Haha that's awesome! That's the exact same kind of thing I'd do to annoy my girlfriend, but she doesn't pay any attention to video games to even notice that I'd be doing it to her. I still going around singing that insidious overworld music for days.

I've had the same thing happen to me with regard to the Timestop spell. I've been tinkering with my strategy for completing 100% as I lost an ~35 minute run yesterday on Arech. The elves don't do much, but it's a good way to get a decent amount of troops without spending a penny, as money is pretty tight in the endgame. I'd definitely forgo buying Pikemen, they can't be that useful in the final battle. The only reason I'd even get archers is because you can get a ton of them and they can shoot while someone else is tanking. But I never knew that about the damage cap. If that's true, then I'd absolutely have to make sure that I don't get more than 3,000 archers!

I'm fine with the any% category, I was just informing you (and anyone else who may/may not be interested) that it can be trivialized. Unless certain rules are implemented, as you suggest. And the game is much easier to pick up and play in an any% fashion, so I'm happy to accommodate!

I should have prefaced, but I am aware that the game isn't completely random. Enemies are always enemies and treasures/recruitment hubs/etc. are always as such, just that what is what is jumbled up each time. Part of what makes this game doable in a reasonable amount of time is mapping out what's safe and what isn't, and using that to progress inland if the King's Bounty gods are unkind.

I personally enjoy the 100% category since, as a kid, when I would play this game, it would be the same every time: get to Saharia ASAP, recruit archmages and dragons, wipe out the first 3 continents, then find the sceptre. But I wanted to incorporate Arech into the run as the difficult spike from Urthrax to him is pretty steep. I wanted to see if there was a way to deal with him and still be able to complete the game quickly, and what would be involved in doing so. So to me it's something different and requires a lot of planning and execution, as well as good RNG.

I'm glad you've been enjoying this game, as I think it's incredibly fun and relatively unknown (unfortunately). And who doesn't love listening to the same five 20-second music clips on loop over and over and over again!

Sorry for the delay, didn't see the post. I've added an any% category, so feel free to post your run. The only reason I had only created the 100% category is because, since the game is randomly generated every time it's turned on, the scepter can be found by constantly searching in front of the castle and resetting until it's there, making this type of run possible in 0 minutes. But as long as the game is being played, I'm good with any and all categories.

Sorry for the repeat post/required verification. I did this on emulator (FCEUX) and figured clicking the box for it wouldn't require any further action. Guess I was wrong :/.

I have FCEUX 2.2.0 all set up, and everything seems to be in working order. I'll use that from now on. Thanks for your suggestion and help. Take it easy.

Hey, sorry for not responding, I didn't notice this post until just now. I think a standard emulator is a great idea, and I'm fine with whichever you feel is best. I'm extremely, extremely new to the whole speedrunning world and I'm not particularly computer savvy, so I don't know any of the differences between emulators. I used Nestopia since that was the emulator I was able to set up along with my timer to get a recording. So if you would like to establish a standard (and since you seem to know much more than me on the subject), just let me know which you think is best, and I'll use that one and figure out how to set it up. Take care.