This is my second submission of Wizards & Warriors X. As before, the goal is to complete the game without taking any damage. It improves upon the first submission by 2820 frames, largely due to better jumping during levels and maximizing the damage dealt during boss fights.
- Goal: Complete the game without taking any damage
- Uses VBA 1.7.2 re-recording version 10 (seems to play back correctly in v19.3)
- Game Boy emulation, no BIOS
- No Left+Right/Up+Down
- No warps or passwords
- Abuses programming errors
- Abuses luck
The Story
According to the dates given in the manuals, this game takes place after Wizards & Warriors III, although it was published earlier. Malkil is back at his evil deeds. He has abducted Princess Elaine and taken her to his Fortress of Fear. It's up to Kuros to save her.
The Movie
The goal of this movie was to get through the game without taking any damage. It is definitely possible to complete it more quickly if one takes damage, but I decided to go for a no-damage run because it is ridiculously easy to get hurt. Enemies hurt you by draining your life; you do not get pushed back upon contact, you just lose life. Furthermore, you have only a few frames of invincibility after getting hurt, so it is easy to get killed by a single enemy. As in many games, you can also lose life from falling too far. However, I think the programmers overdid it in this case because even normal jumps from one ledge to another that is only a few pixels lower can hurt you.
I only opened two treasure chests during the recording. The first one contained the Spell of Invincibility. As far as I can tell, that is the only chest from which you can get the Spell in the entire game. It was actually impossible to avoid that chest, since the enemy would have turned around and hit me if I would have tried to jump over it. The spell allowed me to jump through several enemies without having to worry about taking damage. I am not sure how much time it saved, since I had to wait for the screen saying I picked up the Spell to go away. You cannot speed up any of those message screens (chests or level endings), which probably increase the length of the movie by at least 3 minutes.
I obtained the Boots of Jumping from the second chest. This required going out of the way a little bit, but the Boots were essential. They allow you to jump higher and farther, as well as allowing you to fall any height without taking damage.
Programming Errors
I discovered one glitch in the game. If you attack with your sword on a moving platform, the attack animation may retain its vertical position even if the platform moves down. You can then jump off of air as soon as the attacking animation is finished. This does not always happen, and I am not quite sure what causes it. I used it twice in level 1-0 and once near the beginning of level 3-1.
Luck
Enemy spawning is very manipulable in this game. It seems to depend on how quickly you are moving through any level, what buttons you are pressing, how long you are pressing them, and maybe even how much life you have. Here are several examples:
- I manipulated one of the jumping fish out of existence in level 1-0.
- If you compare this movie to my previous submission, you will notice that there are fewer enemies near the end of level 1-2. This might be related to me jumping more in that level instead of walking.
- At the beginning of level 3-0, I manipulated a second soldier out of existence. I am pretty sure it happened because I started moving to the right as quickly as possible after the soldier that did appear turned around.
Improvements
Most of the improvements in levels come from better jumping, while most of the improvements in boss fights come from watching the RAM to maximize the damage of each attack. When jumping, it is better to continuously jump rather than to make individual jumps. This is because Kuros has an animation that costs about one frame every time he starts a jump from a standing or crouching position; the animation does not occur if he is already jumping.
- Level 1-0: 55 frames saved by using the glitch twice and by better jumping
- Level 1-1: 19 frames saved due to better jumping
- Level 1-2: 62 frames saved by luck manipulation, ignoring a gem, and better jumping
- Level 1-3: 64 frames saved by defeating the boss more quickly
- Level 2-0: 21 frames saved due to better jumping
- Level 2-2: 1076 frames saved by taking that hidden door near the beginning, basically skipping the level
- Level 3-1: 7 frames saved due to better jumping
- Level 3-3: 57 frames saved by defeating the boss more quickly
- Level 4-0: 665 frames saved by jumping over those soldiers instead of killing them
- Level 4-2: 579 frames saved by defeating the boss more quickly
- Level 5-0: 215 frames saved by defeating Malkil more quickly
By the way, the number of re-records is so low because I pasted several levels from the previous submission into this movie. Between the two movies, there were 8788 re-records.
