Thanks go to:
- SDA for hosting my run.
- xarugas for having strats and videos up here that helped me eke out my time, probably more than my own videos did for him. I don't think I would have broken this time without him breaking mine in the first place.

I used mostly the same methods xarugas did to achieve his impressive 0'13"03, and ended up trying some tweaks that in the end managed to save me more than half a second.

- The first couple of sections are identical; fight the jelly, get into town for 1"85, get Gladius, fight a crab, get back for 0"60, reset the clock.
- The method changes here, where I go and fight another crab, and then a second one, getting back into town at 0"65, where I heal up and pay for the 200g time reset.
- I skip fighting a jelly by running a couple steps, then fight a Scorpion putting me to 2300g, and run straight to the bottom town. Buying the Brave Sword and resetting time at this point costs exactly as much gold as I have.
- From this point on, the method is identical to before: run up and over to the right, then start walking to OHKO a bird, then run straight to the topmost town, where I heal, reset the clock, and buy Silver Mail.
- Because it bears mentioning, I obviously dawdle a bit in town before I make the run to the boss. This is me repositioning myself (physically) a bit, taking blatant advantage of the stopped clock in town, so that I can perfectly get into the boss's castle. If you get there as fast as seems to be technically possible, and you get no crits on the boss fight, you finish at level 10 or 11 with 0'00"03 left on the clock, and I wasn't taking any chances with this run. I obviously need better town skills if I want to speedrun Hard mode Hero 30 levels, heheh.
- I get no crits on the boss, and they are incredibly lucky to land. This run with crits on the boss would have a 0'00"20 time reduction for each one.

Thanks for watching my first speedrun, I hope to be able to add more to my resume soon!

Here's my 2nd Half-Minute Hero speedrun, this time taking on Hero 30 mode. Before anything as always let me thank the following:

• mike for dealing with my questions on run timing, as well as for being awesome in general.
• nate for putting up with my tech-knowledge noobness about video quality, codecs and such, and his encoding work on SDA.
• the rest of the SDA team for keeping up the great work even with so much backlog.
• MAS8705 for starting the thread on SDA, as well as some early planning help.
• carosh for help on certain quests and route planning.
• StarsofViolence of YT for a couple of his vids on some quests.
• The Hall of Half-Minute Heroes leaderboards for being a great reference and foundation for getting fast times.

GENERAL INFO

• Hero 30 has a total of 52 stages with multiple split-paths/routes. A completed playthru only has 30 stages.
• The in-game clock starts when you exit the Load/Save menu, and stops when you enter the Load/Save menu.
• The in-game clock also stops during the 3 second countdown that starts up each stage, as well as the short (system dependent) loading screen from selecting Hero 30 and moving to the World Map.
• Because of how the in-game clock behaves, it is imperative to spend the least amount of time possible in towns, to skip every cutscene, (although that's already required by SDA) and to fastforward through the credits.
• The game only allows 5 save files, but since there are 26 segments I have to transfer the save data to my PC to make space every 5 segments. This is why you'll see me end up with 5 files on segment 5 but start with 1 file on segment 6 and so forth.
• this run was recorded with RemoteJoyLite. I set it up in such a way that will eliminate 99% of the in-game lag, at the cost of some screen flickering in some screens and menus; most notably in the stage clear results screen. Shouldn't be that much of a bother as it doesn't happen in the real gameplay.

Some people might think I'm cheating when I go from a random encounter into a town instantly without seeing the map, so I think I should elaborate on a trick I call "town warping." You can enter any town by holding/tapping X while you're positioned at least 1 tile away from it, or when you're 2 tiles away AND facing it. Because of this you can instantly bridge the 1 or 2 tile gap and "warp" into the town, which saves about 00"15 or so from the in-stage countdown timer. It's pretty small, but some stages have events that happen at certain times and you have to race against the clock to bypass them. I also use town warping as much as possible to have the best stage clear time possible. This technique is displayed perfectly in segment 12, among others. This doesn't work when entering castles or caves though.

My reason for putting almost every individual stage as their own segment is that there are alot of manipulation involved in most stages. Some segments contain 2 stages because there's little to no manipulation required. You'll see what I mean when you get there.

And here we go..

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Quest 1 - Hero's Departure

I walk exactly 8 spaces before entering the castle after beating the fiends so that I get a random encounter on the 9th walk step right when I exit from the west town. Thanks goes to carosh for pointing out that I don't need to buy the 2nd Herb during the first countdown. It made my route easier to deal with.

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Quest 2 - Continental Bridge

I was lucky to get that much crits on the boss, otherwise it would be my usual clear time of 22"xx. Another thanks to carosh for his route on this stage.

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Quest 3 - Caves & Forests

This stage doesn't require any manipulation so it goes with Quest 4 in the same segment. Town warping the west town isn't required for getting the best clear time; town warping the southwest town is what's crucial, and was done near perfectly here.

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Quest 4 - Firestarter

This is where you get the first path split in the game. I don't stop the fire so I end up with the Southern route, which has quests that are way faster to clear compared to the Northern route.

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Quest 5 - Thru the Cave

Pretty good timing for entering the cave. I usually miss the right time and either go in too early (obviously a reset) or too late. (wastes about 00"30 or so)

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Quest 6 - Castle over the Sea

Quite a tough stage to manipulate. I have to get 3 encounters of the Cactus+Bee pair to get enough cash and lv5 before the shore opens up.

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Quest 7 - Good ol' Days

ALL YOUR BASE R BELONG TO US! Move ZIG for great justice!

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Quest 8 - Change the Current

Here's another stage with alot of manipulation involved. The 2nd fight determines what enemies you should fight in the 3rd encounter. If you get the blob pair, you must fight the triple corals. If you get the blob+crab pair, you can settle with the triple hermit crabs.

Here I get the blob+crab, miscount my steps and miss the random encounter 1 tile to the left of the castle. (I hit the run button anticipating the encounter) Not much of a big deal (about 00"50 wasted) considering that fighting the corals takes much more time than the hermit crabs, so I still got a faster stage clear time than the usual.

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Quest 9 - Beautiful Evil Lord

Wasted about 00"30 when I stepped a tile further than needed while entering the castle. The lucky crit during the 2nd encounter covers up for that loss perfectly though.

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Quest 10 - Bandit Valley

One of the hardest stages to manipulate by far. There's the issue of having to fight 3 pairs of Bandits at the start, as well as fighting just the right amount of Bandits in the cave. The interval at which they appear is fixed, but I had to do some trial and error to get enough crits to kill them quickly AND get lv11 in the process. (crit manipulation is pretty hard at low levels)

Because of the extremely lucky amount of crits during the boss, I could have done without the time-reverse. About a second lost there, but since my usual clear time of this stage is at the 30-34 sec range, getting 29 sec is pretty great.

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Quest 11 - Road to Land or Sea

The 2nd path split, and the most important choice in the whole run. The land route splits up into Cleric and Devil route: Cleric quests are slow although the item rewards are great; Devil quests are fast but you get no items at all so the land route is out.

This quest is fastest when you don't get the ship, but since I'm going for the sea route, I had to backtrack and grab the ship anyway. Had to use some awkward "claw" hand movements here to use the herb while running down to the beetle. Killing the beetle is necessary otherwise it'll take alot more time grinding for the Mo battle.

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Quest 12 - Past the Ocean

Now for the path split on the sea route. The swim route is the fastest in the quest 11-17 splits, although sea quest 16 and 17 without the gear from the other paths are quite slow. Still, the items you gain from this route helps alot for the late-game quests.

This stage is full of manipulation: I have to get 7 fights with a pair of enemies in an area with 4 different types of random encounters (2 of which are pairs). It's a good 50% chance, but this stage really messed with me ALOT. I got an amazingly lucky crit streak on the boss which shaved almost a second off my usual clear time.

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Quest 13 - Dragon Island

I take the first town warp to preserve my HP for the run to the cave. This quest is fastest with the Quick Knife (+5 speed) from the Northern route, so I have to make do with the lesser Utility Knife. (+2 speed) This is a near perfect run of the stage with this setup though. (my best being a mere 00"05 faster lol)

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Quest 14 - Tiny Sailing Trip

No manipulations here so it goes with quest 13 in a segment. I can't prevent the slowdown during the castle run. It's the damn water current.

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Quest 15 - Flower in the Dusk

The only thing to manipulate here is the 1st and 3rd fight. The first must be the mushrooms and the 3rd must be the eagles. This stage has a bad habit of giving me the eagles for the 1st fight 1 out of 10 times so I couldn't join it with the previous segment. Thanks to some lucky crits in both the boss fight and the 3rd encounter, I get sub 15. :D

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Quest 16 - To the Snowy Country

Getting the eagle for the 3rd encounter was great, but it saves only about 00"20 or so. Could've been luckier with crits during the penguin fight but meh, the crits during the scorpion fight evened it out.

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Quest 17 - Avalanche Pass

Yet another hard stage to manipulate. I had to fight 2 mammoths after the avalanche and get to lv11 right when I'm about 2-3 tiles away from the town at 15 secs left. That's pretty tight. I got the 2nd mammoth late and got me 1 level higher than required, but that extra +1 in Attack worked wonders against the boss.

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Quest 18 - White Earth

The walrus didn't show up in any of the encounters so I got 1 level higher than needed, plus I mess up and hit the run button a bit late when getting back to the north town. The amount of crits against the boss as well as that +1 attack still brought my clear time to my goal of sub 23 though.

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Quest 19 - Great Plains

Epic stage, huh? This is where the items from Sea-Swim route really shine. Land route items won't cut it in this stage. I could've skipped the Red Bandana but it helps ALOT with the crit rate, so I take it.

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Quest 20 - Floodgate Panic

This is another fast stage with Swim route items. The 1st encounter can be skipped, but I needed the cash to buy the Spike Mace, which will help me clear the next 2 stages faster than the Knight Lance.

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Quest 21 - The Have-nots

The stage is about 16 seconds slower than its Floodgate route counterpart, Giant Evil Lord, but actually fixing the floodgate in the previous quest takes more than 30 seconds anyway so this is actually the faster route. There is a slight pause after getting paid in town where you can't move, can't do anything about that.

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Quest 22 - Fire Mountain

The death was necessary to get back to the first town instantly. The crit on the first bird was lucky and made my run to the first rock smoother than usual.

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Quest 23 - Turtle & Hermit

Getting lv18 from the Sage's training took a bit of practice to time properly. Sometimes I get lv17, sometimes I overshoot and get lv20 or so. I actually killed more fireballs than required, as you can see my exp bar is at 95% to lv19. Less than 00"20 wasted I guess, but still 1 second faster than my original best time for some reason.

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Quest 24 - Swamp & Witch

More "claw" usage here when I use the herb while running to the witch's lair.

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Quest 25 - Isolated Castle

Getting that many crits in the cave fight was extremely lucky, though it only saved about 00"50 off my usual time.

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Quest 26 - Grand Wings

I apologize for the lag in this stage. The scrolling animation of the map screwed up a bit of my originally lagless capture. Ah well, I hope it doesn't look that bad.

I take the time to obtain the Duel Greaves because it's a HUGE help for the following stages. I did some extensive testing with and without the greaves going from stage 26 to 30 and found out that NOT getting the greaves is faster by about 2 seconds, but due to some changes in the stage route it's actually slower by about 4 seconds in terms of overall game-clock time. Without the greaves there will be alot more healing in towns as well as an extra time-reverse in stage 30, so getting the greaves is optimal.

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Quest 27 - Farewell Bandit Trio

Had a bit of trouble with positioning when I bought the herbs, though once again it was overshadowed by the crits in the random encounters, letting me enter the cave as soon as it showed up.

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Quest 28 - Infinite Weapon Lord

Town warp frenzy, all so that the Evil Lord can't steal the Sea Spear from the East town.

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Quest 29 - Cursed Hero

Pretty straightforward stage. The Hero Sword would've made my quest 30 run easier and a bit faster, but it takes nearly 30 seconds to obtain it, plus Lamde doesn't get OHKO'd by it so I opt for the faster solution.

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Quest 30 - Last Battle

The only special trick in this stage is to clear the western tower with at most 20 HP left. This is enough HP to make the next few enemy encounters faster and reach lv25 right before the Porta-Statue takes effect. After that it's pretty straightforward with some fights and maneuvering.

I release the run button at certain points during the beetle and chimera fight so I don't drop down to 50/30 hp respectively, or else I won't have enough HP to run back to the town and thus get owned by an enemy encounter on the way. 1:44 was my original best when practicing this stage, but after polishing each tricky town warp, I was glad to get it down to 1:42. Although it's around 10 seconds slower than if I had the Hero Sword, it takes a bit more than 30 seconds to clear Quest 29 to obtain it, so it's not a bad trade at all.

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And that's it! This game was very fun to plan and speedrun, and I don't think I'm done with HMH just yet. I'm thinking of taking on Knight 30 in the future, or even an IL run of Hero 30 this time with all the items from each path available for some great setups, who knows.

If you read all the way here within 30 seconds, you win 2 intarnetz!

After taking a break from the game, here I am again with another Half-Minute Hero speedrun; and this time I take on Hero 300!

Of course, before everything else I'd like to thank:
-mike and nate for their tireless work on SDA, you guys are epic.
-Breakdown for his effort on clearing the enormous backlog, and his recently speedy updates.
-MAS8705 for starting the thread on SDA.
-StarsofViolence of YT for the Hero 300 vid I took some strategies from (mostly from the last 2 towns of the game)
-The Hall of Half-Minute Heroes leaderboards and the player 'NIM' for being a great reference and foundation for fast times.

Hero 300 is a single large stage that has a 300 second timer before it's game over. You start out completely naked without any items whatsoever so the route is simple to follow, but the luck manipulation is not. The current non-hacked best time on the HMH Leaderboards is NIM's 3'28"88, so I took that as a standard. After a bunch of test runs and route changes, I found that in order to obtain sub 3'30", there are 17 important random encounters that have to be manipulated:

• 2 encounters right before the 1st castle have to be against the bug/plant, and must be OHKO'd with a crit. This will leave you with at most 20 HP after the 1st castle to use for running to the next castle. The game hates me when it comes to low-level crit manipulation.
• 5 encounters in the east desert on the path to buy the Trident. NONE of these should be the White Scorpion except the 5th one (to easily suicide back to the castle)
• 4 encounters after meeting Millenia. The best fight here is against the trio of wolves. They give the most exp and gold. (1k gold required)
• 2 encounters after the Bandit Trio. Any fight is good EXCEPT the one against a Rhino + Shield Bug duo, which take too long to kill without the Hero Sword.
• 4 encounters after beating both Zain and Lambde have to be against the Rhino + Shield Bug duo, as they give the most gold to quickly buy the Brave Vest.

So, how lucky did I get in my best attempt?

-I got NO CRITS against both the bug and the plant, so I only had less than 10 hp for running to the next castle.

-I got all 5 encounters perfectly without meeting the scorpion. Having to fight the Jelly + Bug duo on the 5th fight was risky though since those usually die easily after you buy the Trident. (un)Luckily I didn't get a crit and suicided as planned. Seeing the white scorpion is a run ender so this was my best lucky streak out of the entire run.

-I got 2 wolf trio encounters out of 4, which is my luckiest out of all my attempts. The wolves have a low encounter rate (or maybe it's just me) so I took what I had. Since I didn't hit 1k gold I had to walk around for a 5th encounter though.

-Since I only needed 300 gold to get 2k when they appeared, I decided to fight the Rhino + Shield Bug duo anyway. No time lost here as fighting 2 pairs of lobsters would've taken the same amount of time as fighting 1 Rhino+Bug. (that and the 9 panel walk for a new fight after escaping the first would be a waste of time)

-To save the 427 gold I had, I took a risk in not healing after the Lambde fight. I fought the Rhino + Bug duo 2 out of 4 times which allowed me to buy the Brave Vest pretty fast. My low HP luckily held out all the way til level 40.

On a final note, while fighting the Ultimate Lord, I used the herb early so that my level 40 HP would hold out until she goes to round 2. If I used it any later she would've taken much more time to kill me and thus waste some actual time. (not in-game time though, as the timer disappears at that point)

With the best luck manipulation, I think a sub 3'20" could be possible, though that's just a rough estimate. It's gonna be pretty mind-shattering to actually manipulate all 17 important encounters though. Overall I'm satisfied with this run coz I beat NIM's best time by 0'0"38. That's just full of win right there. :D

Thanks for watching the speedrun, and I hoped you enjoyed it as much as I did making it. :)