Good morning everybody, and welcome back to VG myths: the online internet video game TV show banned by the laws of physics. Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker is an experimental puzzle platformer without the platforming, focusing on spatial awareness and densely compact levels full of hidden nooks and crannies. And since this game is made for literal babies, a challenge run of it is the perfect opportunity to wash away my nightmares. Can you beat Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker without moving the camera? And, just to explain, since i got a few comments about it during the stream, I'm fully aware that this challenge is significantly easier than what came before, and honestly is pretty easy. On VG Myths, I like to showcase challenge runs that make the player go a step beyond what the game asks of them, whether that be by upping the difficulty to ridiculous levels or simply messing with the mechanics in an interesting way. And trust me when I say Captain Toad without the camera is gonna get interesting. We'll be playing the Nintendo switch version of the game. All direct player camera control is banned. This means no camera rotation with the right analog stick or L&R buttons, no zooming in with the X button, no camera centering with the ZL button, and no left analog stick aiming while in a cannon. and of course, no gyro camera control in handheld mode. But I couldn't record the game that way anyway. Plus, since I don't want to get laughed out of the youtuber cool-kid club, no crystal mushroom. Captain Toad is all about spacial awareness, and this challenge is gonna kick your spatial awaring to the maximum. While some levels are basically the same as a casual playthrough, others will become practically invisible. But don't worry. You're not navigating completely in the dark. You'll always be able to tell exactly where Captain Toad is based on his shadow. Though it's a bit unorthodox, it's still just enough information to get a feel for what the stage is shaped like. In the simpler stages you can just hug every wall and mash the A button until eventually, you accidentally find the way forward. In other stages it gets more complicated. For example, in level 1-2 there are rotating platforms above the water that are almost completely obscured. Key word: "almost" When booting up the level, you have a slightly different camera angle, and can see the very edge of one of the moving platforms. Notice it's timed in sync with the rotating disc at the top of the level. Keep track of that discs rotations and you'll always know exactly where the moving platforms are. The boss stages will prove particularly difficult, occasionally requiring you to navigate around hazards on thin ledges which, if walked off, lead to instant death. For most of the playthrough, I avoided looking up stage layouts online, going only from memory and whatever I could glean from playing the level myself. Thankfully, we technically have more than one camera angle to work with. The camera will automatically move on its own if the player walks in certain locations, such as here, where the camera pans up to look at the star. Accidentally also giving us a better view of the pathway on the right. The mine cart levels are significantly different. They're a lot less fun now. This is a problem in Stage 13: Turnip Cannon Jungle. Usage of the cannon to break this block is required, but we're not allowed to aim the cannon. Or are we? Welcome back to our secret weapon: 2-player mode. While the second player character doesn't help us directly, their mere presence completely changes the game's mechanics. When in the cannon, you no longer fire at the center of the screen. Instead, each player fires wherever they're aiming their cursor. This eliminates the need for camera movement as long as our target is on screen at the default camera angle. Unfortunately, we then come to Stage 16: Bizarre Doors of Boo Mansion. The doors are attached to sliding blocks which are activated by tapping them. You can't tap anything you can't see, and in all three naturally occurring camera angles, the sliding doors on the mansion's backside are completely obscured. These doors must be moved from their starting positions to progress through the level, at least in the dev-intended solution; making the dev intended solution impossible. Nevertheless, the strem chat and I spent a few hours head-butting every single piece of level geometry in the hopes of forcing an alternative solution. If we could somehow move Toad past the gate to the right side of the level, we'd be able to skip the untappable doors. The most viable method is this little trick: By standing roughly in the center of a moving block as it squishes toad, he'll be pushed inside it. Walk carefully to the right, and you'll pop out where the moving block once was. On top of that, if you move continuously against the right balcony at a slight angle, you'll be able to walk off in midair. But this still is not good enough. Toad consistently falls off the balcony before being able to round the corner, ultimately getting us nowhere. I even booted up the game on the Wii U version to check if maybe the collision might be a bit jankier, but that's also a no-go. And besides, without co-op mode, that version of the game is completely non viable. And while I don't have the 3ds version handy, I'm not too hopeful the physics system will be that drastically different. Until a better breakthrough is found, the Captain Toad cameraless run is But, of course, I was fully expecting and prepared to be a failure. From now on, this is a minimalist run. Trying to beat the game with as few camera rotations as possible. For each rotation, we completely stop movement and rotate the camera to whatever position we choose. The rotation is considered fully complete when we move our character once again. Boo Mansion is clearable with only a single camera rotation, bringing the counter to one. There aren't any more standout levels until Episode 2, Level 6: Drift Along Canyon. The first half of the level is completely visible and completely easy, but the second half is exactly the opposite. We're on a moving platform with homing Bull's-Eye Bills chasing us. We technically have an infinite supply of turnips to keep them at bay, But my technique of madly running around in circles while throwing turnips as fast as possible wasn't cutting it. Instead I climbed to the level top's right edge, unearthed the pickaxe, and turned on co-op mode. The pickaxe makes us immortal for a brief period of time. It's not enough to survive the entire trip, but if you touch your co-op partner just before it runs out, They'll be given a pickaxe with the timer fully refilled giving just enough time for the moving platform to reach its destination. 2-9: Draggadon's Revenge is also going to be painful, featuring several automatic moving platforms that are only just barely visible right at the end, at a camera angle that makes depth perception darned near impossible. You'll probably just want to go ahead and tank a hit from the fire breath. Rushing through is not worth it, and you'll feel just as satisfied when you reach the end We also dodged a bullet near the end of Episode 2: Bullet Bill's Touchy Trials. You might think this level looks pretty impossible, being designed entirely around movable blocks, several of which are fully obstructed, and you're totally right. This level is just not possible Luckily, nobody cares. Bullet Bill's Touchy Trials is an optional level that only exists to buff up the players diamond count. If you so choose, there's nothing stopping you from turning the page to Level 17 and moving on. In the Episode 2 Finale: Battle Tower Blitz, I was worried the cannon at the end may make the level impossible, but noticed an awesome cheese strat along the way. The two hammer brothers on the right side need to be killed to lower the bridge, and they're fully visible while climbing the ladder up to the final battle. There's an alternative co-op option, assist mode, that lets Player 2 fire lower powered turnips with the cursor. They can't break blocks, but they can kill hammer brothers. Turns out this wasn't actually required, since the cannon would have been facing the right direction to begin with, but I thought I was clever, so it's going in. Rock Block Badlands could have been bad news. While we can aim the cannons in co-op, the camera angle is too low to hit several required breakable blocks, stranding us on the bottom half of the level. Thankfully, co-op mode completely breaks this level's puzzle design. Raise the left cannon with one player while the other stands on the platform, and they'll skip half the level entirely, giving a clear path up to the goal. There's one more Draggadon boss fight along the way: Secret of the Golden Realm. And of course, this one uses oodles of touchable blocks. But, in a bizarre twist, This is actually one of the easiest of the three Draggadon fights. Though, Draggadon is annoyingly planted right in front of some of the platform's we need to move, They occasionally bob just enough to make the platform visible. You can also abuse the alternate camera angle whenever you get into a cannon. You're completely safe in there, and have a good view of every tappable platform in the next section, letting you prepare the path in advance for a quick getaway. In Magikoopa Keep, you have to climb a giant Tower from quite possibly the worst possible camera angle. It's difficult to see basically everything, and obscures the majority of the tower, which, of course, is covered in enemies. If you go up in co-op mode, you can use the other player as a checkpoint, teleporting up the tower when you make a mistake. You don't even have to worry about the magikoopa. It's not very good at its job. Upon reaching the top of the tower, however, you'll discover co-op as a no-go. One of the three magikoopa you're required to kill up here refuses to move in front of the cannon no matter how long you wait. The only option is to play through the entire level in assist mode, purely so you have access to the red turnips for the final fight. There's only one more stage left that poses any risk. Welcome to the game's final challenge: Rolling Inferno. I did it. I'm da Captain Toad masta- Welcome to the game's final challenge: Trick Track Hall. Another moving block level where the dev intended solution is seemingly impossible. Weirdly, every block we need to touch is visible at the default angles, including the one that's the problem. That being the platform at the top left, which we need to stand on to raise ourselves. We can just barely see the edge, and lower it from its starting position, But it moves off-screen and we can't raise it back up afterwards. Sorry, but this level is simply not happening, unless we can figure out some way to break the laws of reality. Which, of course, is a completely valid strategy, so let's go with that. As you may have already noticed, the star is just below the level starting position. if we could figure out a way to fall down there, we could avoid any camera rotation. We did a ton of experimenting with the moving platforms at the starting line, finding some very viable looking alternatives, until eventually stumbling upon a strategy already found in a single level speedrun on YouTube by Dan Demolition14. If you walk off one of these platforms mid movement, you'll carry their sideways momentum with you while falling. This isn't enough to get us down to the star on its own, It's just too good. We'll always overshoot our mark and land on the banister. However, we can cancel out the momentum a bit longer by immediately moving the adjacent platform, landing us directly next to the golden prize. there are no more roadblocks for the rest of the game. With Wingo thoroughly stuffed, our final total for the captain toad minimal camera run is one rotation. Just one! I honestly expected more of the tapping block stages would be impossible, but even the one we're stuck on looks barely doable. Seriously, if anybody out there wants to try for it, I thoroughly encourage you to try out Mad Doors of Boo Mansion cameraless. We are so ridiculously close, but I'm out of ideas. And of course, if you're a fan of Captain Toad and need an excuse to replay it, the cameraless challenge serves that purpose well, keeping the light-hearted feel of the game mostly intact. Special thanks to all patreon backers including: [Gamechamp reads out the names on the left.] I have the power of god and anime on my side, [Unenthusiastic "aaahhh"] I'm sorry, I wish I could scream, but, like, I've got neighbors. [Gamechamp continues reading out the names on the left.] hey-gamechamp, hakobakobako-jbvkjfnakjdbvksbfkjbe [Gamechamp finishes reading out the names on the left.] Let me know how much this video sucks, and how to improve in the comments below. Let's for adventure for watching, and get out of my house.
