I have wanted to make this game race viable for a long time now because, aside from Technodrome manipulation, I feel like this would be a fantastic race game. Therefore, I have created a rom hack that guarantees Technodrome spawn in the best location, and still moves it to bottom left if you game over.
I plan to add cutscene skips in order to make tournaments a bit more viable as well, but this first version only forces Technodrome spawn to the top position. I don't think I introduced any bugs, but if people would give it a test, I would appreciate it.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/qtpas2bwdrc1peg/TMNT%20Race%20Edition.nes?dl=1
Damage boost to avoid the third jetpack guy duck. Even if you have 3 health before, it should leave you with enough to survive an accidental laser or jetpack collision in the next narrow section.
Rope skips with the beetle enemy set are actually pretty easy and forgiving. I think only the first 2 are possible. The second beetle spawn needed for the second gap seems to be RNG if it will spawn or not.
The "trick" is to jump very late in terms of the ground. You want to do a jump that is technically off of the platform (similar to the jump used when grabbing the scrolls, but attacking is unnecessary).
If you jump late enough, the beetle damage boost is actually very forgiving and you can even press back a bit if you think you aren't going to be hit by the beetle.
After you make the skip, avoid the white pillar, as touching it will activate the rope throw back to where you came from. Just jump over it.
First skip seems to save about 1 second, the second skip saves about 2 seconds.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/hfa1um2fgjp7lql/TMNT%20best%20TT.ips?dl=0
Quick and dirty hack to practice Technodrome spawns on flash carts. The location gets put into your high score as the tenths column, after you kill one enemy. 2 is the best spawn.
New improved version. Puts the value into high score instead of score. This also doesn't seem to have the overflow issues from before, so enemy spawns are normal (as far as I can tell).