(Link to video)
No zip run, better optimization, more precision and tricks.
This run uses version 1.1 of Stealth's Knuckles the Echidna in Sonic the Hedgehog hack. This is the version used in the previous movie as well, although it has been mislabeled as using v1.0.

Game objectives

Comments

Here are the improved acts:
Act New timeOld time
Green Hill 10:16::310:16::31
Green Hill 20:13::470:14::07
Green Hill 30:28::330:28::33
Marble 10:13::540:15::40
Marble 20:14::320:14::32
Marble 30:28::090:28::09
Spring Yard 10:19::160:20::30
Spring Yard 20:20::200:20::20
Spring Yard 30:44::440:44::44
Labyrinth 10:23::100:23::10
Labyrinth 20:33::57non
Labyrinth 30:55::01non
Star Light 10:17::290:17::42
Star Light 20:14::440:14::44
Star Light 30:31::55non
Scrap Brain 10:21::470:21::47
Scrap Brain 20:28::510:29::21
Scrap Brain 30:13::050:13::05
Final Zone1:10::201:10::20
The times given are the in-game timer values. The value after the final colon pair indicates the in-game frame counter, and is restricted to the 0-59 range. It is updated every frame (except during lag frames), and increments the in-game second when resetting to zero.

Stage by stage comments

Green Hill 1

Same as the previous one

Green Hill 2

So you might think this isn't a good run of a level, believe me this was the fastest route that I took, yes I tried the bottom route as well and I got 13.50 so this was the fastest I got. I will accept the criticism in the discussion forum.

Green Hill 3

Same as the JXQ'S run

Marble 1

New route and faster route by Shiro, and he jump glide it to get to the top and then finish the level

Marble 2

Same as the JXQ's run

Marble 3

Same as the JXQ's run

Spring Yard 1

This route was found by Evil 3D and said that you can use the slope glitch to go up to the top and finish the level, this route is much faster than the JXQ's run. So this level is played by me.

Spring Yard 2

Same as the previous record

Spring Yard 3

Same as the JXQ's run

Labyrinth 1

Same as the JXQ's run

Labyrinth 2

First half is by WST & marzojr, in second half is Shiro.

Labyrinth 3

The entire act is done by Shiro, no zip variant.

Star Light 1

In star light and in other games too, when going down the slope at such speed and when the slope is going to end, jump and that will increase the speed and velocity of the character. I went at such high speed in the first quater of the level that I made up the upper path.

Star Light 2

Time is the same, but I got fast after the loop. But then the rotating platforms came and that bugged me out.

Star Light 3

Nothing new, I got fast at the first loop, and did the loop glitch which saved me 10 to 8 frames. And the Boss at first was annoying but I found new strategy to beat it quick.

Scrap Brain 1

Same as the previous run.

Scrap Brain 2

Shiro did a much faster and did better optimization to beat the level faster than the previous one.

Scrap Brain 3

Same as the JXQ's run.

Final Zone

Using Aglar’s pause trick to exchange real-time for in-game time. Done by Shiro.

Other Comments

Possible improvements: None that we can find.

Thanks to Shiro for finding a faster route in Marble Zone 1 and in Scrap Brain 2. AND Evil 3D for finding the Spring Yard act 1 slope glitch trick.

feos: Fixed formatting. Don't start long lines with spaces.
Samsara: Updated one of the author's names to be consistent with their recent solo submission.
Memory: claiming for judging
Memory: Delaying to allow for potential improvements
Samsara: Removing JXQ from author list at their request.
Samsara: File replaced with a 128 frame improvement. Movie will remain on Delayed so Memory can set it back to judging herself, because the submission status system is weird.
Memory: resuming judgment
Memory: Optimization looks good especially after the improvements.
So the reception for this tas was mixed, largely in part due to the choice of hack. It was generally agreed that we cannot have both this and zips. It was also agreed that zipless better showed off the hack. However, I believe that if we receive better hacks, this should be obsoleted by one of them.
fsvgm777: Processing. EZGames69 is handling the encodes for this one.

TASVideoAgent
They/Them
Moderator
Joined: 8/3/2004
Posts: 14776
Location: 127.0.0.1
Spikestuff
They/Them
Editor, Expert player, Publisher (2254)
Joined: 10/12/2011
Posts: 6324
Location: The land down under.
Going to need an author check / clarification as there's a lot of conflicting information: Author's nickname field: DarkShamilKhan & Shiro Paradox Submission Mentions: DarkShamilKhan, Shiro Paradox, WST, marzojr, JXQ & Aglar YouTube Subtitles Mention: "Played by me and 4 more" YouTube Description Mentions: Me (Shiro), DarkShamilKhan, WST, marzojr and jqx (typo of JXQ) To my understanding that's 5 authors (possibly 6) and only 2 are listed. (Scrapped Aglar's name since it's a trick that's mentioned, not any input provided) ----- Author procceded to update the nickname field after I pointed it out.
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
+fsvgm777 never censoring anything.
Disables Comments and Ratings for the YouTube account. These colours are pretty neato, and also these.
xxezrabxxx
He/Him
Joined: 7/15/2017
Posts: 199
Location: Kentucky
Looks good to me, I don’t see any issues with this TAS, pretty fun to watch. Yes vote Also, I will point out, in the encode, the boss fight’s music glitched out and a bunch of frames are dropped while spindashing in Final Zone. I’m dumb it was pause manipulation to get eggman to spawn faster Good job tho, it was entertaining to watch!
I like to comment on submissions and look around the site. You have probably seen me before (if you have been around for a while) either on the site, Discord, or any other social media. I recently took up making temporary encodes for new submissions. Also, I never forget to greet Tompa wherever I find him! "when resyncing stuff sucks it's called Resuccing" - EZGames69 “If an emulator stops being accepted to the site it should be called an emuLAMEr” - EZGames69 "oh no discord, everything I say will now be logged forever, sdfsdf, time to hide" - Masterjun "just had to give therapy to a taxi with daddy issues" - psx Current Projects: Mother 3 (75% complete)
Joined: 6/4/2009
Posts: 893
it's a pretty nice run but it kinda bothers me to see a "no zips" category while you go thru a wall in Labyrinth 2 (7:50 ) i'll abstain to vote for that but it'd be a nice yes vote for me
Active player, Banned User (416)
Joined: 6/7/2017
Posts: 420
Location: Somewhere
Nicos wrote:
it's a pretty nice run but it kinda bothers me to see a "no zips" category while you go thru a wall in Labyrinth 2 (7:50 ) i'll abstain to vote for that but it'd be a nice yes vote for me
I checked myself. No zips were done there. There's a bit of ceiling you can fall through to get back inbounds. Here's a bit of game knowledge about collision with tiles. The game uses 2 different methods of keeping you out of tiles. Zipping when you're on the ground, and terrain ejection when you're in the air. Neither one works in opposite conditions. Zipping is the one this run aims to avoid. It pushes you the opposite direction of where you're going with actual speed. In normal senarios this does work fine, but when you initiate it while already inside a wall you get ejected out at ridiculous speeds. Terrain ejection however simply displaces you horizontally (ie without any speed). It always pushes you right if you're spot where the game would otherwise not be able to decide which way you should go. This is why that stair clip works. If you happen to end up inside a tile while in the air you get horizontally locked in place.
Memory
She/Her
Site Admin, Skilled player (1515)
Joined: 3/20/2014
Posts: 1762
Location: Dumpster
So I feel zips really aren't the way to show off a hack like this, with zips it feels not all that different to sonic. Admittedly I'm not in love with "X character in Sonic game they're not from" hacks to begin with and there have been some way more interesting hacks in recent years. However until we start receiving some of those, we're kinda stuck with what we got. I'd honestly lean towards obsoleting zips with no zips if voting was better but as is it's kinda borderline. As totally separate branches... it's very eh to me...
[16:36:31] <Mothrayas> I have to say this argument about robot drug usage is a lot more fun than whatever else we have been doing in the past two+ hours
[16:08:10] <BenLubar> a TAS is just the limit of a segmented speedrun as the segment length approaches zero
Active player, Banned User (416)
Joined: 6/7/2017
Posts: 420
Location: Somewhere
Memory wrote:
I'd honestly lean towards obsoleting zips with no zips if voting was better but as is it's kinda borderline. As totally separate branches... it's very eh to me...
If you ask me you'd be better off in the long run if you made a seperate branch. I'm in the process of making an improved zips run.
tormented
He/Him
Editor, Player (222)
Joined: 9/25/2015
Posts: 37
I see no reason to publish this branch. The appeal of a "no zips" run with vanilla Sonic is that it presents the game as it was "intended" to be played. When you add Knuckles into the mix, the game is already inherently broken; Knuckles gliding across stages is in the same realm of unintentional as clipping to the exit. I have no idea how to end this post. Cat kiss.
Spikestuff
They/Them
Editor, Expert player, Publisher (2254)
Joined: 10/12/2011
Posts: 6324
Location: The land down under.
Yeah to me this branch is redundant with this hack when compared to the vanilla game. I'd rather see the vanilla game "no zips" get destroyed and not a character replacement rom hack, which just knuckles on through. Abstaining the vote.
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
+fsvgm777 never censoring anything.
Disables Comments and Ratings for the YouTube account. These colours are pretty neato, and also these.
Memory
She/Her
Site Admin, Skilled player (1515)
Joined: 3/20/2014
Posts: 1762
Location: Dumpster
I see absolutely no reason to have both zips and no zips for this hack. There's way too much redundancy between Sonic and Knux and Tails in these hacks/vanilla as it is. In fact we want to transition away from "character in vanilla game" hacks to more dynamic and extensive hacks. To the people that don't like "no zips", what about zips? Do you just not like this hack in general or would you prefer zips?
[16:36:31] <Mothrayas> I have to say this argument about robot drug usage is a lot more fun than whatever else we have been doing in the past two+ hours
[16:08:10] <BenLubar> a TAS is just the limit of a segmented speedrun as the segment length approaches zero
Samsara
She/They
Expert player, Senior Judge, Site Admin (2121)
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2792
Location: Northern California
No zips over zips, definitely. The appeal of using a different character is completely lost when the majority of the run is spent with the character offscreen and the camera scrolling incredibly quickly. Ideally, though, a level hack comes in the future and obsoletes the character hacks in general.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 | Cohost
warmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
fsvgm777
She/Her
Player, Senior Publisher (221)
Joined: 5/28/2009
Posts: 1180
Location: Luxembourg
Having watched all relevant TASes (Sonic 1 zips, Knux in Sonic 1 zips as well as Sonic 1 zipless and this TAS), I can say that at least for zips, there's just way too much redundancy between the base game and the hack. Matter of fact, some of the zips are practically the exact same. Zipless isn't much better, though, but at least it has more merit IMO. For instance, Knuckles skips over Marble Zone completely by flying over the stages instead of having to go through the zone normally. So in the end, I'd much prefer seeing a zipless TAS for this hack instead of a zips TAS, and thus this TAS should obsolete the zips TAS we currently have published. However, these "character-in-vanilla game" hacks are just not interesting at all IMO, and would much prefer seeing a Sonic 1 ROM hack that actually changes the levels instead of keeping the exact same levels from the base game.
Steam Community page - Cohost profile Oh, I'm just a concerned observer.
Player (134)
Joined: 4/24/2020
Posts: 36
Location: Pakistan
However, these "character-in-vanilla game" hacks are just not interesting at all IMO, and would much prefer seeing a Sonic 1 ROM hack that actually changes the levels instead of keeping the exact same levels from the base game.
------------------------ I understand but that won't be accepted on tasvideos.org. Currently Kaan55 is doing any% speedrun. Zipless is entertaining than Zip ones. Just look Sonic 3 and Amy, the level design is the same. But you have amy and her abilities. And in the latest run. It is the same thing. Zips, unless you have a camhack emulator or a video to see what is the character doing.
Hi me is Shamil Khan. I am TASer and creator (kindof). "Are you kidding me?!" - DSK 2022
Samsara
She/They
Expert player, Senior Judge, Site Admin (2121)
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2792
Location: Northern California
DarkShamilKhan wrote:
I understand but that won't be accepted on tasvideos.org.
One, don't speak for the Judges. Two, you're wrong, any hack TAS has the possibility of being accepted. In fact, character hacks tend to be less well-received than hacks that actually drastically change the game, since for the most part "different character in the same levels" adds nothing of real value to the site. The character hacks we currently have were published at a time where our rules were much less defined than they are now, and should not be taken as precedents because of it.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 | Cohost
warmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Player (134)
Joined: 4/24/2020
Posts: 36
Location: Pakistan
Apologies mate as I thought it wasn't accepted before. Now I know
Hi me is Shamil Khan. I am TASer and creator (kindof). "Are you kidding me?!" - DSK 2022
Player (26)
Joined: 8/29/2011
Posts: 1206
Location: Amsterdam
Memory wrote:
To the people that don't like "no zips", what about zips? Do you just not like this hack in general or would you prefer zips?
Speaking for myself, I do not like this category of hacks in general. The difference between the characters is not all that big in casual gameplay, the difference gets less discernible in TAS gameplay, and it essentially disappears when zipping is allowed. I can imagine that for several (but not all) categories of S3&K, doing the same goal but with a different character would be downvoted as "not different enough to be entertaining", and the same principle applies here.
fsvgm777 wrote:
I'd much prefer seeing a zipless TAS for this hack instead of a zips TAS, and thus this TAS should obsolete the zips TAS we currently have published.
I like this approach.
Player (26)
Joined: 8/29/2011
Posts: 1206
Location: Amsterdam
Checking the history, I find it interesting that the run for "Tails in Sonic 1" was initially rejected for being too similar to "Knuckles in Sonic 1" (as detailed here). And that was before the discovery of several zip tricks that made the newer versions of those runs more similar to each other. Considering the current Tails run uses heavy zipping, is there a case for this zipless submission to obsolete both Knuckles-with-zips and Tails-with-zips?
Editor, Experienced player (548)
Joined: 10/22/2016
Posts: 581
Location: Argentina
I watched the movie and I have some questions. 1. In GHZ 2 0:02 - I'm sure taking the speedshoes + the lower route is more faster than taking the upper route, I saw that you slowed down a little and taked the loop, was not faster skip him jumping upside? 2. The movie claims that is used Predict Animals script but I didn't saw animal manipulation in the capsules (perfect rng maybe?). In one hand Sonic games aims for IGT but on the other hand it's good trying to save every possible frame if it's possible. 3. Marble 1 0:09 - Climbing is more faster than landing here, remember when Knuckles lands he has immobility for 15 frames, with climbing you avoid that, you did this way the rest of the movie, maybe you missed this spot? 4. Marble 2 0:03 / 0:09 - Well... you did the same here at 0:03 but no at 0:09, even at normal speed you can see that is sighly faster. 5. Marble 3 boss - I don't know if it's because of Knuckles' jumping force penalty, but I remember Aglar fighting the boss with perfect frame hits. 6. JXQ was actively involved in the project? If not I think you guys need to revisit his stages, JXQ's movies are a little old and his input can be outdated. 7. Remember that Knuckles can use the slope glitch in every level using the monitors, I think you can skip Spring Yard 1 activating the slope glitch with the speedshoes monitor and glide jump to the sky using the badniks down here. Link to video 8. Is possible to skip robotnik cutscene in SBZ2 Link to video In my opinion, the run feels rushed but is good enough for a first try, Maybe you should check my points and verify they are valid and then you can resync the movie, you can ask the judges for a delay in the verdict if you need to fix these things.
You can see more TASes on my youtube channel
Player (134)
Joined: 4/24/2020
Posts: 36
Location: Pakistan
Evil_3D 1. After posting this run, and now you reminded me, I said to Shiro too and he said we will obsolete it now. 2.That might be my script mistake. 3. I didn't knew that, I will advise Shiro to see this zone again. 4. I can't answer 5. I know this, I think it is possible by using Marzo and wst strategy. 6. JXQ's input were added. His name was added because his inputs were added. Me and Shiro will be seeing this soon. 7. Huh? I knew about the slope glitch in this hack. My request to the judge. Can we ask for time for improvements.
Hi me is Shamil Khan. I am TASer and creator (kindof). "Are you kidding me?!" - DSK 2022
JXQ
Experienced player (749)
Joined: 5/6/2005
Posts: 3132
I appreciate the efforts here to keep the author list comprehensive, but I'd actually prefer to not be included in this (or any future) author list, even if some entire levels from my previous run are used in the finished product. Though I suspect as Evil_3D said, that they are improvable even without zips since a lot of Sonic engine knowledge has been gained by the community since this project. Still I look forward to checking this out later today. (And also exciting to hear kaan is improving this with zips!)
<Swordless> Go hug a tree, you vegetarian (I bet you really are one)
Site Admin, Skilled player (1234)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11251
Location: RU
I watched this side by side with S1 zips, S1 zipless, and Knuckles in S1 zips. It's hard to tell where the most difference is: between this and zipless Knuckles, or between zipped Knuckles and zipless Sonic. Even though some zips with Knuckles are different from Sonic, and some levels in zipless Knuckles are similar to Sonic, I agree that the zipless approach allows us to see more of the game and more of the character movement and mechanics. I'm not sure if a new zipped run with Knuckles is gonna be more entertaining than this. And I don't think they can co-exist, because the nature of this hack is less than ideal in general: hacks with different levels would be preferred, as that introduces something we haven't seen before, instead of mixing up the same things in slightly different amounts..
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
ParadaxeTH
He/Him
Player (134)
Joined: 12/23/2020
Posts: 6
Location: Far Lands
Player (134)
Joined: 4/24/2020
Posts: 36
Location: Pakistan
Ok i did Updated the submission. The only thing is left is to put the updated gmv file. which i cant see.
Hi me is Shamil Khan. I am TASer and creator (kindof). "Are you kidding me?!" - DSK 2022
Samsara
She/They
Expert player, Senior Judge, Site Admin (2121)
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2792
Location: Northern California
Sorry for the delay! I've replaced the file. Two things for future reference: 1. Only Judges can replace submission files 2. It is much better to use our site Userfiles to upload improvements
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 | Cohost
warmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Player (134)
Joined: 4/24/2020
Posts: 36
Location: Pakistan
Samsara wrote:
Sorry for the delay! I've replaced the file. Two things for future reference: 1. Only Judges can replace submission files 2. It is much better to use our site Userfiles to upload improvements
Ok, I got it. Thanks
Hi me is Shamil Khan. I am TASer and creator (kindof). "Are you kidding me?!" - DSK 2022