Time Lord is what you might call a 2.5D platforming game (z direction is on a slight diagonal). It has a reasonably good engine, which is what attracted me to it. Unfortunately they managed to use a decent game engine to make a really crappy game. There is no blue police box, so we'll assume the main character is not The Doctor.
Game Objectives
- Emulator used: FCEUX 2.1.5
- Genre: platform
- Aims for fastest time.
- Takes no dammage.
Most levels consist of collecting 5 orbs, the 5th is held by a boss enemy. The 6th level has the final boss, but no orbs.
This is actually a fairly difficult game because the enemies are fairly unforgiving in some places, and the method to get a few of the orbs is outright cryptic. I would be surprised if many players got past level 3 in real time without a turbo controller. The mexican cowboy boss on level 3 does have health that regenerates, but with no on screen indication most players probably gave up not knowing if they were even causing dammage.
It may look like using up and down (z direction) to go diagonally has an effect on speed, but if you watch the RAM values this turns out not to be the case. Moving diagonally only looks faster or slower because the z plane is rendered diagonally.
Enemy bosses do not have health bars shown on screen, and strangly the RAM values start at 1 and progress upward to 128.
This game engine does lend itself well to a TAS and in particular a no dammage run. The act of attacking essentially turns off hit detection for enemies and enemy projectiles. You'll notice quite a bit of jump kicking because attacking in air doesn't impact speed. It is particularly evident on the last run up to the boss when I'm getting constantly bombarded by following enemies.
Some Useful RAM values:
- 0xC0 x minor
- 0x484 x minor
- 0x476 x velocity related
- 0xC1 X major
- 0x492 X major
- 0x79 y minor
- 0xC4 z minor
- 0x60F Health
- 0x6A Ground (Not very reliable for choosing when to jump)
- 0x501 Enemy
- 0x726 lvl 4 Orb (set when you are allowed to get the orb)
- 0x4F7 Enemy
- 0x723 Boss
Stage 1:
Your mission - Capture 5 orbs in each time zone and eliminate alien forms changing earth's history. Good luck, time lord.
Small level, orbs are fairly close together. This easy level luls you into a false sense of security.
Stage 2:
Position - Castle Harman. England. ETA - 1250 A.D.
- Orb 1: Collect mushrooms.
- Orb 2: Jump kick in the correct place to be launched towards the orb.
- Orb 3: Go to the lower level then hop back up the pillars. (I have also seen this orb be floating above the landing above and you need to walk back and forth underneath it to get it)
- Orb 4: The red flying monster drops it.
- Orb 5: Stab the dragon.
Stage 3:
Position - Dead Man's Gulch. Western U.S.A. ETA - 1860 A.D.
- Orb 1: Grab the pistol, then shoot the orb and it will launch you higher into the air.
- Orb 2: There is a shotgun available before getting to this orb. The orb is hiding behind the station.
- Orb 3: Shoot this orb repeatedly to freeze it in place while you collect it.
- Orb 4: Jump kick in the correct place to be launched towards the orb.
- Orb 5: Shoot the mexican cowboy. Note that his health does regenerate, so the faster you fire the better. The pistol fires more rapidly than the shotgun.
Stage 4:
Position - The Dora Marie. Caribbean. ETA - 1650 A.D.
- Orb 1: Ring the bell 4 times, and collect the first 3 coins.
- Orb 2: Jump kick to the right when falling back down into the area you just climbed up from.
- Orb 3: You'll notice I skip this flashing orb earlier in the level. It turns out, cryptically, that you need to kill the one eel looking enemy near the throwing knives (needed for the boss).
- Orb 4: I skipped this one earlier also. It will be flashing when you try to get it until you drop down from above.
- Orb 5: Throw knives at the clam.
Stage 5:
Position - Front line trenches. France. ETA - 1943 A,D.
- Orb 1: You need 6 kills before you can collect this one. Kill 6 and come back.
- Orb 2: This orb turns into a projectile. collect it when it stops moving.
- Orb 3: Collect packages to get the grenades. Throw them at the orb to move it to a collectable position.
- Orb 4: Drop into the trench to collect the gas mask and reveal the orb. Drop in again to collect the orb.
- Orb 5: Toss grenades at the machine gun soldier.
Stage 6:
Position - MB Time Travel Center. U.S.A. ETA - 2999 A.D.
No orbs here, just the alien boss. If you collect the stuff from the robots along the way you can get a blaster gun and homing missles. These would be extra helpful in real time to keep the boss at a distance and home in on the heads when they start flying. In a TAS though it was easier to just keep jump kicking, the constant attacking keeps me from taking dammage.
Acknowledgements:
I'd like to thank the following for the helpful resources.
- TenguMan who posted maps on vgmaps.com.
- DDCecil for his walkthrough on gamefaqs.
- MASnVIC for their youtube review.
DarkKobold: I'll judge and attempt to console verify this run.
DarkKobold: This run had enough people happy with it - and the negative voices seemed to be more ambivalent than out-right negative. Therefore, I am accepting this.