Phoenotopia All Medals Q&A

Phoenotopia All Medals Q&A
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Q: What is this game?
A: It's a free online Zelda-inspired 2D platformer provided by Newgrounds. It's also hosted at http://www.onemorelevel.com/game/phoenotopia, which is my preference because I am more familiar with OneMoreLevel.

Q: Why would you run a game like this?
A: Because it's fun. (http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/561/280/7f5.gif)

Q: Can you explain this category?
A: This is All Medals, which entails collecting all 30 medals in the game. (List: http://pastebin.com/CKbEy9WF) In other words, each medal must appear and disappear from the screen, therefore any existing Flash data from uploads.ungrounded.net must be cleared from the browser beforehand. The most efficient way to complete this category is to do a deathless run in less than 64 minutes (for the "The End", "Speed Runner!", and "Indomitable!" medals) and pick up the remaining collectibles (Heart Rubies, Moonstones, and inventory items) while performing small tasks for other medals along the way. The route is designed to minimize backtracking during the endgame.

Q: But couldn't you just load a save password and...?
A: No. Save passwords are strictly prohibited. Otherwise the category would just be a glorified any%. (Medals obtained after beating the game are not transferred between files, and the in-game time of files loaded through save passwords is rigged to always be 1h 4m or more to prevent cheesing the "Speed Runner!" medal.)

Q: Why no in-game time, like for any% and 100%?
A: In-game time only applies to categories that end with beating the game once, and this is not one of them.

Q: Why not use the browser's Incognito Mode?
A: In Incognito Mode, browsing data is cleared when you refresh the page, and therefore saved files and obtained medals (most importantly the former) do not linger. For that reason, clearing browsing data is the best way to go about preparing an All Medals run.

Q: Couldn't you get an any% record while doing All Medals?
A: You could, but it's faster to get the Heart Rubies from the first two bosses in the any% part of the run than to have to backtrack for them later.

Q: When is the appropriate time to refresh after obtaining the three medals that require beating the game?
A: After all three medals have appeared and disappeared.

Q: gibe route pl0x?
A: https://goo.gl/SgpHBP

Q: Why do you throw loot containers instead of just breaking them?
A: What I'm doing is called Loot Duping. If a container with Rai or hearts is broken multiple times on the same frame, the container will drop its spoils that many times. In this case, I throw each container at one of three particular positions so that the container hits the wall and the floor at the same time, which equates to double the Rai obtained. This makes financial planning significantly easier.
For a more detailed guide on Loot Duping, consult the following document: https://goo.gl/QWtj38

Q: How did you clip through that door/wall/barricade?
A: When Gale tries to jump with a container on top of her head, the game moves her to the nearest available space in any straight direction (up, down, left, or right). With proper positioning and—given you're not clipping through a key door from the left side—proper placement of surrounding objects, the nearest available space will be just past the door/wall/barricade. Another quirk about this trick: if the container on Gale's head contains a collectible item—e.g., a moonstone or inventory item—then Gale will collect that item and, less importantly, jump slightly higher than usual after the clip. I refer to the trick as Pot Head Clipping, because it originated while I was mucking around with pots on the 7th floor of Prince Tower.

Q: That locked door just got pushed away! What sorcery is this?
A: This is Door Pushing. If you take a solid box-sized object, place another such object or a Bomb on top of it, and push the duo into a locked door, the door will move with the duo. Due to some seemingly random factor, there is a high chance that the object on top will straighten itself out to match the horizontal positioning of the lower object. For that reason, in spite of its simplicity, Door Pushing is possibly the most inconsistent trick in the game.

Q: What are you doing at Misty Gorge / Duri Forest?
A: They're both places for farming required medals.
The Misty Gorge farm is for the "Never Waste Food" medal, because farming from ghost wasps (in addition to the nearby green toad) is the easiest way to obtain unsafe-to-eat food items.
The Duri Forest farm is for the "Big Eater" medal, because the Mikan Fruits and random Duri Fruits make for relatively easy-to-obtain consumables.

Q: What is RNG?
A: Random Number Generator. Basically it's the luck of the draw in a video game. Notable instances of RNG in the run include: Harpy Backfire, farming for Never Waste Food and Big Eater (especially the former), and existing RNG in the other two main categories.

Q: How do you record footage of a web game?
A: I use OBS. It's a free and easy download at https://obsproject.com/

Q: How do you record splits?
A: I use Llanfair because I am on macOS. This program can be downloaded at http://jenmaarai.com/llanfair/en/
To be honest, I never knew how to set it up until I realized that you need a second mouse button.

Q: What's that keyboard viewer?
A: It's a Mac thing. I don't know if there are any counterparts for other operating systems.

Q: Lag spikes?
A: It's a Flash game. Nothing I can do about it. Can't download an external SWF because the game has an internal countermeasure against accessing it from an unauthorized source.

Q: Why is the audio quality so bad?
A: I can't be bothered to set up a program for capturing computer audio, so I just stick with external audio, which includes the computer's external speakers and my hitting the keys on the keyboard.