My personal take on what the rules should be:

• No easy except for the Sexy + pin wall ("required for a drop" rules are iffy because what if you're playing easy to get money pins?)
• No food routing that takes advantage of the midnight reset
• Pin evolution via mingle or shutdown PP banned

And everything else should be fair game.

As for the subject of 1P2C vs 2P2C, until it's proven that 2P2C is significantly faster than 1P2C, then they should be lumped together. 2P2C is theoretically faster but only if both players can read each other perfectly.

Midnight reset can be done accidentally, so while it’s annoying and I’d prefer it didn’t exist, banning it causes more issues than allowing it given how easily it can be done. Shutdown PP is more difficult, but unless it causes a negative effect on the run as a whole, I’d probably allow it too.

The characters' diets should already be planned: the first 18 bytes are locked, and after that, only food that digests in <=6 bytes will work. The only >6 food that should be bought anyway are 1 Tonkotsu Ramen (Neku brv +6), 1 Shio Ramen (wall), 1 Miso Ramen (Shiki atk +1), and up to 7 hot dogs (partner atk +1). You can't screw this up unless you accidentally have a partner eat a 4th hot dog. Allowing midnight reset would just allow Neku to intentionally eat other stat boosting food.

I support banning shutdown PP evolution because changing the date is different on the various systems (DS/DSi/3DS) and it's a pain in the ass to deal with that. It is also an external exploit; traditionally in-game exploits are allowed but not external ones.

So Neku gets slightly better stats? That seems like a small trade instead of a difficult to enforce rule. Saying “oh, they can only do so much” is weird when by the games own rules, the player has done nothing to change that. Setting the switch clock to 11 pm before a run is annoying but not super difficult unless I’m mistaken.

You are right though; the rules probably should make the easy mode exception for Sexy + explicit unless the argument is made that any drop farming could be allowed on easy.

I agree with some of the arguments for shutdown pp but it doesn’t cause an issue for the Switch version in particular so it doesn’t hold there. It is, however, a very deliberate action which makes it easily enforceable if it’s agreed that changing the switch time mid run is a negative (I’d generally agree that it is)

But it's easy to enforce: you watch the run and see what food each character eats. The items menu is accessed so many times, and all stats are on one page, so it's impossible to hide anything.

The main thing with disallowing a midnight reset is that it wouldn't matter that much for Any%, as your objective is just not doing many fights. There's just no real use to having a new set of 24 bytes unless you go past the credits and do All Secret Reports, which is why I actually use it in my NDS route for that.

I'm ok with allowing SDPP in Final Remix in particular since there are no hardware differences this time. It MAY be useful but it's unlikely.

I'm 100% ok with changing rules to "Normal or higher", although we may have to change the category names to include that.

I don’t think changing the category name really matters that much; normal mostly means “not easy” in this situation. Regardless, I think changing Sexy + to be an explicit for easy is a good rule unless we want to allow optional fights on easy if the reason is a drop, which likely changes other parts of the route, since Gispy is right, the current wording leaves lots of potential loopholes and could cause issues of intent.

I’m also more in favor of not banning midnight reset because it’s currently not particularly impactful, and leaving it shelved until there’s clear time save potential from it at which point it probably should be reopened. Banning something before it’s used or tested is bad policy, especially if nobody uses it in any% currently. If there’s clearly demonstrated time save potential or a route discussed, we can reopen it.

True. W3 doesn't have enough fights for Viper Drink to be of any use, and all of the other ATK+ foods are inefficient. Hot dogs are used because it's the only option. DEF and HP foods are irrelevant, and sync foods fall under the fullness threshold anyway.

In DS, the Force Rounds pins with penetrating bullets bugged out. As a penetrating bullet went through an enemy, the enemy became invulnerable for a few frames. This caused penetrating Force Rounds pins to have significantly worse real DPS than regular Force Rounds pins. Black Venus, even without the set bonus, was the Force Rounds pin of choice because it used regular bullets. Sexy Beam was the best Natural Puppy Force Rounds pin.

I can't test out Remix anymore so experiment to see if they fixed this.

yeah it works fine on solo/final remix. Also, yes, "Normal or Higher" makes perfect sense.

edit: also innocence beam kinda owns so I'm board with this suggestion

Burst rounds work again... On 1 sensitivity. It feels awful for everything else but it's 100% optimal now... Ugh.

For press inputs I can get them pretty consistently, when my deck is set up properly.

Personally they work better when I have them subbed, and when they’re in early slots. Sometimes it seems that unsubbed pins with similar inputs (tap, drag) can conflict, not sure why.

Joycon calibration seems a little weird but you should know that they can be recalibrated at any time. In menus, on the overworld, in cutscenes, in fights, with or without pausing... As long as they’re perfectly still for a moment they’ll recenter. Good luck mashing dialogue and having them recalibrate lol. It’s plenty of time if you have the text skip though.

I believe when you hit the system menu where it wants you to turn on a Joycon, like coming back from the home menu, the moment it connects it sets that as true neutral. So, if possible, set it down after/while it connects. Otherwise it’s going to race across the screen like I’m sure you guys have seen.

Another thing to note is that you don’t have to point at the screen before recentering. Center can be wherever you want it.

And well, uh... I play a lot of Splatoon with split Joycons. I’m pretty steady even on high sensitivities. I play with a pillow on my lap and rest my hands on it to keep steady. I also do aiming drills at least once a week. It’s carried over pretty well to TWEWY, so... I’ll let you guys make of it what you will, but I’m definitely recommending the pillow or some support. Maybe look at what some Splatoon pros have to say about the controls over there? Might find out something useful.

Punchy tried mass ATK Beat last night. It works, I'll leave it to him to tell you about it

I didn’t doubt it. I’m just running through and putting together my own version of the route. :)

Beat's week is now cleared in under an hour. At this point, I think his week is almost optimal; virtually every fight in his week is under 30 seconds. Clothing looks good because I can't find anything better than San Francisco/Negotiator/King Pendant. The only significant non-glitch time saves here would be less random reaper bounties. Another thing to maybe explore is skipping the 2 pigs, but this would mean fighting the bat boss and Uzuki with a crippled Beat.

Looking at Shiki and Joshua's weeks, their clear times are still a bit over 70 minutes. What if we massed ATK on these weeks too? The boosts aren't as juicy, but Ideally the setup is Purple Sneaks + hat + top + accessory. This means Green Warm-ups as a battle equip isn't needed. (You'll still need 4 Mus Rattus clothes for the W2D5 wall.)

Hat: Knit Casquette (+4) is ideal for Neku/Joshua. Star Cap (+5) is for Shiki only due to BRV. This is the best until W2D4, where you can buy San Francisco (+7).

Top: Maybe getting a second Biker Jacket (+10) for Joshua on W1D6 could work, as Neku will equip his on W2D2. (The 2nd Durable Leather is given at the W1D6 Molco wall.) For the D+B wall, Denim Blouse (W2D4 Molco, +5) looks OK, and means you don't need to buy Stronger Cap/Cupid Tee. For week 1, Alive (W1D4 Wild Boar, +3) works for Neku and Shiki (until she equips the Biker Jacket), but it might be too expensive in the early stage of the game. Buying 2 Alive here means you don't have to buy 2 New York on W3D2 to raise shop FSG.

Patchy Biker Jacket is +21 for Neku but I don't think it's worth the time loss to farm 5 Tektite for it.

Accessory: Double-spiked Cuff (W1D5 Molco, +3) isn't special but it's still better than Nylon Waist Pack. On W1D7, you can buy Funky Shades (Kurakura, +4), and on W2D4, you can buy Red Mohawk Set (Tigre Punks, +7). Neku can get a Wild Boar Pendant (+9) for himself on W2D2.

By replacing all of the Mus Rattus equips with beefier stuff, money will be in very short supply, so some of these suggestions may not be feasible.

Lastly, you can play risky on W3D6 if you're using Natural Puppy pins. Set level to 1 and hard at the start of the day, and any random reaper fights will drop the NP Resonance pin. Wearing it is equivalent to ATK +14 if you're playing with Casual Pendulum/Innocence Beam/Sweet Talk Tether. But you're screwed if you can't beat it. Hmm.

Fwiw I generally think ATK focused builds are almost certainly more beneficial in Final Remix. You build meter pretty fast in co-op already, fusions are slow as balls and we often are just building meter that doesn't get used.

I wouldn't know how to turn all of that stuff above into a cohesive route, but I definitely agree it's something that'd probably turn out worth. Shiki already hits like a brick shithouse, the only time you ever really need a fusion during her week is Day 7 Bird Dude and a Level 1 suffices perfectly fine, ATK build or no.

EDIT: Routing pic removed; see updated one on page 4

Try this. No detours required.

Week 1: Neku could eat a hot dog too, though that delays the equips. I don't think giving him a hot dog is a great idea. Shiki has ATK +2 on D5 and D6, and ATK +4 for the GM. Neku has ATK +4 on D6. This is very modest so I don't think much time will be saved here. But there aren't any better ATK clothes.

Week 2: Joshua immediately has ATK +5 on D1. This goes up to +8 on D4 from Red Mohawk Set (+7), and Joshua gets to keep the 2nd Biker Jacket for D3-D7, excluding the GM. If you have enough money for 3 San Francisco, then you won't need to swap out Joshua's. Maybe a 5-minute save if we're being optimistic.

Equips for the brand walls -- NP: Black Stripe, Brown Jeans // DB: Knit Casquette, Denim Blouse

Week 3: Stays largely the same, but Beat wears Biker Jacket (+10) instead of Hey Everybody (+7) until he gets Negotiator on D5. Neku stays with Red Mohawk Set until Beat can wear King Pendant, then he gets the Wild Boar Pendant.

Final buylist. Massing ATK for all weeks works, and Punchy lowered the WR to 3:16:09, a 7.5 minute improvement. Slight changes to the original buylist:

• Neku can't equip BBT, so that was a mistake. He can equip the Yellow Tee for ATK +1. Punchy didn't bother with this.
• Double-spiked Cuff has the ability "ATK Break Finisher". This is a detrimental ability, as it overrides Poison Bones' DEF Break. After a practice run, we decided to just go with more Spiked Chokers at a slightly additional cost.
• For W2D7, Joshua's lv3 is so powerful against Sho that it's better to run BBT over Denim Blouse just for the faster fusion.

As for routing changes, the NP Resonance pin was obtained on W3D5 by doing the mass reaper fight on lv1 hard. It has the benefit of no longer hearing Punchy bitch about what should go in his extra pin slot. :p His final deck was Nenekiri (replaced by Lightning Rook after Kitaniji) + NP Resonance + 3 NP pins.

Any further timesaves with the mass ATK strategy would be based on execution, and a bit of luck. A radically different routing strategy that might challenge this is SOS, but farming the additional Tektite could be a massive time loss. (Sun Emperor needs 3, Goth Bondage Coat needs 2)

Shoutout to Punchy for working on this run and giving me the motivation to pry into FR a bit further. I'd assume this would also work for Solo Remix, but SR has slower text speed and no co-op.

Hmm what

Ribbon Bonnet (Shiki ATK +5) cost ¥3000/BRV 117 in DS. But it got lowered to ¥1800/BRV 107 in FR, which means Shiki can wear it immediately on W1D3 for cheap. The yen discount appears to be an English-only buff, as the JP wiki lists it at ¥3000/BRV 107. It would work for all fights during D3, then get replaced by Star Cap on D4.

Maybe there are other buffed clothes hiding around. I mainly used the EN wiki (which has DS stats) for buylist prep, so there could be other changes.

EDIT: This and other changes (starting yen, ATK Capsules) were all in Solo Remix, too.