Game:

Super Robot Wars Z2: Hakai-hen (2011)

Duration: 4:56:23

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Game: Super Robot Wars Z2: Hakai-hen
Platform: PSP (played on PPSSPP 1.17.1)
Final time: 5:00:38 (game time)/4:59:59 (real-time)
Category: NG Any%
Twitch VOD link (a.k.a. original blabbering "commentary" version): https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2171509864
Speedrun route notes link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LGEwj--hKAG3yrKrloMSiRajHSwvdN0sQB6qPjKzmtc/edit?usp=sharing

I came up with a speedrun route for this game recently, so I wanted to record a companion video for the written notes in case someone prefers a visual aid (or just wants to see what the run is like). As a result, this is not meant to be the cleanest run. This was also played on an emulator, because I really don't care to figure out how to capture with my PSP and its non-existent battery. So load times are no doubt way better than actual hardware.

This was also my first time testing a significant route revision, so I made a few mistakes toward the end. I did my best to edit out the few significant quicksave loads (and one longer break). I actually missed one, but it ends up being a good teachable moment. The timer was still counting for the mistake loads, so you'll see a few jumps. You'll also see that the hour count on the timer is cut off for about an hour (from 1 to 2). I was streaming this attempt, and I didn't notice the issue until a viewer pointed it out. (Kudos to them for that!)

The overall route idea isn't that complicated. Crowe does most of the heavy lifting, Apollo helps out on some boss fights, and Jeffery is there for handling more drawn-out mob battles thanks to evasion decay being a concern.

There's still plenty to optimize in this route, but I'm not that keen on squeezing every bit out of it. It suffers from a bit of the same problem that F had, which is that MAP weapons don't seem to be a good option. In this game's case, you can't skip the voice lines and animation that comes with them, which really limits their usefulness. The original route didn't include any of them, but this revision added a few from the Macross Quarter toward the end of the game.

I'll add a few other comments to the subtitle track at relevant parts, but it's probably worth noting here that I left the Saisei-hen preview in at the end. Technically, the timer could've ended after the final boss went down, but the general rule seems to be to use final save in-game time for Super Robot Wars runs. It's an unskippable preview that you can't speed up in any way, but it's still fun to laugh at the "coming soon" for an old PSP game.

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