I'm actually not sure how to access the game's credits, but it's not from advancing the screen forward at the end; after the ending cutscenes, it just brings you back to the gameplay section.
The credits do appear to exist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_OYpqVB7HA
You know what, and this would suck, there's no difficulty section (there's no options menu), but there is difficulty in the minigames which I used in my TAS, so there is some way to get them to ramp up in difficulty. Probably by repeating the minigames.
I'm almost wondering if you have to do all the minigames several times to get the credits to roll.
It let me replay the unicorn game if I kept talking to the guy, found that out by accident. So I'm wondering if that's it. Some of the games only have one difficulty though, including that one I believe, so it would have to be checked on something like the flower minigame.
If you're looking to be co-auth Retro, maybe that's something you could do.
However, the speedrun.com entries for both normal category and 100% all end without the credits. I'm guessing the minigame replay would be considered 100%, but it could go either way.
There's no credits option in the menu either.
Where do these strange credits come from?
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My final update to this as promised. 181 frames saved over RetroEdit's BIOS update and trim, and a 53 improvement over my unfinished last file.
This is all from dialogue fixes noted above, and a fix in the flower minigame (again).
EDIT: Removed, saved an addtional frame (-182, -54)
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Dialogue fix before and after, just for future reference Pinky since you're new
Last input was a "B" and needed to land on an "A" on the first non-lag frame. This happens to almost every dialogue skip so I'm cleaning that up now
Instead of mashing, let BizHawk show you where the lag frames run out and use that.
It's a lot cleaner too
PinkyNoice
OtakuTAS
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I may have overestimated the length of the BIOS, or just typed the wrong number as a typo, I honestly couldn't tell you. I didn't write down my findings anywhere but here so it could have been a slip of the key for all I know. It wasn't that important to me (faster is faster!) and isn't really documented on the site anywhere, but I appreciate your record keeping as I think that's a cool thing too.
Comparing my movie to yours is probably the best reference for having to do no real work other than a simple subtraction, and the 128 figure seems correct.
I'll probably go through shortly and finish up some of the other things I listed, starting with the dialogue.
You brought up the ending where PinkyNoice stopped... any judgement on that ThunderAxe31? In the past it has usually been required to reach the credits, so I may add that in if deemed necessary (that part obviously wasn't my work/doing).
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193 frame improvement when not considering BIOS which has been added.
You probably missed my own resync where I cleanly added a few frames to the beginning to account for the boot ROM and trimmed the blank inputs at the end. Comparing to that, your movie is only a 128-frame improvement. (Note: this resync was purely mechanical and took only a few minutes, so I do not deserve or want coauthorship at this point in time).
I might have a look at this. There were a few moments I was curious about, but I might not be able to find anything here. I certainly lack the minigame expertise you have from making a prior TAS, so I appreciate that you've taken the time to give your feedback here.
I just counted the BIOS frames and then subtracted them from what my update would be without it. I'll try to do the rest of my plans tomorrow
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Interesting. The Japan notation makes me wonder if this is 1.0 exclusive though and I have a feeling this port isn't that version... but maybe?
If you want to mess with this and get your name back on the project (I saw your past TAS! Kudos) shoot me a PM.
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https://tasvideos.org/UserFiles/Info/638256591557062299
193 frame improvement when not considering BIOS which has been added.
There's really too much to list but it was a lot of "don't overshoot the NPCs to the right, if you have to go left again after the minigames" sort of thing.
The flower game had a consistent padding to each input, when certain inputs after certain inputs you can do instantly on the next frame.
The unicorn game I had to redo from scratch as it wasn't syncing on my end. In this game you can also use the hover feature to get places faster as well as perform a glitch to turn around faster.
NEEDS DONE WHICH I MAY OR MAY NOT GET TO TONIGHT:
A) Original author is mashing A and B in a pattern to get through every single set of dialogue, none of these patterns match up to the text, so a lot of dialogue skipping is a frame late because a text skipped with "B" is landing on another "B" input instead of "A" or of course vice versa. This happens a LOT.
B) In the "dark room" the NPC is activated 2 frames late with an "A" push
C) In the "dark room" the NPC is then overshot by those 2 frames in the wrong direction, losing 4+ frames and more momentum (two frames right prior to speaking, two frames left post speaking to compensate back) of movement. Compensating for this causes it to desync, game has pretty simple movements so it's an easy fix and doesn't have to be precise whatsoever but I can't see with the damn lights off! Lol just kidding, but I just didn't have time at the moment to finish it up
Request co-auth.
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Regional differences such as text and cutscene length are not counted as improvements or time losses.
That's my goal. Either way, it'll be nice to have a clean version of this without the giant text loss and the emulation issues. Hopefully with a co-author credit going to these guys, any judge would see it that way too - this one isn't a competition. But yes, I intend to save a few frames anyways! Even if it's just a token of doing so, so there's no worry about the rule.
However, it'll definitely need a special case of judgement due to the timing differences as in any other game I'd be behind even if I was ahead. (There's been several publications like that, I'm not concerned)
This game just has the luck of saving so much with the timesaves so far that it overrules the blatant emulation differences and then some, otherwise the publication would come out like any other GBA game then and now, falsely behind due to emulation issues both in terms of FPS as well as load times.
Noticing not only the lag differences in loading areas and whatnot, but the generally FPS drop is really taking its toll. I'm just glad it'll all be resolved in the judging process (hopefully).
Even from the first transistion exiting the house, where input is disabled and irrelevant and there is no potential for extra speed, measured exactly at the same starting frame AFTER movement is disabled, I'm losing 6-7 frames from between the last frame in and the first frame out, it all just being black loading screen. As for movement, I start out ahead (obviously when comparing individual levels not the massive +30 second time save) in some improvement areas, and slowly fall behind due to the FPS differences despite the input being identical at certain points. It'll be nice to have an accurate run going.
Here's what the house is doing:
Last frame inside:
First frame outside where both screens have something (7 frame difference despite starting on same exact frame):
And just for anybody reading not familiar with the GBA FPS debacle:
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(Note I didn't optimize movement and pixelporting once I go indoors for the last time as I need to fix RNG before worrying about anything inside)
Link to video
I'm exhausted. Spent about 9 hours so far redoing it completely and polishing it as a fresh TAS as VBA is so inaccurate by today's standards that it's like apples and oranges.
So there was a major desync from that, nothing even worth even toying with because it's so far off I couldn't even add some frames here and there to make it work without making a huge jumbled mess. So I started over and did it by hand, largely referencing Tompa's VBM file in plaintext (with plans to credit unless he seriously objects).
Also tried copying and pasting section by section but even that was too far off. So frame by frame it was... some sections it ends up near exact, some I had to come up with new solutions without losing frames.
I do also think I got a faster pixelport in 2 spots, but I haven't timed it yet. I also made it out of the "sword room" a few frames faster, even with the timing at my disadvantage, due to a movement optimization. I'm glad I'm not just relying on the language change to make a new submission.
You can see how fast VBA is running just in the first 2 seconds of the video, and obviously it just gets worse with time. However despite that still coming out way ahead.
Anyways, I gave up for now at the "hard part" as that's going to take some planning, and for some reason at this point it's getting hard to even reference what's going on because the timing seems to be even worse and obviously it's easy to lose your bearings in such a intense area.
Also curious what's going on with the items and if any different steps will be taken because it's the Japanese version and depending if they moved addresses or not.
Lastly, I need to get some RNG manipulation going as I'm pretty sure I lost a few frames not having a guard bump me in the one outdoor area, and also avoiding guards in the indoor area is obviously a timesuck.
All in due time... anybody want to help out I can co-auth. If not, I'll figure it out eventually...
Lastly, added BIOS.
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I think RTA rules shouldn't be followed 1:1 (as they have been known to be surprisingly glitchy), but are definitely a good thing to compare your own pre-determined judgement against and come up with a solution per game. Plus a lot of them (if the category really takes off) won't have any guidelines to go off of.
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Yeah, great idea. Even though you see all the content by level 5(?), the ending screen is important, and heck, could be considered "content" itself.
Pub.
Were you able to loop the inputs after a certain point or was there still differences?
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Does this game accept subframe inputs? I'm curious about that because that could overcome the CPU at the end.
I did toy with that a little bit. From what I understood the subframe layout would just delay the input by however many cycles rather than provide extra inputs. It appears it can only happen once per every other frame. Wouldn't be surprised if I was proven wrong though.
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Doesn't that mean that we're letting the game shine through whatever extremes it allows for? In some games the use of glitches is the only thing you can minimize or maximize, and we would be highlighting those differences officially, rather then requiring it to be entertaining.
I think this is the most important point in the thread, and actually probably one of the coolest features TASVideos could ever offer: comparing two extremes and showcasing exactly how relevant glitches are to TASing.
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As for the subject itself, I'd rule out anything that would be considered a glitch, otherwise what's the point? All or nothing. Things like wall clips, etc., would definitely fall under my definition of a glitch. I'd say it should be pretty strict guidelines for "glitchless", otherwise the runner may as well just do a glitched run. Even minor glitches should not be allowed as it violates the basic terms of the name. Plus it helps solve a lot of brutal discussion both here and by the YouTube audience before it even starts.
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[5267] GBC Barbie: Magic Genie Adventure "Activity Mode, Genie Master" by OtakuTAS in 02:28.50
Might be worth playing the games on the hardest difficulty as I did. Helps it from being already sort of bland.
At the same time, perhaps the lower difficulty with a focus on speed helps solve a bit of redundancy and gives the quickest result possible.
I'll have to take a closer look at the minigames, but I know the one with the potion took me a really long time to find optimal route, because there's a ton of different ways you can move around. Generally my rule became never to skip a space's movements (i.e. every move turn if you must), but even then there was the challenge of routing the shortest path to all the pieces you need to move.
The encode is hard to watch with it being unthrottled, so I'll take a closer look later.
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Ended up realizing after not being exhausted, that since each game ends on a button press frame (or perhaps the frame after), and the time between rounds in consistent, that is why the constant cycle works as well as not spamming the input the entire time. Had there been an extra frame inbetween rounds, it would not work (it's an even number of frames).
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Also wondering if something you did early on saved a lot of lag or altered the pattern of the lag frames in a large way, 64 frames is a lot and especially if it was widespread as you insist, that is very odd and obviously would be extremely noticeable to myself and others
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Boss fight is as tight as it gets, the rest are autoscrollers, which leaves the palace level. You're welcome to double check it.
At the beginning of the palace I went back and added a timesave to the cave, which ended up causing a desync that required a lot of patching.
I assume that is likely the source of any deficiency, if you found it to be "most things". I'll see what my time was at pre-adjustment.
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Well, 4 levels of the game are autoscrollers I did by hand in real time using maybe... 5... re-records, so it's probably not too off base. Other than that it's what 2, 3 minutes?
I'd assume appending to a file would add to the count quite a bit rather than anew.
You say you did things "sooner", what exactly does that mean?
64 frames is definitely a big time save for a run I spent perfecting every jump, etc., so I'm curious where the slip-up is and if it's a single incident or a widespread problem.
I did every jump, slide, stairs down, stairs up, frame perfect... and there isn't much else to the game.
What exactly did you change so I can look into it? 5k for a single level that you're not even TASing and just error checking is pretty hardcore. (Is that including my 3,700?)
I'll see if I can spot your changes when I get a chance.
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jumping for the sword saves time and i kill himfaster
Link to video
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Full comparison (Ex. screen on GG has a Sega logo so cropped that out for fair comparison, GG takes a LOSS there(!!!!!))
Link to video
examples of time saves (few, not all). you can see the game is the exact same
i jump past boulder, he waits for it
Link to video
(spikes look slower but we just start and stop crouching at different times but the same amount of frames crouching, as seen the level ends sooner on mine despite spike illusion)
Link to video
moving back and forth saves a significant amount of frames
Link to video
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Full comparison (Ex. screen on GG has a Sega logo so cropped that out for fair comparison, GG takes a LOSS there(!!!!!))
Link to video
examples of time saves (few, not all). you can see the game is the exact same
Link to videoLink to videoLink to video
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I'll have to stick them side by side and see, besides a slide across a platform in the cave level which saves quite a bit of time without stopping movement at all instead of waiting for a bat to fly past. Surprised he didn't catch that.
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OtakuTAS
First frame outside where both screens have something (7 frame difference despite starting on same exact frame):
And just for anybody reading not familiar with the GBA FPS debacle:
