Important info for syncing the dtm of this TAS:

  • The Dolphin revision used was 3.0-735
  • Memory Card must be on, regardless of its files.
  • LLE recompiler Audio.
  • Dual Core and Idle Skipping turned off.
Before anything, we’d like to give a special thanks to the following people for their help with strats, being TAS pioneers of SA2, or for just being around to help whenever they can:
Authors comments about the run:
  • THC98: I joined this project while itsPersonnal was still optimizing City Escape. We took a very long time to do the ramp abuse skip, and it turned out to be very optimized. We improved a whole second over the TAS made back in 2012, which was a great incentive on the next stages. A few more seconds were improved in Wild Canyon, due to getting a really good emerald layout in the 2nd possible frame. And then it came Prison Lane. This level was very annoying to optimize, but we ended up improving a LOT over 2012 TAS! And in the next levels, we kept getting times that we could never imagine that they were possible! We also had a few other annoying levels to optimize, like Route 101 and Pyramid Cave. But we still got through them! So overall, I’m so glad that itsPersonnal asked for help in this TAS and I’m so happy to see this masterpiece finally finished, with a really high optimization level!
  • itsPersonnal: It’s crazy to think that this is actually finished. I started this as a project with Sonicpacker and Mapler back in 2012. Progress came to a complete stop once we hit Prison Lane (the first Tails level), and after a 2 year hiatus, I tried to start it up again. But new strats were found in City Escape so I had to restart from the beginning. I added all the current SA2 TASers to a skype group and asked for help on the TAS, and THC98 was the only really up for the task. I think for the first few months, the idea of actually finishing never went through my head. I dreaded the idea of TASing Route 101 and some of the Tails levels. And to be honest, I never would have got past those levels on my own. THC98 was a great partner to have. Though we certainly reached sections where we had no idea how to make progress, having someone else around to test ideas and try to improve on is really what got us through to the end. Also the vast majority of “entertainment” during bosses and other sections where you have time to kill, was done by him, which was really nice because I don’t like doing entertainment. This was easily the most incredible TAS project I’ve worked on. We broke so many records, even with the lack of time saving upgrades. We found so many new tricks and techniques for optimizing speed and movement. We pushed Sonic Adventure 2: Battle to new limits. And I’m so excited for the public to finally see our finished project.
About this TAS:
  • The rerecords count is just an average, because the revision of Dolphin that was used doesn't show an accurate number of rerecords
  • Completes Hero Story
  • Aims for real time over in-game time, although we tried to optimize in-game time as much as possible without sacrificing real-time. IL tricks like stopping time were ignored in this TAS.
  • Manipulates RNG for optimal hunting layouts
  • Uses soft resets to save time
  • Abuses glitches
  • GOTTA GO FAST
Final time:
  • According to the VI count (without loading times): 25:11.87
  • According to the frames count (with loading times): 27:12.38
  • According to the in-game time (sum of all levels and bosses): 18:09.48
Commonly used techniques as Sonic:
Bouncing
Bouncing is a game breaking trick that is done by pressing B 30-20 times/sec (depending on the terrain) and holding sporadic directions. You can build speeds up to "17" incredibly fast. Where as a fully charged spindash caps at around 10 speed.
Spindashing
Prior to collecting the bounce upgrade, spindashing is commonly the fastest way of movement. Essentially you just chain spindashes.
Storage/Instant Spindash
Interrupting Sonic while he is about to start a spindash will store his state, allowing you to spindash instantly when you go back to an "on the ground" state. This is often done using springs to interrupt Sonic.
Ramp Abuse
There are two kind of ramp abuse, one during the City Escape boarding section and one on any other kind of ramp. On the boarding section, jumping right before hitting the ramp and then jumping again while on it, this will give you significantly longer air-time. Going at the ramp sideways gives even more air-time. When in a normal state, Sonic can jump off ramps on a skewed angle by jumping before landing on a ramp and then jumping again.
Loop Speed
A technique that was reinvented during this run. Loop speed is performed by taking advantage of scripted loops weird properties. Essentially you just need to homing attack while inside a scripted zone extending out the back of a loop.
Grinding
Some rails have speed caps that are lower than Sonic's speed when he gets on them. You can lock your unexpectedly high speeds by putting Sonic into a "falling off the side of the rail" state and NOT holding B.
Gravity Control/Wallruns
If sonic is moving fast enough off an angled surface, his gravity angle can be skewed temporarily, allowing things often too steep to be considered ground, well, to be considered ground.
Super Bounce
Super bounces convert forward speed into vertical speed by bouncing right before hitting a wall with a high speed.
Mock Super Bounce
Spindashing into certain objects at high speeds can sometimes give an effect similar to a super bounce. It can also be done by spindashing off a ledge and hitting a steep angled surface. This trick was used in Metal Harbor and Pyramid Cave.
Commonly used techniques as Knuckles:
Abusing Down Slopes
Drill diving onto something that is downhill relative to Knuckles’ gravity amplifies speed, like a lot.
Glide Breaking
Glide breaking is a technique used to slow your descent while gliding. When you initially start a glide, you're falling speed stays relatively low for ~60 frames, and then starts to accelerate. By doing a 1-frame drill dive and then starting a new glide, you reset that ~60 frame timer and can cover far distances without losing much height.
Rocket Abuse
Rockets can give weird gravity angles if you drill dive as soon as possible after getting off them. The skewed gravity can be used as a massive speed boost.
RNG Manipulation for emerald layouts
By skipping the cutscene before a hunting level in later frames, we get different emerald layouts. So we simply wait for an optimal emerald layout to come before doing the stage itself. This is the only way to manipulate RNG due to a soft reset right before the stages.
Torch Clip
By jumping below and right in the center of a torch, Knuckles grabs the wall and gets pushed out of bounds by the torch.
Commonly used techniques as Tails:
Pause Jumping
Abusing Pauses to press A twice in two in-game frames will give Tails a height boost that normal hover jumps can not do. Some tricks and out of bounds can only be done with a well timed pause jump. (Holding Y and X makes the pause screen invisible, so that’s why you never see it in the run).
Vulcan Cannon
The Vulcan Cannon shot travels faster than the Laser Cannon and also shoots immediately after pressing B, instead of needing to lock on. With perfect facing angles, you can snipe enemies from across rooms (or even through walls) with the Vulcan Cannon to save time.
Jumping as little as possible
Tails moves fastest on the ground, minimizing air-time saves more than you might think.
Turn around to get speed
When Tails’ speed is very low (or if he’s stopped), it’s useful to do a turn around by holding the opposite direction as he’s facing to. When the turn around animation ends, Tails gets the max speed allowed by the speed cap in the ground he’s on.
Individual levels comments:
City Escape (1.06.50)
We saved an entire second off the 2012 TAS on this stage. Mostly due to more knowledge of how to optimize the boarding section, and the trick to get onto the rail in the section after the giant skip. I think this level is very very close to being capped. More-so than any other stage, this one seems basically maxed.
Big Foot (0.21.39)
All hits were first frame. Nothing special here.
Wild Canyon (0.06.95)
This is the best emerald layout ever, we could never imagine this! Some down slopes were abused to make this time possible.
Eggman 1 (0.11.20)
Dies to stop the timer early. All hits first frame.
Prison Lane (1.21.70)
This huge improvement from the last TAS of this stage (that got 1:27.65) just came from overall optimization, believe it or not. Some jumps were avoided and the movement got much more smooth.
Metal Harbor (1.10.62)
Here is where it starts getting interesting. In the first loop, a wall was hit while Sonic’s gravity was facing sideways so he could get bounced from it. This trick was repeated in another loop in the stage to save even more time. Right after the first check, a loop speed trick was done and it allowed us to do a crazy wall run that saved a lot of time.
Shadow 1 (0.10.94)
All hits were first frame. Nothing special here.
Green Forest (0.58.47)
So much loop speed! This time is unbelievable, it beats the old IL record that had the bounce upgrade! And everything due to the loop speed trick.
Pumpkin Hill (0.19.07)
It’s possible to skip the upgrade cutscene by making a hint monitor text to show up while the cutscene is playing. We just have to activate the monitor before getting the upgrade. About the layout, the emeralds were pretty well placed over the stage, so it was pretty good.
Mission Street (2.00.69)
Cycles make this stage pretty boring normally, but they actually made the first check interesting. We had 2 frames of leeway to make early cycle before check 1, and it costs about 6 seconds to get second cycle here. This was so tight because of how the platforms still move during the upgrade acquiring cutscene.
Aquatic Mine (0.08.67)
This layout was incredible. It was over 3 seconds faster than the second best layout we found! Digging up the last piece was near-pixel perfect to avoid hitting water but still landing inbounds.
Route 101 (2.12.17)
Drifting locks your speed on flat ground.
Hidden Base (1.30.29)
Very nice new strats came from doing more pause jumps.
Pyramid Cave (0.48.34)
Ridiculous first check time, and cool strats up until the bounce upgrade. Everything from there on you just need to see for yourself.
Death Chamber (0.18.47)
This doesn’t look like a good layout at first. But because of the many out of bounds tricks that can be done here, this one was insanely good. A lot of RNG manipulation was done to get those speed shoes. It was manipulated by digging in slightly different spots until speed shoes were got.
King Boom Boo (0.34.67)
It’s possible to go through King Boom Boo by going in a certain area of its body. But when Knuckles get hit from him, the stick control gets locked for a few seconds, so a spiral upper was done to change the facing angle so hitting the hourglass was possible. This is why there were a lot of punches after getting hit.
Egg Golem (0.18.04)
The first 3 hits were done by doing a super bounce on the fence of the platform after a few bounces. In the last 2 though, as Egg Golem’s arm was close to Sonic, it was possible to bounce on it and save a few frames (and it looks very cool!).
Eternal Engine (1.48.40)
There wasn’t anything special about this stage. Movement was a little hard to optimize, mostly on the big skip though.
Meteor Herd (0.20.67)
No layout could get a so fast and so amazing strat like this one. The wall run after the first piece was simply crazy!
Rouge (0.14.39)
All hits were first frame. Nothing special here.
Crazy Gadget (0.29.82)
AHHHHHHHHHHHHH CRAZY NEW STRATS
Eggman 2 (0.14.00)
All hits were first frame. Nothing special here.
Final Rush (1.02.57)
This is almost identical to the old IL record, but a new strat to skip one of the rails and save time was found. All other time-save came from more bouncing and rail optimization.
Shadow 2 (0.14.25)
All hits were first frame. Nothing special here.
Suggested screenshot:
VI #62880
Other cool screenshots:

Nahoc: claimed for judging!
Nahoc: amazing audience response! Great TAS! Although it is made on a pretty old dolphin revision, I see no reason to not publish it. Good job guys and good luck with the future "Dark Story"!
feos: Now or never!


TASVideoAgent
They/Them
Moderator
Joined: 8/3/2004
Posts: 15619
Location: 127.0.0.1
Experienced player (589)
Joined: 2/5/2011
Posts: 1417
Location: France
Followed wips, awesome TAS, yes vote of course ;D
Current: Rayman 3 maybe? idk xD Paused: N64 Rayman 2 (with Funnyhair) GBA SMA 4 : E Reader (With TehSeven) TASVideos is like a quicksand, you get in, but you cannot quit the sand
Experienced player (691)
Joined: 11/23/2013
Posts: 2238
Location: Guatemala
Here, my YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/dekutony
Experienced player (986)
Joined: 8/30/2012
Posts: 373
I've been excited about this for a while. I was highly entertained from the fast-paced feel of the entire run. My favorite stage is Pyramid Cave. I like the fourth screenshot with Knuckles.
Previous TASes: Frogger's Adventures: The Rescue Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door any% x 8 Paper Mario 64 Luigi's Mansion Sonic Heroes - Team Sonic Mario Kart Wii ILs
Joined: 6/6/2004
Posts: 223
Why does it say 9 emblems at the end instead of 17?
THC98
He/Him
Experienced player (924)
Joined: 8/7/2012
Posts: 280
Location: Brazil
Mr. Pwnage wrote:
Why does it say 9 emblems at the end instead of 17?
I don't really know, but I think that the game thinks that after 0 emblems, you need to get an 1-digit number of emblems. So the closest number to 17 that the game can show is 9. Then in the next time you get to an emblem cutscene, the game shows 17 emblems as it's supposed to.
Youtube Channel | Twitch Channel • Finished projects: GC Sonic Adventure DX - Sonic | GC Sonic Adventure DX - Tails | GC Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story | GC Sonic Heroes - Team Sonic • Current projects: GC Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Dark Story - 1st WIP • Paused projects: GC Sonic Adventure DX - Knuckles - 1st WIP • Individual levels records: Sonic Adventure DX | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle • My Discord: Tales98#0408
Joined: 2/1/2011
Posts: 88
Yes. This is one of the fastest Sonic TAS I've watched. The game is broke to the furthest extent it can be while still being watchable. The more glitches that are used the more interesting the TAS is. When you are able to make even the slowest levels (the mech level) look fast, that's a sign you've got yourself a mighty fine TAS...
Active player (264)
Joined: 4/15/2010
Posts: 198
Location: England
My god, Crazy Gadget. Wow. Excellent work, yes vote.
Retired smw-96, smw any%
Active player (309)
Joined: 8/21/2012
Posts: 429
Location: France
Hitboxes, collision detection and physics are just illusions made real by our willingness to believe in them. Thanks for providing a good proof of that. Voting yes of course ^^.
Experienced player (584)
Joined: 2/23/2008
Posts: 266
Location: CA, USA
Amazing run! I'm happy that a run of this game has finally been completed. Loved the crazy skips in Eternal Engine, Crazy Gadget and Final Rush! Yes vote!!! Looking forward to a future Dark Story TAS ;)
Editor, Experienced player (860)
Joined: 8/12/2008
Posts: 845
Location: Québec, Canada
Bobmario511 wrote:
Looking forward to a future Dark Story TAS ;)
Same! Awesome work guys, really enjoyed it.
PoochyEXE
He/Him
Active player (274)
Joined: 12/5/2010
Posts: 32
Definite yes vote! Also, just out of curiosity, what was the reason for intentionally hitting the walls on Route 101? It looks like there's some oddity with the physics engine being exploited here, but I can't quite tell what it is.
Zarmakuizz
He/Him
Joined: 10/12/2013
Posts: 279
Location: France
Sonic was peacefully living his own life, running fast in the whole world. When he finally reached a town, he learnt that Rayman, Mario, and even an ugly dinosaur were going faster than him to complete games. He then went from surprises to surprises: Tails and Eggman were on a Mecha Contest with the finals being on the moon, and his pal added a pro killer feature allowing his Mecha to walk through walls. Knuckles, jealous, pretended he could do it without robots just with a slice of the Master Emerald, so Rouge just defied him to do so and broke the Master Emerald, collecting a few slices to ensure Knuckles won't try with a complete Master Emerald. To top it all off, a new hedgehog tries to steal Sonic's popularity. Sonic had no choice… Gotta go fast!
Synahel
She/Her
Former player
Joined: 1/19/2011
Posts: 260
Location: France
Holy molly, sweet! Looking forward to a Dark Story TAS as well
Mitjitsu
He/Him
Banned User
Joined: 4/24/2006
Posts: 2997
Wow, incredible :-O
itsPersonnal
He/Him
Player (234)
Joined: 1/20/2012
Posts: 542
PoochyEXE wrote:
Definite yes vote! Also, just out of curiosity, what was the reason for intentionally hitting the walls on Route 101? It looks like there's some oddity with the physics engine being exploited here, but I can't quite tell what it is.
Sometimes it's used to turn sharper without losing control. Or because we literally can't take the turns Sharpe enough at the speeds where at. Others, hitting a wall didn't lose any forward speed, but gave us sideways momentum while still going full speed forwards. And lastly, it was sometimes used to stop upwards momentum and land sooner, which means we could boost sooner.
Completed: 2010-Current | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Individual Level TASes 2014 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 1:05:03.23 2014 | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story (w/ THC98) in 25:11.87 2016 | Metroid Prime - Any% in 00:37 (In-Game Time) 2018 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:42.350 2020 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 0:39:20.10 2022 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:25.567 Currently working on: SA2:B DARK STORY
Joined: 6/16/2011
Posts: 48
I'm not too happy about how ridiculously old that rev of Dolphin is--just one look at the loading screens shows how inaccurate it is compared to new builds. I hope one day someone starts a run with a more recent build, but I say yes to this because it was entertaining, and that's what's most important.
THC98
He/Him
Experienced player (924)
Joined: 8/7/2012
Posts: 280
Location: Brazil
RedGreenSonic wrote:
I'm not too happy about how ridiculously old that rev of Dolphin is--just one look at the loading screens shows how inaccurate it is compared to new builds. I hope one day someone starts a run with a more recent build, but I say yes to this because it was entertaining, and that's what's most important.
If you render that run with an av-sync build of this revision, you can get pretty accurate loading times. We just don't really know how to build av-sync versions of Dolphin.
Youtube Channel | Twitch Channel • Finished projects: GC Sonic Adventure DX - Sonic | GC Sonic Adventure DX - Tails | GC Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story | GC Sonic Heroes - Team Sonic • Current projects: GC Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Dark Story - 1st WIP • Paused projects: GC Sonic Adventure DX - Knuckles - 1st WIP • Individual levels records: Sonic Adventure DX | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle • My Discord: Tales98#0408
Techokami
He/Him
Joined: 6/23/2008
Posts: 160
Everything was pretty awesome. Then you got the Bounce Bracelet and snapped the game in two. Yes vote!
Hoandjzj
He/Him
Experienced player (659)
Joined: 4/6/2010
Posts: 240
Patashu
He/Him
Joined: 10/2/2005
Posts: 4045
Me and the three relatives I watched it with give a YES
My Chiptune music, made in Famitracker: http://soundcloud.com/patashu My twitch. I stream mostly shmups & rhythm games http://twitch.tv/patashu My youtube, again shmups and rhythm games and misc stuff: http://youtube.com/user/patashu
Joined: 5/8/2010
Posts: 177
Location: Entropy
Now this is true super sonic speed, without sonic being super that is. Yet! I'd love to see a full hero, Dark, and secret run in one segment. and getting all A in all stages (12345) missions as well. a true 100% run.
Patashu
He/Him
Joined: 10/2/2005
Posts: 4045
Bamahut wrote:
I'd love to see a full hero, Dark, and secret run in one segment. and getting all A in all stages (12345) missions as well. a true 100% run.
180 emblem or RIOT
My Chiptune music, made in Famitracker: http://soundcloud.com/patashu My twitch. I stream mostly shmups & rhythm games http://twitch.tv/patashu My youtube, again shmups and rhythm games and misc stuff: http://youtube.com/user/patashu
Active player (437)
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 3517
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Good run, easy yes vote. I found the Sonic parts the most entertaining ones. I didn't care much for the Tails sections as I found them a bit boring. Good job on the run!
Nitrogenesis wrote:
Guys I come from the DidyKnogRacist communite, and you are all wrong, tihs is the run of the mileniun and everyone who says otherwise dosnt know any bater! I found this run vary ease to masturbate too!!!! Don't fuck with me, I know this game so that mean I'm always right!StupedfackincommunityTASVideoz!!!!!!
Arc wrote:
I enjoyed this movie in which hands firmly gripping a shaft lead to balls deep in multiple holes.
natt wrote:
I don't want to get involved in this discussion, but as a point of fact C# is literally the first goddamn thing on that fucking page you linked did you even fucking read it
Cooljay wrote:
Mayor Haggar and Cody are such nice people for the community. Metro City's hospitals reached an all time new record of incoming patients due to their great efforts :P
Joined: 8/21/2012
Posts: 29
Location: Russia, Moscow
Rolling around at speed of TASes, Got places to go, gotta voting my YES.