Yeah, why not...

Seems like taking a break from speed running Sonic (or just games in general) wasn't such a horrific idea.  At first I was convinced that I'd have to keep playing to stay sharp.  Eh... perhaps if it meant me trying to execute a speed glitch, maybe.  Otherwise, I can't say that I've really unlearned anything.

Throughout January and December of 2012 (Happy Belated New Year, btw) I was occasionally playing Generations, and instead of taking on something new and large like a main stage, I decided to focus on taking on something new and small, like a mission.  It wasn't something I was doing too often, just whenever, really.  I had always wanted to speed run the Way Past Fast mission in Green Hill Act 2 and 1 minute turned to 58 seconds... which turned into 57 seconds... and eventually turned into 56 seconds, and here I thought that it's probably a good time to start recording.

And the result is that I believe this is the fastest non-glitched run of the stage (so far).  I think it can go faster.  It may seem minor, but the mistake I made here was holding on to the boost button after Sonic was launched where the drift section ended.  That small amount of boost could've been used at the end of the run.  I can't help it if he looks so cool covered in his own blue speedy element.


After that, I gave my favorite stage another run and almost effortlessly broke my old record.  Time to record again?  Yeah... and what semi-strange times I trapped...

Even after I record a run, I look back at it over and over and ask myself, "Can it go faster?"  For a much more complex stage such as this one, the answers come clear (also after looking at other people's runs not so compulsively).  There are quite a few things I could've done better.  The difficult air boost to platform->jump to next platform thing I pointed out at the start is still weird, but after a thousand deaths I realized it seemed a bit more successful not only boosting as late as possible but to the far left of it as well.

On the same token, I feel like it's possible that Sonic's jump height from the platform is almost always high enough (though it does fluctuate).  It's just that if it's low, then I might have to air boost earlier.  I decided to play with the skill that slows down time and tell me... why is it that when I used that skill to play in slow motion, 3 out of 3 times when I landed on the platform, I made that jump every - single - time.

I made a mistake after the first pulley because I hadn't practiced that part with boosting it and that resulted in a late homing attack on the spring (and I know now to aim for the far right one).

The cloud... oh... I hate the cloud.  It's always more rewarding to hit the cloud as early as possible, but it's placement + Sonic's controls after hitting it just make it much easier to land on the far left of it so you line up with the tick launcher.

Maybe I should've tapped boost going down the rail or attempt the new way of leaving the rail with an air boost in 3D... because I was a full second behind to the next checkpoint, geez...

After landing on the rotating platform, I could've air boosted a bit earlier to that brief narrow hallway as it's not that high.

And when I air boosted to the transport thing - that was completely spontaneous and was the first time I did it while recording.

Just before the side-step area, I was able to do that faster by boosting as soon as I landed on that area.  It can go faster if your jump to there lines up right in front of the dash pad so you can just boost right on it's path (or maybe side-stepping to the right as you boost, maybe - though I think side-stepping in this game without skills slows you down a bit).

And everything else after that went pretty much the way I wanted it to.  I ended the stage with a lot more boost meter than I expected.

I will be attempting Sky Sanctuary with skills along with another mission.  SS2 will be my first serious skills run.  The Green Hill skills run with the Unleashed run I did back in November '12 wasn't really serious.  It was really just filler and seeing how tieing two speed runs in 1 video would work. (The Unleashed run however was serious.)


Outside of my speed runs, anything in the Sonic universe that concerns me?  Actually, yes.  But that will be in a near future post where I'll be talking about what I've come across in what is known as the worst Sonic game of all time.  The speed runners I keep up with still seem pretty active and I've managed to collect a few new names that have come out and even best one of sobatuyu100's times.  Who in the world Japan could do this?  Find out next time!