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Game information

Earthbound (also known as Mother 2) is a game where the hero, Ness, is just an average 13 year old kid from the suburbs... until the night a meteor lands in his backyard. The local wildlife starts attacking him, he begins to realize psychic powers, and a mysterious messenger from the future tells him that he must save the world, but before he faces any of that Ness has to change out of his pajamas. With a baseball bat as his weapon, Ness begins a quest to stop an evil alien presence from destroying the world. He will later meet with Paula, a girl with strong psychic abilities, Jeff, a young genius with the ability to repair broken things, and Poo, a prince from far, far away who also happens to have strong psychic abilities.

About the run

  • Uses death to save time
  • Uses warps
  • uses two controllers
  • Abuses programming errors
  • Uses a game-restart sequence
  • Genre: RPG
Used emulator: snes9x rerecording 1.51 v6
This improves the published run by 38229 frames (10 minutes, 37.15 seconds).

Credits: 9:26.13
The End: 20:04.96
Comments written by mugg.
In the previous run Ness heads out to make his way to the circus tent in Threed in order to use the "Check area" glitch there. This glitch occurs if you check certain places that aren't located on the map (10.2 MB). The game reads from random places in the memory and may rarely crash, warp you somewhere, bring up menus etc.
There are many such glitch spots as the red spots on this map [dead link removed] indicate (ignore the notes). As you can see, and as came to my attention shortly after the previous run was completed, there's such a glitch spot right at the top of Onett and only a cliff separated Ness from it. After some testing it turned out you can bypass the cliff with a Skip sandwich, which we could get at the Onett bakery, fortunately.
I had much hope the run could go near or below the 20 minute mark with this new route since all the stuff up to Twoson is skipped (the run was at this point in February 2011). I came up with a lot of rather interesting stuff and I posted it in the forum topic. I could warp to Twoson, Threed, Dalaam, Winters, Belch's Factory, Fourside's Bar or start many sequences such as the tunnel ghosts in Threed pushing me back, or the photoman shooting scene. But there just wasn't anything useful that could lead me to the credits or the debug menu.
As time passed, Ross Miller (Sprocket2005) posted a 4 minute [dead link removed] using the same route, but without a Skip sandwich. So he could skip all of the night part in Onett and go to the glitch spot while Ness was still in his pajama. The run is considered fake because neither pirohiko nor me could bypass the cliff without a skip sandwich and looking at the video frames of sprocket2005's video, Ness walks literally through the cliff diagonally which is impossible since any diagonal movement is stopped when walking against a solid wall whereas walking vertically or horizontally may eject Ness and let him move on sometimes. It's also considered fake because the author never provided an SMV (instead he blocked me on YT), and is known to have created fake runs in the past. Needless to say, I was rather pissed since I spent much of my time trying to replicate his run and the way he walks through the wall without a skip sandwich. His Mother3 runs are the only runs I'm fairly sure he didn't cheat on.
Eventually, I managed to bring up some debug menus in Fourside's bar, but most of them were glitched and I was stuck after going to Event 70 (Giygas defeated). Of course, by this time I pretty much lost my motivation and only tested every now and then when I felt like it, for an hour at most. I took my "Threed warp" SMV I posted in the forum topic and tried going to the tent from there. I tried saving & restarting in the hotel, then going to the tent and surprisingly I got a debug menu but, as far as I remember it was too slow and didn't save time over the published run. Some days ago I got the debug menu in the tent again, by pure luck and it was fully functional and useful. This led to the 25 minute TAS that was initially submitted.

The submission file was replaced

Pirohiko found a debug menu without the need to save the game in Threed! Additionally, there was almost no glitch text at all in the circus tent and in Saturn Valley, so this brings the TAS down to 21.5 minutes!

The submission file was replaced again

Pirohiko investigated text pointers and how input influences things. So the debug menu could be triggered right away, at will. This brings the TAS down to 20 minutes and 5 seconds.

Pirohiko's explanations

'To be added later'


Route

The route:
  • Went to the glitch spot in Onett
  • Debug menu was triggered right away, by abusing text-based memory
    though I don't understand this very much. Pirohiko plans on writing some explanations
  • In the debug menu:
  1. Paula was added as a character
  2. Ness was made unconscious
  3. Paula was made unconscious
  4. Ness was given the 'diamondized' status ailment
  5. Paula was given the 'diamondized' status ailment
    These steps make the game behave like Ness and Paula have no HP but are still alive. This is needed to make a game-over sequence work later on.
  6. Go to Event '70' (After Giygas is defeated)
  • In Saturn Valley, we immediately die
    After gaining control, the unconsciousness state takes effect...
  • Death warped to Ness' house which is where we last saved the game. Credits!
This run has been updated 2 times. It went from 25 minutes to 21.5 minutes and then to 20 minutes. I take my hat off to pirohiko who managed to make these multi-minute savings!

ROM version change

The old run used the Japanese version because the debug menu could be reliably manipulated in it. This time around, the debug menu couldn't be manipulated at all in both versions. Much more time was spent testing on the US version because people kept saying the debug menu only appears in the Japanese version, and I wanted to make a run on the version most people are familiar with (and the English version is prefered on TASvideos). The Japanese version would be about a minute or so faster, but I have no idea if the same route could have worked. Probably an entirely different route would have been born if I had focused on the Japanese version - or maybe it wouldn't have been successful, who knows.

Closing words

Thanks to Nitrodon (for our conversations), Fractalfusion (for lua help) and others. Feel free to ask questions.

sgrunt: Replaced the submission file at the request of one of the authors.

mugg: I cancel this movie due to the very large savings made since the initial submitted movie. This run has gone from 25 minutes down to 20 minutes in only two days, and I was advised to resubmit it.


TASVideoAgent
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This topic is for the purpose of discussing #3404: pirohiko & MUGG's SNES EarthBound "glitched" in 21:35.27
Joined: 11/22/2004
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Minor note: encode linked in the submission is still processing so it'll probably be up about an hour or so from now. (Great big YES vote from me) edit: 360p version is up. edit: Youtube has an audio drift problem, so I'm replacing it. The new one will take a little while to go up, but it's already linked to in the submission.
Joined: 12/6/2008
Posts: 1193
Man "glitched" is such a stupid category name. Everythign uses glitches. Can that please be changed to "uses debug menu" or something? Anywho, great run! Yes vote.
Skilled player (1099)
Joined: 8/26/2006
Posts: 1139
Location: United Kingdom
Loved it. Yes vote. My favourite parts were: The seasonal "HoHoHo" dialogue when you checked the Onett glitch point. The terrified rendition the game gives of "Because I love You" after all the glitching is done.
Editor, Experienced player (570)
Joined: 11/8/2010
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Thank you for the HD encode, Dada. Great run, pirohiko and MUGG! And great improvement too! Obvious yes vote. I have some questions about the run though: What exactly causes the glitched music and sound effects on the walk home? Why do you have to fill Paula's inventory with Skip Sandwich DXs instead of giving her just enough to make it home? Why do you give Ness a Skip Sandwich DX if you immediately revive Paula and start eating the sandwiches in her inventory instead of eating the one you gave Ness? EDIT: Never mind, my questions don't need to be answered anymore now that the new run skips all of the parts I was asking about.
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Great job on this run Pirohiko and Mugg, and thanks for the encode Dada. It's a nice improvement over the old run, and I liked the use of the Onett glitch spot. It makes the game look that much more broken because of the blue field above the map. Yes vote.
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Very good (and hilarious) run!
Joined: 12/4/2011
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Location: Australia
the glitched music gave me the creeps but nonetheless a well done TAS. definate yes vote from me
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The movie file was replaced. Now Ness doesn't need to walk all the way back to his house anymore :D
Skilled player (1792)
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Yeah! I saved 3 minutes!! But I am sad because my favorite glitched music disappeared :p
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Seems the movie file was replaced, so I'll go and make another HD encode later today.
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Wait, how is using a debug menu any different from e.g. entering a password to start from a game's last level?
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@ Radiant: It's fine because we're not entering a cheat code or input code, but we're glitching to the debug menu. This is the glitched category and here's the regular category. Of course it would be a great thing not having to use the debug menu, but I highly doubt we can directly go to the staff roll... Maybe if we can make Ness' mother's ending text appear, we could manipulate the game into starting the ending right away, I'm not sure.
"...share all your incredible experiences with me...
You did so well!
[credits start]"
@ everyone This raises some questions about the two Earthbound categories. As I see it, the glitched category was made because of the debug menu (which was a questionable way of completing the game). But would the "check area" glitch, which makes glitched text appear, still be allowed in the regular category? It could be used to warp to places quickly, and there wouldn't be any debug menu at all. Of course it would take some fun away from the regular run, but why allow the "walk through walls glitch" and not the "check area glitch"? I don't have any problems with the categories, as I'm not going to make any more Earthbound runs soon, I was just saying...
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WTF?! That is all. Snes9x 1.51 rerecording v6 works fine. Do not use 1.52 it will desync at Buzz Buzz's death.
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I finished watching the updated submission, and I have to say that my yes vote still stands. I do agree with Pirohiko, I did miss the glitched music, but on the other hand, the death warp was a nice thing to see.
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MUGG wrote:
@ everyone This raises some questions about the two Earthbound categories. As I see it, the glitched category was made because of the debug menu (which was a questionable way of completing the game). But would the "check area" glitch, which makes glitched text appear, still be allowed in the regular category? It could be used to warp to places quickly, and there wouldn't be any debug menu at all. Of course it would take some fun away from the regular run, but why allow the "walk through walls glitch" and not the "check area glitch"? I don't have any problems with the categories, as I'm not going to make any more Earthbound runs soon, I was just saying...
I don't see any reason we would deny the "check area" glitch. It's taking advantage of poor coding but not messing with RAM; in that sense, no different than walking through walls (programming error, no modifying game memory). I would test forcing the game to call Ness' mother's dialogue outside of her house and see if it can run that code without crashing. I don't know why it would crash, but these things tend to be... unpredictable. Assuming you forced it (using PK Hack or an emulator cheat) you could probably verify that calling her dialogue works or doesn't work. Then, of course, someone still has to manage to get her dialogue to come up using only the glitched chat. This would be much easier if we knew how to manipulate what pointer is being used to call dialogue.
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Text pointer addresses in Earthbound seem very unreliable to me, so I would need help testing it... Earthbound (U) pointer1: 7E97B8 pointer2: 7E97B9 window #: 7E8958 Might be of use: http://datacrystal.romhacking.net/wiki/EarthBound:RAM_map Also, the check area glitch is a game-breaking bug that can mess up the game pretty badly; it can be more damaging / is more powerful than the walk through walls bug.
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Yes vote for pacifist night walk before a dreams)
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I posted about this over at Starmen.net (They really love this game) http://forum.starmen.net/forum/Games/Mother2/TASVideos-does-Earthbound-in-21-35-27
When TAS does Quake 1, SDA will declare war. The Prince doth arrive he doth please.
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Slowking wrote:
Man "glitched" is such a stupid category name. Everythign uses glitches.
Join the club.
AzumaK wrote: I swear my 1 year old daughter's favorite TASVideo is your R4MI run :3 xxNKxx wrote: ok thanks handsome feos :D Help improving TASVideos!
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New encode: Link to video It's uploading right now, so it'll appear here in a while. It shouldn't take long to upload, but it might take a while to process.
Editor, Experienced player (570)
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Wow, the new run is even better! Good job manipulating the debug dialogue to shorten the run by so much! And thank you again for encoding, Dada. The new encode looks great!
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Thanks for the encode, Dada! I thought the run wasn't very entertaining, though. I've never played the game, but it started very very slow and only got interesting because of all the epic glitching. Don't get me wrong, though, the run seems very optimized. Good work guys!
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Just yesterday I was watching the Chrono Trigger TAS again... Now this. Poor SNES RPGs, getting raped one after the other. Great TAS, nice improvement!
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