The Absurd History of Level 8-2
Summary
TLDRThe video script narrates the intricate history and evolution of level 8-2 in Super Mario Brothers, a game renowned for its challenging speedrun dynamics. Once deemed impossible for a perfect run, the level saw a transformation within a year, shifting from an unattainable feat to a prime target for record-breaking attempts. The narrative unfolds through a series of peculiar events, including a 20-minute title screen wait, millions of simulations, and even a solution inspired by a dream. The story highlights the dedication and ingenuity of the speedrunning community as they tackle frame-perfect tricks, phantom bullet bills, and the infamous coin toss mechanic. Despite the complexity and the numerous strategies explored, including a rare plant despawn and a double Bullet Bill jump, the essence of the narrative lies in the pursuit of simplicity amidst absurdity. The journey from an initial time-consuming and complex approach to a more streamlined and efficient strategy is a testament to the continuous innovation and exploration within the speedrunning community.
Takeaways
- 🎮 The history of level 8-2 in Super Mario Brothers is filled with surprising developments and strategies that have evolved over time.
- 🚀 At one point, achieving a perfect run in level 8-2 was considered impossible, but within a year, it became a key area for improving world records.
- 💡 The evolution of strategies involved odd sequences, such as waiting on the title screen and running millions of simulations to find solutions.
- 🕒 A significant change involved a discovery that allowed for more precise control over the game's frame rules by manipulating power-ups and taking damage.
- 🌟 The 'Double Bullet Bill' strategy was developed, which potentially improved the speedrun time but required a lengthy wait on the title screen.
- ⏱️ Despite the potential of the Double Bullet Bill strategy, it was not widely adopted due to the initial long wait time and slight increases in difficulty in other parts of the level.
- 🔄 Kriller 37's innovative thinking led to the realization that the fast acceleration at the start of the level (fast Excel) might not be necessary, which simplified the strategy.
- 🎉 The culmination of these strategies and insights led to a new world record time for Super Mario Brothers speedrunning, achieving the long-awaited time of 45:45.
- 🧠 The story of level 8-2 showcases the dedication and creativity of the speedrunning community, as they continuously push the boundaries of what's thought possible in a game.
- 📉 The process of discovering new strategies often involves complex and sometimes convoluted methods before arriving at simpler and more efficient solutions.
- 📈 The constant refinement of strategies and the willingness to challenge established methods are what make speedrunning an engaging and dynamic competitive scene.
Q & A
What is the significance of level 8-2 in Super Mario Brothers?
-Level 8-2 is significant because it is one of the hardest levels in the game, especially for speedrunners. It has a history of being considered impossible to complete with a perfect run, but over time, strategies were developed to achieve this.
What is the 'coin toss' phenomenon in Super Mario Brothers?
-The 'coin toss' phenomenon refers to the game mechanic where Mario can only interact with enemies every other frame. On one frame, he can stomp enemies or take damage, but on the next frame, he will pass through them without interaction until the second frame of overlap.
How did the initial strategy for a perfect run of level 8-2 change over a year?
-The initial strategy evolved from being considered impossible to becoming the best place to improve the world record. This change was due to a sequence of odd events, including waiting on the title screen, running simulations, and discovering new tricks like the fast acceleration and the Bullet Bill glitch.
What is a 'Phantom bullet bill' in the context of Super Mario Brothers speedrunning?
-A 'Phantom bullet bill' is a bullet bill that never appears on screen but shows up in memory for one frame. This phenomenon can affect gameplay, and it is used in the strategy to despawn the piranha plant in level 8-2.
Why was the Double Bullet Bill strategy not widely adopted by speedrunners?
-The Double Bullet Bill strategy was not widely adopted because it made early parts of the level slightly harder and required waiting on the title screen for an extended period. Speedrunners preferred the three-frame jump setup, which was more consistent and less time-consuming.
How did kriller 37 contribute to improving the strategy for level 8-2?
-Kriller 37 discovered that a precise jump from the top of the staircase could achieve the necessary height for the Bullet Bill glitch without the need for a fast acceleration at the start of the level. This simplified the strategy and improved the success rate of achieving a perfect run.
What is the 'fast excel' at the start of level 8-2, and why was it initially thought to be necessary?
-The 'fast excel' is a technique where Mario accelerates faster by jumping backwards in the air than running forward on the ground. It was initially thought to be necessary because it allowed for a slight speed increase at the start of the level, which was crucial for achieving the perfect run.
Why did the initial strategy for level 8-2 require waiting on the title screen?
-Waiting on the title screen was a method to manipulate the frame rule timer, allowing access to more patterns that could potentially lead to the despawning of the piranha plant and other advantageous outcomes.
How did the discovery of the 'Phantom bullet bills' impact the strategy for level 8-2?
-The discovery of 'Phantom bullet bills' led to the realization that they could be used to despawn the piranha plant, which was a significant obstacle. However, the conditions required for this to happen were extremely rare and difficult to replicate consistently.
What is the frame rule in Super Mario Brothers speedrunning, and how does it affect the game?
-The frame rule in Super Mario Brothers speedrunning refers to the specific frame on which a player can arrive at a certain point in the game. It affects the game by determining the enemy patterns and other in-game events, which can significantly impact the strategies used by speedrunners.
How did the speedrunning community react to the various strategies developed for level 8-2?
-The community showed a mix of fascination, experimentation, and skepticism. While some runners tried out the new strategies, others stuck with the more established methods. The pursuit of a perfect run in level 8-2 led to significant innovations and a deeper understanding of the game's mechanics.
Outlines
🎮 The History of Level 8-2 in Super Mario Bros
The paragraph introduces the history of Super Mario Bros' level 8-2, which is considered one of the hardest levels in the game. It discusses how a year of change transformed the level from an impossible perfect run to a record-breaking one. The story involves odd strategies, simulations, and even a solution found in a dream, highlighting the absurdity of the level's history.
🏎️ Perfecting Level 8-2: The Three-Step Challenge
This paragraph breaks down the three parts of achieving a perfect run of level 8-2. It details the fast acceleration start, the precise jump over the piranha plant and pipe, and the Bullet Bill glitch. The paragraph also explains how a runner named Tav managed to combine these elements to achieve a near-perfect run, with the only issue being the plant despawning glitch.
🌱 Despawning the Piranha Plant: A Rare Glitch
The focus is on the unusual phenomenon of the piranha plant despawning in level 8-2. The paragraph explores why this happens and how it's related to the game's sprite management. It also discusses the concept of phantom bullet bills and how they contribute to the plant despawning at a specific time, adding a layer of complexity to the level's strategy.
🔍 The Search for the Perfect Pattern
This section delves into the effort to find a pattern that allows for the plant despawn and a perfect Bullet Bill shot. It explains the use of scripts to test millions of combinations and the rarity of the successful outcome. Despite the difficulty, the search continues, highlighting the dedication of the speedrunning community to mastering the game.
🕒 The Time-Consuming Strategy and Its Drawbacks
The paragraph discusses the impracticality of the plant despawn strategy due to the extensive waiting time on the title screen. It also mentions the discovery of a more consistent method to start the game at the right time using power-ups and taking damage. However, the method's inconsistency and the high chance of failure make it unsuitable for top-level speedruns.
💡 Innovations in Level Strategy: Simplified Solutions
This section describes how Kriller 37 questioned the existing strategies and found simpler solutions to the level's challenges. It covers the discovery of a new Bullet Bill jump technique and the realization that the fast acceleration at the start of the level could be skipped without losing the frame rule. The paragraph concludes with the current strategy for achieving a perfect run of level 8-2.
📈 The Evolution of Level 8-2 Strategies
The final paragraph recaps the evolution of strategies for level 8-2, from the initial complex and time-consuming methods to the more straightforward and consistent approaches discovered later. It emphasizes the journey of speedrunners from finding a possible method to refining it into a practical strategy and the excitement in witnessing their innovative solutions.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Super Mario Brothers
💡Speedrun
💡Level 8-2
💡Frame Rule
💡Bullet Bill Glitch
💡Phantom Bullet Bills
💡TAS (Tool-Assisted Speedrun)
💡Power-Up Animation
💡Title Screen Demo
💡Piranha Plant Despawn
💡World Record
Highlights
Summoning Salt's video on the history of level 42 in Super Mario Brothers is well-known, but level 8-2 has an equally fascinating and absurd history.
Level 8-2 was once considered impossible to complete with a perfect run, but within a year, it became the key to improving the world record.
Glitch Hunter, known as 'nobody calls me tubby,' demonstrated a perfect run of level 8-2 in three segments, showing each part of the puzzle could be done.
The 'fast acceleration' at the start of level 8-2 is critical and can be achieved by Mario jumping backwards in the air.
To clear the piranha plant without frames to spare, runners must land on the edge of the pipe and time their jump and acceleration perfectly.
The Bullet Bill glitch on level 8-2 requires landing on the very front of the bill for maximum speed, which was achieved through a unique jump method.
Tav Webb managed to combine the fast acceleration, perfect pipe jump, and Bullet Bill glitch in a single run, marking a significant advancement.
GT, while attempting a perfect 8-2, accidentally caused a piranha plant to despawn, which was later understood to be due to 'phantom bullet bills'.
Phantom bullet bills are a quirk where bullet bills show up in memory for a frame without appearing on screen, affecting gameplay.
The plant despawn strategy requires an incredibly rare pattern involving two phantom bullet bills and the plant spawn frame.
Mr. Tubby discovered a method to break the 21-frame rule by pausing the game before the run starts, allowing access to more patterns.
Threecrepio found a way to start the run on different frame rules using power-ups and taking damage on the title screen.
Kriller 37 improved the Bullet Bill glitch by finding a method that didn't require the complex three-frame jump, simplifying the strategy.
Kriller also discovered that the fast acceleration at the start of the level could be skipped by timing a jump through the piranha plant.
These innovations led to the first world record using the TAS 8-2 frame rule, and eventually, the long-awaited 4:54 completion time.
The evolution of level 8-2 strategies showcases how complex and sometimes less efficient methods can precede simpler solutions in speedrunning.
The story of level 8-2 is a testament to the creativity and persistence of the speedrunning community, always seeking the most efficient paths.
Transcripts
summoning salt ever heard of him of course you have and if you're watching this you've
probably seen his video about the history of 42 in the original Super Mario Brothers that level
has quite the history and has continued to have interesting developments even after that video
was made you may be familiar with all of that but there's another level in this game which has its
own storyed history an absolutely absurd history that level is 8-2 one of the hardest levels in the
the game in general and especially in speeduns if we go back in time just a few years it was
considered impossible to do a perfect run through this level the strategy we were doing which was a
third of a second away from perfect was the agreed upon limit and that was as good as it
was going to get but over the course of just one year everything changed this level went
from impossible to improve upon absolutely never happening to instead being the obvious best place
to improve the world record how did that happen well it was through a very odd sequence of events
today you'll learn why someone waited 20 minutes on the title screen before starting a run how
people were running millions of simulations to try and find a solution potential ideas
coming to one runner in a dream we'll talk about frame perfect tricks on the title screen Phantom
bullet bills and more if all of that seems a little absurd and way too involved for one
level in a 40-year-old video game you're exactly right stick around this is the story of level
82 before we move on I have to take one minute to tell you about this video sponsor rayon they just
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shipping all right let's take a trip back in time to the year 2019 the world record speedrun of this
game is 45.7 n by some West this is what 82 looks like in his run he clears this piranha plant Waits
on the stairs for a Bullet Bill and then performs the Bullet Bill glitch I keep re-explaining this
flag pole glitch every video so I'm going to have to skip it this time if you're not familiar with
this trick I recommend this video by bismuth for the best explanation one crucial detail of it that
you must understand for this video though is that it's only possible because of a specific quirk in
this game you can only interact with enemies every other frame half the time you'll stomp enemies or
take damage from them on the first frame you touch them but the other half of the time you'll just go
through them on that frame and nothing will happen until the second frame you overlap with them we
call this coin toss because there's a 50% chance each frame that you'll interact with an enemy or
not anyway in this run by some West his 82 was one frame rule slower than the perfect tool assisted
run this was one of just a few areas in the run where we knew you could go faster but at the time
it was considered totally unrealistic impossible and why was that I don't know I really don't
know why that was the consensus back then I think those who were familiar with the requirements just
decided they were probably too hard they relayed that message to everyone else and we took their
word for it after all we were having a hard enough time getting past the stage without making things
even harder on ourselves so looking into this wasn't really a priority but around the middle
of 2019 it started to make more sense to look into it multiple people were getting runs with all the
wellest Lish tricks and it was time to push the game further we knew we could save time in 81 but
that alone wasn't going to be enough to get the record down to 454 it was time to find out if 82
was possible even if just hypothetically in July of that year the runner and glitch Hunter nobody
calls me tubby you may know him by another name comes out of nowhere with this video a perfect
82 in three segments it's not a perfect run of the ENT high level but it does show each piece
of the puzzle can be done let's go ahead and break down exactly what a perfect 82 is there
are three parts to it hence the three segments in his video he tried each part a bunch individually
until he got it and then put them all together to show what the whole level would look like
step number one of a perfect 82 comes immediately at the start of the level you need to do a fast
acceleration Mario accelerates faster jumping backwards in the air than he does running forward
on the ground doing a perfect turnaround and jump at the start of the stage you can accelerate just
a tiny 1 to two frames faster depending on the level but that extra bit of speed is going to
make all the difference here once you get the perfect acceleration to start the level it's
smooth sailing for a bit until we reach this big gap now we have the next obstacle this big pipe
is in the way normally you could jump clean over the pipe and the piranha plant but not with the
giant pit that comes just before this one there's not enough space to gain height before slamming
into the pipe to get past here we're going to have to slow down at least a little bit this is
the main reason doing the level perfectly is hard it's easy enough for skilled Runners of
this game to maneuver Mario around the pipe and over the plant but doing it absolutely as fast
as possible it requires a different approach you can't just wait until Mario is above the piranha
and then speed back up you have to land on the edge of the pipe and do another jump so you can
clear the plant while speeding up earlier there are absolutely no frames to spare on the frame
rule here normally it wouldn't be a big deal if you jump a little bit after you land or
don't land right at the very edge or slow down slightly more than absolutely necessary but to
get a perfect 82 there are absolutely no frames to spare on the frame rule here you have to land
on the very edge jump as soon as possible slow down as as little as possible to avoid bonking
the pipe release your jump at the perfect time so you land on the pipe as soon as you can and
jump off the pipe as soon as you land on it it's a harder thing to do a whole series of
inputs like this than it is to just hold right and time some frame perfect jumps like with most
other tricks this whole sequence is pretty tough but by spamming attempts at it tubby was able to
get past the pipe two steps down one to go the final step was of course course the Bullet Bill
glitch but again we have to do it perfectly we can't just land anywhere on the bullet we have
to land on the very front in order to be fast enough the usual approach is doing a big jump
off of the staircase to land on the bill but for some reason tubby was always one frame too slow to
get the frame rule he started messing around with other ways to jump on the bill to see if it made
any difference and he figured out that doing this really weird jump onto it it came out fast enough
so that that was it he had demonstrated that each of the three difficult parts of a perfect 82 could
theoretically be performed now if something has proven possible at all in this game you know it's
bound to happen sooner or later within one week of this video being posted Tav web is already getting
close he got the % world record of 45.74 a few days after Tubby's video and now he's messing
with 82 first he posts this video showing him due the fast acceleration and the perfect pipe
jump he stumbles a bit with the weird Bullet Bill glitch method but this was really close he got the
first and second steps right at least a few weeks later he posts another video where he starts from
a Save State before the pipe jump and nails that and the perfect Bullet Bill glitch now he's gotten
part two and part three together he just needs to add the fast excel at the start and one week later
he did exactly that fast Excel pipe jump Bullet Bill glitch I got it I think I got it we did it we
got it that's it it's been done 454 is officially on its way not really I mean it's been done once
but we're going to need to put in some more work before we can pretend this strategy is ready for
use in runs another Runner GT starts trying it out he's just tinkering with it seeing what he can do
and then he posts this on Discord this is massive don't you see the plant despawned it's gone Mia a
pced out on vacation this plant being gone for runs would be massively useful as long as this
isn't some weird one-off glitch that can never be replicated with the plant out of the way you could
get past this section so much easier is it real though no one has ever seen this before why did
it happen when GT was trying to do a perfect 82 he actually messed up a little bit on the first step
the inputs weren't quite what they needed to be to get a perfect fast acceleration normally you just
restart after this and keep loading save states until you get the perfect start but again he was
just kind of messing around so he kept running he was now moving through the stage at a slightly
different speed than anyone normally would he's is going to get different enemy patterns than anyone
normally would and this plant despawned which normally would not should not ever it doesn't
make any sense I'll explain why in just a second but let's take a minute to appreciate that this
is the same guy who was doing runs of Mario the Lost Levels when something very similar happened
uh uh uhuhuh what he accidentally jumped into this block that has a Vine in it then he tried to swag
on these Koopas with this fun stomp plus Fireball combo but he missed fireballing the second one
and somehow all of that accidentally despawned the flag at the end of the level this guy is the
king of accidentally despawning stuff shout outs to GTA for finding these things for giving me two
video topics to talk about and for helping a lot with the research for this video anyway despawning
is actually extremely common in this game but it's very rare to despawn something completely
brand new we already regularly despawn certain enemies to speed up the Run we hit the vine in
42 to make sure that no plant appears in this pipe we stomp on these Koopas in 81 to despawn
one of these three Goombas and make this section A lot easier and in 84 we make sure not to stomp
on this Buzzy Beetle otherwise there will be a plant in the way in this pipe all of those
examples work because there's so many Sprites on the screen already all the available Sprite slots
are full and there's nowhere for the next enemy to spawn into so it just doesn't spawn at all but
look at this example in 82 where GTA managed to despawn the piranha plant there's hardly anything
on the screen there is one piranha plant here and if we rewind a little there's also a parupa that's
two Sprites but we need five one important thing to note here is that things try to load in a lot
earlier than when they come on screen and they Stay Loaded in even after they go off the screen
a bit to the left so if we rewind a a little bit more we can see this Bullet Bill shoot out
of the cannon and it's following us just off the screen still loaded in at this point okay that
makes three Sprites but what else maybe this plant is loaded nope fun fact piranha plants and Hammer
Brothers actually have specific checks in place to delete them sooner after going off screen than
every other enemy I'm not positive why this is the case but if I had to guess maybe because there's
just so many piranha plants in all the pipes in this game and they don't want them hogging all the
Sprite slots as much and Hammer Bros I guess they probably don't want them chucking hammers at you
from off screen or something but yeah this piranha plant in 82 is not going to help us because it
despawns nine frames too early as far as I can see there's only three Sprites out of the five we need
here but let's go to the exact moment the plant in the tall pipe tries to spawn in and take a look at
what's loaded into each Sprite slot we've got this piranha plant we've got the parupa we've got the
Bullet Bill we've got two other bullet bills what all right my fellow Mario speedrun enjoyers let me
introduce you to Phantom bullet bills there's a really odd Quirk with the Bullet Bill cannons in
this game here's how they work as you go through a level once you see one of these launchers it
initializes a timer the timer starts at 14 and ticks Down based on the random number generator
so once this timer exists the game is constantly doing dice rolls to decide when to decrement the
timer once it takes down all the way it Loops back to 14 and a Bullet Bill shoots each Cannon has its
own timer and they're all waiting independently for their chance to shoot in the case of 82 there
is a lot of bullet launchers so we can get the maximum of six timers going at once here's the
goofy part though the timers stay in memory and keep working even after the cannon has gone off
screen as soon as you encounter a bullet launcher the the game will continue trying to fire bullet
bills for the rest of the level even after you're well past it whenever it's time for a Bullet Bill
to shoot the game will first check to see if that particular Cannon is still on screen if it is then
a bullet will of course fire from it but if it's not the bullet just gets deleted instead there
is however one frame where the Bullet Bill exists the Bullet Bill ID will show up in the Sprite slot
list for a single frame before being deleted the value for bullet bills is 33 and even though there
are no bullet launchers on screen right now you can see the number 33 popping up very briefly here
and there this is what we call a phantom Bullet Bill a Bullet Bill which never really exists on
screen but does show up in memory for one frame at a time a Bullet Bill which though invisible can
affect gam playay now that you get the basic idea of phantom bullets you probably understand what
has just happened here in 82 with the plant despawning and if you start to put together
the finer details you'll realize just how insane this all is let's review we need five Sprites to
fill up all the Sprite slots so the plant doesn't spawn we get two for free the piranha plant in the
little pipe and the parupa we need three bullet bills to fill in the rest and three is actually
the maximum number of bullet bills that's possible at a time so this works out perfectly in our plant
despawn example we have one bullet build that shot out of a cannon and is following behind us still
barely loaded and not even visible on screen at this point we need two more bullet bills to fill
the remaining Sprite slots and the only way we're going to get them is through the Phantom Bullet
Bill phenomenon let's take a second to think about what we're really asking for here we need
the cannon timers of previous offscreen cannons to expire so they try and shoot a Bullet Bill and
it fills up a Sprite slot we need two Phantom bullet bills here remember Phantom bills only
exist for one frame so we need two Canon timers to expire on the same frame but they'll also only
remain in the sprit lless for one frame so we need two Phantom bullet bills we need them to
appear on the same frame and we need both of them on the same frame that the plant tries to spawn in
it all sounds crazy and bizarre but that's what we're dealing with here we need a pattern where
one Bullet Bill shoots to the right and two more try to shoot at this exact moment from offscreen
launchers I did say that there are six timers available though they're going ham trying to
spawn bullet bills constantly so how rare could it really be to get two of them to shoot on this
Frame oh some West wrote a script to go through every frame rule you could arrive on 82 and check
for plant despawns he factored in things like stomping certain enemies which changes what
pattern you'll get his script tested millions of combinations and in the end it found 13 out
of all of them he found 13 frame rules you can get the plant to despawn on that's not
a lot and it shows just how rare this is but it's enough we only need one after all
so that's it problem solved we can despawn this plant and make this part of the level
easier let's go to the leaderboard now and see how many runs on there make use of this
strategy that one all of that work and the only person using this is in 334th place shout out to
yzr by the way legendary NES speedrunner but why is he the only one using this the issue
is that when we're trying to match the task and do a perfect 82 there's already a somewhat rare
pattern in place that we have to manipulate all of this plant despawn stuff has been focused on
part two of the level getting past the pipe but part three the Bullet Bill glitch also requires
a Bullet Bill shot and not just a shot not even a fast shot you need the fastest shot once again we
have no time to spare when trying to perfect this level we need this Bullet Bill to shoot as soon as
possible and if you're too close to the launcher when it's timer expires this is another case where
the Bullet Bill will just be deleted instead of shooting it seems they didn't want them to
shoot you when you're standing right next to them which is fair so the earliest this Bullet Bill can
shoot is right here we need this Cannon's timer to expire at this exact moment so we can use it
for the Bullet Bill glitch as soon as possible and that's the bad news of the 13 plant despawn setups
that some West found none of them also gave a perfect Bullet Bill shot that's really unfortunate
but it was really unlikely with how many bullet timers we need to line up here I guess this Strat
is dead we weren't able to find anything even though we searched through literally every pattern
wait what if we didn't search through every pattern the script ran tests on every frame rule
you can arrive in 82 but frame rules only allow you to arrive every 21 frames the random patterns
we get in the level are based on how much time has passed if all of our tests are arriving 21 frames
apart that means in theory we're really only testing about 5% of all of the possible patterns
out there if we're going to make this happen we need a way to make more patterns possible
we need a way to break the 20 1 frame Rule and this is when Mr tubby had a dream his brain is
working on this problem he wants to despawn this piranha plant and his mind solves it in his sleep
he wakes up hurries to the NES to test out his idea this gift that his dreaming brain gave him he
loads into Super Mario Brothers and it works but it's kind of a huge meme the idea is simple just
pause the game before the Run starts the frame rule timer pauses but time in general doesn't
you can wait any number of frames like this then unpause and play out the rest of the run like
normal you can still only arrive at each level 21 frames apart but you can start on any frame
you want meaning you get access to any of the other 20 sets of frame rules this Strat works
we have millions more patterns we can search through using it but again it's kind of dumb
you would have to unpause the game with frame perfect timing to get the right pattern you
want in 82 and you wouldn't even know if you did it right until you got to 82 and
this is all just a big technicality in the rule set anyway the rules say that
time starts when 400 appears on the timer in the top right corner because that's when you
gain control of Mario you can pause a couple frames before that happens and wait around but
it's pretty silly it probably wouldn't fly on the leaderboards even if it was a good option for runs
okay back to the drawing board this was a good start at least now let's jump over to Legendary
Mario scientist three creepio he's also working on this problem he knows if you can pause the frame
rule timer you can gain access to more patterns but how can we pause the frame rule timer without
pausing oh wait powerups whenever you get a power up the frame rule timer freezes and this actually
holds true even when Mario grabs the mushroom during the title screen demo in regular gameplay
this can offset the frame rule timer by 59 frames but on the title screen you can interrupt the
PowerUp animation at any point by pressing start meaning you can use this to freeze the frame rule
timer for anywhere from 1 to 59 frames this is yet another way to start the run on a different
set of frame rules and it also doesn't land in a weird gray area with the rule set like pausing
after booting into one one does but it still has one of the same problems as that Strat to
get the exact pattern you want an 82 you'd have to press start with frame perfect timing during
the PowerUp animation and you wouldn't know if you got it until 82 we're so close back to the drawing
board again is there any other way to freeze the frame rule timer I guess there actually is one
more option taking damage in exactly the same way that powerups can offset the timer by 59 frames
taking damage offsets it by 55 frames in addition to getting a mushroom Mario also takes damage on
the title screen creepio realized we can use any combination of the power up and power down
animation that we want to start the game on all sorts of intervals this is it finally the
solution to our problem a very consistent way to start the game at the right time except it's
still not entirely consistent I've mentioned in a previous video video how the title screen demo
can desync because of the way enemy Collision Works this is that coin toss phenomenon at
Play Again check that previous video for a full explanation but yeah this means he doesn't make
it over here to take damage every time the first time through he never makes it to the glomba and
each time after that there's a 50% chance that he does depending on which frame you interrupted the
previous demo on with that headache in mind creepio has found a setup using this he made
his own tools to search through all the different patterns and combinations in 82 and found a pretty
good setup All Things Considered but you may have realized by now that using this strategy is going
to mean spending quite a while waiting on the title screen the best currently known solution
that gets a plant despawn and perfect Bullet Bill shot requires spending 40 seconds on the title
screen to let Mario get two mushrooms and take damage once that's not going to cut it this would
make the Run Easier by getting the plant out of the way but to put things in perspective you'd
spend 11 hours on the title screen every 1,000 attempts top level runs of this game are going
to require hundreds or thousands of attempts and you're probably just going to reset one or
2 minutes in it's just not worth it this is the real reason that yzr is the only one using this
strategy he was just aiming for sub five not world record Pace he could make it here a lot more often
and when he did he didn't need to go for a perfect 2 or bullet B glitch or anything like that he just
did it to make the jump past this pipe easier in general and because it's awesome all right
at some point we have to admit defeat at least for now maybe in the future some setup will be
found which doesn't require waiting forever on the title screen and this plant despawn can be useful
in world record level runs even though we weren't successful at making part two of the level easier
maybe there's still something we can do maybe we can improve one of the other other parts of
the level enter kriller 37 you'll hear killer's name coming up in a lot of my videos at this point
he's helped find setups and improve the quality of life for a lot of tricks in this game and in 2020
he set out to do exactly that in 82 he took a look at the current strategy for the level and wondered
why do you have to do the Bullet Bill glitch so weirdly what magic is going on here that let you
save the frame rule when doing it like this but not when you do it the regular way kriller figured
out that the core of this issue is Mario's height when doing it the normal way if you stomp on the
Bullet Bill from this distance Mario will be too high when he reaches the pole and you won't get
a full flag pole glitch but if you have a precise height value before stomping the Bullet Bill Mario
will stay a bit lower and he'll be low enough to trigger it essentially this lets you stomp the
Bullet Bill from farther away while still getting the glitch that means slightly less time is spent
waiting for the bullet to get close to the pole so if the key here is Mario having a specific height
is there any other way to make that happen ker did some searching and figured out that if you
press jump for exactly three frames When jumping from the top of the staircase that gives the magic
height value you would still need to do a perfect jump height and time things frame perfectly to
land on the very front of the bill so doing this isn't like free or anything but at least
it's not all Wiggly weird that begs the question are there any other ways to get the magic height
value kriller kept messing around with things and then This brilliant idea hits him maybe the best
solution isn't a specific jump height maybe it's not a jump at all maybe we can use a second Bullet
Bill to bounce on he tests this crazy idea and it just so happens that you can get the specific jump
iine needed by running off the steps and bouncing on two bullet bills in a row just a frame Perfect
Right press to run off and get the glitch as soon as possible this is awesome I don't think
an optimal Bullet Bill glitch can get easier than this this is it 454 is happening let's
go now to speedrunner hits crits who is about to do the first ever official 454 attempt using this
strategy yeah so the setup for the Double Bullet Bill shop pattern has us waiting 24 minutes on
the title screen hey but once he waits this out he's got a better shot at 454 than anyone else
ever has ah so close Okay that was of course a little silly but the first setup for this
really did require waiting around for 24 minutes no worries though just one day later more setups
were found that only involved a few seconds of waiting you'd think at this point everyone would
jump on this cool new Double Bullet Bill strategy but surprisingly that never really happened all of
the setups for it seemed to make earli parts of the level slightly harder and people had gotten
comfortable with the three-frame jump setup in the meantime so they just stuck with that this is a
really cool strategy though that people could use instead if they really wanted to up to this point
kriller has been quite successful at improving the success rate of Tas 8 2 but he's actually
not done yet so far we've only looked at attempts to try and improve part two of the level and part
three but what about part one kriller was once again thinking about this level and why it all
works why each piece is necessary we have to do a super precise Bullet Bill glitch because there's
zero frames to spare to get the perfect 82 frame rule we have to do a super precise jump past this
plant because there's zero frames to spare on the frame Rule and we obviously have to do this fast
excel at the start of the level because there are zero frames to spare on the frame rule it's
not even a question of course we have to do the fast Exel there's zero frames to spare of course
we have to do the fast Excel wait do we have to do it it's a crazy idea that doesn't even make sense
to consider or at least it didn't make sense until kriller came along if we combine all of our Super
Mario Bros knowledge it may actually be possible to skip this fast Excel just as a quick recap
doing this exact movement from a standstill makes Mario accelerate faster and generally allows him
to move enough extra distance to save two frames so if this saves two frames we definitely need it
to save the frame rule in 82 but that's the thing it doesn't always save two frames it kind of saves
1.8 frames it can often let you reach somewhere in a level two frames earlier like entering a
pipe or stomping an enemy but sometimes the extra distance only gets you there one frame earlier it
just depends on exactly which part of the level is significant for example it only lets you reach the
axe in the final room of 84 one frame sooner the significant point that we need to reach in 82 is
this ground right here the limiting factor for getting past this pipe is how soon you can land
on this bit of ground and start your jump to get over the plant as it turns out fast acceleration
at the start of the level only lets you land here one frame sooner he's really close to getting
there two frames sooner but doesn't quite make it all right big deal this fast Excel only saves one
frame there's zero frames to spare on the frame rule we obviously still need it ho not so fast
that's where kriller had a light bulb moment once again we have coin toss Shenanigans at play this
piranha plant can only hurt Mario on every other frame even though we got here a frame slower we
can get past the plant a frame Faster by going through it on the frame it can't hurt us it turned
out that all this time you didn't need the fast excel at all you could just skip it and still get
past the plant at the same speed kriller didn't just improve part one of the level he removed it
thanks to his efforts now Runners just needed to do the fast pipe jump and then use his much more
straightforward jump onto the bullet pill this is the current strategy for matching the Tas in
82 just a few months after these Innovations nify got the first world record with the Tas 82 frame
Rule and 5 months later he managed to include a perfect 81 as well resulting in the legendary and
long awaited 454 yes it's crazy how much this level changed in just one year it went from
impossible to a really hard strategy done one time in practice to a pretty consistent strategy that
was implemented into runs before other known time saves even were let's recap everything it took to
get here we looked into an exceedingly rare plant despawn something that works because of
phantom bullet bills these Phantom bullet bills have to appear on the same frame as each other
and the same frame that the plant tries to spawn in we searched through millions of combinations
to try and make this a useful strategy and in the end the only person to use it is in 334th
place the strategy requires waiting 40 seconds on the title screen there's a 50% chance it
doesn't even work after waiting all that time at top level you cannot afford to deal with
all of that so we try something else this other very rare Double Bullet Bill strategy turns out
we're not happy with that solution turns out you just need a particular jump onto the bullet pill
turns out you don't even need to do a fast excel at the beginning of the level at all
you can just jump through the piranha plant it's all just so ridiculous all of these
things combined together for what I consider to be the most absurd strategy in Super Mario Bros
speedrunning this is the Absurd history of level 82 it's amazing how often a simple solution is
not the first one found people find a method that could be possible and work really hard to make it
happen until it becomes real and then somewhere down the road a much easier simpler approach
is discovered I don't know why this happens but it really keeps things interesting it's
always amazing and entertaining to watch Brilliant Minds at work as they push into unknown territory
and fascinating to see what trinkets they bring back from their voyages there that's all for now
thanks for watching And subscribe if you enjoyed I've got a lot more videos like like this coming
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