Super Punch Out!! - Mad Clown [0'08"97] (PAL WR)

This run was done on an original Spanish Super Nintendo cartridge of Super Punch-Out, as well as an original PAL Super Nintendo 1chip console that was recapped and modded with the Borti RGB amp.

The PAL version of Mad Clown is interesting in that the new optimal NTSC strategy that was found recently that can get you a 9"01 actually ends up getting you a 9"04 with a 5"62 1st knockdown on the PAL version, but the older TAS strategy that got a 9"05 actually ends up being faster than both of those in the PAL version, which makes a sub 9 second fight barely possible. If you'd like to see the NTSC version of this older 9"05 strategy, you can check it out here:    • Super Punch Out!! - Mad Clown [0'09"05]  

The newer NTSC Mad Clown strategy requires a completely different approach compared to these ones because it skips ahead to a slightly faster pattern that Clown has in phase 2. If you would like to check out that version of the fight, you can check it out here:    • Super Punch Out!! - Mad Clown [0'09"01] (N...  

Mad Clown's PAL record strategy is a fairly easy fight to execute relatively speaking, but the fight is riddled with randomness throughout the first and second phases, which involve randomly blocking, randomly dodging, and randomly counter attacking any punch you attempt to throw.

This fight starts with you pressing nothing for the first frame, and then pressing "Up" and "Y" to throw a left jab on the next frame. Follow up from that left jab with a buffered right jab (for 1 extra damage so we get a good refill), with Mad Clown hopefully standing still without random retaliations and not randomly blocking for both of these punches. The odds to get past these 2 jabs are about 1 in 4.2 (or ~23.7%). From there, Clown will throw a jab on your left side, and you'll need to do a delayed left jab to counter it.

Once the jab is countered, just buffer 2 left jabs during Clown's stun, and then buffer 2 more right jabs, the first of which intercepts a hook Clown was about to throw. You'll need to hope that 2nd jab lands without him randomly blocking, or doing a random retaliation. Once they both land, Clown will instantly go into a dizzy state, and you'll need to land the strictest dizzy knockdown in the game, which sits at a 5 frame window. Thankfully, there exists a buffer for an optimal dizzy knockdown, which is to do a quick dodge into a left jab, followed by a quick dodge into an uppercut to get a time of 5”15. The total odds to get past phase 1 are about 1 in 10.

It’s also worth noting that the 9”05 Clown strategy had you do a specific buffer to waste some frames so you can do a quick duck to frame perfectly counter his hook in the next phase, however in the PAL version, no such setup exists, so you have to hit the punch manually.

The start of phase 2 will consist of Mad Clown either opening by doing a taunt where he's pointing to his stomach, which means he'll retaliate when you attempt to throw a punch, or he'll start to throw a hook. If he taunts, then your attempt is dead, but if he attempts to throw a hook, then you're past the final piece of luck in this strategy. The probability of him not doing the taunt is 3/4, so this successful outcome is reasonably in your favor.

You will need to throw a delayed right jab in order to counter Clown’s hook to stun him. Once you counter that hook, then immediately buffer an uppercut during Clown's stun, then once Clown's animation of getting hit ends, he's going to attempt to hit you with a backhand attack. You want to land an uppercut directly into this attack in order to take him down for the second time. I time this uppercut roughly around the first frame I see him start to throw out the attack.

Once you get past phase 2, then congratulations, because you've basically finished the fight! For phase 3, Mad Clown always opens with "Show Time", which involves him throwing really fast jabs. Because of Show Time, you can easily counter his first jab by buffering a right jab as soon as the phase begins, and because of how fast phase 2 was, he'll come back with so little health that he'll go right back down when the jab lands.

This strategy isn’t too bad as far as execution goes, with only 4 things you have to time frame perfectly in order to match this record, but the luck is fairly obnoxious, coming in at about 1 in 13.3 (or 7.5%), which is thankfully at least slightly better than the 9”01 NTSC strategy, which is about 1 in 21.3 (or 4.7%). The exact probability of the 8"97 is (3/4)^9, while the NTSC 9"01 fight is [(3/4)^9]*(5/8), which accounts for all random blocks and retaliations, as well as landing an unstunned super in the NTSC version.

It took me 23 frame perfect phase 1’s to get this fight, about half of which came from bad luck, and the other half were due to adjusting to the slightly different timings between PAL and NTSC. You can see my best times table is filled out quite a bit as I got closer and closer to the perfect timings.

Anyways, thanks for watching!