If there are any ways you can shave a few minutes off the time go for it.
There'll be a reasonable shave of 30 seconds to 1 minute by... not dying.
The best time still had 1 avoidable death. Levels take between 20 seconds and 1 minute, death moves you back to their beginning, and you lose weapons.
I caught interest in Jazz Jackrabbit 1 speedrunning. This is lots of memorization and dexterity.
Honestly, I'm surprised that you caught interest at all. Speedrunning feels precisely like the kind of grindy, execution-heavy activity that I imagine you would eschew.
it's not even a tool-assisted speedrun, it sounds like one actually executed manually completely unaided.
<_<;
Yeah, it's real-time attack.
Grinding and mindless repetition is acceptable here, because it's an end-in-itself. There's no purpose outside of training for this particular game. When I fail, it's for my own fault, but it doesn't impact anything else.
(and god help you if the game's physics includes pseudorandom elements)
Physics can be chaotic, but not random. Gadgets spawn once they're very close to the screen. Most gadgets behave in a pattern according to passed time since their own spawn, that's easy to anticipate.
But certain gadgets move in a pattern according to time since level start. This is harder to plan. At least one place feels random, can cost seconds. Not a worry yet.
tricks and other strategies to help you get to the ballpark of an optimal route, and I can imagine Simon catching some interest in that
The route is a mixture of my own knowledge, Vortale's real-time WR, and a TAS. Most of it comes from the real-time WR. I do some things differently on purpose, but most are different only because I haven't practised the better method.
All that said, best of luck and would love to see a video eventually, even if it falls far short of world record.
Thanks! Maybe I can talk Icho into screencasting from his machine. :-]
-- Simon