Speed run of Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga completed on July 19 2006. Available in five versions: normal/low quality DivX, and normal/high/low quality H.264 MPEG-4.

Author's comments:
Thanks go out to AquaTiger and the other SDA-ers for giving the motivation to get off my ass and re-do this one, and also for all the info/criticism.

Rather than bore you with the details of each segment, I'll just answer what will probably be some questions some of you will have:

Q: Isn't it faster to use the last coin box rather than fighting the two sets of enemies in Stardust Fields?
A: Yes and no. I timed it to being 19 seconds faster using the coin box, however Luigi will be one level down for both Dragohoho AND Queen Bean. I need those levels for extra damage to cut rounds off the fights.

Q: Why did you sometimes wait so long before stopping the Level Bonus Reel?
A: I managed to find a few "sweet spots" that would stop on a 2 or 3 more often. In the beginning I needed all the POW I could get so I abusing this as much as I could. I was using the sound the reel makes to determine when to stop it. Also note that Luigi's and Mario's "sweet spot" differed at times depending on which bonus reel they got.

Q: Speaking of the Level Bonus Reel, why didn't you do for +3s more often?
A: The +3s diseappear altogether after a short period of time, and appear less frequently the more times I choose POW as my Bonus stat. Getting +2s was hard enough at times, +3s were nigh (and on some occasions, completely) impossible to get.

Q: Why did you stop going for +2s and +3s?
A: For Wiggler, that battle was tough enough without manipulation. Beyond that, I didn't feel it was worth it. The badges do well at increasing POW, and later the Mush Badges trump pretty much everything.

Q: You seemed timid around some of the enemies. Why not just try and blaze past them and restart if it doesn't work?
A: Blazing past some enemies just plain doesn't work, and others it isn't worth losing the segment over. One second to take a different path / wait for it to move isn't too big of a deal. Some of the segments were hard enough without adding this to the mix.

Q: Why pick up so many Mushrooms? Why not just buy them later?
A: Money issues. I would have wound up with less mushrooms (and thus, less damage) if I hadn't been grabbing them.

Q: You picked up items that you really didn't need, like Syrups and 1-Up Mushrooms. What purpose did they serve?
A: I needed money, plain and simple. I can only get so much from bosses, so I needed them to sell so I could afford more Mushrooms.

Q: OK, so why did you only pick up some items, but not others that were also barely out of the way?
A: Certain items just seemed to take too much time to get, others didn't. I got what was convenient. I'm sure there were a few that I could have gotten that wouldn't have cost me much time, but they really wouldn't have made any difference.

Q: Why didn't you spend all of your money on Mushrooms in Lil' Fungitown? Why only 40?
A: There's two spots coming up that I needed money for: The Relaxation Room (200 coins) and for Chuckola Bounce (500 coins). If I had spent any more I wouldn't have had enough for both.

Q: Why didn't you open the Warp Pipe in Lil' Fungitown? You can get some good stuff here later...
A: Unneeded items. The only things worth it are the Scandal Jeans for Luigi (Luigi gets a turn before Mario) and the upgraded Mush Badges (A and AA). I could easily manipulate to have Luigi go first with the #1 Trousers, and the POW boost from the Mush Badge A and AA wasn't enough to justify wasting the time to buy them.

Q: Why did you wait so long to sell all your stuff?
A: High levels mean a high Stache stat, which in turn means I can sell stuff for more coins.

Q: If you were just waiting for a higher Stache stat, why not take a couple level bonuses for it? (Thanks to Radix for pointing this one out)
A: The short answer: It wouldn't have saved all that much time in the end. Seeing as Luigi doesn't have a multi-hit attack to abuse until the final Cackletta fight (thus needing high POW), and the fact that I milk the hell out of Mario's attacks so Luigi could get more Knockback Bros. off, it really wouldn't have saved time until the Bowletta/Cackletta fights, which would have only been a handful of seconds.

Q: Why did you get only the Greed Wallet and not the Bonus Ring?
A: The Bonus Ring I found to be completely unnecessary due to the inclusion of the Mush Badges. Not only was the extra POW not needed, it also saved me time in the form of not sitting through even MORE level ups...

Q: That Laser Snifit in Woohoo Hooniversity had it's nose up Luigi's ass! Why didn't it trigger a fight?
A: Don't ask me - this game works in mysterious ways sometimes...

Q: That Gritty Goomba in the 1st room in Teehee Valley was practically looking up Peach's dress! Why wasn't she captured!? For that matter, why didn't the Goombas always move, and how the hell did she walk THROUGH that one in the 3rd room!?
A: I found a trick that allows me to manipulate when the Goombas will start moving. If they're not on screen, they generally won't be "active" and thus won't move. In the 3rd room, this also allows me to bypass the Goomba above the ledge since by not being "active" it can't capture Peach. As for the 1st room...your guess and my guess would be equally good.

Q: Your Barrel-ing was a little weak...
A: Yeah, I know...technically I call it a 3 minute time-waster since you can't end it early. After watching it myself, I was rather puzzled as to why I didn't catch some of the easier lines I could have made.

Q: Where did all that damage come from during the Hermie III fight?
A: The Mush Badges. Despite what the description says, the Mush Badges DO NOT boost POW. Instead, they add straight damage...and as a bonus, it's done AFTER all other damage calculations are made! Effectively, it makes the minimum damage equal to whatever my Mush-Bonus is plus one. Thus the reason Mario did such a tremendous amount of damage.

Q: You suck at Chuckola Bounce...
A: Yup, definitely not one of my best performances. This is just really another time-waster, although it may be considered entertaining to observe my level of suckage here...

Q: You could have easily killed Popple in Chucklehuck Woods with Mario...why did you milk Chopper Bros. and have Luigi finish him off?
A: To learn the Advance Bros. attacks you have to use the normal versions a certain number of times. Luigi takes more uses of Knockback Bros. than Mario does of Chopper Bros. to learn the Advanced version, so I had to sneak in extra uses whenever an opportunity presented itself.

Q: Why did you unequip the #1 Trousers for the Jojora/Chucklissa fight?
A: If Jojora goes first, then I won't end up wasting a round attacking him. If I attack Chucklissa while Jojora is still on the screen, he'll perform a counterattack which will heal both of them, so I needed him off screen as soon as possible.

Q: Why didn't you just manipulate to hit the correct Lemmy the first time?
A: It's not possible. I tested it, and the first time Lemmy will always appear one position clockwise from the one I hit. It seems the game doesn't decide which one is the real one until you've hit one.

Q: WTF!? Why didn't Cackletta's Heart revive the other body parts!?
A: I managed to find a useful bit of information: Cackletta's Heart technically gets a turn even if it's not exposed! Apparently all body parts have equal speed, which means the game randomly decides which part goes in which order. If the Heart's turn comes up and it's not exposed, it gets skipped. Since the Arms were killed by a counterattack, and the Heart's turn had already passed, it wasn't allowed to revive the other parts until it's next turn...granted, I didn't GIVE it a next turn...

Q: Why didn't you just use Chopper Bros. Advance against Cackletta instead of wasting all that time learning Knockback Bros. Advance?
A: Knockback Bros. Advance is about ten times easier to chain than Chopper Bros. Advance. Pay close attention to the windows when I have to hit the button on Chopper Bros. Advance...I took a look using Freeze Frame on my DVD Recorder and found that after the fifth hit, the target window for Luigi jumping is somewhere between 2 and 6 frames (1/30th to 1/10th of a second), depending on whether or not I can hit the button one frame early/late of not. Rather than deal with that, I just went with Knockback Bros. Advance since I knew I could chain it reliably.

And now, some things I learned while making this run:
-Mario needs 19 uses of Splash Bros. to learn the Advance version, while Luigi only needs 8 to Learn Bounce Bros. Advance.
-On the flip side, Mario only needs 32 uses of Chopper Bros. for the Advance version, while Luigi needs a whopping 43!
-The Mush Badges add direct damage instead of boosting POW as the description would have us believe.
--Mushrooms and Super Mushrooms add .199 damage.
--Ultra Mushrooms add .25 damage.
--Max Mushrooms add .299 damage.
--1-Up Mushrooms, 1-Up Supers, and Golden Mushrooms add nothing.
-The Bros. Rock does absolutely NOTHING when equipped on Luigi! However, if Mario has it equipped, it acts as if BOTH Bros. have it on...
-Spin Jumping up stairs while moving toward the top of the screen will increase speed by a fair bit.
-Popple has an unusually high Defense for a Thief...
-Tanoombas need to be shot. Repeatedly.
-If I ever see another Lakipea it'll be too soon.
-Red Viruses are the bane of my existence.

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