Stage 5 is finished, yay!
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1986509721/WIP-Power-Blade2-stages-1-5.fm2
I remade the boss battle with the twin cyborgs(robots) from stage 4 because I found out that the shot animation when you are in the air gets canceled when you land and you can perform other actions right after that! ... so I saved about 75-80 frames by placing myself in between the twins and making small jumps to do double shots (I even show this at the end of the battle).
One important thing to mention is that the loading screens also have some frame rule where if you finish faster the next room will show up at the same time even if you finished a little slow ... and in some cases, finishig quicker may produce additional lag frames in further areas which is annoying.
Now onto stage 5:
- in the first area I had to slay the flying robot with laser, otherwise the game would lag and lose more frames if I hadn't done that
- in the second area I'm trying to keep it entertaining while going up on those moving platforms
- in the 3rd area I'm saving time by bumping into one of the runners which propels me at a great speed towards the exit
- 4th area: just skipping the cutscene + a shot to the face at the woman
- 5th area: keeping it entartaining ... I sacrificed a few frames for entertainment
- 6th area: raining death from above and grabbing a small battery
- area 7: just swimming downwards and avoiding enemies
- area 8: going up ... and that's about it
- area 9: the first balloon producing machine causes a lot of lag frames so I get rid of it as fast as possible
- area 10: I get rid of the two female disc throwing robots because they cause lots of lag
At the boss battle I jump a lot to cancel shot animations and to destroy the suckers attached to the ceiling while still doing damage to the boss according to the 16 frame rule ... for the last stage I'm left with 16 units of energy which translates to about 16*400 = 6400 frames with the suit ... not very much considering that the last stage is the longest and i have to defeat the first boss with at least 1 unit of energy to spare.
It just occured to me that I might be able to save some time by not using the suit in the first area (since i go back to normal in the next room and the transformation takes 1-2 seconds) ... i just tested that and at first glance it saved about 16 frames XD (my bad) ... but I don't want to leave you guys with nothing so I'm posting this anyway.
The next post with the final stage will probably be put on hold for more than a month or so since I'll be busy with studying for exams and going to work ... also I want to make a real-time play of the game following the exact same path in the TAS (stages 3,1,2,4,5,6) and post it in the 'Let's see you play something' topic of the forum ... just to have a comparison.
