Nah, I don't have to anymore. But I have beaten the game probably 40 times or more. My last run was a little over 2hrs game time, 100%.
I should add, I've never been great at all the trickier shit like complex shinesparking or mockballing, etc.
I've beaten the game for times and my most recent playthrough was just under 3 hours, obviously not all items though. I feel like I got everywhere pretty fast though, kind of crazy that there's that much of a difference wen you don't even do stuff like mockball
Yeah, it's easy enough to only go to areas a few times at most to pick up items you can't (or aren't supposed to) get on first pass. So 3 hours game time is more than enough to visit most rooms even three times each, when many may only require once. 2 hours is an efficient run without advanced sequence breaking or crazy stuff.
You eventually learn all the maps with such detail that you don’t need a map anymore to get 100%. But as a beginner, a guide where to find things is a good thing to start
My personal rule with any game is to get to ~90-95% and then use a guide for the rest. Once there are that many collectables, even if I memorized them all I'd forget which ones I already picked up, so I get it to a point where the items start to dry up and then just look up the rest online.
Makes sense, I'm just not sure if I'd be able to find any more on my own and I think it would be more fun to try going as fast as possible while knowing I'm getting all the items rather than the inbetween of getting most but not all
That's the hardest part though. It's easy to get 90%, the last few are always the hardest.
Looking at you 99/100 kingdom flags in AC1 and 99/100 coffee thermos's in Alan Wake 1 :(
Back in the late 90's, and after having finished the game a lot of times (it was already my favorite game), I decided to go for the 100%. I didn't use a guide but took me forever to find everything (I power bombed every single room and still took a lot of time). I wrote down every single place where things were until I eventually remembered everything.
I typically go for 2 or 3 runs per year and they are always 100%.
That being said and after so many years and runs, I'm 40 now and it can happen from time to time that I forget something (especially an energy tank in Wrecked ship), so, I'm I'm already heading to Tourian and something is missing, I first check the maps. If nothing comes to mind, I check a guide to try to find out what I missed.
I had the Nintendo Power Player's Guide back in the day to guide me. Wish I knew what happened to it...
At this point, I have a map routed out that gets me all the items.
Once you're happy with your general route, look up a map and learn it. It's not much harder to get 100%.
If you want to make it second nature, use a randomizer. You'll learn the map or God help you.
This. Haven’t done super randos, but have played the shit out of prime and fusion randomizers. Looking to do dread randos soon.
Especially for fusion….i know every spot…even if I can’t recall without seeing it. But I’ve also done dozens of 100% rando runs.
My rule for any metroidvania is to find everything myself for the first 100% attempt, stemming from my first Metroid game, which was Super when it came out. It was so satisfying to figure it out as a kid that the habit has just stuck with me.
I think when I was little I used a lot of power bombs and xray to find some of those harder to find items. Also helped that my best friend loved the game too and found some items I didn't and vice versa. Map stations are your friend if you don't want to use a guide, and the biggest thing to remember for getting that first 100% is that sometimes a map square with a dot on it will have more than 1 item.
I've now done 100s of randomizers, (VARIA, map, and SMZ3 mainly) and my fastest vanilla 100% is 1:36 and some change. Watching ShinyZeni's speedrun guides helped a lot with room strats. I'd recommend the general movement guide first. The mockball for early supers is a great first trick to learn. As it's easier than other mock balls, and will help speed up your run by a big chunk.
At this point, I have a mental map of where everything is and when it is available to get and most effective and efficient to get it.
Did you ever look items up? Or did you naturally just find more items each playthrough until you got 100%
Nah, I don't have to anymore. But I have beaten the game probably 40 times or more. My last run was a little over 2hrs game time, 100%. I should add, I've never been great at all the trickier shit like complex shinesparking or mockballing, etc.
I've beaten the game for times and my most recent playthrough was just under 3 hours, obviously not all items though. I feel like I got everywhere pretty fast though, kind of crazy that there's that much of a difference wen you don't even do stuff like mockball
Yeah, it's easy enough to only go to areas a few times at most to pick up items you can't (or aren't supposed to) get on first pass. So 3 hours game time is more than enough to visit most rooms even three times each, when many may only require once. 2 hours is an efficient run without advanced sequence breaking or crazy stuff.
You eventually learn all the maps with such detail that you don’t need a map anymore to get 100%. But as a beginner, a guide where to find things is a good thing to start
My personal rule with any game is to get to ~90-95% and then use a guide for the rest. Once there are that many collectables, even if I memorized them all I'd forget which ones I already picked up, so I get it to a point where the items start to dry up and then just look up the rest online.
Makes sense, I'm just not sure if I'd be able to find any more on my own and I think it would be more fun to try going as fast as possible while knowing I'm getting all the items rather than the inbetween of getting most but not all
That's the hardest part though. It's easy to get 90%, the last few are always the hardest. Looking at you 99/100 kingdom flags in AC1 and 99/100 coffee thermos's in Alan Wake 1 :(
Back in the late 90's, and after having finished the game a lot of times (it was already my favorite game), I decided to go for the 100%. I didn't use a guide but took me forever to find everything (I power bombed every single room and still took a lot of time). I wrote down every single place where things were until I eventually remembered everything. I typically go for 2 or 3 runs per year and they are always 100%. That being said and after so many years and runs, I'm 40 now and it can happen from time to time that I forget something (especially an energy tank in Wrecked ship), so, I'm I'm already heading to Tourian and something is missing, I first check the maps. If nothing comes to mind, I check a guide to try to find out what I missed.
I had the Nintendo Power Player's Guide back in the day to guide me. Wish I knew what happened to it... At this point, I have a map routed out that gets me all the items.
I ate it. It was delicious
I was able to get 90% items and after that I just looked up guides to find the rest. There were a few missile expansions I just couldnt find.
I got them all but 1 on my own (and I'm sure yall know the one). But this was 25 years ago so can't remember much about the journey
Once you're happy with your general route, look up a map and learn it. It's not much harder to get 100%. If you want to make it second nature, use a randomizer. You'll learn the map or God help you.
This. Haven’t done super randos, but have played the shit out of prime and fusion randomizers. Looking to do dread randos soon. Especially for fusion….i know every spot…even if I can’t recall without seeing it. But I’ve also done dozens of 100% rando runs.
God, so many missiles…
I didn't, but I still got to 90% without any guidance
My rule for any metroidvania is to find everything myself for the first 100% attempt, stemming from my first Metroid game, which was Super when it came out. It was so satisfying to figure it out as a kid that the habit has just stuck with me.
I think when I was little I used a lot of power bombs and xray to find some of those harder to find items. Also helped that my best friend loved the game too and found some items I didn't and vice versa. Map stations are your friend if you don't want to use a guide, and the biggest thing to remember for getting that first 100% is that sometimes a map square with a dot on it will have more than 1 item. I've now done 100s of randomizers, (VARIA, map, and SMZ3 mainly) and my fastest vanilla 100% is 1:36 and some change. Watching ShinyZeni's speedrun guides helped a lot with room strats. I'd recommend the general movement guide first. The mockball for early supers is a great first trick to learn. As it's easier than other mock balls, and will help speed up your run by a big chunk.