Another fun speedrun. I had some bad moments near the beginning, died against Frank and also died against Strong after he used his submission hold twice. Then took a little longer than usual in the cave trying to get to level 9, didn’t encounter many big groups of slugs, but maybe that’s a good thing cause they’re kind of tedious to fight without Rockin’ (or Slime in my playthrough.)
Keyman bit the dust Peaceful Rest Valley as I was catching up, and I managed to get through PRV without getting into one encounter. The screen scrolling trick works wonders. Later, I caught up some more by abusing some skip sandwiches, as I had gotten a lot of money dying twice in the beginning of the game. Also by killing myself in the Mondo Mole cave, I went back to Twoson, also inching me back to Keyman who forgot to get the wad of bills or something and had to watch the show twice, ha!
Meanwhile, Keyman and I got ahead of Michael1 and we assume he got ahead of us at some points too. It was a pretty close race. Near the end, Keyman lost Jeff in the battle against the Boogey Tent, which allowed me to skip sandwich my way from the Threed crash site and nail the tent with the big bottle rocket and pass him up.
Unfortunately, my game ended 30 seconds before the end of the 2 hours, and froze after I was exiting the hotel after a good night’s sleep of catching zombies with zombie paper. My theory: the zombie paper didn’t work, Apple Kid succumbed to gluttony and spent much of the night eating Jelly Donuts, so much so in his bloated state could not judge his completed product correctly. When I exited the Hotel, the game was black, emphasizing the total darkness of Giygas’ power. Then Ness, Jeff and Paula likely tripped down the stairs into an abyss leading to the center of the Earth. They were never heard from again.
Oh, is that sad? Anyway, Keyman brushed ahead of me in the last 30 second stretch.
Edit:
Ah, pretty funny moment was observing the sign in the Dungeon Man getting the photo man to come. This is such a habit for me playing the game regularly that I did it unconscously, ha! Then I was bereaved! Dang photoman!