Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow
	posted Saturday, August 18, 2007

Big thanks to DarkValentine for helping with the editing!

Speedrun of Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow for the Nintendo DS. Completed on June 28, 2007 in 21 segments by Chris "Satoryu" Kirk. This run aims for fastest time, gets the best ending, on normal difficulty. To record this, I used a DS Lite for a better picture and a digital video camera, since there is no direct way of recording DS runs yet. This was not submitted to www.speeddemosarchive.com because of "live" audio. SDA wants audio recorded seperately with no other sounds heard. Something my camera can't do. I was probably too shaky for their liking as well.

My recording setup was an interesting one. I had my camera on a tripod placed between me and my desk. In order to get the best picture, I had the camera focused on the bottom screen as much as possible. Because of obstruction of view, I watched myself playing through the preview window. My hands were propped up by a small pillow, though I would still get a cramp or two. I was also leaning over to see my progress, so my back was killing me. Until a more reliable setup is discovered, this will be my only DS speedrun. It's a shame, cause I would really like to do a NG+ run and runs for PoR. Pray for a DS Player in the near future.

People to thank:
- Persona for running The Castlevania Encyclopedia, doing the NG+ run that I want to obsolete, and some general tips.
- Serris for some gameplay tips.
- Sorcerer88 for teaching me how to use VirtualDub and encoding segments 3 and 6.
- Whoever discovered the Succubus Glitch.
- IGA and his team over at Konami.
- Sleep.
- Anyone else I missed.

Techniques I used in this run:
- Jumping up slopes is faster than running up them.
- When attacking in the air, landing cancels the animation. Therefore, attacks can be launched quicker without cooldown periods. This works for swords and Bullet Souls, but not for overhead weapons. Works best with a short hop. A trick also present in SotN, AoS, and PoR.
- After attacking or using a Bullet Soul, backdashing cancels the animation. Additionally, ducking cancels the backdash. Using this, I can swing overhead weapons much quicker than normal.
- Using the Cutall's special attack, I get into the Clock Tower and Subterranean Hell much earlier than the game intended. This skips multiple areas and bosses.
- The Succubus Glitch. By using the Succubus soul, immediately using the Cutall special, and using the Cutall special again after a certain amount of time, Soma can warp forward. This glitch is normally used to get outside the map and warp around, and get glitched souls and equipment. An obvious boundary violation. I only use it to bypass walls and doors.

=The Lost Village=
I got two Axe Armor souls. One was needed to synthesize the Bhuj I used later, the other I used against a few bosses. The extra soul may be skippable in a future run. There's no real good way of fighting Flying Armor, so that's why it may look sloppy. Otherwise, this went fairly well. I apologize for the sound desync. I don't know how that happened.

=Wizardry Lab=
En route to the Warp Point, I got a Manticore Soul for synthesis. On the return trip to Hammer and Yoko, I messed up attacking the Armor Knight. I sold my stuff at Hammer's and bought an Axe and Mind Ups. Then I visited Yoko and synthesized a Bhuj, which I used for the rest of the game. After coming back to the Lab, I got the Bomber Armor soul, which I don't use till much later. After fighting Balore, I had some difficulty with my stylus. Supporting the DS Lite with my left hand hurts, so that's why I was extra shaky. The room with the skeletons never goes well, so I was more or less expecting the hit.

=Garden of Madness=
The hit on that Boomerang Skeleton is pretty bad, I must say. But not nearly as bad as fudging that one jump. Twice. The reason I kept that was that I got the Yorick soul on the first available enemy. Something I hadn't planned. I skipped the Doppleganger soul because it's not necessary.

=The Dark Chapel=
My performance here was terrible. The only reason I kept this was that I got some crazy luck during the boss fights. Here, you'll see why I got Yorick. A seemingly weak soul, if you slide into the skull, it inflicts MASSIVE DAMAGE. On Dmitrii, I was able to kick Yorick WITHOUT doing a short hop. TWICE. The window to do this is extremely small, almost frame perfect. And Malphas, despite flying earlier than I would've liked, came down later on. This enabled me to get one more Yorick on him than I planned. The extra Axe Armor may be skippable if Malphas cooperates nicely so that I can attack him with the Bhuj like I did here. Balore is also a small factor in that decision.

=Garden of Madness again=
I got the Elfin Robe and Ninja Suit. The Ninja Suit gives a modest Attack and Defense boost, while Elfin Robe gives an unheard of INT+8. This means my attacks will be plenty more powerful and I can take less damage. I got an amazing Dario fight. I was able to stun him multiple times. I had not planned this at all.

=Demon Guest House=
I only take a small trip through here, ignoring most of the stage and Puppet Master. During the tile puzzle, I made a few extra moves, but that's me being nervous and anxious. I got the Cutall, which is the key to skipping many areas in the game. My original plan was to get a Lilith soul right after the save point. I ditched that plan cause the Clock Tower was giving me hell. A future run should get it, though.

=Cursed Clock Tower=
Going here early skips most of the Condemned Tower and the incredibly lengthy Gergoth fight. I almost fell off the first pendumum, and I messed up on the pistons. At the part with the four pendulums, the Imps gave me some trouble. The Zephyr fight went very well. The 4th level seal has screwed me out of my fair share of attempts. I spent a little too much time on the warp screen.

=Subterranean Hell=
I used Cutall again on the barrier in Wizardry Lab. This skips most of Subterranean Hell, including Rahab. I only use this area as a way to get to Silenced Ruins.

=Silenced Ruins=
From the entrance to the save point was a flawless victory. Everything went exactly as planned. This was done on my first attempt, too. Can't say the same for the next part. The hallway prior to Bat Company is tough to speed through. I found a nice pattern on Bat Company that works as long as he doesn't change shape.

=The Pinnacle=
Again, most of this area is skipped, including Paranoia, Aguni, and the level 5 seal. All thanks to the Succubus Glitch. Getting the Succubus soul had its own segment devoted to it. Afterwards was a very long segment due to lack of accessible save points and an unskippable cutscene. I got the Erinys soul, which is one of the most powerful souls in the game, especially on the final boss. Got the Truffle as well for the final fight.

=Condemned Tower=
Again, only a short detour through here. I got the Silver Stud for a small stat boost.

=Mine of Judgment=
Everything leading up to Death is self explanitory. I used SG to skip fighting Death, because without the level 5 seal, he can't be killed. I forgot to equip Succubus at first, which pissed me off so much.

=The Abyss=
This place is very hard due to my low level. Many things can kill me in a few hits. I got the Hippogryph soul. While optional, it does speed things up. I skipped Abaddon. Then, I got the Black Panther soul for high speed movement. The Malacodas right after don't like me, so I took a few hits. At the end I took a trip to Hammer to stock up for the final fight. I might have been able to get away with selling the Ninja Suit as well.

=Menace=
This isn't perfect, but I wasn't really going for perfect. My only goals were to not die, of course, and not miss one Erinys. I missed one axe swing, but I let it slide, among other things. For the 1st phase, my original plan was to burn out my MP, refill completely, then burn it out again, using axe hits afterwards. I decided not to refill this time in hopes I'd be able to defeat the 3rd head quicker, which I did. That alone might've given me the sub40. This might've been even quicker if I was one level higher (19 vs. 20). With that and Lilith, Erinys would've done 75 damage per hit instead of 70.

My goal was under 45 minutes for this run, so getting under 40min was pretty nice. While this can easily be improved by at least a minute or two, I'm proud with the results. It also feels like a huge relief, cause I wanted to do this run for the longest time. Once better technology becomes available, I'd be glad to make an improvement, and some other runs. Enjoy.

NOTE: After compressing the video, there seems to be 2 small errors where the screen will black out for a few seconds. One at around 00:04:10 and the other at around 00:09:39. The second isn't that important due to not much action during the blackout but the item that Satoryu gets in the first blackout is a Mind Up.

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