NOTE: I (pickfifteen) have suspended development on this fork of Bizarre Dimension, and have ported all features thus far to the new browser-based, online EarthBound Randomizer available at https://earthbound.app. Many thanks to Abyssonym for the original creation of Bizarre Dimension and the blessing to port it and his framework to allow for this new online randomizer.
Bizarre Dimension is a program that randomizes a ROM for the Super Nintendo game EarthBound, providing endless unique gameplay experiences with many distinct modes.
Windows users can simply download the eb_bizarre_dimension.exe file and run it; other platforms can run randomizer.py with Python 2. You will need to provide a ROM file of EarthBound; we will not provide this file. When you run the program, it will first ask for the location of this file; simply put the file in the same directory as the program and enter the filename.
Next, the program will ask for a seed. Simply leave this field blank to get a random seed, or enter a specific integer if you want to play the same generated game as a friend. Any ROMs generated with the same version, seed, and flags will be identical.
Next, the program will ask you which flags you would like to set. You can pick and choose which features of the randomizer you want enabled, or you can simply enter a blank line to get the default, all features enabled. After all options are selected, a new ROM file will be created, as well as a .spoiler.json file. If you get stuck during the game, you can use this file at https://eb.compnode.net to get a visual map of where doors lead to, what chest contents are, and other spoiler information.
By using Help! on the ATM card, you will be able to get details on the version of the randomizer used, the flags selected, and the seed of the particular game.
Most flags are self-explanatory, but additional details for some modes are included below.
Ancient Cave mode completely changes how the game is played. Instead of proceeding through the normal storyline of EarthBound, all rooms and doors have been shuffled around into a multi-level maze. You start with all four party members, and your goal is to proceed through all 8 levels of the maze, each level guarded by a Shiny Spot, and reach and defeat Giygas. Enemy spawn locations grow in difficulty as you proceed deeper into the maze, as do gift box rewards (if randomize gift box contents is on, which is recommended).
You will not have to do any storyline events, like riding the Sky Runner or beating Carpainter, to beat the game in this mode. Often, you can do story events to "skip" around in the cave. This may take you much deeper into the maze. Use common sense when taking skips, as some may break the game; giving an item to a monkey in Monkey Cave is safe, for example, while riding the bus is often not. If you take no skips, you will encounter each of the 8 shiny spots before reaching Giygas.
Known skips:
- Any of the Monkey Cave monkeys who want items
- Having a theater ticket attendant move out of the way, in either direction
- Removing pencil, eraser, or rabbit statues
- Getting abducted by ghosts in the tunnels
- Giving the Tiny Ruby to the museum guard
- Getting teleported by Carpainter's lightning
- Entering Dungeon Man
- Riding the bus (dangerous, can lock game)
Keysanity mode also radically changes how the game is played. 15 different key items have been shuffled around throughout the world; Mayor Pirkle may give you the Bicycle, while the Bike Shop guy may give you the Carrot key. To help you on this more complicated quest, however, Ness already knows PSI Teleport, and all available teleport locations are unlocked at the start of the game (including bonus teleports to South Winters and North Onett). Your goal is to beat the game as normal, but getting to all 8 Your Sanctuary locations will be more of a challenge.
The list of items that have had their locations shuffled in this mode is as follows:
- Franklin badge
- Shyness book
- King banana
- Key to the shack
- Hawk eye
- Bicycle
- Wad of bills
- Diamond
- Signed banana
- Pencil eraser
- Key to the tower
- Town map
- Carrot key
- Tendakraut - but the Tendakraut has been transformed into a Jar of Fly Honey
- Suporma - but the Suporma has been transformed into a Meteorite piece
Because you can get a Jar of Fly Honey through one of these 15 locations, it is not necessary to do the Jeff-alone-in-Winters part of the storyline. However, you can still do so if you wish, as the Boogey Tent will still contain a Jar of Fly Honey as well.
Be careful with how you proceed through storyline events! If you take a very unusual order, it is possible you may lock yourself out of having a character available until you complete Magicant. Since you can teleport anywhere instantly, you can get the game into very unusual states; this is expected and encouraged to take advantage of to get a lower time.
A few events have been made more lenient with regards to in-game triggers; notably, Venus will always give you her item right away, you can access the Pyramid without fighting Kraken (but you still must see the heiroglyphs), and Montague should always appear. It is also possible to get the game into a "spawns-off" condition. This is expected, but note if you game over in a spawns-off condition, you may softlock and have to reset the game, so be sure to save if necessary!
Keysanity mode is incompatible with Ancient Cave mode, and if both modes are selected, Keysanity will be disabled. (Therefore, if you simply enter a blank line at flag selection, you will be playing Ancient Cave, not Keysanity.)
Randomizing gift box contents works differently in Ancient Cave mode and in non-Ancient Cave mode. In Ancient Cave mode, gift boxes will generally increase in value as you proceed deeper into the cave. About 60% of the gift boxes will be equipment. In early levels of the cave, you may get "skip-enabling" items such as the Pencil Eraser that could allow you to skip around in the cave.
In non-Ancient Cave mode, gift boxes will be replaced with an item that is similar in value to their contents in the normal game. However, every gift box has a 20% chance of being replaced by an item of any value, so there is a chance you could get a very good item very early.
A special note should be made when playing with these flags enabled in non-Ancient-Cave modes, either Keysanity or "normal" EarthBound: There are a few scripted events that are bugged when these flags are used. It will appear that the game is softlocked, but usually it will proceed after waiting 5-10 minutes. (Usually an NPC is walking all the way across the entire world map after spawning at an incorrect location.)
While they won't actually lock your game, these bugs are obviously annoying, so you may want to not use these flags if you are playing a non-Ancient-Cave mode. If you do encounter one of these situations, let us know where it is, as we would like to eventually fix all of them.
Currently known bugged events:
- Post Twoson show
- Delivering the Diamond on the bridge
- Defeating Clumsy Robot (possibly a true softlock?)
Our method of randomizing the battle backgrounds often leads to extremely good-looking results, but rarely, there will be a bright flashing palette used. If you are sensitive to bright flashing lights causing epilepsy or seizures, you may not want to enable this mode.
Bizarre Dimension includes a patch that adds a run button to the game. Holding Y will make the characters run as if they had used a Skip Sandwich. If you do not want this feature, follow the instructions in the program to disable it.
There are a few special codes you can enter along with the flags. For example, to add wildgifts and funsize to a game with the a, g, and p flags only set, you would enter agpwildgiftsfunsize.
wildgifts– In Non-Ancient Cave mode, with gift box randomization, 20% chance of any item increased to 100% chance.funsize– With PC Sprite randomization, additional PC sprites that don't conform to normal PC size are added to the pool of options. These sprites occasionally cause small graphical hiccups, but they can add a lot of variety.devmode– Additional details are added to the.spoiler.jsonfile, usually only useful for development purposes.
- Possible Lost World "geyser softlock" in Ancient Cave mode. More information is needed.
Bizarre Dimension was originally created by Abyssonym; you can find him at Twitter or his website.
Current development on this fork is being led by pickfifteen; you can contact him either via the Issue Tracker on this repo, Twitter, or on the EarthBound Speedrunning Discord.