Game objectives
- Emulator used: Bizhawk 2.3.1
- Takes damage to save time
So I didnt expect to have an improvement to this game so soon but here we are.
So zallard1, who is the WR holder for this game in RTA, found an improvement in the stage 6 boss, which saved 42 frames. zallard1 wanted to try and tas it in so I helped him out.
eventually I ended up finding another time save, which makes some rooms end earlier.
NOTE: there is a lua script available for this game included with bizhawk, it will let the viewer see hitboxes which will help explain some of the new tricks found for this game.
I will only cover stages that have improvements to them.
Stage 1
so the improvement to this stage is the one I discovered. in order for the first room to end, Rick's hitbox needs to touch the end room trigger, rather than Rick being off screen. it turns out if you do a kick in the air, it pushes Rick's hitbox a bit behind him, so this allows me to hit that trigger earlier. each time this is done, it saves 12 frames.
Stage 3
first Room has the same time save as explained above
for the boss of this stage, the improvements come from better lag reduction.
Stage 4
for the Ghosts room, I did the hitbox trick again and managed to save one lag frame in the process.
Stage 5
every room here was able to use that hitbox trick at the end of each room
for the Dr West room, I managed to avoid a lag spike by hitting Dr West and destroying a flask he was about to throw at me, that flask will spawn an enemy which will cause a big lag spike.
Stage 6
The Trick that zallard found involves jumping and punching the boss as soon as it appears, which normally shouldn't happen, but apparently has a 3 frame window where you can do it.
I'd like to thank the Splatterhouse Speedrun community who, despite being a small community, are very dedicated to this game and have supported each other in helping bring down the times of this game.
I would also like to thank zallard1 for finding the Stage 6 boss trick and helping out with the TAS.
Memory: Optimization appears good, no obvious flaws. If there are ways to deal with how laggy this game gets, they are not immediately obvious.
The TAS was decently entertaining to me, though I feel some playarounds could be a bit better. It fared better with the audience though, with 8 yes votes and plenty of positive comments.
