Pokemon Stadium 2 Speedruns are CRAZY

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Thanks to the following people for their speedrun contributions! Be sure to check their channels out:
Video Footage
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Stadium 2 Footage - Werster
Nuzlocke Footage - PM7
Special Thanks!
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​Pokemon Stadium Speedrunning Discord - / discord
GenericMadScientist - genericmadscie...
Thumbnail Art
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h / bluefiremochi
PulseEffects is a Pokemon Speedrunning focused KZbin channel with an emphasis on teaching you how truly fun it is to Speedrun Pokemon games. You'll find Speedrunning Tutorials and Pokemon Speedruns ranging from Pokemon Crystal, all the way up to latest releases Pokemon Scarlet and Violet. Whether you have an interest in learning Pokemon Speedrunning, or you just enjoy Speedrunning content, this is the place to be! Hit Subscribe and ring that bell icon to see how it EFFECTS your Pokemon experience!
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[@PulseEffects]

I hope to see you all live on my Twitch stream for the new Pokemon DLC! www.twitch.tv/PulseEffects 👈 👀

[@jigglyppuff8]

The Destiny Bond/Explosion strats remind me of how Ribbon Collectors solved the WiFi battle tower in gen 4 by abusing Destiny Bond.

[@doomsdoor]

is there a video about it that I can watch? Sounds very interesting to watch

[@UncalibratedAimbot]

I’d also love a video

[@dustimus8177]

Go on...

[@chesspuppeteer]

Can't blame them. It was riddled with mons with illegal stats. Even weirder given that if those mons are caught they pass the hack checks in Gen 4 and beyond's hack checks.

[@AkaiAzul]

​@@chesspuppeteerThat's...really weird....where can I read / watch more about this?

[@mgloriousone9823]

Voltorb: "I remember when the internet didn't exist...", Elite 4: "Okay, boomer"

[@samusfan117]

"We're going to need to use every move I've mentioned this far against him." That was crazy. This is like a classic YT video that actually has tons of content in a limited run time. This video is under 9 minutes but with that line, I realized I had been taught something and went on a journey. No filler, no gags, just a single shout-out to the Twitch channel. What a good use of my lunch break. Amazing content, I'm looking forward to more!

[@udhsids]

Are we watching the same video? There is clearly a twitch plug in round 2:13

[@skunkface_]

I never knew Whitney's face was a broken jpg

[@PulseEffects]

That's what happens to Gym Leaders when they don't give you their badge after beating them.

[@darwinwatterson4568]

hey!! >:O i've used that exact haruko pfp ! rad sweet cool

[@LittleMountain90]

Of course the guy with the username "Generic Mad Scientist" would figure out the AI manipulation math for speedrunning

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

Currently routing a complete game speedrun of Stadium 2 that I believe to be competitive, would have finished sooner but other commitments got in the way. Generic Mad Scientist was a godsend for providing insights on how the AI selects teams, I even found a bug in his tool that was incorrectly weighting the value that the AI assigned to Mirror Coat and Counter, which caused some team predictions to be incorrect when your team includes Wobbuffet. He fixed it mere hours after, as well! EDIT 11/19/23: Still not done, but getting there, this is a huge undertaking! Prime Cup R2 is a huge consistency hurdle, I may just have the accept a team that has a weakness in some areas. EDIT 5/15/24: I DID IT! 17:57:15 WR LFG!!!

[@vreeze33]

Good luck with your route!

[@theslimelegacy]

It took me 6 months to beat this game both round 1 and round 2 so good luck man i truly wish you nothing but the best, you’ll need it.

[@johnellis9077]

​@@theslimelegacysix months? I've been playing ever since it first came out N64 and only just beat round one a couple of months ago this year....😅🤣

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

@@vreeze33 Wow, you made this comment 8 months ago, but I will let you in on a little secret before it gets published: I broke the complete game Stadium 2 WR by over an hour and a half! It really did take a LONG time to route the game, but it was well worth it in the end!

[@vreeze33]

@bigtimetimmyjim6486 Congratulations, that's very impressive! Are you satisfied with your time or will you be trying to get it even lower?

[@herbertunkraut]

I'd argue early gen Exolosiom isn't dumb at all. I think the newer version is dumb for being useless. I wish they would bump up the base power of Explosion back to effectively 500, since its current 250 isn't even the highest base power in the game anymore. I think trading a pokemon for a KO is a fantastic mechanic.

[@doomsdoor]

I feel like it would be a win win for gamefreak to make explosion stronger, they like flashy moves and short battles for VGC

[@Lobster222]

The move also has significant counterplay between protect, ghost types, and even damp. They can always tweak the numbers a bit (400? 450?) but 250 is just too low.

[@RalorPenwat]

Almost definitely won't happen. It's the highest basepower attack that has no conditionals or setup. And it's on too large of a spread of mons to balance it. I can already see two pokemon that could get obscene use out of it if that happened- Alolan Golem and Regileki.

[@iss2075]

In Gen I Explosion was 170 power (340 in reality because it's doubled). So maybe putting it back to that might work. I agree, I loved Explosion in the early gens, it was one of the most disappointing changes they ever made, but they did it because of VGC. If you look at what was going on at the time it's clear why they nerfed it, but it's still a shame for those of us who don't really care about VGC lol.

[@RalorPenwat]

I mean it's not like it's just VGC that dislike it either. Nuzlockes and other challenges generally don't like explosion either (except speedruns in some games lmao). Generally, it's seen as annoying because of course it is. Having to remember which enemies have it to be able to bring a pokemon with either Damp or Protect or a Ghost type is the only counter. In doubles it effectively becomes twice as effective and after gen 3 double battles are fairly common, even if not against gym leaders. Partner NPCs having it is an actual crime. It'd be slightly more tolerable now that ghost is a more common typing and everything but having a move that deletes almost anything it's up against unconditionally makes most battles completely pointless no matter what the cost is so it's not really fun to use to most people anyway. Remember that with the exception of Rival, Champion, and Red, until rematches or battle tower type areas *nobody* has 6 pokemon. So you can get a free win with 5 pokemon with explosion and a magikarp if you wanted. It trivializes the game to abuse it and there's very limited options to play around it. If you really want to do this, then you can still do it, you just have to use a different move. Final Gambit with a max HP Blissey accomplishes the same thing, without having to worry about it being very abusable because it's only a sure fire option on one mon and there's more options against it, and AI don't use it nearly as effectively.

[@Typh3621]

I miss the pokemon lab from the stadium games. It was wonderful to adjust all your boxes and items in a much more efficient manner versus in the games.

[@MrGermanpiano]

I remember that game as my database to look up when pokémon will evolve. Back then when we had no internet it was the only way for me to get that information

[@tysondennis1016]

There should be a modern new Stadium-esque game. As the last one we had was Gen 4’s Battle Revolution.

[@scrunkore]

the only reason they existed was to have pokemon battles in 3d, no need anymore

[@Andre-od5hf]

@@scrunkore I mean the current 3d from new gen games is complete trash with very bad animations (like legit, stadium 1/2 which are the oldest battle simms have better looking and animated pokemon than any of the gen 8 or 9 games), so i think we still need that.

[@LuisSilva-yc5fz]

we need that, but making a game with actual good 3D would expose the mainline games' horrible graphics even further, which might be a bad business decision from gamefreak. Their investors don't want us to play good games, they want to shove broken games that people will buy anyway due to brand loyalty@@Andre-od5hf

[@Typh3621]

I agree with this. It would be great to have a stadium based battle frontier style 3d pokemon setup. Allowing the earning of special item rewards or move tutor // pokemon rewards for performing certain feats. This was the biggest letdown of the series imo. Imagine emeralds battle frontier but on pokemon stadium? The options would be limitless.

[@nathan94251]

Love how Red subtly cued the 007 music 😂

[@doddsfactor]

Love the goldeneye music 😂

[@Fr0stySn00ze]

I love the Shiver Mountain score from Paper Mario lol

[@nathangammage3080]

gotta love wobbafet aka destined death ☠️

[@christopherballero866]

Even with a proper team from a Gen 2 game Stadium 2 was not easy

[@Vaithegamingwarrior]

No. Not it was not. I still have memories of getting absolutely slapped by the dumb BS of the game.

[@LuisSilva-yc5fz]

i remember using a pretty decent team that could blast through Gym Leader Castle until I found that Chuck underling who uses OHKO moves and he defeated me in 3 turns lmao (one of my mons even held Brightpowder, making my luck even worse)

[@Typh3621]

​@@LuisSilva-yc5fziirc OHKO moves dont calculate evasion modifiers when they accuracy roll. So even max evasion and brightpowder wouldnt make a difference. You sir appear to have had very bad luck lol.

[@beauvogames]

7:06 "Okay boomer" (Awesome video. I always loved Stadium 2 when I was a kid but struggled with the Gym Leader Castle using the rentals in my youth. I got better once I was older and wiser but seeing how to efficiently do it is so cool)

[@FortyPerc]

Fantastic video, but what got me to comment is the use of Night Walker as BGM. Good stuff

[@Zethoro]

we love night walker

[@sp0ngeb0b53]

7:18 Look how they massacred my boi

[@DieGurke_]

7:17 why mega heracross xD

[@theslimelegacy]

Seeing people speedrun this game makes my brain hurt. It took me 6 MONTHS to completely beat this game and i did it only using rentals. I did the same with stadium 1 but that took me four months of casual play.

[@jeanbob1481]

Werster did it in one sitting in a little less then 20 hours. He dies sometimes and have to restart entire cups, he mostly use explosion, self destruct, destiny bond, mirror coat and counter. Some meme pokemon like Hitmonchan ends up being useful due to being able to use counter, mach punch and elemental punch. He mostly used something like 10 to 20 pokemons. MVP being Abra, Kadabra, Voltorb, Wobbufet, Hitmonchan, Hitmonlee, Weezing, Haunter, Gastly, Magmar, Starmie, Corsola, Lanturn, Tentacruel etc.

[@theslimelegacy]

@@jeanbob1481 props to him man i aint got the patience or time to do it in one sitting. EVEN with my yellow team, stadium 2 might be the hardest pokemon challenge ive ever done.

[@DanteCrowlley]

Didn't played as much as 1, I do still have both a dead 64 n the cartridge, but I also played on PC n realized how hard it really was using only rentals, never got to beat round 2, now the second game it was just unplayable on PC, can't how it's now so many years later, but I know its hard to fix ROMs

[@zoranadraws]

Well then, I'm early. I really enjoy these videos, keep it up!

[@ashmander3465]

Blue spiny Shell goes crazy

[@MapleLunii]

Played through Stadium 2 recently on an emulator with my team from the romhack Pokemon Crystal Clear, it was awesome ❤

[@Madia367]

This game defined Pokémon stadium 2

[@Xand_]

Really cool video!

[@fk5774]

Will you do a vid on todays new world record of soulsilver glitchpess

[@PulseEffects]

Eventually for sure! It's a pretty hilarious one considering the circumstances. 😂

[@ashmander3465]

Speed running challenge mode should technically be separate as everything or most things are randomized

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

Challenge Cup involves knowing a few things: the pool of pokemon available to you, how the AI picks moves for said pokemon, the pools of pokemon your 8 opponents draw from, and how to put a team together to successfully counter the pokemon that you will likely be facing.

[@steelcrocodile5495]

Did anyone else catch Shiver Mountain from Paper Mario N64 at the beginning?

[@slateportraichu5416]

I lvoe this game and this was such an interesting video. Thank you=)

[@angelomaldini3316]

Just goes to show how opinions about Pokémon are always changing depending on the game. Because who would think to select Voltorb in a game.

[@Max-zv8hm]

all you focus on is the gym leaders. speedrun challenge cup master on R-2.

[@griifster99]

Is that the under night in-birth OST I hear???

[@clarafedde8674]

Also using emulators, you could use put your Pokemon from either real or gb emu on a N64 emulator and vise versa...in 2004.... Nintendo should have no trouble with this, but....

[@psyxypher3881]

It's more "accessible" than ever but still doesn't have GB connectivity.

[@WhyUHaf2BeMad]

might be a hot take but animations in this game look better than the new gens

[@theaverageyoutubecomentera9877]

Hamburger cheeseburger big mac whopper

[@horrochowruncible8488]

Hambur hambur hamburger

[@jimtsap04]

Hamburgers and cheeseburgers go well with fries

[@Feroror]

Ok pull around for your total

[@AgentXRifle]

…sir, SIR… This is a Wendys!

[@enoyna1001]

Salad

[@donlyphans7801]

Is there any reason why rng manipulation isn't used?

[@Super_Top_Secret_Area]

The AI opponents cheat, somewhat. Things are more or less predetermined at the start of the turn, if I am not mistaken.

[@iss2075]

@@Super_Top_Secret_Area No that's not true. And also you can RNG manipulate Pokemon Stadium, I've done it on emulator using save states before. I don't know why they don't do it in real life, but my guess would be that it's too hard to do in real time on a console. Also, the AI doesn't cheat, it's just the AI is really good, like 100x better than the main series game, but there's 0 evidence of it actually cheating. But it knows all the damage calculations, the entire movepools of every Pokemon (but NOT your actual moveset), takes into account added effects of moves when deciding what to use, and so on. That may be why some people think it's cheating, but it's not, it's all programmed in.

[@Super_Top_Secret_Area]

@@iss2075 If I am not mistaken, the AI knows when its moves will be critical hits, meaning that it may use moves that are guaranteed to KO your Pokémon, that otherwise wouldn't without the critical hit. That's what I mean when I say the AI "cheats", it's all coded into their AI but it is still using values the player doesn't have access to.

[@LocalMaple]

7:07 Okay Boomer.

[@zephyrurchin4763]

First view, first like, first comment

[@greggchambers9716]

I'm sorry, but this title is really kind of clickbait, and not very accurate. These rentals don't "break" anything. They're very good, but they're part of the game and they don't sequence-break and they don't do anything out of the ordinary. Saying these things break Stadium 2 is like saying the character of Ayla breaks Chrono Trigger.

[@TheRevolutionDF]

First

[@boringnolifekillstreak]

i remember playing this as a kid and its hard, i managed to reach the elite 4 but never beat it. so i give up and play the minigame with my brothers and sister and compete each other, i'm gonna buy it for the N64 soon and play with the family like old time sake if giving the chance.

[@YourFavoriteSociopath]

The Pokemon Stadium games were my very first Pokemon games. My brother taught me how to read playing these! He also taught me how to play Pokemon via these games... by repeatedly kicking my ass 6 ways to Sunday using his full team from Blue while I was stuck with rental mons lmaooo. But lemme tell you I learned my way around types, and it solidified my favorite pokemon as Golduck very early in my life

[@LuisSilva-yc5fz]

yea they were my first pokemon games too! they taught me a lot of English

[@gadielinutil]

I just noticed that they peeled Typhlosion in stadium 2