It's been 4 months of 2018 and I've managed some pretty big scores this time. In the past week or so I've barely played at all so I might be taking a break doing other stuff... It occurred to me that I never really write blogposts about scoring in DS despite my passion in sharing DS with the world, which is for a few reasons:
1. Laziness. Writing stuff takes effort.
2. Nobody reads my blog lul
3. I have my stream and a DS discord
But right now I am in the mood to talk a little bit about the year so far, it's just that my memories might be hazy regarding some stuff. I'll do my best. I'm going to talk a bit about each score, and the potential future prospects for the category.
In chronological order:
January:
10-6 Hatate: 1,068,792
10-6 Aya : 959,834
February:
10-2 Aya: 1,548,738
10-2 Hatate: 1,290,535
9-2 Aya: 1,400,492
9-2 Hatate: 1,770,386
6-5 Hatate: 720,120
March:
6-4 Aya: 898,789
6-4 Hatate: 960,526
2-4 Aya: 162,806
9-7 Aya: 631,270
EX-3 Aya: 717,656
2-3 Aya: 166,464
April:
12-4 Hatate: 1,398,372
12-4 Aya: 1,412,926
EX-2 Aya: 896,097
EX-3 Hatate: 825,277
EX-2 Hatate: 931,772
11-7 Aya: 414,219
10-6 Hatate: 1,068,792
This scene is a very tough one, and it is even more tough with Hatate in my opinion. This score is good, and quite lucky, but I love this scene so much that I think I'll improve it one day. I got the god luck one time, but I failed to execute that run (missing two nice shots)... so in order to make up for that, I'd like to compromise with the luck and have semi-godluck one day resulting in a 1.1 million score.
10-6 Aya: 959,834
I made a video about this category (the PB used in the video is older, though) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ik4KsLEkiKA
If you are interested in how this works, you could watch this video. It's a bit lengthy, since there's a lot to explain. This is one of my favourite categories in the game, and this is probably the most finalized score I have right now. Brilliant luck, great execution, and it was a pretty lengthy grind (55 hours). I have no plans to improve it, but because I love this scene, I think I might improve the Hatate score in the future since it's not as good.
10-2 Aya: 1,548,738
This run is really good, and it's a tough scene (even more so with Aya, in my opinion) but It's tempting to go back to it at some point since I hadn't figured out the optimal cycles yet when I was playing Aya. It's just a small loss, though, and the run is really good otherwise, so I'll probably be keeping it. I got really lucky with this one!
10-2 Hatate: 1,290,535
There was much despair behind this run. I had the right strategy and I played it very well. I put in around 19 hours in two days to get this, and by this time I knew all about the cycles. However, luck was not kind; 1270000+ has been reached 32 times. 22 times 1.27s, 9 times 1.28s, and
this time 1.29. This frustration makes me not want to play this scene any more, although, 1.3 million isn't unrealistic.
9-2 Aya: 1,400,492
A collaborative effort with KirbyComment. Learning was a very gradual and interesting evolution. The pattern is beyond subtle, and quite different from Hatate. I might go back and improve this some more, maybe up to 1.415 or so, since my Hatate run is better.
9-2 Hatate: 1,770,386
This was a really fun and interesting grind! I learned so much and felt very close to the game while doing this... Such a deep optimization! I managed to make the optimization so consistent that I somehow came up with this brilliant score. I had so many 1.75s, and then a sudden 1.77! I think this score is quite satisfying and I don't think I need to come back to it.
6-5 Hatate: 720,120
This only took a few hours. It's one of the most simplistic scenes in the game. Position yourself next to the laser spawn. Max your macro bonus and risk bonus, aim backwards to get all the multipliers, and let go just as the laser is spawning. If you do it all correctly, you will get a photo scoring 180,030 points. At a glance, it would appear to be a maxed out score(180,030 x4 = 720,120) but you can actually score slightly higher. If the stars align and Yuugi moves just the right way and fires the lasers at the right angle, you can get a photo at least several hundred points higher. Should this happen once in your run, you could even beat my score with an execution error or two (missing some macro bonus). It's doubtful that you could beat my score if you lose 0.01 boss shot anywhere, though. This kind of luck seems exceedingly rare, and I find this scene unenjoyable, so I won't try this.
6-4 Aya: 898,789
6-4 is the hardest scene in the game to me... Sure, mechanically with the photos there are scenes which are harder to optimize a sense, but I find everything about 6-4 to be absolutely brutal. This score is lucky as fuck but I made a huge mistake. I missed a nice shot on the 3rd shot! How this is still my PB just goes to show how unbelievable the luck influence is. I could try to beat this, I suppose... It's not quite as good as my Hatate run.
6-4 Hatate: 960,526
Stellar luck on the 1st, 2nd and 4th photos. Only the 3rd had to be compromised (a shame, since this could've been a million with non-compromise strategy. Sadly, that was impossible in this situation)
Before, I've had a chance to score much much higher with a true godtier luck, but I failed in the very final moment. Sad! This run is still good, and took much effort. I find this to be the single toughest category in the entire game. Also, as a sidenote, I noticed something I've never seen before in the other photogames in this scene. The reason why earlier photos are so high isn't because you're getting more Suikas or bullets in them. The value of Suikas (and perhaps the bullets too) actually goes down every photo! If you don't know that, you might think the theoretical value is much higher than it is in reality.
2-4 Aya: 162,806
This is very easy, and I didn't really bother to put much effort in. I came up with a better plan on the 4th photo, so now with solid execute and more importantly superb luck, we could possibly see a 170,000 run if I ever go grind that out (and I might in the future). For some reason, I appear have difficulty in stabilizing the position of the camera on the first 3 shots, resulting in some pretty random boss shot multipliers...
9-7 Aya: 631,270
It's insanely hard. I've had a lot of 600,000+ runs, and still stuck... I want to somehow reach 700,000 one day. I don't have much to say here, it's one of the more self-evident scenes in the game.
EX-3 Aya: 717,656
I just can't seem to optimize the last photo. I find it simply impossible. If I could just get past that, I could totally score in the range of 760-770,000 eventually.
2-3 Aya: 166,464
One of the easiest scenes in the game and I gave it a thorough grind! Usually I grind out the harder scenes more, but I guess I just had to get this one. And what a score I got! 166k is absolutely fantastic. I didn't even need to stall many waves in my run, either! Normally I have to stalla nd stall and stall and stall until I get a good heart position. And then the RNG isn't any good anyway. Well, it took around 13,000 shots to get this where I would rarely ever make any notable mistakes. It's all RNG and intuition!
12-4 Hatate: 1,398,372
Oh yes! Intense! Lovely! One of my best scores in the game it is :D and such a fun category too!
If you want to learn more about the secrets, I have a video describing how I went about scoring in this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_YyzS-CthA
The truth is that I'm 90% sure the last photo could also be taken at a backshot with a Nice shot. However I could never manage to do it so and even if I found a way, it would likely be so hard that I could go for weeks without finishing a run.. That's kind of what I would expect. If I were to attempt this, the potential would go up by around 45k I think. That's big! But the difficulty rise would also be absurd, and the run is insanely hard as it is, and I don't think my run is quite optimized enough to think about incorporating such an ordeal. Perhaps if I had reached 1.42m or so I would consider it. As of now, I would rather wait for someone else to figure out the best way to optimize the 6th and move on.
12-4 Aya: 1,412,926
I didn't get a run I'm satisfied with here. I'm just so tired of this scene that I'm moving on, but I will probably return to it. Although Hatate looks much flashier and harder, I still find Aya to be incredibly fucked up to optimize all the way to the end (and way too RNG dependant...)
All the same, I could totally see myself getting a much higher score in just a day or two of grinding with some luck, it just didn't happen for like 10 days of (admittely not a lot) of playing and I got tired of it.
EX-2 Aya: 896,097
Simplistic scene. The execution isn't very hard, but the scene is long and boring. The luck is severe, and I think I could hit a luck at about 910,000 or maybe even 915,000 at best.
EX-3 Hatate: 825,277
Oh yeah! This went much better than with Aya! It's cause I find the final much easier to optimize with Hatate. If I can get enough luck, I think I might be able to score around 840,000 or more. I don't really like this scene, so not a super high priority, though.
EX-2 Hatate: 931,772
Almost the same thing as with Aya. This run might be a little bit luckier, though. I think I could hit up to 940,000 with enough luck.
11-7 Aya: 414,219
Requires a lot of luck and patience. It's also pretty complicated. My PB got absolutely unprecedented luck for me up to the final shot, never seen anything close before. Then somehow the final shot didn't get as high as expected...
What I want is for the 2nd pillar (coming from the right) to first move straight into kanako and then angle down a bit. Then the 3rd pillar should go through Kanako, a bit on her left side is preferred, and go straight down (maybe angle a bit at the end depending on my positioning). Where to position is RNG in two separate ways: Firstly the position of bullets from the 2nd and 3rd pillar must allow you to go inside and get up to 2000 risk bonus. Secondly the position you choose will also completely alter the angle, of which the effectiveness depends on the rng of the pillars. It's very rare for the RNG to make everything good all at once!
I also think the first pillar position makes quite a big difference. I'd prefer for it to not go off screen as that seems to be a significant decrease in base value, and if it arcs leftwards you're fucked, too.
And that's all for this year so far! Some prety awesome scores here! DS is by now my favorite game ever, so I will surely put out more great scores :D
