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I think we need to organize this information a little better so we can keep track of exactly what has been improved, and what could still use looking into. We should create a chart of the framecount of the fastest strategy for each level discovered so far, put it in the first post, and keep it updated as new things are found. And to go along with it, possibly a zip file of movies of the levels being completed the fastest known way.
In fact, to help out, I'll go ahead and make such a chart for the submitted completed run. The following frame counts are measured from the frame Lolo appears at the beginning of the level to the frame the palette darkens at the end of the level or the frame which Lolo strikes a pose when standing on a staircase, whichever comes first...
ORIGINAL MOVIE TIMES:
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Here's a run of 6-1 that's exactly 2 seconds faster than in the submission. It turns out that you don't need to push the Don Medusa all the way into the corner, just block it off halfway.
http://www.samus.co.uk/cad/lolo2_6-1_1821frames.fcm
Then again, I just thought of something. I wonder if it would be possible to not block Don Medusa at all. I'll give that a shot.
Edit: Heh, It worked. I'm not sure how many more frames it saved, though.
http://www.samus.co.uk/cad/lolo2_6-1.fcm
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That would be a pretty cool community project, actually.
Imagine: You have the link to the work in progress so far, and have everyone experiment around and discuss how to make the next level the fastest it can go. Everyone could make their own version of the level using different strategies, and then look at the other peoples' movies to see if they missed anything. The one who finally ends up recording the best run of the level gets it added to the movie and recieves credit, and the final completed movie would have many credits.
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For fun, I wanted to see how many lives I could get in Bubble Bobble using luck manipulation. Only 3 (4?) lives can be obtained by score, the rest come from EXTEND bubbles.
After beating half the game and getting tons of lives along the way, things started to get really screwy...
http://www.samus.co.uk/cad/blue.fcm
Weird graphical glitch. I turned blue after I picked up the cherry.
http://www.samus.co.uk/cad/EXTE_D.fcb
This looks like it's the end for me. Try dropping down and picking up the N. The game freezes. If I let the N pass and I wait for a different level to pick up another one, the game still freezes. Apparently I can't get any more than K lives.
Also, On a previous playthrough where I achieved K lives shortly before the final boss battle, I found that the game would crash if I died on the final battle. (It wouldn't lock up FCEU, though, like the N bubble does)
I wonder what causes all this? I was hoping to get Z lives. Now I'll probably have to start over again, this time recording a movie file in case I have to backtrack.
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For fastest game, I would have to nominate Spelunker, which you can cause the Game Over screen to appear on frame 566!
For slowest game, I'd have to nominate Marble Madness, which you have to wait for frame 4687 to have a game over because of the timer.
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Pick some of your favorite NES games and try to find the least number of frames required to cause a game over! Which game is fastest? Which game is slowest? What's the average amount of time it takes to kill yourself in a NES game?
Posting movies isn't necessary, just pick some game you have experience with and we'll trust you.
[Edit by feitclub]: Corrected spelling of topic title.
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Holy crap, it's Donkey Kong meets Super Pitfall!
I'm going to vote No. This movie didn't really entertain me too much, mostly because I'm not framiliar with the game, and because there were a lot of things that looked like mistakes and unnecessary pauses. Perhaps if the author explained a little bit more about this game and the techniques used...
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ZeroSeven wrote:
Yeah, the double jump glitch is a bit after the girl ninja, I jumped, then it allowed me to a spinning kick in midair.
To be more specific, the opening after the building your in front of.
Other than that, the glitch won't work as far as I've tested in level 1, I'd like to know what causes it..
I could do it just about anywhere. I don't know what causes it, but you can do one out of a regular jump or a kick jump.
Here, I'll make a video as an example...
http://www.samus.co.uk/cad/baddudes.fcm
This shows the potential of a beginning of a TAS, and how the double jump can be used to kill the girl ninja.
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There's a glitch which allows you to do a midair jump if you do a bicycle kick in the middle of your jump. You can use this to hit the girl ninja, the one you stopped to kick, in Level 1.
That's about all I know. I know a "faster" way of killing the level 1 boss, but it requires waiting for him to walk onto the screen so I'm not entirely sure if it's faster.
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It's my opinion that it's fun to see the game freeze just when something is about to happen. For example, in level 2 I shoot a plane just before picking up the powerup, and in level 5 I got a few big planes that just suddenly appear at the bottom of the screen. And on level 7, I'm 1 frame away from getting hit by a plane when I trigger the scene. It's just another something to make it more interesting.
2 more levels done... and here's a savestate so you don't have to watch the first 5 over again.
http://www.samus.co.uk/cad/1943movie.fcmhttp://www.samus.co.uk/cad/1943movie.fcq
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daniayaw wrote:
i dont think u should max out your plane i.i
Why not? The only things that really affect gameplay at all are the offense and possibly the Special Weapons which I may or may not use if there exists one which fires a small enough number of shots that I still will be able to never miss (you know, to keep it interesting)
Do sideplanes count as maxing out your plane though?
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Hmm, let's see.
The sideplanes exploded at the beginning of stage 5 because I let myself get hit by some bullets. Like I said, I didn't want to spend the whole game with them, and I could get them destroyed without taking damage myself.
I'm upgrading defense power simply because I want to max out my plane, and it's the default choice (I don't have to move the cursor), and sometimes I like to take a break from the movie and play unassisted, and this helps keep me alive. :)
The somersault is something that happens automatically when you beat a boss. I can't do it myself.
I didn't beat the boss of stage 4 as fast as possible because I wanted to preserve my 100% kills and accuracy. I had to wait for the extra plane to fly next to me so my 2nd shot would hit it as my first shot finished off the boss. The boss of stage 5 was not beaten as fast as possible for a similar reason: there were extra planes on the screen which I wanted to shoot down before clearing the level.
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New WIP. Played from scratch, and has level 5 completed.
http://www.samus.co.uk/cad/1943movie.fcm
A few notes:
My opening move on level 1 doesn't look as cool as in the first movie. Oh well.
Level 2 is my favorite so far. There are lots of little things that I hope you enjoy, including 2 shots that you will SWEAR are misses (but aren't!)
Level 3 was the hardest to do, specifically in the place near the end with the 2 big green bombers and the 2 rising and falling planes. That took a lot of work to get everything dead.
Level 4 is interesting. Near the beginning, just when I think I'm getting the hang of things, the game throws a curveball at me. I pick up something I had completely forgotten existed (I won't spoil what it is) that forces me to play in a whole new way. It may look like a cool change, but it was annoying as hell for me (there are a few obvious parts where I really thought I was a goner. If it looks like I'm going to have to miss, I was probably just as scared as you are.) Surpsisingly, I still never miss a single shot.
The first thing I do in level 5 is get hit by 2 bullets. This is to rid myself of the "surprise" from level 4 (It's allowed, because I don't take damage). I really didn't want to play the whole game level 4 style.
Enjoy. Hopefully by the time you finish watching, My hand will have healed.
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At frame 13580 of level 2, a shot sails off the top of the screen. I think I'll just redo the whole movie so far. I'll post a new WIP when I beat level 5.
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Could you post your current WIP when you have time, CtrlAltDestroy? That would be great.
So far I finished level 3, same link.
A question: You pick up a lot of upgrades on level 1. Could you tell me what all the upgrades you pick up do? For example, you pick up an upgrade that looks like a red shuriken or something, I have no idea what that is :)
The POW powerup, the cow, the pinwheel, and the oxygen tank all give different levels of energy. Since I never get hit, picking these up only serve to keep the "low energy" music from playing.
The keg of beer replenishes special weapon time. I never use special weapons, but I pick them up anyway.
The weird mountain-looking thing lets you upgrade your plane.
1. Try to move around as much as possible. Although your currently posted WIP is cool when the enemies show up, you could try to show off a little whenever there's a waiting period. I can understand that there isn't really much to do during that time, but I think that it would be more entertaining if you just flew around a little than standing still for a few seconds.
Good idea, I'll keep that in mind.
2. You could try flying around more in the upper part of the screen if possible. I know that you keep a lot in the lower section of the screen to be able to hit all the enemies that show up, but maybe you can be a little more in the upper part of the screen. It looks cooler if you just barely kill all the enemies with just one the absolutely last frame possible. Another upside with this is that you can fly closer to the enemies too, making you look more like a daredevil. Just as long as you can get 100% kills that is :) I believe frame advance could be helpful when doing this.
Another good idea. I've been trying to avoid killing all the enemies at the FIRST frame they appear, but just barely killing them before they disappear does look cool. I have 20+ more levels of this, so I'm slowly getting better as I learn what combos and techniques look the best.
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I must note that this game requires a lot of effort to look entertaining. When I first started playing with this game, I tried playing 12% speed and re-recording whenever I missed a shot. I beat the first level, but when I watched the replay I found that it just looked awful. I started over, using smooth movements and much more foresight- and that's the current WIP.
Maza wrote:
To make the movie more interesting/entertaining you should try to evade those enemy bullets (or what ever they are) more closely.
Alright, I can do that.
Vatchern wrote:
I made a movie of this a while back.... but i got bad comments of people saying they didn't want a movie done of it. i went for 100% kill on the levels, and fastest time to kill the bosses.
I'd like to see that too. If it's a completed run, I bet it's about an hour and a half long!
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Just a question- does anyone find this movie particularly entertaining?
http://www.samus.co.uk/cad/1943movie.fcm
All I know is that this movie was VERY fun to make. This run does NOT aim for fastest time. I think there are only a few factors that contribute to the framecount:
-Reducing lag
-Not picking up stat boosters
-Killing bosses as fast as possible
-Ending a level with low energy to reduce the countdown.
Aside from killing bosses as fast as possible, I don't care about fastest time.
Instead, this movie aims to:
-Destroy all enemies
-Miss no shots
-Always use the default weapon
-Take no damage
-Pick up all powerups dropped by the red planes
-Pick up all of the shootable secrets I know about/can find
-Move around in a smooth manner so as to be more entertaining.
I don't think I could actually submit this since it isn't really material for a published move, but I'll keep going until I get bored of it.