The trick of holding down after entering the name. I tried to time it out using avidemux but feel free to check me on that. If it's something that will take a lot of time, don't feel rushed or anything. I'm in the process of learning this one at a more casual pace in between other runs so the matter isn't pressing by any means.

Thank you for the response!

Would anyone be able to tell me if it's permissible to skip the cutscene of the hero exiting the cave after naming him? Doing so drops the 15.2 second wait down to a 0.9 second wait, which is kind of nice. I understand it's a bit trivial; it would just make resets a little easier to deal with, I think.

Thank you so much! I appreciate you taking the time to find them and reporting back. So far I'm really loving the run. Hopefully I'll be able to make some serious progress now.

I'll be sure to drop by; thanks for making yourself available for help :)

Hi!

I would like to begin running this game and I wanted to check if there are any route notes available. The link in the guides section doesn't seem to be up-to-date and I wanted to make sure nothing else exists before I start from square one :D

I've already seen the TAS notes so any other resources with the exception of watching existing runs on the leaderboard (which I already plan to do) would be much appreciated!

Thanks!

Thank you for the reply! That's very helpful information.

Hello! I'm in the process of learning the glitchless route and am having trouble understanding enemy item drops (not artifacts, but things like stones and material chunks). Are there any resources or is there information available on what exactly affects RNG in relation to item drops?

For example, on any given run through of Year 1 Mushroom Forest, there are a couple enemies that do not seem to have consistency in what they drop (if anything at all), while others will drop specific items every single time. Do we know what causes this? Or is this just one of those "If the enemy drops a good item, keep going. If not, reset." situations?

I should clarify that I'm assuming this behavior is affected by RNG. I could be completely wrong :D

In another forum post here, MLSTRM advises against running on GCN, [quote=MLSTRM]Don't run on a Gamecube. It's much more stable to run on a wii (Less chance of disc read errors, slightly better loading), also that way you can have a Wii from Any region and Softmod it so that you can play games from anywhere, including Japanese ones.[/quote]

So I would have to guess that your Wii is probably the preferred way to go anyway.

This is something that's on the proverbial TODO list but nobody has gotten around to yet (mainly due to this run not having a lot of interest). If more competitive times start being submitted that would probably help make figuring out load times a higher priority. I can't speak for Pres, but I know that I'd be more likely to spend time working on that if there were more activity.

At this point though, things are still pretty stagnant around here so I personally would be less likely to spend much time on it. Plus, I just flushed a bunch of hours into the autosplitter and wiki and kind of want to just spend some time actually running the game now XD

Wow, thanks for the kind words; it means a lot to know somebody might find some of this stuff useful :D

I'm currently working on a relatively in-depth route guide (with pictures! hooray!) so I may get in touch with you at some point and get your input.

As far as Shovel Knight specific things, I would join the Discord server if you haven't already. That can be a wonderful place for asking questions, getting clarification on terminology or even just having someone point you toward a particularly helpful resource.

As @Quivico said, another great way to learn is to ask current runners questions in chat while they stream. Even if the runners themselves don't/won't answer chances are there are other people in chat who run the game and will help you out.

I think the biggest piece of advice that helped me is try to fight that urge to perfect every nitty-gritty detail right off the bat. Learn the basics/essential pieces for each part of the run and try to get a completed run under your belt as soon as you can. It can help you keep momentum and motivation for learning the game because you're actually achieving something and seeing a bit of a pay-off for your hard work. Having that base time to work down from makes spending time on the details much more rewarding, IMO. Now I'm not familiar with the intricacies of running Shovel Knight but if there are any strats that aren't absolutely essential to simply finishing the run I would say to wait and come back to those after you have the basics of each stage down.

Obviously each person is different with different learning styles so this may not be the best advice for all, but it does seem to be a somewhat common hint that I can say helped me tremendously. Hope this is helpful and GL on all of your future speedrunning endeavors!

I like this thread :)

It's no longer Saturday, but I'll post my positive things FROM Saturday!

1. PB'd by 7 minutes on my current running project.
2. Somebody told me I have a good stream, lol. I've never been given that compliment before and it really made my day.
3. I successfully wrote my first auto-splitter!

Combine these and the result was a very enjoyable weekend!

That makes sense. Thanks!

I'm a bit confused on the requirements for submission timing. If the load-remover is used, is it necessary to also submit a time with loads included?

Hi, I'd like to request a mod change for the leaderboard of the game Antenna. The current mod has been inactive on SDC for 3 months and their Twitch account also seems to be inactive. There are no other mods for this game to reach out to, so I'm making a change request here.

Lately I've been encountering an odd glitch in between the 2nd puzzle and the beginning of the 3rd signal. The antennas on the 3rd signal will come up and then soft lock so that the B prompts never show up. This seems to happen sporadically if I skip the animation between the puzzle and the signal and occurs consistently if I spam the B button during the initial antenna raising animation.

Has anyone else encountered this or have thoughts on what's triggering it?

I take breaks from time to time if my schedule gets super packed, but I always come back to it. It's one of the ways I relax and is something I genuinely enjoy. Unlike those currently occupying the AARP age group, most of us have more or less grown up in a time decently saturated with video games. If you look at what was available to us in the mid-80s and 90s vs what was available in the 70s and prior it kind of makes sense as to why not too many geezers these days are avid gamers.

All of that to say, when a couple more decades roll by I will absolutely still be playing games. I cannot wait to be a cranky old man trolling youths and yelling at kids to get off my server.

Thank you!

Sorry for reviving a dead thread, but I wanted to ask if the FFIV Discord server is still active. I'm pretty new and would love to be able to pick some experienced minds about running FFIV and see what info is available for it. If it's not really that active anymore, is there anywhere else I should be looking?

Thanks in advance!