Shedding light on Healadins

I’ve done a total of three healadins on hardcore Diablo II. I enjoy the build because of its unorthodox nature, not to mention it is generally extremely strong against undead. My first two focused on Holy Bolt + healing aura (either Cleansing or Meditation with Prayer maxed, Salvation and misc. auras on switch) and a healing A2 merc. First one got to hell (where I never proceeded onward thanks to the lack of decent parties), second to NM end. Neither died in battle or via PK as of yet, but technically they’re as good as retired already.

My third healer was a more experimental build. It was melee-oriented, using Charge as main attack. Not much Holy Bolt use or investment. All healing, if needed, was done using Cleansing (salvation, vigor, etc. on switch). Main weapon was Insight (lvl req 27), which effectively doubles prayer bonus. +59 healing aura to everyone, plus the benefit of a healing merc (who brought the total figure closer to +65 healing.) Another bonus with this build is that Meditation goes very well with Charge (compensating for that big mana cost.) I just love playing like this. Almost hard to return doing builds that have no regen healing at all (which is the norm, sadly.) Unfortunately even +65 regen healing starts to get somewhat lacking at mid-way of Nightmare, but before that, you and your party are kept very safe. With twinking you could get almost +200 total regen healing aura, which sounds completely ridiculous… (currently at NM end, but might not continue becuse hell is like it is…)

It’s a build that is a different one and also very cool to play. I might do a new one in near-future.

Silent Hill: Origins

Quite the rough jewel. If it is a jewel at all. Lots of glitches. INdeed. Maybe the useful ones come next.

I find it strangely suiting that this one has almost similar weapon stance glitch Silent Hill 1 does. It is a closely knit prequel after all… the same spirit (or attempt at it, at least).

EDIT: I’m on new game+ now, enjoying the benefits of cutscene break-outs.

Diablo II fired up again

My LoD-CD broke, but now I’m back in the fray. I can potentially be found from Europe HC Ladder, currently playing few hours a day (usually going online right after midnight). But my motivation is fickle like the spring weather. I may be gone in a few weeks again.

Many things

1. CoO glitch FAQ has been uploaded at GameFAQs.
2. I’m year older since last september.
3. New Kotinäky was published on Jamendo.
4. Got an electric guitar. Work on doom metal projects can continue.
5. I began a new Silent Hill 4 speedrun, which strives for perfection, and I utilize the newfound continue abuse movement trick in it. It might take a while ’til it’s finished, since I’m not feeling particularly motivated. I saved before picking up the Doll Key (because saving here allows for a new route with continue movement abuse) with time of 00:20 (2 mins faster than respective savepoint of the other test run.)
6. I’m attempting to TAS Game Boy Colour’s Xena. I’ve found loads of interesting glitches for it. However, like with the above, my motivation is currently on music and not games.

SH4 test speedrun completed…

…with the final time of 55:36. As I said earlier, I was aiming for less than two minutes of mistakes. I’m not sure if I succedeed in that goal, though. Some parts could’ve been better (though some parts went really well). 52:XX might be possible if you luck manipulated until your socks fell off.

A playlist of the vids (note: the newest ones are uploaded in a few days)

One thing which inspired me to continue was a new capturing program. It is Virtualdub. I’m still struggling with capturing quality settings, but so far it’s been more reliable than Pinnacle Studios (which I previously used).

God of War : CoO

A link to the thread which deposits information on any and all glitches I manage to find from this game. Which is a fair amount so far.

EDIT: just to note, you can’t see the thread unless you’ve registered to the forums… and it might not be easy to get an account from there. So never mind this post.

EDIT 2: I’m eventually going to publish a CoO glitch FAQ, so just hang on ’til then.

More SH4 news

I’m trying to find more glitches of this game, to help with speedruns and other mess-abouts. The biggest thing I’ve found thus far is the weapon charge trick, with is basically the realization that accumulated charge can be used from any weapon to any weapon. You can speed up high-level charges many seconds with this, by first gathering charge with (f.e.) paper-cutting knife, then switching over to a heavy weapon, keeping the full charge. Most useful on higher difficulties…

I’ve devised some strats for a speedrun, and I’m showcasing them with a test speedrun (easy-mode, new game). I’ve recorded the first half, up to the end of apartment world, and the save time is 00:22. The second half will undoubtetly be more interesting than the first, both because of the more complex item management and the reckless Eileen strategies that are possible on easy-mode. I’ll record that half when I got the energy, maybe in a week or so.

By the way, I earlier mentioned about 3 new kills I am able to reduce from the kill count (for worst possible stars). The method is: you can run through a Toadstool whilst recovering from a hit, meaning that 1 innocent life can be spared at each mandatory Toadstool spot where Eileen is not with you. Unfortunately, if Conquerer’s FAQ is correct, I would have to find 2 kills to prevent in order to ever get a score of 0.8…

Silent Hill 4 “worst possible stars” results

So, during my 17 kills run with every other stat at its potential worst (according to Conquerer), I got 1 whole star. This was a lot more than I expected, since according to the calculations, I should’ve gotten only 0.4. In any case, I was not discouraged, and soon found a way to reduce my score even further.

In my earlier post I speculated whether other characters’ kills add to the total Enemies Defeated-count, but I know now they don’t. I was able to kill all the Toadstools at Water Prison II’s sub-levels by pushing Eileen into them, reducing kill count by 7. Now I was the proud owner of a 0.9 star ranking! However, it seems at least one more worst star run is in order, since I found a way to reduce the kill count by 3 more…

On another note, I did a practise speedrun on easy for this game, with the final time of 1:03:05. Not too shabby!

Silent Hill 4 “worst possible stars” run.

I’ve seen a lot of requesting for 10-stars runs for any of the Silent Hills, but hey, why not for the “worst possible” star runs? According to Conquerer’s Silent Hill 4 FAQ, the star requirement for 0.2 stars would be…

Difficulty: Easy
Play time: Over 11 hours 30 minutes
Saves: 10
Continues: 10
Enemies Defeated: 1 star per 6 enemies
Memos found: 32/52 or less
Ending: doesn’t matter
Freebies: 0.2 stars

*some spoilers follow*

Silent Hill 4 ponderings

Out of the first four undoubtetly the worst. The designing has so many loose ends and rough edges it can’t be anything else but a result of a rushed schedule. They could’ve done more with the concept of a “room”, and from gameplay standpoint, the lack of a 3D-control is very noticeable…

Why am I bringing up something like this right now? I began re-playing the game, assessing challenge run possibilities. I think a no-running, pacifist HARD-mode run would work really fine with this game too, have to keep it in mind for the future. More info on that time.

(I’m reluctant to begin new gaming projects right now thanks to my SH3 run still being in the middle of completion. And there’s no telling when I’ll get back to doing it…)