I made a short testrun of this awesome game just to see how it turned out, it ends after Shinoa's training. It isn't overly optimized (in fact choosing the gamefile and all that was done without slowdown due to annoyance with the emulator), but I think it turned out quite nice, and I think that a full run will be very sweet. The reason I jumped back and forth when hitting the old man was to make him reappear at the same spot every time, and not to my left.
Also a run with the extra character must be done, by pointing at the screen you can basically make him warp (or move very quickly, at least) to that spot. It is practically impossible to use this to its full extent unassisted (as you would need very, very good reflexes and a third hand), but with tool assistance I can only imagine how this can be abused :)
And for the record, I don't have any intention of doing a full run of this as of now, but if it still hasn't been done later in this year I might very well pick it up.
dsmPoor quality wmv
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
I can already tell how the boss fights after the huge crab will be: Attack a bunch of times, wait 1 minute for the MP to regenate, repeat.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
I can already tell how the boss fights after the huge crab will be: Attack a bunch of times, wait 1 minute for the MP to regenate, repeat.
Mana restores. Also, glyph combos use hearts, so some mixing up. In this vein, deviating for some MP max-ups and restoratives may speed things up.
19:74 bossrush 2. Whee. Redire-flying is fun
Most Castlevania TASes just begin to carry on the same IMBA boss fight patterns from time to time as soon as they become available.
<klmz> it reminds me of that people used to keep quoting adelikat's IRC statements in the old good days
<adelikat> no doubt
<adelikat> klmz, they still do
Joined: 6/13/2006
Posts: 3300
Location: Massachussetts, USA
Ah, finally a Castlevania run where I'll be watching the main hero's chest most the time. Visually appealing (because it's quick too, of course.)
If the extra character can warp by clicking on the screen, I don't see how a run could NOT be done; seeing as how many tests of other games show how abusable stylus input can be when TASed. Is he unlocked with SRAM?
The main problem with warping is mana management, because this move eats through it like nothing else. In order to use it to its fullest extent, you'd need to do a NG+ run with a 100% file - lvl 255, maximum amount of max ups collected, attributes maxed out. It wouldn't be as "impressive" as far as tough boss battles go, but the ridiculous speed alone justifies such a run. With a fresh / lvl 1 cap file, you'd be walking around 75% of the time, waiting for your mana to recharge. How to get your hands on such a file is another question - cheat and it most likely wouldn't be posted on the site, or create it yourself through hours of painful grinding - I've done it myself on console, and it's about ten times more annoying than Shanoa grinding.
Well, basicly, in theory, its not that hard to make a grinding robot
It doesnt matter your max file is cheated, its not possible to realy verify it, hence anyway a robot would blow up the "leggit" process, so in the end, i think it doesnt matter how you acquire max stats, i believe
(else you would end up needing to submit a 99 hours long run to be able to acquire max stats conditions, sound idiot and useless to me)
If the run is that much awesome by using a max file, then i guess lets be it, witchever its from a file using cheats at the basis
"max stats" category i would guess
The way to do a movie that depends on a savefile is to create a movie that creates that savefile from power-on and then use the savefile created by that movie to do the second movie. The first movie doesn't have to be TASed or even remotely efficient, so long as it's verifiable and doesn't cheat. Then you submit the two movies together.
In this situation, using a bot to grind would be entirely reasonable. Just find a room you can go into, kill a monster, and leave, record the required button presses, and let it run for a few hours.
Edit: fixed wording.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
If bots don't count as cheating, awesome! Best grinding spot for all intents and purposes is the lower left entrance to the Double Hammer room in Training Hall. Just don't forget to include all moves you're going to use in the run in your kill script so you they get enough attribute points (iirc, only the move that delivers the killing blow gets AP, though I could be wrong). At least one and a half playthroughs are required to get all max ups, though you could probably write another bot that starts a NG+, plays up to the first available MP up, saves, and starts a new game.
Both way its executed by a dsm so you cant tell if the guy played or just edited a script, else, you would say from any tas that its a bot playing
Especialy since dsm file format is text based, its very easy to script for any user (its not a bin file)
Serris wrote:
(iirc, only the move that delivers the killing blow gets AP, though I could be wrong)
Correct, only way to acquire +1 to all is to steal glyph
Comicalflop: because then you can't verify the savefile's stats are within the legitimate range. What if Super Metroid had a NG+ and someone started with 255 missiles? That seems like a plausible amount, but of course it's impossible to achieve in normal play.
The rules cover this:
However, there are certain games with unlockable modes that can only be accessed if a save file (or an otherwise "dirty" SRAM) is present. If you really wish to submit a movie made on such mode, you will need a verification movie first. Any input file that starts from power-on (for example, a previously submitted or published movie for that game) and creates the exact circumstances for your submission to sync will generally do. Note that you don't have to optimize the verification movie: it only serves as a save or SRAM generator that makes it possible to claim the legitimacy of your effort.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Joined: 11/17/2005
Posts: 278
Location: Massachusetts, USA
pirate_sephiroth wrote:
I can already tell how the boss fights after the huge crab will be: Attack a bunch of times, wait 1 minute for the MP to regenate, repeat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChyQvqIVi6o
The TAS won't be so overlevelled though. Maybe three or four swings of the giant lightsaber. Dracula might take 6 or 8.
I was never able to get the Redire (magnetic boomerang) trick to work when I played it.
Joined: 11/17/2005
Posts: 278
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Satoryu wrote:
you're not going to get Redire in a TAS.
Oh yeah. Even if you wanted to you couldn't have it for that boss anyway. Come to think of it, you don't get Nitesco until closer to the end. So I think was wrong about the lightsaber dominating all the bosses.
actually, i think it is possible to have Redire for the Eligor fight. the requirement for unlocking the secret dungeons is using the back door in the area where Blackmore is. but that's besides the point.
in place of the Nitesco/weapon combo, Light/weapon should do okay. Light/Dark would be great if you have the hearts to spare.
Ah, finally a Castlevania run where I'll be watching the main hero's chest most the time. Visually appealing (because it's quick too, of course.)
That reminds me of this:
andymac wrote:
So if anyone can suggest a way to encourage non-TASers to TAS, without displaying pictures of boobs on-site or promising financial gain (for the slightly older audience), that would be great.
So quickly animated images can be better than static ones as encouragement. Good idea.
<klmz> it reminds me of that people used to keep quoting adelikat's IRC statements in the old good days
<adelikat> no doubt
<adelikat> klmz, they still do
Bleh, the redire trick for Eligor-fight is pain in the ass for me.. maybe I should have used the right eye-item. Well, at least got no damage using "normal" way. Great boss rush-time, though :o
actually, i think it is possible to have Redire for the Eligor fight. the requirement for unlocking the secret dungeons is using the back door in the area where Blackmore is. but that's besides the point.
More importantly, isn't the speedup glyph back there? Granted, you'd still have to do the training hall for Redire, but...
I could see the Dominus glyphs getting a lot of use in this run. Especially if we can use the one in combination with the light/dark glyph combo.
Also I'm reminded that I still haven't finished this game.
actually, i think it is possible to have Redire for the Eligor fight. the requirement for unlocking the secret dungeons is using the back door in the area where Blackmore is. but that's besides the point.
More importantly, isn't the speedup glyph back there? Granted, you'd still have to do the training hall for Redire, but...
it is there. maybe it wouldn't be too bad a detour to get.
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
Long story short, the only way it will be entertaining is through cheats.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
Joined: 11/17/2005
Posts: 278
Location: Massachusetts, USA
pirate_sephiroth wrote:
Long story short, the only way it will be entertaining is through cheats.
Wait what? Eligor dies really quick with or without Redire. It's just that the Redire trick is extremely awesome. But then with tool-assistance we might find something even cooler.
Is this the first Castlevania game in a decade where you can't leave the map or abuse some exploit to get lots of free stuff? DoS and PoR both have memory corrupting exploits related to closing the lid while you're out-of-bounds and stuff. This game has been out for 7 or 8 months now. No exploits yet? Really? I tried looking for stuff on my own in March but I didn't find anything. However, I wasn't expecting to be able to TAS this game so quickly. :)
So I need access to all the maps and items before I can start looking for exploits. So I start the game up and start playing. At 45 fps. Ugh. I get partway through the Monastery but it's painful to play like that. So I open the memory search tool...
(All memory addresses have an 0x02 assumed in front. The number of bytes is in parenthesis.)
100310 = GOLD (4)
1002B8 = MP (2)
1002BA = Max MP (2)
100D64 = 'total displayed INT'
100D50 = 'effective base INT'
100D38 = STR stat
100D3A = CON stat
100D3C = INT stat
100D3E = MND stat
100D40 = LCK stat
100D36 = your natural DEF stat (this is added to your DEF stat)
100D34 = your natural ATK stat (this shouldn't exist either. it is unused)
Your stats are recalculated when you level up. So you'll need to pause and unpause with these cheats on to get your godly stats back.
1002C0 = glyph equipped to 'Y'
1002C2 = glyph equipped to 'X'
1002C4 = glyph equipped to 'R'
1002D6 = what is displayed as being equipped to 'R'
Your weapons can be anything from 1 (starting weapon) to 49 or 50 (Dominus). Hacking them to 51-54 lets you use your transformation skills as Shanoa. "Weapon 51" is actually kind of awesome. For the R button the good values are 1 (Magnes), 2 (Paries), 3 (Voliticus), 4 (Black Panther), 23 (Dominus), and 24 (Agartha).
100458 = Lizard Tail (starting item)
100459 = Ordinary Rock
10045A = Serpent Scale
10045B = Glyph Union (starting item)
10045C = Glyph Sleeve
10045D = Book of Spirits
Set the relic's bytes to 255 to own the item and set it to ON.
10045E-100548 = inventory
Each byte is one item. The right nibble is the quantity. The left nibble, if odd, marks the item as found in the guide. For some reason the game likes to use '9' for this. So at the start of the game 10045E will have a value of 0x91. That means 1x Potion, and mark it as found in the guide. I recommend you open the memory viewer, put your cursor on 10045E, and then hold down the 9-key for a few seconds. (100485-100489 = colored drops.)
1003EA-100437 = glyphs
Same as inventory items. Just write 0x99 over each byte. *shrug*
1003CC-1003D0 = map availability
Write FF onto each byte. Interestingly, the maps are in a very different order than the order you play them in.
Tomorrow I'll start having fun with these. :) The behavior of the game with 800+ luck is pretty funny.
