Run Information

Run Information
Completion Date			May 13, 2016
State			Published
Runner			Paul 'The Reverend' Miller
Tag			Character: Thief
Links
Verification Thread

Run Comments
[TECHNICAL DETAILS] Quests for Glory II, originally, was developed by AGD Interactive. They received a limited license from Sierra to produce and distribute a remake of the original EGA version of the game, provided that they release it for free. The game was recorded using ZD-Soft Screen Capture, because this game REALLY doesn't like Fraps and cuts the recording down to less than 30 frames a second. Encoding in Yua stated that an IQ file was not required. A special thanks goes out to Puri for routing the original game, but also for his commentary and assistance during practice for my RPG Limit Break 2016 run of the marathon. It was fantastic. He suggested a time-saving trick using numbers that cut a serious amount of time off of the run. I also thank God for the little bits of extra time I get where I can work on perfecting my runs of my favorite series. --- [TIMING] Timing starts when you gain control after the opening dialog from Abdullah. Timing ends when the Force Bolt spell connects with the brazier in the final room. --- [WHY RUN THE REMAKE?] Because it is very different from the original EGA. There are some things that are slower and some things that are faster. There are also new skips, which make running the remake significantly faster than running the EGA version. The route is different also, because the requirements for particular items are more diligently guarded by the coders of the game, so items I would purchase immediately in the EGA version require me to wait to purchase to line up the acquistion of other items. This is a different game. --- [CHARACTER CREATION] Fifteen points are allocated to buying the Magic skill at the beginning and the rest of my points go into Throwing. [OPENING] At the Inn, it is important to set your character to running and to change the speed and difficulty sliders all of the way down. I also disable the "Silly Clowns" setting, which cuts out particular Easter Eggs that make your character occasionally watch cameos while running through the streets of Shapeir. [DAY 1] Unlike the EGA version, there is no "sell beard" miracle glitch to gain the correct currency and amount to complete the run. Fortunately, a New Game gives more than enough money to make the necessary, and the AGDI remake gives players to option to simplify the layout of Shapeir (at the cost of some special Easter Eggs which don't affect us). Once at the Money Changer, I exchange my currency and head back to make some purchases. The first thing I do is buy the lamp. In a marathon run (1-5), I would wait until Day 5 because the merchant will give you the lamp for free when the Fire Elemental is attacking, but that requires an additional trip. Of particular note is the time I take to purchase food. In the EGA version, you do not need additional food because time-skipping at the Inn does not consume your rations. In this game, you will starve around Day 8 if you do not purchase more rations. In the Apothecary, I mention incense to get the option to buy incense from the shopkeeper. This is an instance where having the text parser as an addition saves significant time rather than navigating the menus. I will type buy rather than clicking, because I type faster. I also make sure to purchase health pills which I will use late into the run. On my way back to the Inn, I buy the map, and immediately use it to warp back into the Inn which resets my cursor to movement, saving additional time. [DAY 5] The Fire Elemental is straight forward. A starting Thief can connect with the Fire Elemental once before getting killed, but luckily, it doesn't happen. The Elemental in the remake appears a less random, so therefore, is a bit more aggressive. We capture him, but before heading back to the Inn I use the map to head to the Blacksmiths, where I cast Fetch to get the Bellows for the Air Elemental. [DAY 9] I make sure I pick up a Cloth Bag, and then head into the Magic Shop. Here, I use the parser again to get the Foolers Earth rather than navigate the dialog, and buy Levitate, Dazzle and Force Bolt. In the VGA remake, even with the additional Throwing, hitting the Air Elemental with the Foolers Earth is, as far as I can tell, impossible. In the original EGA, Throwing dirt into the Air Elemental is much more consistent. Again, I find that the Air Elemental is far less random, and therefore, much less of a troll. The Air Elemental single-handedly caused more restarts in my EGA runs than ANY OTHER cause. [DAY 12] The first thing is to head back to the Apothecary to get the Burning Powder. The Burning Powder is the main reason that I put points into Throwing, because the Burning Powder connects everytime when thrown, putting the Earth Elemental down very quickly. It is only possible for the Earth Elemental to appear in corridors with a end, and I pick this spot because it is easy to move back and forth using the keyboard to find him. He can appear immediately, but unfortunately he doesn't. Still, it is an RNG-related cost of about five seconds by my estimations. [DAY 14] Water Elemental is about the same. No surprises. [RASEIR DAY 1] This is single-handedly the best thing about the remake. In the original EGA game, you cannot rest anywhere except in the Inn. Period. This means that Raseir is an unavoidable ten minute time-sink. In the remake, we can use the rest feature to skip all of that, and the ESC key to skip MANY of the cutscenes (such as resting). I take my time to click the drink Ferrari offers me, because screwing this up costs quite a few seconds trying to fix. After ignoring Ugarte's offer, I head in to sleep. This saves about 5 minutes over the EGA version. [RASEIR DAY 2] I head out and watch Ugarte get arrested, and give my clothes and travel visa to the Emir's daughter, Zayisha. I move my mouse near the top to get the clothing and visa out the second I have control again. I move to the entrance to my room before resting, because Ferrari will want to talk to you if you are not in the immediate doorway. Also, if you choose not to talk to him, he kills you. This skips the risk and is faster. I jam the ESC key to skip the resting cutscene again. [RASEIR DAY 3] Once we are arrested we get out of prison quickly. There are little animations that are skipped by pressing the ESC key repeatedly. [FORBIDDEN CITY] I save a few more seconds by pressing the ESC key and skipping Ad Avis' monologue and go right to the part where I can use the mirror. Inside, pressing the ESC key skips some more movement, but by keeping my mouse near the top of the screen I can immediate pull out the lamp and move. After a three-second RNG Easter Egg of a man falling, you almost always miss the first log. You usually miss the first log any way, but I use that time to cast Open on the windy hole and then jump across and head the fire room. The fire room went perfect, but I know my damage levels are probably critical so I use the Healing Pills to I can immediately fall and hurt myself again because it is faster than casting Levitate to get down. The only thing I wish for from the Djinni is Healing (not for my health, but for my Magic Points so I can cast more spells) and to Teleport which requires two clicks to make happen. [BACK AT RASEIR] Pressing ESC the whole time skips another cutscene and allows you to move immediately. I run up to the gates and use the Dazzle/Open combo to get inside, using the keyboard to speed up the process of running in. If I move my mouse to the top of the screen after casting Dazzle, the game hangs until you move it back into the play field, so I have to wait for the text box before bringing up the Open spell. Inside, there is a new solution that I use in the VGA remake, where you jump down and stab the Khaveen. This is much, much, much faster than the usual Calm spell and jump, because it solves everything at once. Inside the next room, I run into Ad Avis, and promptly end the game. This is much less glitchy than the EGA verison. [POTENTIAL TO SAVE TIME] Better handling. The route is minimalist, so I am confident that will not change. Thanks, SDA!

Run Comments

[TECHNICAL DETAILS]

Quests for Glory II, originally, was developed by AGD Interactive. They received a limited license from Sierra to produce and distribute a remake of the original EGA version of the game, provided that they release it for free.

The game was recorded using ZD-Soft Screen Capture, because this game REALLY doesn't like Fraps and cuts the recording down to less than 30 frames a second. Encoding in Yua stated that an IQ file was not required.

A special thanks goes out to Puri for routing the original game, but also for his commentary and assistance during practice for my RPG Limit Break 2016 run of the marathon. It was fantastic. He suggested a time-saving trick using numbers that cut a serious amount of time off of the run.

I also thank God for the little bits of extra time I get where I can work on perfecting my runs of my favorite series.

---

[TIMING]

Timing starts when you gain control after the opening dialog from Abdullah. Timing ends when the Force Bolt spell connects with the brazier in the final room.

---

[WHY RUN THE REMAKE?]

Because it is very different from the original EGA. There are some things that are slower and some things that are faster. There are also new skips, which make running the remake significantly faster than running the EGA version. The route is different also, because the requirements for particular items are more diligently guarded by the coders of the game, so items I would purchase immediately in the EGA version require me to wait to purchase to line up the acquistion of other items.

This is a different game.

---

[CHARACTER CREATION]

Fifteen points are allocated to buying the Magic skill at the beginning and the rest of my points go into Throwing.

[OPENING]

At the Inn, it is important to set your character to running and to change the speed and difficulty sliders all of the way down. I also disable the "Silly Clowns" setting, which cuts out particular Easter Eggs that make your character occasionally watch cameos while running through the streets of Shapeir.

[DAY 1]

Unlike the EGA version, there is no "sell beard" miracle glitch to gain the correct currency and amount to complete the run. Fortunately, a New Game gives more than enough money to make the necessary, and the AGDI remake gives players to option to simplify the layout of Shapeir (at the cost of some special Easter Eggs which don't affect us).

Once at the Money Changer, I exchange my currency and head back to make some purchases.

The first thing I do is buy the lamp. In a marathon run (1-5), I would wait until Day 5 because the merchant will give you the lamp for free when the Fire Elemental is attacking, but that requires an additional trip. Of particular note is the time I take to purchase food. In the EGA version, you do not need additional food because time-skipping at the Inn does not consume your rations. In this game, you will starve around Day 8 if you do not purchase more rations.

In the Apothecary, I mention incense to get the option to buy incense from the shopkeeper. This is an instance where having the text parser as an addition saves significant time rather than navigating the menus. I will type buy rather than clicking, because I type faster. I also make sure to purchase health pills which I will use late into the run.

On my way back to the Inn, I buy the map, and immediately use it to warp back into the Inn which resets my cursor to movement, saving additional time.

[DAY 5]

The Fire Elemental is straight forward. A starting Thief can connect with the Fire Elemental once before getting killed, but luckily, it doesn't happen. The Elemental in the remake appears a less random, so therefore, is a bit more aggressive. We capture him, but before heading back to the Inn I use the map to head to the Blacksmiths, where I cast Fetch to get the Bellows for the Air Elemental.

[DAY 9]

I make sure I pick up a Cloth Bag, and then head into the Magic Shop. Here, I use the parser again to get the Foolers Earth rather than navigate the dialog, and buy Levitate, Dazzle and Force Bolt. In the VGA remake, even with the additional Throwing, hitting the Air Elemental with the Foolers Earth is, as far as I can tell, impossible. In the original EGA, Throwing dirt into the Air Elemental is much more consistent.

Again, I find that the Air Elemental is far less random, and therefore, much less of a troll. The Air Elemental single-handedly caused more restarts in my EGA runs than ANY OTHER cause.

[DAY 12]

The first thing is to head back to the Apothecary to get the Burning Powder. The Burning Powder is the main reason that I put points into Throwing, because the Burning Powder connects everytime when thrown, putting the Earth Elemental down very quickly. It is only possible for the Earth Elemental to appear in corridors with a end, and I pick this spot because it is easy to move back and forth using the keyboard to find him. He can appear immediately, but unfortunately he doesn't. Still, it is an RNG-related cost of about five seconds by my estimations.

[DAY 14]

Water Elemental is about the same. No surprises.

[RASEIR DAY 1]

This is single-handedly the best thing about the remake. In the original EGA game, you cannot rest anywhere except in the Inn. Period. This means that Raseir is an unavoidable ten minute time-sink. In the remake, we can use the rest feature to skip all of that, and the ESC key to skip MANY of the cutscenes (such as resting).

I take my time to click the drink Ferrari offers me, because screwing this up costs quite a few seconds trying to fix. After ignoring Ugarte's offer, I head in to sleep. This saves about 5 minutes over the EGA version.

[RASEIR DAY 2]

I head out and watch Ugarte get arrested, and give my clothes and travel visa to the Emir's daughter, Zayisha. I move my mouse near the top to get the clothing and visa out the second I have control again. I move to the entrance to my room before resting, because Ferrari will want to talk to you if you are not in the immediate doorway. Also, if you choose not to talk to him, he kills you. This skips the risk and is faster. I jam the ESC key to skip the resting cutscene again.

[RASEIR DAY 3]

Once we are arrested we get out of prison quickly. There are little animations that are skipped by pressing the ESC key repeatedly.

[FORBIDDEN CITY]

I save a few more seconds by pressing the ESC key and skipping Ad Avis' monologue and go right to the part where I can use the mirror. Inside, pressing the ESC key skips some more movement, but by keeping my mouse near the top of the screen I can immediate pull out the lamp and move.

After a three-second RNG Easter Egg of a man falling, you almost always miss the first log. You usually miss the first log any way, but I use that time to cast Open on the windy hole and then jump across and head the fire room.

The fire room went perfect, but I know my damage levels are probably critical so I use the Healing Pills to I can immediately fall and hurt myself again because it is faster than casting Levitate to get down.

The only thing I wish for from the Djinni is Healing (not for my health, but for my Magic Points so I can cast more spells) and to Teleport which requires two clicks to make happen.

[BACK AT RASEIR]

Pressing ESC the whole time skips another cutscene and allows you to move immediately. I run up to the gates and use the Dazzle/Open combo to get inside, using the keyboard to speed up the process of running in. If I move my mouse to the top of the screen after casting Dazzle, the game hangs until you move it back into the play field, so I have to wait for the text box before bringing up the Open spell.

Inside, there is a new solution that I use in the VGA remake, where you jump down and stab the Khaveen. This is much, much, much faster than the usual Calm spell and jump, because it solves everything at once. Inside the next room, I run into Ad Avis, and promptly end the game. This is much less glitchy than the EGA verison.

[POTENTIAL TO SAVE TIME]

Better handling. The route is minimalist, so I am confident that will not change. Thanks, SDA!