Part 2:

Part 3:

YT Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRybRQCxAXm1sP4csU01exT0E-zl_Jnu3

The first official run ever of this category! Also only my third completed speedrun ever of the game lmao As a result, I didn't do so well, but it also could have gone a lot worse. I did get some practice in during the couple weeks prior to this run, and if not for that, the entire run would have been a complete disaster.

This category in general has a fascinating amount of depth in terms of routing, execution, and even on-the-fly decision-making with regards to which recruits you should take when. Even with the hardships I faced, I would love this category through and through, if not for one major issue: RIOLU.

That one recruit single-handedly ruins this category, as the blue bastard can take any number of HOURS to recruit. For me, it took four hours to get him. On the bright side, I didn't have to grind for any other particularly rare recruits, because they had all spawned by the time Riolu showed up. But that alone unfortunately killed my mood for the entirety of day 3, and that whole day had a lot of difficult tasks to do. By the end, I was so exhausted, that the Purity Forest finale unfortunately started off kinda disastrously as well.

All in all, quite a roller coaster that is hard to summarize. My run definitely leaves room for improvement in pretty much every way, from execution, to routing, to strategy, to RNG (Riolu), and so on. I was also pretty liberal with food/water/bathroom breaks until near the end, since I wasn't sure how long this would go on for. Its_a_Random has already completed two other runs that are faster, just they weren't done all in one shot like this. But despite that, I'm still always glad to be the first to brave the dangerous waters that are these runs.

Mod note: Retimed 2s earlier to the first fade out after Celebi joins