Post subject: Vice - Project Doom
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Well, now that I'm done with Wai Wai World, this is my next project. Currently I have an incomplete FCE Ultra movie available on my Filespace page, which covers the first 4 levels. Some notes: - There are 3 types of levels in this game: Action-platformer stages, driving stages (basically, your typical overhead shooter with a car instead of a spaceship), and Lethal Enforcers-style shooter stages. I chose to upload the movie after level 4 because it shows all three of these types. - You can only affect speed in the driving stages by not getting hit and killing the bosses ASAP; in the shooter levels you can only affect speed by killing the last enemy ASAP (there are no bosses in these levels). Thus, in addition to speed, I have these goals in mind when playing these levels: 1. Kill all enemies with 100% accuracy. 2. Collect all items (some enemies in the shooter levels don't drop items). 3. Don't get hit (in the shooter levels). - In the driving stages you can shift gears, which affects the car's moving speed; naturally, I stay at "3" all the time as it is fastest. - In all stages except the driving ones, you can shoot a pistol and throw grenades. The "B" icons give you ammo for the gun, and the "G" icons give you grenades. In the shooter levels the only difference between the two is that the grenades have a wider hitbox, while in the platformer stages there are many differences between them. - In the platformer stages, in addition to the two special weapons I mentioned, you have a whip. It's a bit different from the ones in Castlevania, as it is pretty quick and can hit above and behind you. The best way to kill bosses, whenever possible, is to get close and whip them to death. - In the platformer stages, the gun has mediocre range and deals one point of damage, and the grenade has longer range and can deal two points of damage (depending on whether or not the enemy moves out of the explosion). They are both slower to execute than the whip, which is why I only use them when at a distance. - If you attack while standing, you stop briefly. If you attack when about to land from a jump, though, you glide along the ground at normal speed. - Being hit can launch you forward or backward, it's pretty much the same as Castlevania 4. The difference here is that you move more slowly when launched, so being hit is something you want to avoid unless it saves you time via invincibility or a shortcut, or you just can't avoid it (all of these cases can be seen in level 3). - There are a couple times where I stop and whip an enemy...in these cases, it is faster than any other solution. - The 3rd boss is hell...one thing to note is that the gun doesn't damage him when he's doing his bo charge, which is why I use a grenade here. That's about it for now. Feel free to post any other questions or (especially!) constructive criticism. Thanks, Josh.
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Before I forget, here are the level times: Level 1 - 1:03 Level 2 - 0:47 Level 3 - 0:56 Level 4 - 1:04 Level 5 - 1:35 Level 6 - 1:15 Level 7 - 1:23 Level 8 - 1:07 Level 9 - 1:25 Level 10 - 0:57 Level 11 - 1:48 -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Level 5 is done, just uploaded the new FCM. Some more notes: - I forgot to mention the coins last time...they serve exactly the same purpose as in Super Mario Bros. - You can move forward while crouching. If you look VERY closely, you can see me use this at one point vs. the level 5 boss. - Also in level 5, I need to look more into how the falling logs work (you can change their position by delaying when you scroll upward) and into the possibility of blowing up walls with grenades so I don't have to stop and whip them. - This movie has 2400 rerecords already and is not even really close to halfway done. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Level 6 is done, and the new FCM is up. Personally I am very happy with how this stage turned out...took no damage, and had to use some creativity to do so. I am quickly discovering how much of a help the crouch-run can be, and am kicking myself for not taking advantage of it in earlier levels. There are 11 levels total...timewise, I'm probably close to halfway done, as the first 4 levels are quite a bit shorter than the rest. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Just finished level 7, you know where to check it out. Even though this level is longer than 6, it's much easier and it took many fewer rerecords. Hm...not much else to say. Total time is up to 8:05, with four levels to go. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Just beat Level 8. Again, it's somewhat short but extremely difficult. I think I've got this one nailed, though. It's up on Filespace, but the names are screwed up. I moved all my movies to a folder with blip's latest version of FCEU, deleted and re-uploaded them (I know now I didn't have to do this, but ah well), and now can't rename them to their proper form. Anyone know what's up? Thanks, Josh.
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Just beat level 9, about 1200 rerecords spent. I'll just hold off on uploading until it's complete. Next up is the other driving level, which is at least short... -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Level 10 complete, and I am very happy with it. Once again managed to fulfill all of my aesthetic goals, and the boss fight shows off a little-known property of your car. =) One more to go... -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
This baby is done finally, with a total time of 13:20. Not submission-worthy yet, but version 2 definitely will be. =) -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Alright, work on version 2 has begun. So far I improved level 1 by 1 second (optimized the boss), and level 2 by 10-15 frames (need to check the exact amount). -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Alright, level 3 is completed 5 seconds faster than in v1. Almost all of this was due to a much, much better boss strategy, and there are a couple other minor improvements as well. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 5/22/2004
Posts: 462
Nice job. I like how you're redoing the whole movie for (seemingly) minor improvements.
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Thanks, Dan. The 3rd boss fight was so bad in my first movie that I just HAD to redo this, and some of my other mistakes were small but extremely stupid; for instance, I had completely forgotten about the crouch-run until the level 5 boss, and that saves a little bit of time in earlier stages. Also, when I needed to drop down somewhere I just ran forward and fell. Now in these situations I jump down ledges as any timeattacker should (well, unless you're playing Wai Wai World or Rygar or something). It seems to save 5 frames or so per drop. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Alright, levels 4 and 5 are completed. Level 4 was done in 1:06, leading me to believe that I wrote down the wrong time for v1; in actuality this is around 1-2 seconds faster (used a quicker way to end the level). Level 5 surprised me...3 seconds better than last time! A great many minor improvements were made, and I found a faster way to execute my shortcut in 5-2. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Level 6 is done with another improvement that surprised me...2 seconds! This was mainly through optimizing the boss, and there were a couple other minor improvements as well. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Hmm...I'm going to go back and redo the movie from the start of level 4. It seems that I allowed more slowdown there than I did in v1, which explains the higher time. That may end up being the one thing that keeps this movie from reaching under 13 minutes... EDIT: OK, using my computer clock as a stopwatch, level 4 really IS 2 seconds slower in v2. I have no idea how in the heck that happened, though... EDIT #2: Alright, I must have put down the wrong time for v1 or FCEU must have calculated something wrong, because level 4 was slightly faster in v2. I am going to redo it, however, because the first part of the level was a bit slower. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
OK, after all that, level 4 is on track to be improved 43 frames from v1 (slowdown WAS the culprit, it turns out). Currently I'm at the beginning of the FPS part, where I will save exactly half a second compared to v1. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Active player (277)
Joined: 5/29/2004
Posts: 5712
Wow, I didn't know you were allowed to make that many posts in a row.
put yourself in my rocketpack if that poochie is one outrageous dude
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Didn't you see my Wai Wai World thread? ;) As far as I can tell, this kind of posting is OK if it's for something constructive (giving updates on your movies) as opposed to spamming, seeing as I've never had any complaints. *shrug* -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Alright, I'm back to working on this. Level 4 done 43 frames faster than v1. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Level 5 done. Total time so far is 5:18, 7 seconds faster than v1. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Level 6 done. Total time is 9 seconds faster than v1 now. There wasn't nearly as much of an improvement in level 5 as I thought, which leads me to believe that I put down too low of a time for stage 4 and too high of a time for stage 5. Well, right about halfway through the game and it's not looking likely that I can get under 13 minutes. We'll see, though... -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 1/1/2022
Posts: 1716
looking forward to it, loved your wai wai world video. it is definitely among my favorite time attacks thus far. along with blaster master, my other favorite.
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
Thanks for the comments. =) Just completed level 7, another 2 seconds saved. Yep, doesn't look like it's going under 13 minutes now...ah well. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
After much time and effort, level 8 is completed with yet another 2-second improvement. Now for the three final and most annoying levels of this run... -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice