Using ricochets, boosting, and precise turns to arrive at the goal, this is a perfect run. While some of this is possible by humans most of the run uses tricks that are too inconsistent or completely impossible by RTA runners.
Game objectives
- Emulator used: BizHawk 1.12.0
- To complete the mandatory 49 levels quickly
- Entertaining tricks that are TAS only due to frame perfection
While the game doesn't warp, die on purpose, or do any save/resets it does take hits on purpose to bounce off enemies and uses the weird programing of one control scheme being faster. The common questions are usually why pause/unpause happens which is because it skips tutorial text and why it crackles which is a sound issue I cannot not find an answer too.
The game is an isometric, platforming marble madness clone made to cash in on the popularity of beyblade in the early 2000's. The controls are simple directions, boost, brake, and special. Then in the game there are enemies with various patterns and behaviors and three special panels spin restore, jump, and boosts.
The movie was made over a month taking a basis in my previous All Levels TAS of the game and was restarted fully twice and partially thrice because the community just recently formed and I had new blood finding ideas as I was working on it
Stages 1-3,4-2,5-2,and 7-1 are all particularly entertaining levels
There are a few points that I could probably boost at different timing or more frequency to save a second or two overall. There are also a few levels where falling off the stage could probably be done with some small changes which saves 10~ frames per instance
GoddessMaria: Alright, so the main thing with this submission is the entertainment value as well as the optimization... This movie does not do well in the entertainment department and as for optimization, it seems okay but there's the question of the author's choice to go with fully charged launches at the start... Overall, this submission doesn't have anything that is too intrusive and subobtimal...
Accepting for Vault.
Noxxa: Due to questions raised about the judgment decision, combined with the fact that GoddessMaria is unable to answer at this point in time due to personal reasons, I am resetting this judgment.
Fog: Okay, there is a bit more to this submission then what was touched on the previous judgement.
The optimization and entertainment opinions from the previous judgement still apply, but the one omission from the judgement is the goal choice. The goal of this submission is not to reach the credits, but to complete the "mandatory" seven rounds of all seven episodes. This is considered by the RTA community of this game as the completion point of any% runs. The issue with this goal is that in this game, there is an actual way to reach the credits through game play. This is considered by the RTA community to be the "all levels" category, and requires the completion of every level in the game (49 main levels, along with 7 bonus levels).
The bonus levels are unlocked by completing every level of an episode under a set par time for each episode. Thus, to reach the credits, every main and bonus level must be completed under each level's par time. Normally, nothing would be out of the ordinary to have categories and goals defined by the RTA community. However, with the goal that this submission aims for, when there is an actual way to reach the credits in normal play, does not really line up with what we consider as completing the game. I would like to point out some precedents and how they apply to this submission:
This submission aimed to reach what I considered to be the bad ending, while being able to reach an ending with credits under normal gameplay. This lines up similarly to the situation with this current submission, as the RTA community of the game defined any% completion by getting caught by Tigger in the final level and trigger the bad ending. This ended up ultimately being rejected because it did not reach the credits, thus not completing the game.
This submission aimed to beat the main levels of the game, getting bronze in all competitions, and unlock the Cruise Ship level. Like this submission and Winnie the Pooh, the RTA definition of any% differs in comparison to reaching the credits when the credits are able to be reached in normal game play. The difference between THPS3 example and Beyblade/Winnie the Pooh is that THPS3 aimed for, and ultimately achieved Moons tier.
With Moons, we allow submissions to have slightly more leeway with how games are completed. In THPS3's case, the goal choice was deemed to be acceptable and being entertaining enough to warrant publication. With Vault, however, we have much more strict guidelines for what is considered completing the game. The guideline for Vault is that if an ending or credits is obtainable through normal game play, the game must reach it for the submission to be deemed completing the game. If an ending or credits is not normally reachable in normal game play, then the game must reach a point where no further progress can be made for it to be accepted to Vault.
Because this game is not entertaining enough to reach Moons, and the goal choice does not reach a proper ending to the game, we cannot accept this run here. As you mentioned in the submission notes, an optimized version of your "All Levels" TAS can be submitted here, and can most likely be accepted through here without any issues.
Rejecting for not completing the game.
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Link to video
