Post by BigBoct

Posted: 2/11/2008 1:58 AM

Post subject: How many hours does an average TAS take to complete?

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Bezman

Joined: 2/7/2008
Posts: 185

How many hours does an average TAS take to complete? I understand it must vary extremely, given game complexity and game length, but I was wondering roughly how many hours of work go into a typical TAS. Say time per frames or a rough minimum or maximum value - I honestly have no idea whether these things take 160 hours for a 1/2 hour video or if it's possible to do a game in 16 hours. Also, I feel wary about posting - I was sure it'd have been asked before but can't find it with the search. Apologies if I missed an obvious search term or technique.

I'm just some random guy. Don't let my words get you riled - I have my opinions but they're only mine.

Posted: 2/11/2008 2:18 AM

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mz

Player (79)

Joined: 10/26/2007
Posts: 693

Bisqwit wrote:

Creating a 10 minute long tool-assisted speedrun for a platform game might take anything from 2 hours to 6 months, depending on the devotion of the movie maker(s) and of course, of the complexity of the game. As for complexity, often, the looks can be deceiving...

You can read more about this here. I've personally been working on a NES Mickey Mouse 3 - Yume Fuusen TAS for 3 months now. I'm on the final stage right now. But, I only work for a very few hours every day...

You're just fucking stupid, everyone hates you, sorry to tell you the truth. no one likes you, you're someone pretentious and TASes only to be on speed game, but don't have any hope, you won't get there.

Posted: 2/11/2008 3:05 AM

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mmbossman

Experienced player (822)

Joined: 11/18/2006
Posts: 2426
Location: Back where I belong

Like you said, it varies greatly with type of game, number of rerecords, and level of optimization, but I'd say I've spent an average of 30 hours per published movie. My first Sonic Spinball submission was probably only about 10 hours, Wild Guns was probably around 30, Vectorman around 25, and Turok has probably taken me about 70 hours so far, if you include my first drafts. I'd say an average 10 minute movie of an NES or SNES action game would take around 15 hours to get a decent result from.

Living Well Is The Best Revenge My Personal Page

Posted: 2/11/2008 3:30 AM

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Xipo

Banned User, Skilled player (1166)

Joined: 12/26/2006
Posts: 231
Location: Lonely City

I spend an average of 50 hours per published movie. I think if there are many route or scheme,we maybe have to spend more time to compare them.And I think it is trouble if you find stage1 should be improved when you have been in last stage- -!

work hard

Posted: 2/11/2008 3:35 AM

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Bezman

Joined: 2/7/2008
Posts: 185

Thanks for all those replies! It was fun to read through that interview and I'm sure I'll enjoy reading the rest of the section - embarassingly, I hadn't perused that until now. Hearing some specific quotations in hours was really useful and interesting to hear. It sounds like it varies from person-to-person just as it does from game-to-game. And if anyone else feels like revealing info, I'd be much obliged. :-)

I'm just some random guy. Don't let my words get you riled - I have my opinions but they're only mine.

Posted: 2/11/2008 3:42 AM

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adelikat

He/Him

Emulator Coder, Site Developer, Site Owner, Expert player (3600)

Joined: 11/3/2004
Posts: 4739
Location: Tennessee

My average is probably 25-50 hours though I've never really paid attention to that. If I am really motivated on a run, I might put in about 8-16 hours per week on it. And I finish a movie every two months or so. It is hard to say though because if varies so greatly. Cardboard and I probably spend 100 hours each on the super mario bros. 2 runs; whereas I spent about 9 hours on the beavis and butthead movie I did afterwards. Also, the amount of work someone does in their time varies greatly depending on the TASer.

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Posted: 2/11/2008 3:44 AM

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Dromiceius

Joined: 10/3/2005
Posts: 1332

I recall Nitsuja estimating a few years ago, "you should expect to spend at least an hour on every minute of gameplay..." It's not surprising that estimates appear to have risen since then.

Posted: 2/11/2008 3:51 AM

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Comicalflop

Editor, Experienced player (730)

Joined: 6/13/2006
Posts: 3300
Location: Massachussetts, USA

For me it's hard to say, because this is how I TAS: -Turn on my laptop -Check my email, log on to TASvideos, log onto facebook. Noodle on other sites if they are fresh on my mind. -Log onto AIM, sign on to IRC -see if any people are on to talk with, if there are, I start chatting -Noodle around on websites, maybe watch a movie -Sometime around here I might open up an emulator -Once emulator is open, load MHS for memory watching, and in virtual dub load any movies I would need to watch while making my run -Go up to get something to eat, or go to the bathroom -Come back, see that someone cool is on IRC or AIM, and start chatting -maybe by now start TASing, but slowly and while chatting at the same time -go get something to drink, or start stretching -by now, someone has said something funny in IRC or there's a huge discussion I start taking part in -maybe play a few more frames in my movie, then reload all websites to see if there's anything new -suddenly get bored, and watch a video game movie -I get distracted and watch some youtube videos. and of course, once each one is done, I click on the next and keep going. -I maybe realize I have not done enough TASing, and go back to emulator and try some more -at the same time however, someone starts a cool conversation in IRC again, which I partake in -Time's up. Either I have to go to work, school, or family is home and I need to start interacting with others. TASing achieved: 15-450 frames. total time: 5+ hours. Now, every now and then I will have a TAS burst and will, like a good TASer should, TAS all the way with no distractions, and these days are awesome. Like I'll finish a boss in one night, or complete 3 stages in one day. But for the most part.... yeah, what I accomplish is what's described above.

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Posted: 2/11/2008 6:02 AM

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Randil

Skilled player (1886)

Joined: 4/20/2005
Posts: 2160
Location: Norrköping, Sweden

Oh boy, this can vary a lot. It completely depends on what kind of game it is, if you've TASed it before, if you have useful RAM addresses for it, etc. A decent estimate is at least 1-2 hours per minute of gameplay, if you know the game well. I remember that when TASing Deja Vu for the third time, I TASed about 2-3 minutes per hour. With Darkwing Duck, the boss fights in Goof Troop, or difficult luck manipulation, a 1 minute segment can take more than a whole day to finish. In total, for me, I'd say an optimized 10-minute TAS of a somewhat complex game usually comes down to 25-35 hours of work in total.

My own page on this site.

Posted: 2/11/2008 11:53 AM

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Mitjitsu

He/Him

Banned User, Experienced player (532)

Joined: 4/24/2006
Posts: 2997

I try to put an emphasis on making progress through the game i.e. get to this point by the day or week. Sometimes I fall behind schedule because there might be a bit that causes more problems that I expected to, I usually get round this by putting in a little more work the next week in order to get to where I wanted to. All this applies with the exception of my recent SM64 run since we knew all the improvements and had a few small ideas of our own. Easy I thought, 7-10 days of very hard work will get this finished. So I thought if I spend an average of 4 hours a day I'll easilly get this finished. Apart from the newer stuff was considerably more difficult to implement and optimize that I thought, heck we even redid areas just because one of us wasn't quite sasified with the camera angles, since I was under the impression that this might be the definitive run, in the end it probaly took more like 33-35 days. So what I thought would take 30-40 hours ended up taking 130-140 hours. So when you consider that there is about 5 mins of gameplay, do the the maths

Posted: 2/11/2008 12:54 PM

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Mukki

Skilled player (1091)

Joined: 8/26/2006
Posts: 1139
Location: United Kingdom

Between November '06 and May '07 I spent between 3 and 6 hours per day TASing Majora's Mask. I made an effort to do at least something every day to keep the game fresh in my mind. In April and May I slacked off a little and was probably only averaging 15-20 hours TASing per week. Between June '07 and the submission I made a huge push to get the run completed. My shifts at work were switched to early morning meaning that I had afternoons and evenings free and I'd finished school for the year so I had more free days. During this period I was TASing 8 hours+ on days when I was working and 10 hours+ on days when I wasn't. However, some of this was spent sync cheking the movie. So... Gex 64 - 70 hours Majora's Mask - 400 hours Streets of Rage - 25 hours on my end. I'm currently working on two projects; one I've been working on since September and has seen about 30 hours work so far and will need about another 15 to 20 hours to finish, the other had been in planning for about a month and I started the actual TAS a few weeks ago, so far it has only had about 10 hours work and will need another 90 or so to finish. I have good concentration so when I start a project I don't have a problem spending long TASing shifts to get it done, if I enjoy the game. I'm a reasonably slow TASer. I also usually redo a lot, and often, so that piles up the hours due to lack of motivation for working efficiently.

http://tasvideos.org/Mukki.html

Posted: 2/11/2008 3:26 PM

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Bezman

Joined: 2/7/2008
Posts: 185

Thanks to everyone for the info. It's great to learn a bit more about this and any more stories/data is appreciated. With the exceptions of the amazingly finely honed Mario64/MarioBros.2 runs, it seems all the specified runs took 1-3 hours per minute, clustering around the 1.7hr/min mark. (discounting Randil's faster-going repeat attempts) it's humbling to know the amount of effort that goes into these. Would I be wrong to assume that turn-based RPGs take less time per minute?

I'm just some random guy. Don't let my words get you riled - I have my opinions but they're only mine.

Posted: 2/11/2008 4:53 PM

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mmbossman

Experienced player (822)

Joined: 11/18/2006
Posts: 2426
Location: Back where I belong

Bezman wrote:

Would I be wrong to assume that turn-based RPGs take less time per minute?

I don't have any experience with this personally, but if you look here you can see many of the lowest rerecords/s ratio belongs to RPGs. But I guess a lot of that comes from the method used to make the run (frame advance vs. 25% or lower), and the amount of dedication used to make the run. But in general, I would say yes, traditional RPGs take less time because there's usually less rerecords used.

Living Well Is The Best Revenge My Personal Page

Posted: 2/11/2008 4:57 PM

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Randil

Skilled player (1886)

Joined: 4/20/2005
Posts: 2160
Location: Norrköping, Sweden

Another imprortan factor is how much waiting time there is between levels and screen transactions. For example, in Snow Bros. there is a ~10-15 second waiting time between every level, where obviously no rerecords are necessary. In the storybook games, about 75% of the time is just waiting for the cursor/text to appear. I think that a big part of TASing RPG's is scrolling through text, and this usually isn't very hard and doesn't require many rerecords. However, I don't think we should underestimate the time it takes to make an RPG TAS, I can't even imagine how much planning it takes before you can even begin recording a serious run!

My own page on this site.

Posted: 2/11/2008 5:05 PM

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Deign

Active player (435)

Joined: 7/23/2006
Posts: 389
Location: Washington

I spend quite a large deal of time optimizing on Final Fantasy 2, so I completely disagree with what mmbossman said. I spend many hours for every boss fight. I'm currently at about 1hr 17 1/2min and have almost 86,000 rerecords. Because of how much time goes into the run, I need to take breaks from TAS'ing it every few months. However, platformers aren't affected by as much randomness as FF2 is, so they would generally take less to optimize. Until you start playing Yoshi's Island...then you get 2 hours into it and want to commit suicide.

I'm sciencing as fast as I can ! ______________________________________ <adelikat> once more balls enter the picture, everything gets a lot more entertraining <adelikat> mmmmm yummy penises

Posted: 2/11/2008 5:37 PM
(Edited: 2/11/2008 6:24 PM)

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moozooh

Senior Moderator

Joined: 8/4/2005
Posts: 5770
Location: Away

There are basically four main time guzzlers: 1) luck manipulation; 2) optimization of execution-intensive parts; 3) reducing lag; 4) strategic planning. Obviously, there are games that all four cases are common, and those where none are. For example, in games like Chrono Trigger, #4 is obviously prevalent (the rest won't take remotely as much time), for 16-bit+ Mario games, Metroid and Sonic games, it's #2 and #3, for most puzzle game runs, it's #1. EDIT: Oops.

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Posted: 2/11/2008 6:09 PM

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Titus_Kwok

Joined: 4/30/2006
Posts: 480
Location: the secret cow level

moozooh wrote:

There are basically three main time guzzlers: 1) luck manipulation; 2) optimization of execution-intensive parts; 3) reducing lag; 4) strategic planning.

Our *three* weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency...and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope.... Our *four*...no... *Amongst* our weapons....

Posted: 2/12/2008 3:23 PM

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Bezman

Joined: 2/7/2008
Posts: 185

Deign wrote:

Because of how much time goes into the run, I need to take breaks from TAS'ing it every few months.

So would you say that the hours work/minute of gameplay is roughly the same for turn- based RPGs as it is for most other genres?

moozooh wrote:

There are basically four main time guzzlers:

That makes it a fair bit clearer. Ta.

I'm just some random guy. Don't let my words get you riled - I have my opinions but they're only mine.

Posted: 2/12/2008 3:28 PM

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mmbossman

Experienced player (822)

Joined: 11/18/2006
Posts: 2426
Location: Back where I belong

mmbossman wrote:

But I guess a lot of that comes from the method used to make the run (frame advance vs. 25% or lower), and the amount of dedication used to make the run. But in general, I would say yes, traditional RPGs take less time because there's usually less rerecords used.

Deign wrote:

I spend quite a large deal of time optimizing on Final Fantasy 2, so I completely disagree with what mmbossman said. I spend many hours for every boss fight. I'm currently at about 1hr 17 1/2min and have almost 86,000 rerecords

Obviously you put forth much more dedication towards your RPGs than some of the others published. I was not saying that RPGs are easier to make, I was simply saying that small frame mistakes are easier to overlook in them because of the typical 2+ hour-long movies. But I'm glad that you put the same amount of frame precision into them as other movies. No offense meant.

Living Well Is The Best Revenge My Personal Page

Posted: 2/12/2008 4:54 PM

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Ferret_Warlord

Skilled player (1405)

Joined: 10/27/2004
Posts: 1977
Location: Making an escape

As others have said, complicated games can take a long, long time to pull off even short segments. Others, due to utter simplicity, can take a mere five minutes to pull off. I don't recommend trying those games.

A hundred years from now, they will gaze upon my work and marvel at my skills but never know my name. And that will be good enough for me.

Posted: 2/12/2008 5:19 PM

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MUGG

Editor, Expert player (2316)

Joined: 5/15/2007
Posts: 3856
Location: Germany

'GB The Smurfs' took me 5 hours, 'GBA Kirby & the Amazing Mirror' about 80 hours, 'GB Master Karateka' 3 hours, 'GBA Kirby Nightmare in Dreamland' (Testrun) 30 hours, 'GB Kid Niki' 5 hours. I don't spend as much time on my runs as others do, because I don't care about every single frame that could be saved. I ensure that every run I make is not too sloppy though. Also, sometimes I playback and watch my movies more than I TAS them ^^

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Posted: 2/12/2008 5:52 PM

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Comicalflop

Editor, Experienced player (730)

Joined: 6/13/2006
Posts: 3300
Location: Massachussetts, USA

MUGG wrote:

Also, sometimes I playback and watch my movies more than I TAS them ^^

Aha! This is another problem of mine that sucks up lots of time.

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Posted: 2/12/2008 7:22 PM

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Saturn

Player (209)

Joined: 2/18/2005
Posts: 1451

Varies between ~2 days and ~2 years for me. Depending on game, movie length, motivation, optimization level, and most important: available freetime to TAS.

See my perfect 100% movie-walkthroughs of the best RPG games on http://www.freewebs.com/saturnsmovies/index.htm Current TAS project (with new videos): Super Metroid Redesign, any% speedrun