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Alyosha
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jlun2 wrote:
Well, apparently, the reason why the rating system isn't updated is because coding it seems to be the problem. I wonder would it be possible to open source it, and try getting help from social media? Not sure if there would be (or how much of a) security risk open sourcing the sections needed though.
Woah, the post in that quote is almost 2 years old already, time sure does fly! XD Just as a point of reference, I looked at the official encode of the TAS BrunoVisnadi linked in his post above. That video has 214 ratings (thumbs up or down on youtube) out of 13414 views at the time of my loading it. Roughly 1.5% Even if only half of those views are unique people watching more then 1 or 2 minutes of the TAS, we'd still only have a 3% participation rate in the youtube rating. I'm also guessing that most of those people are not even aware of the publication page for that TAS on TASVideos.org, so they aren't the same audience that would use the rating system either. Obviously this is just one movie, but it does seem that people just aren't interested in rating TASes, not TASers and not the general public, so it might not matter what the rating system is changed to, if the concept itself does not appeal to many people.
Alyosha
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C64 core in BizHawk defaults to PAL video mode. Also, I believe many of the readily available ROMs are also PAL. @DrD2k9: I would strongly recommend that you research the ROM you are using before trying to change the emulation settings. C64 appears to be quite a bit messier in terms of ROM cataloging then other systems. Also, check other sources to see if the game sounds correct and seems to be playing at the correct speed, as these are often obvious signs of using the wrong region. Using PAL isn't necessarily wrong, and NTSC is not necessarily faster.
Alyosha
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I think one way to improve participation is to be able to rate movies while on the workbench. That way people won't have to be bothered with going back after the fact after the movie is published (although this would still be an option too.) Maybe even just replace the 'did you find this entertaining?' question with the ratings box. Personally, I've never rated a single movie, as it seems like a pointless exercise, but at least having the option up front might be more motivating.
Alyosha
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natt wrote:
Alyosha wrote:
Alright, I just updated gambatte with a fix for pocket monsters. Also, I updated console selection in the GB menu so that you can now pick which console you want to boot your game in. 'Default' boots according to rom extension.
Why not according to header, as the old code did?
My mistake, it does whatever it did before , I didn't change it.
Alyosha
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Alright, I just updated gambatte with a fix for pocket monsters. Also, I updated console selection in the GB menu so that you can now pick which console you want to boot your game in. 'Default' boots according to rom extension. 'GB' always boots in GB mode (even games incompatible with GB) 'GBC' always boots in GBC mode.
Alyosha
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Equal length frames effect how input is processed. If equal length frames is set to true, each input frame lasts a set amount of time, regardless of how long a video frame (i.e. time between vblanks) lasts. If it is false, each input frame lasts however long the video frame lasts. So basically, NOT having equal length frames will mean you always change input when a VBlank happens, which might be more intuitive for TASing. HAVING equal frames means you always change input roughly every 1/60 seconds. but whichever you choose makes no difference for accuracy.
Alyosha
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It's an initial state problem. I'm not sure what exactly since the error appears so far in, but looks like it might be related to sound. I went back and set everything that looked relevent to zero or false in the initial state (for bios loading) and it fixed the problem. I'll patch it along with the patch to allow GB games in CGB. Thanks for the report, this feature does need more testing.
Alyosha
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zoboner wrote:
Ok, it's cool! I work actually, on an inputs generator, on master system 2 (european) than i mod in 60 hertz, for verifying my run of golden axe warrior, I created the module with an genesis PAD, who have a DB9 port, and I linked this with an Arduino uno, but you said: "But, it won't suddenly make runs sync on console that didn't before, SMS / GG is not terribly well documented in terms of timing accuracy, and BizHawk's core is not that low level", you think it's not possible to run this input file with no desync, due to that? Thank for all informations.
Well it's worth a try , who knows it might even work! Just be sure to document whatever results you get as information is sparse and any info is valuable
Alyosha
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Alright first game already taken off the list! Since it's come up recently I'll mention it here too. GG and SMS runs should be made using BizHawk 2.0.1 or later due to a bug in the z80 in previous versions. It is a rare bug that only effects a few games but it's best to avoid it altogether. Also I'll take a look at Rocky now that the run on the workbench was rejected and I already have a good idea how it works.
Alyosha
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Nice work! That is a pretty big improvement for such a simple looking game, good research and optimization.
Alyosha
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Let's see, There were about 10 less frames of lag in the autoscroller section of the castle ruins, and about 30 more frames between tiny cavern and flower field. Also the level select after flower field took longer by several frames. I did have to manipulate tornadoes in level 2 but it was trivial (just changing one directional press before enterring the door.)
Alyosha
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@pokota: you have to go to the GB menu and select the enable bios option, then reboot the core. It's not enabled by default currently. @Fortranm: no, but I will test it and see how gambette handles it, if it works I'll add the option for it. EDIT: looks like it works, I'll just need to figure out the best way to make this option presentable to the user.
Alyosha
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Well, this is a bit embarassing, but unfortunately this run was made on a build of BizHawk that contains a bad IRQ bug that I inadvertantly introduced (you can see it most plainly where the screen shakes as mickey jumps into the water on level 2.) The bug only impacts an edge case where an IRQ occurs as the game is running an EI instruction and interrupts are enabled. This causes interrupts to (erroneously) be re-enabled. The bug occurs on this game because the game runs EI as part of it's idle loop. Anyway, as this is my error, and a pretty serious one at that, I've started re-syncing this run on 2.0.1 where the glitch is fixed. @ The8bitbeast: this run syncs the first half of the game, it's a few frames slower do to lag differences, but gameplay is basically the same except for the card boss where I had to change up manipulation to get 128s. Let me know if you think it's good and I'll sync up the rest. Sorry for the bug! http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/40098174170260212
Alyosha
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feos wrote:
In battletoads the method used is arbitrary data manipulation, not arbitrary code execution. There's some period where battletoads executes open bus, which can theoretically be manipulated to look like it's executing sensible commands, but it's very hard and no one feels like doing it.
Would you mind sharing the details of this feos? It sounds interesting.
Alyosha
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zoboner wrote:
Ho, ok, I'm happy than you explain this. If I understand well, I can change the BIOS especially if i use a specific game (JPN...)? It's more accurate to use the original BIOS or just for more proper? Thank you for information.
Yes, you can (and probably should) use the BIOS of the region the game is from. There are also different BIOS variants you can use (I just picked a common one.) Is it more accurate? Yes in the sense that RNG and maybe cycle timings will be closer to console then without it. But, it won't suddenly make runs sync on console that didn't before, SMS / GG is not terribly well documented in terms of timing accuracy, and BizHawk's core is not that low level, despite having a very strong z80 core.
Alyosha
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Ha! Even now a new glitch. Thanks for posting that is interesting and unexpected
Alyosha
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zoboner wrote:
Cool run, this is a rare games who put up "SEGA MASTER SYSTEM" before game starts. Musics are good and when I watch this TAS, i feel like in a "shoot them up"! It's a good illusion. yes vote
That's actually the system bios screen, not the game.in the past we've neglected using the SMS bios, but now the goal is to be a bit more proper and include it in runs.
Alyosha
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One other thing that occured to me is that it is trivial to get a 5.51 if the 6502's Decimal mode doesn't work. This only impacts the timer. Then you actually have to go pretty slowly for the timer to display 5.51. (It would be obviosly visually distorted thouugh as it counts up, so might be obvious to any observer.)
Alyosha
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D: how did I not notice zanac , oh well so much for that , thanks for the encode though !
Alyosha
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Hurray 2.0 is here! Great work to everyone who helped get the new cores working and especially natt who made some seriously huge commits and got the magical water boxing stuff working. This is a big advancement in TASing technology ! Now we just need a TASVideos 2.0 :)
Alyosha
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True wrote:
On the contrary. On Z80 the R register is 0 at reset. So on emulators now without BIOS, they start at 0. However with BIOS, this register will increment. So regardless of cycle accuracy, this register won't match based on BIOS or not. It has nothing to do with emulation accuracy. And many games use this register as part of randomness routine. Except this isn't how one would usually play these games...they'd use the original machine, not a copy of the BIOS of that machine on a different machine...
Ah ok I see what you mean now. As for built in games, I worded that poorly, it does indeed just use the BIOS file, not a file on top of another file.
goldenband wrote:
What about the Model 1 Genesis/Mega Drive? Did that have any kind of a BIOS for SMS games?
Good question, I have no idea. Ok I just made the PR to bring Boot Rom loading into BizHawk and Gambatte, it works for both GB and GBC. Right now it is strictly optional, but my hope is that it will start to be used for TASes and hopefully required eventually. EDIT: done!
Alyosha
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Definitely an emulator bug. Hard to tell what it is, but disk writing is known not to work in the emulator, so if the game is attempting to write to disk and checking the write, then it will fail (also known to happen with Family Feud.) This is unlikely to be fixed in the near future unless Saxxon returns.
Alyosha
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Ok I fixed it, turns out gambatte was turning on the screen in the initial conditions, so writes to VRAM were getting blocked. Now just a little more cleanup and I should be able to add this as a capability to BizHawk.
Alyosha
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I'll still need to know what game it is in order to diagnose the problem.
Alyosha
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Warepire wrote:
What I did was having the DMG bootstrapper in an array, and then choosing based on register 50 which array to read when accessing the ROM region of the memory map. Basically, that should have worked. EDIT: If you can share your code, I could maybe have a look?
Yeah, that's exactly what I did. I created a copy of the default rom mapping and put the BIOS in the first 256 bytes. It loads and runs as intended, but the screen gets corrupted for some unknown reason. Maybe there is some configuration in gambatte on start up that i'm not aware of that is throwing things off. I'm not familioar enough with gameboy architecture though to guess what it might be. Also, it's pretty obvious from gambatte's code that they never really intended to use the boot rom, it was quite a mess getting it in there.