
When you move horizontally while you holding vine, X-velocity is set to 48
at the frame. So, you can boost by pressing <UP> and <RIGHT> rapidly on
vine.
Misc
Some stages have bonus areas, and you can finish the stage by playing a
bonus game. But the bonus game takes about 30 seconds, so it is no use for
TAS.
Resources
Here is some useful memory addresses:
| $C201 | current form (0:Ultraman, 1:Ultraball) |
| $C205 | position x (16-bit, little endian) |
| $C207 | position y (16-bit, little endian) |
| $C209 | velocity x |
| $C20A | velocity y |
| $C518 | invincibility timer of bosses |
klmz: Perhaps it's level design and music's limitation, this movie lacks a comfortable pace and feels out of joint. However, it does look well-executed.
klmz: Accepted as nobody would oppose.
