Pokemon Red FAQ (with RNG manipulation)

Pokemon Red FAQ (with RNG manipulation)

Q: What are you trying to do?
A: Beat Pokemon Red as quickly as possible without using glitches.

Q: What are you playing on?
A: A GameCube using a GameBoy Player.

Q: What is the world record?
A: 1:49:48 by me.

Q: I thought you had a 1:48?
A: That's according the in-game timer, which we no longer use. Real time is now used to measure all Pokemon speedruns.

Q: Why are you resetting?
A: Probably my Nidoran died or I failed the RNG manipulation.

Q: What's the RNG manipulation?
A: The game almost always starts from the same RNG frame when you hard reset after a save. You can buffer every input from reset to file select, allowing you to frame perfectly load your saved file. As long as you continue to be frame perfect, you'll get the same RNG. So what you can manipulate in the game depends on how easily you can be frame perfect. Movement is extremely easy to do frame perfectly, so encounters are manipulated whenever it is mathematically worth the time to save and reset (~20 seconds). Surge's trash cans are also manipulated. Battles require too many precise inputs to do frame perfectly.

Q: When is it worth manipulating encounters?
A: Route 22 (catch a perfect Lv. 4 Nidoran in the same spot every time) and Mt. Moon (catch a Paras before the first Super Nerd, then kill a Paras to reach Lv. 16 before the Rocket).

Q: How much time does the manipulation save?
A: It's tough to say, since runs before RNG manipulation just reset for good Nidorans and encounter luck. A good run with RNG manip will exit Mt. Moon at about the same time as a good run without it. But these good starts will happen nearly every run with manip, whereas they often took weeks to achieve without it. More good starts means more time-saving risks can be taken without fear of losing a valuable run. All things considered, I'd estimate 2 minutes.

Q: What stats does this perfect Nidoran have?
A: 13 HP, 15 Attack, 15 Defense, 14 Speed and 15 Special. Because of RNG constraints, it is impossible a Nidoran caught on Route 22 to have higher HP and Speed without sacrificing Attack, its most important stat.

Q: How are you catching the Nidoran from full HP almost every time?
A: By buffering all of the inputs before the catch. The first text box ("Wild Nidoran-M appeared") looks like it can't be buffered, but there's actually a 4-frame window (hold A before you see the arrow). I also catch Paras this way.

Q: What is the Mega Punch route?
A: Picking up the Mega Punch TM in Mt. Moon allows us to skip the Mt. Moon center. Mega Punch also saves turns throughout the early game with its added power (80 compared to Horn Attack's 65). Since Mt. Moon can be manipulated, this is a fairly cheap detour. Our current manipulation has a 1/3 chance to fail, but I'm doing it anyway because we will eventually find a manipulation that always works.

Q: What do the letters next to your splits mean?
A: This is a grading system for my splits. A means amazing, B means bad, C means crap, D means disaster and F means fuck, time to reset. I got this idea from Werster, who got it from another streamer.

Q: What is "Lys"?
A: I'm currently running against the splits of famed streamer LysDesTenebres in order to motivate her to run for a better time.  :)

Q: What is your goal time?
A: For now, just to beat my PB. The optimal Mt. Moon manipulation hasn't been made yet, so I don't have motivation to go for an actually good run/time. Once this manipulation is made, sub-1:48 is probably the goal.