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Last change: 2023-08-08, mention 1.3 + GOG Patch 1

Jazz Jackrabbit, Tips for new speedrunners

Let's run this speedy, colorful action game together!

Game Version to speedrun Episodes 1-6

Jazz 1.0. The best version to speedrun Episodes 1-6 is Jazz 1.0, the initial Floppy release. This is hard to find. Ebay maybe?

Jazz 1.1. The second-best version is Jazz 1.1, the second Floppy release. This is even harder to find than Jazz 1.0. During practice, you must prepend dd to cheat codes. (Runs are played without cheat codes.)

Jazz 1.3 + GOG Patch 1. Buy the Jazz Jackrabbit Collection on GOG. This is by far the easiest version to obtain, and it doesn't have any egregious bugs, you can easily finish every level.

Viewed purely from a speedrunning perspective, Jazz 1.3 + GOG Patch 1 not the fastest version possible:

• Even though Orbitus 2 is easily passable, the zig-zagging section in the second half of Orbitus 2 can't be cut short.
• The start of Dreempipes 1 will be slower because of the fast water raising. The water will catch you earlier, slowing your movement.
• The final vertical shaft with red switches in Dreempipes 2 will be slower because of the fast water lowering. You'll have to hit more red switches during the ascent. This is probably the biggest loss, but I haven't timed it, and to make the loss matter, you must be able to play really well in the following fast-feet section.

Still, I warmly recommend Jazz 1.3 + GOG Patch 1. I'd start worrying about the slower Dreempipes only after you've reached times around 30:00 or 29:00 for Episodes 1-6. Let me know when you've broken into the magical 29:xx, and we'll find a solution together!

1.0-1.3 Hybrid. The next-best version is the 1.0-1.3 hybrid that you create from an unpatched 1.3, i.e., you don't have GOG Patch 1. This will give you 1.0 physics and 1.0 levels. Instructions to make the hybrid:

1. Find an unpatched Jazz version 1.3. If you played Jazz 1.3 as-is, it would have a near-impassable Orbitus 2 and many broken airboard ditches.
2. Keep backups of Jazz 1.3 in case you want to play Episodes A-C, X, Z later, or in case things go wrong.
3. Download the Jazz 1.0 shareware and copy the following two files from the 1.0 shareware into Jazz 1.3 (e.g., from GOG):
   • JAZZ.EXE
   • MENU.000
   Overwrite the existing two files in the 1.3.
4. Run this Jazz 1.0-1.3 hybrid via the JAZZ.EXE. (You can't run the hybrid via FILE0001.EXE.) Orbitus 2 will be of normal difficulty (instead of near-impassable) and all airboard ditches will work.

Downsides of the 1.0-1.3 hybrid compared to 1.0 or 1.3:

• It will claim "This is Shareware" in the main menu, unlike the 1.0 or 1.3 fullgame. This is a mere cosmetic difference.
• Hip-hop birds fire large birdshots, not small birdshots as the 1.0 would. I don't know if birdshot size is a physics difference or a mere cosmetic difference. I doubt that this affects anything when running the Episodes 1-6. The Battleships 2 boss kill seems to work exactly the same.
• You cannot access Episodes A-C, X (Holiday Hare '94), or Z (all bonus levels) in the 1.0-1.3 hybrid because it uses the menu system of the 1.0 shareware. Keep an unmodified 1.3 to play these episodes.

Still, this 1.0-1.3 hybrid has its merits. You can build a record-capable Jazz 1 version from the most common Jazz CD release of the 1990's.

Jazz 1.2. If you have an older CD release with a normal Orbitus 2, i.e., not the near-impassable Orbitus 2, you can certainly learn the run on these. Tubelectric 2 will differ in both 1.2 releases, and the Medivo 1 airboard ditch is broken. For record attack, you'll eventually want to switch to 1.0 or the 1.0-1.3 hybrid.

Jazz 1.3 with MaxStrike's patch. To fix only the near-impassable Orbitus 2, copy MaxStrike's patch for Orbitus 2 into Jazz 1.3, e.g., the GOG release. Airboard ditches will remain broken. Therefore, for speedrunning, I recommend to create the 1.0-1.3 hybrid instead, see explanation above.

For casual play, MaxStrike's patch is good. Episodes A-C, X, Z will remain selectable with MaxStrike's patch, and the broken airboard ditches may be acceptable.

Jazz 1.3. Without modification, Jazz 1.3 is near-unrunnable because of the near-impassable Orbitus 2. This would pseudorandomly lose several minutes even with a well-practiced setup. Orbitus 2 is too hard by development oversight, feel free to patch Jazz 1.3 to get around it.

See also my list of Jazz Jackrabbit 1 version differences.

Dosbox setup

In the Dosbox config, set cycles to 40,000 for comparable loading times. If, during levels or menuing, Jazz stutters at 40,000, then set cycles to whatever you like, but we should still discuss loading times. The black screens with text such as LOADING DIAMONDUS LEVEL ONE have a massive effect on the run.

If you use GOG's Jazz 1.3 with/without the hybrid (see above), you can set 40,000 cycles as follows:

1. In your installation directory, open dosbox_jazz_single.conf with a text editor.
2. Below [autoexec] add this line: cycles 40000
3. Save the text file and run Jazz with GOG's normal shortcut (that starts DOSBox and then Jazz inside).

If you use your own custom Dosbox setup, you can set cycles either in your normal configuration file, or you can type cycles 40000 into a running DOSBox's prompt before starting Jazz from the prompt.

Contact me

I'm Simon N., visit twitch.tv/simonnaar or send email to eiderdaus at the gmail.com.

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