Just so everyone knows, I will be trying to explain a way to get the move scrolls (Heel Sweep and Monkey Roll) in Dragon Street Kowloon, from the Lucky Hit Challenge stand.
Before we begin here are some things you need to know.
1) This method is for those playing on Demul v0.7 Alpha Emulator (specifically demul07a_230915 on the gpuDX11ng plugin). Those on the actual Dreamcast (or Xbox) can still try this out but it might be harder to figure out where to place your ball.
2) This method is trying to replicate exactly what was done in this video: "Lucky Hit Board (Kowloon)" - Youtube
3) The game DOES NOT center the ball in the true middle of the lucky hit board. In fact it it centers it in slightly different positions each time at random. This is one of the reasons why it takes so god damn long to get the move scroll.
4) The ball bounce is also random i.e. even if you hit the pin at exactly the same point everytime, the ball may bounce differently each time. Therefore it may still take quite a while to get the move scrolls, but it won't be impossible.
My method to getting the move scrolls is by trying to find the exact position the ball was dropped in the video listed above. After hours of playing I noticed (by carefully looking) that the game doesn't center the ball in the same place everytime and so I didn't get the right initial bounces that were in the video. This means that you can't just press A blindly and it also means you'll have to try to reposition the ball everytime. Then the next big discovery is that many positions on the board contain graphical errors on Ryo's arm which is extremely helpful in finding the same position the ball was dropped in the video. Here's some images I've slapped together to hopefully help you understand what I'm talking about.
Note:
- On Demul, you must unmap all the left (and/or right) analog controls for your controller (don't worry if you use keyboard) so that the camera is exactly fixed. Sometimes your controller's analogs are a bit too sensitive and moves the camera slightly which changes the graphical errors.
- You need to use the gpuDX11ng plugin for you to see these errors in the way it's shown below. You can still see these errors with the gpuDX11 plugin but the "+1 to the right" image and others have a vertical line aswell. The main one to look out for is the "+3 to the right".
Image with highlighted errors. Red circles are errors, blue circles are the center pin.
+1, +2, +3 corresponds to button presses on the D-Pad from "The Lucky Hit" position. I.e. "+2 to the right" = pressed right on the D-Pad twice from "The Lucky Hit" position. View in fullsize to see it clearer.
Image without highlights
The aim of the game is to find "The Lucky Hit" position above. When you get to the third lucky hit board you'll have to shift a few spaces right or left around the center to find a graphical error that you can recognise. If you can manage to find the pattern of graphical errors then position yourself in "The Lucky hit" position. Again, I usually find the "+3 to the right" the easiest one to find. Once you are in "The Lucky Hit" position you'll have to try for an hour or so to get that scroll since the bounces still have a bit of randomness to it. You'll notice however that the first two bounces will be exactly the same as the video's first two bounces on the exact same pins. You'll also notice that this happens everytime you are in "The Lucky Hit" position.
I spent 4 hours trying to get the scrolls with no luck but once I figured this out I got both scrolls in 1 hour. On the first scroll I got, the ball took a slightly different path than the one in the video but the I managed to replicate the video exactly when I got my second scroll.
To those on console, I don't know if these graphical errors show up. If they don't show up then I'm afraid all I can say is that you need to position the ball slightly right from the true center of the board and hope for the best.
Also if no-one else can see these graphical errors on Demul then I'm sorry and I'll delete the post.
