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Well, of course, it was unintentional, but there are some interesting points here.
For example, if a password was entered, then the movie recording started that saved the password at reset (Punch Out!!), you wouldn't need to enter that password again. Or worse, and I'm not sure, but if a game could be reset and you could continue to, say, the final boss by hitting reset and continuing, this method could be used. If memory serves (although it usually doesn't) Strider remembers the password at reset, and thus remembers the continue.
Reasonable man says you could tell immediately whether this was being used within seconds of the movie starting, but if not for a popular game that most people hadn't seen...
In any case, I should withdraw this submission? (Doesn't look like it's a "go" anyway)
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Well, I'm not a coder so I can't tell you how it works, but I can tell you how I did it. I started recording from reset and put in my settings. I didn't like the way it was turning out, so I stopped the movie and started recording a new one (again, from reset). I hit start and the settings were already in there. I liked the new run I was making, but I thought this might be a problem, so I stopped it and reloaded it to see what would happen and, don't ask me how, the fcm remembered the settings. Maybe someone else knows why.
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Pretty much hit the bee between the buttcheeks there. I did my best to turn the disadvantage that the next piece isn't random into an advantage by planning ahead, but the level chosen is the only real luck abuse. I mostly tried for "Why'd he put that there?" as often as possible because I thought that would make it more interesting, without sacrificing any speed. I suppose it wasn't that good of an idea, but I didn't have much to go by except for the already published video. (This is, I think, 2 minutes faster.)
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Heh - been there. My last run, I got to the Brinstar door with exactly 100 and finished with one to spare. I think MB's random, but the Zs take 8 a piece - not negotiable. I think 98 is a good number to shoot for. Would be sweet to finish this with the exact amount.
As for energy, I actually made it through the third missile door once with metroids on my rumpus and only lost 4 life. The first one is the toughie. If you make it through that one with more than 5 life, I think you can finish. It'll take a butt-ton of patience though.
So happy you're doing this. I'd hate to run through this a 4th time and have it rejected again, but I can't do anything else until this run is published. I appreciate you taking one for the team.
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It seems, in order to get the fastest movie possible, you'd need to score as few points as possible. Not that you're trying to get a speed run out of this, but I was just thinking for a speed run you'd have to run the clock out and not score until there was no time left in the 4th. Probably make a boring vid, though. I suppose that's why you never see a speed run of a sports game.
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Was hoping either you or Arc would pick up on this idea and try it out. Looks solid. Are you gonna have enough missiles, though? I've found that you need 75(ish) to get through the lair. You'll need 20 on the doors leaving you with 68...
It's going to be sweet to see your Tourian run, though:)
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I seem to remember Bowser being dead and jumping over the axe many times (simple to pull off) and it's still there when the screen scrolls, but never when he was still alive.
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Oh what a fun idea. It's so much easier to watch that than a 99-0 blowout. But I agree, the ending could use a little work, and it's a shame you need to run around the ball-carrier to keep everyone else in line. Definitely yes, but with hopes for a remake with an intense ending.
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Interesting stuff - I mean, you could tell me these are stock options for midgets on welfare and I'd believe you, but nevertheless...
This discovery did actually give me a sigh of relief, as I can't count the number of times I've replayed a fighter to beat him by milliseconds. More info on the topic:
davieboy wrote:
I have one more find regarding the milliseconds that I want to share. To summarise this note, it intends to prove that the only valid millisecond values you will ever get for a time in Punch-out are 00, 25, 48, 61, 82, 97 or 99. If some-one tells you that they beat Glass Joe in 00:35:18 then they are lying, because the game will never report 18 milliseconds. If you want to read why, here is the proof:
The rest here.
Always wanted to learn about this stuff. Perhaps they should write a computer book for people that don't get this kind of thing - like a "computers for dummies" kinda book.
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Yeah - but I'm not talking about the clock stop glitch. I mean, if the seconds tick away at different speeds, perhaps it's more beneficial to your time to wait a split second longer rather than to keep punching away in order to get the clock moving at a slightly slower speed - if the clock is indeed unpredictable in its movements, it could be manipulated like any other game.
But the millisecond thing is the issue here anyway - sorry to throw the topic off.
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A recent post at Gamefaqs caught my attention because it would certainly affect the way we've looked at Punch Out runs. We have been using time units to determine the fastest run, but the following allegation might change things:
davieboy wrote:
I've looked through the memory locations used by the game and I can't find where they are stored. The minute information is at 0x302 in RAM, the seconds are at 0x304 and 0x305 - but the millisecond values don't seem to be stored (I have looked very thoroughly). I think they are randomly generated. If they are randomly generated then how do we really know if 2:19.25 actually does beat 2:19.82, since we can only be accurate to the second.
It also makes sense that such a game would be short on CPU cycles anywhere, so why waste precious cycles continuously incrementing a millisecond counter in RAM? I've also produced a histogram of the memory location updates per second, and no unexplained location seems to be updated enough times a second to be useful as a millisecond counter.
Does anyone know any different?
Not sure if this can be proven or not, but it means that a 0:42.97 time and a 0:42.00 wouldn't be any different - might affect the landscape of the game.
Not to mention the fact that the clock temporarily stops whenever speed punches are thrown or an uppercut is landed. And give this a try: Start a new game and just stand there on Glass Joe and watch the clock. The "seconds" don't exactly tick away at a consistent speed. Maybe even the "second" time-units can be manipulated by throwing certain punches at certain times (this might, say, allow you to knock down Glass Joe before the 0:40 power hook by maybe, say, throwing a punch at 0:28 instead of 0:27).
Some ramblings as food for thought. Any ideas?
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In the published video of Super Mario 1, in 8-4, after emerging from the second pipe, he jumps over the "goal" pipe to go underwater, kills a flying fish, and goes back towards it. He enters the pipe at time-unit 357 and it starts with 356 after play begins again with the underwater sequence.
Now, I know this is a hell of a nit-pick of an absolutely astounding video, but does anyone know why? I noticed it at full speed and I opened up the .fmv to play around with it and ended up going down the pipe at time-unit 359 with just a couple of half-assed tries at full speed. Any thoughts?
EDIT: I knew there was an explanation for this one. I didn't wait to see what happened after I went in the pipe - nice little trick. Shows how long it's been since I've actually played the game.
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Well, I thought it was faster to not stop for energy on the way there than to take damage on Ridley - one hit there and I was dead. I had to stop for a second. At Kraid, I needed to start conserving, so I jumped once to play him flawlessly (notice Arc gets hit once). It's not a long run to Tourian and I can't get energy or missiles in there. I only had 2 life in the final room and couldn't get hit even once. And the escape run...well...
K. I thought about it all day and I'll do it one more time, but I gotta wonder if I have the skill for this game or if this run is just a dumb idea.
One thing I want people to consider when I submit again, however, is that Zoizite has every item in the game by the end and Arc stopped for an energy tank. The energy and missiles kinda roll like this:
-Half conservative on the way to Ridley so I can last long enough to beat him then trounce on the balls to get everything at 100%.
-Less conservative towards Kraid because I have a lot to play with.
-Way conservative after Kraid because I need a lot in Tourian.
-Collect over 90 health and at least 100 missiles to survive and beat Tourian in that little path from the climb in Norfair to the entrance to Tourian.
That's not a lot to play around with and if I stopped to get energy from the enemies along the way that I don't already get stuff from, I think that would actually take more time.
As for the final battle room in Tourian, it was 10AM and I just wanted to get this thing just done, but I couldn't do it insanely better because the energy just isn't there. The most I've ever gone into that room with is about 30 health, enough to take one hit, while Zoizite gets hit at least twice on the way up to Mother Brain with the ice beam and the screw attack.
The problem in Tourian is that I can back up the metroids a little further to take less damage when I'm in the door, but this will take up a bunch more time. It seems faster to just take the hits and not be able to take a hit inside Mother Brain's Lair. There isn't a whole lot to play around with.
But as for the improvements I'll strive for:
More energy collecting on the way to Ridley and Kraid so I can take a hit of damage and immediately start wailing on them.
More conscious of the frames I'm taking up while shooting backwards (which I can only remember a couple of times I do this anyway).
I know all this sounds pretty defensive, but I appreciate being pushed to perfection with the criticism, even if I am making a career out of this run. And every time I redo it, I find myself saying "Oh, I did that a lot faster this time," so it's working. But I think after this time, I'll just pass the idea along - gonna take some time, though.
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Yeah - I've never bothered to install a Japanese language pack either. I see boxes.
As for the movie, there's some pretty intense stuff, but I think it would look better spreading these techniques through the game finishing it. But as it stands, I'll still go yes because I've never seen anything like it.
EDIT: Oh, and perhaps include the small-fiery Mario?
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Man - you're a heartless bastard. You blew up the compound and didn't even "locate missing our grey fox."
I was actually wondering about that with the last video if the prisoners could be optimized so only the ones that said the least could be saved, but I thought some gave you information without which you couldn't proceed. For example, can you talk to Jennifer without talking to the prisoner that tells you about her?
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I tried and tried, but I think AxeMan's right. It doesn't seem possible to get all 13 shells in the first encounter (it gives you a bunch of speed-crabs before it even thinks about shells), but even if I could get 13 shells, there doesn't seem to be a way to get to the port before "hitting something" again. Therefore, my run of hitting two underwater encounters then the bonus stage (not preventable after the second "hit something") seems to be the only way to go. The mini-sub saves tons of time, hence the going out of the way, but the only improvement that has been pointed out that's possible is the Jaws fight. I'll play around with this when I'm done with my Metroid run, but I don't think I can save but a few seconds.
The only other thing I could do to save a fuzz of time is not get all 30 shots in in the bonus round and skip the "You got them all - bonus points blah blah," but that only takes a couple of seconds - I think it's better to get them all.
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I love it - and personally, I don't understand why people think Metal Gear makes a boring movie. I suppose if you've never played the game you could think that, but as stated, you've probably never stood behind a closed door inanely selecting your card-keys one by one to just discover a box of ammo. This could use improvement, but I loved watching it.
Do you need the flashlight?
Also, I heard something about the glove - necessary?
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My point was that Kyrsimys said faster=more entertaining, and I agree that's not always true. As I said, if that were the case, someone would have beaten Arc's speed-run long ago using the reset, but I think it would get rejected out of hand because it wouldn't be played as well. And even if it was, it would be looked upon as an obvious abuse of the game ("Of course you got a faster time - you used UP+A.")
I'm going without it. The main reason is because you can't just UP+A and go back to the beginning. You must go up the elevator and use it to get to the beginning of the previous level. As I've said, defeat Ridley, Pause, UP+A, restart, go up the elevator until the music changes, Pause, UP+A, restart, go up the elevator, Pause, UP+A, restart...then do it again once defeating Kraid. It's a bit annoying and seriously breaks the flow.
