This is one of my favorite videos of all time, perhaps even surpassing Watch for Rolling Rocks in 0.5x A Presses (although obviously not as iconic). It just perfectly scratches that itch of someone using a combination of technical skill and lateral thinking to complete an absurd video game challenge, all presented by an even-keeled narrator with clear visualizations and a bit of humor sprinkled in. I think I've watched it half a dozen times at this point--it's my "comfort food" for when I'm having trouble sleeping.
Kind of amazing that the very first video the creator has put out is such a banger, not just in terms of content but in terms of production value. He did say that he'd be making another video, so I'll be looking forward to that--tough act to follow, though, not unlike Watch for Rolling Rocks.
Can anyone recommend any channels/videos along the same lines? I've devoured the following:
- All of pannenkoek's videos (both commentated and uncommentated)
- bad_boot's Enter the Secret Aquarium in 0x A Presses
- All of Bismuth's videos
- All of Pikasprey's Softlock Picking videos (tbh while some of these can be interesting, they're not really in the same ballpark...more just something to take the edge off)
- Many of Crystal_'s Pokemon glitch videos (again, interesting, but no voice commentary and not as grand in scale--mostly just straightforward glitch documentation)
- All of Lowest Percent's videos
- All of Retro Game Mechanics Explained's videos (okay only a few of his videos are remotely related but holy crap, easily some of the highest quality videos on the net if you're into detailed technical breakdowns of retro games/consoles and absolutely top-notch visualizations)
Got excited, then realized I'd already seen it. I like these kind of videos too, something very satisfying about the creativity plus the dedication to pull this stuff off.
Maybe https://www.youtube.com/@DisplacedGamers/videos it's a bit dry and code heavy comparatively though.
https://www.youtube.com/@SwankyBox mods old games for challenges and to show off cut content and stuff.
Lots of "history of speedrun records" channels have a similar vibe, but not quite the same thing.
Sorry to get your hopes up! Well, you can be sure I'll be posting his next video whenever it drops.
I've seen a few random videos from Displaced Gamers, but for some reason I'm not subbed! Thanks for rectifying that.
Now SwankyBox, I haven't heard of--will definitely check out some of their videos. I do enjoy perusing TCRF and watching Boundary Break from time to time
I do watch some speedrunning content from time to time (e.g. Summoning Salt and AverageTrey) but I'm mostly interested in the glitches/exploits/tools so my enjoyment can vary pretty heavily depending on the quantity and depth of those aspects
Ah, wanted to reply but the site keeps breaking on me!
Boundary Break is a good one too, been following for a while, I like to get a glimpse of the weird left-overs and strange things that show up in games. I've seen a few more good channels like that and I wish I'd subbed to them so I could recommend them now!
I'm a bit the same wrt speedruns, I like the creative ways people find to exploit code, and then the absurd level of mechanical precision that goes into polishing those runs until they're prefect is cool to see too.
gamechamp3000 has some great ones https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MK6ub-Z7snI&list=PLfDC5d996dRH4StrfmU1SEqXjhpstgoML&index=57
Who knew pushing a box could be so heroic? Thanks for the recommendation!
here's a playlist with some more https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfDC5d996dRH4StrfmU1SEqXjhpstgoML
okay, but why doesn't he just purposefully lose the first fight w/rival, to avoid having to account for both "lvl 5" and "lvl 6" disjuncts and ensure he just needs to worry about "lvl 5"?
maybe it's impossible to actually lose on purpose? like, will enough growling just result in squirtle never hitting him, and then he's eventually forced to scratch squirtle to KO?
I see a few comments mentioning that on the video, but I didn't see the creator addressing any of them directly
It's definitely possible to lose on purpose--I just tried it a few times in an emulator and I lost easily by spamming Growl. I suppose it's technically possible that the Squirtle with its 95% accuracy Tackle could whiff every single one (or most of them) and Struggle itself to death, but that seems so astronomically improbably that it's not worth considering.
He actually does address this in the video, albeit indirectly (which is why I think there was some confusion--I had to double-check myself even having watched this video so many times):
(@4:18) It doesn't really matter whether I win or lose this battle but for reasons I'll describe later it's nice if I can
(@6:46) The second caveat is that whether or not you can run away is dependent on your Speed stat. If you're faster than the enemy, then you get away; if you're slower, there's a chance you can't escape. The slowest Charmanders are outsped by fast Pidgeys in the grass outside Pallet Town and there's a chance I can't escape. Winning the Rival Battle helps mitigate this since Charmander will be faster at Level 6, but I can't avoid a slow Charmander that loses the Rival Battle not being able to escape, and from there the run is basically over. The chance that this happens, though, is quite low at less than a percent, but this is the reason that I can only say that this sequence of inputs almost always beats the game.
So TL;DR/TL;DW: intentionally losing the Rival Battle will make it more likely for Charmander to get outsped by a wild Pidgey, thus increasing the run failure rate.
