What have you done to the last SS Tea Cup level? x.x
Awesome WIP, dude :D
Anyway, here's the usual high quality AVI from me:
I just realised it's labeled as WIP4 when it should be WIP5. Who cares.
Joined: 9/2/2008
Posts: 289
Location: United Kingdom
Thanks Nineko for encoding my last WIP.
I've finally worked out the coin plan :D on my last courses but I have to redo the Ship Boss reward section, I've noticed that I pressed B on every other frame and sometimes I might get another coin if the "Jet function" responded for 1 or more frames, the only thing that could end up "not" saving any time is the fade out frame rule. Then I'll copy paste (the fast way or the slow way) on the first 2 courses then I'll be up to date.
I'll tell you my progress (via edits on this post) but will not give any more secrets away (glitches, and stuff) :).
Something really awesome that looks like it is zipping. (I perform a "Wrong Entry" glitch caused by the camera's position... I'll explain more on the workbench submission text).
Joined: 9/2/2008
Posts: 289
Location: United Kingdom
I've been having some technical issues with my main PC that I can't properly continue my TAS. I got my work saved on my external harddrive. I got another PC in the house but SOMETIMES the screens gets screwed up so bad it's unreadable. To make up for it, there is a new glitch on my Youtube channel now which was Discovered by UNKNOWFILE. www.youtube.com/Greenalink (yes I am using the Wii so I can't copy the video link).
Joined: 9/2/2008
Posts: 289
Location: United Kingdom
Well it has a different effect on the stages that only shift the camera upwards if Wario is on a higher platform. UNKNOWNFILE's channel has 2 video examples. It even shows how to get treasure A (Course 3 with floods) WITHOUT the key which might save some time.
Haven't posted here in a while, I think I will explain my discovery:
The jet pack glitch works in a way that it assumes that you're still in water. The game only checks that you're out of the water when jumping normally (pressing A), so by rapidly tapping B and holding the D-pad in a certain way (left+right works well, but I also tested pressing one direction then holding the opposite), the game, for whatever reason, will assume that you're swimming. In the first level of Mount Teapot you can use this to get up to a ledge, and you will walk slowly on the ledge if you timed it right because the game still thinks you're underwater.
Now, the reason the game glitches out when you go too far in a specific direction is because the game wants to scroll in that direction. There is normally a thin wall here, but on many levels the game doesn't assume you're going to be up there anyways. This glitch exists on many levels, but the easiest way to trigger the glitch is to go to the second train level and fly to the left just above the level entrance.
You can use this to get to treasure rooms and goals early: flying to the left above the enterance causes the level's layers to get misaligned; there are two layers (level and sprites) that are aligned upon entering an area, but get misaligned when the glitch is performed.
Short version: Fly up and scroll left, layers will misalign, abuse glitch for highest score.
If you can't get either problem fixed (have you tried using a CRT on that other PC if you don't have one already, or getting a new video card?), I have an idea...
1. You can send your work so far to a trusted member of the forums who knows how to exploit the hell out of this game...like UNKNOWNFILE maybe?
2. That member (say UNKNOWNFILE) finishes the TAS and submits it as "Wario Land (Super Mario Land 3) in (time) by GreenaLink and UNKNOWNFILE."
3. It gets accepted, encoded, and published.
4. ???
5. PROFIT!!!
I mean I would do it but I am unsure of my knowledge of the glitches in this game, so that is why I suggested someone else.
Also, in another thread I will ask what exactly is wrong with your computers.
Course 34 has a bit of a scrolling issue... some guy posted a youtube video of it, but here's a more practical use.
Note: The save used is hacked here to allow access to this level at any time)
Also note: You have to let the screen scroll, otherwise you'll just end up where you started.
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1737359475/warioland_course34_test.vbm
Joined: 9/2/2008
Posts: 289
Location: United Kingdom
Well I know there were moments that 1 TASer can finish off an old TASer's work (GB Megaman IV). But there is a flaw as early as Course 4. You see that I did a Dash bump boost to skip the ladder, I didn't know the faster strat until Course 17 (and a even better one on Course 30). Course 5 the boss reward coins were not optimised which I learnt how to do that on the end of Mt.Teapot.
The recent OMG Hax vid on Course 3 (revisit) shows that it's possible to get Treasure A without the key possibly saving a few frames (due to screen transistion costing some frames).
I am going to wait until 1 of the 2 PCs are healthy and try to finish it off.
The new trick could open up some awesome sequence breaks on the courses that has treasure.
Basically I am going to finish it off and post the full movie file on this topic (Unsure about submitting it that is 90% optimised).
Then I'll point out the main flaws on each course. It will give you readers the ideas how much improvement the 100% TAS can be done.
All I can say is take your time and finish this. You've been doing an awesome job with this TAS, you should be the one that completes it, given that you still have the motivation for this task.
I look forward to the new strategies.
I've watched the WIPs of the run so far, and I think it's well done, aside from some places it could be improved.
Here's the latest I've discovered using the scroll glitch:
- On the Mount Teapot course containing a treaure (can't remember the number, but it starts inside with waterfalls with super repetitive music), you can scroll up to the second part of the stage without climbing up the long passageway. However, the door destinations will not have been loaded for that area, so you will just end up exiting the stage or be forced to climb the passageway. I'm still working on this one to see if I can get the data to load correctly.
- Another course in Mount Teapot (the one with the star), there is an area where you can execute the scroll glitch to end up committing suicide. It's funny, but it isn't useful in a speedrun.
The glitchwatch continues...
New bug discovered. This could have some usefulness but I couldn't keep up with the game itself. Maybe someone else could have better luck.
Broken physics in action
Tried it, and no such luck. Once the enemies begin scrolling off the screen, they're more likely to die, and bigger enemies (which often remove the goal) die when they hit a wall. Besides, it's not too useful in the context of a TAS.
The latest bugs I've turned up do not significantly break the game, but do have several humorous side-effects. I think it's time to disassemble this thing to do further probing.
Initial probe reveals game logic is in bank 0x0D. This leads us to some interesting offsets:
- Game logic offsets are all around 0xA900
- 0xA902: Current x-offset of the current screen in the level
- 0xA911: Current y-offset of Wario in the level
- 0xA99C: Type of level. 0x00 = normal, 0x10 = freescrolling, 0x20 = autoscrolling.
- 0xA998: Jetpack "fuel". Normally counts down as a timer, and can be used for optimal performance with the jetpack.
More to come soon.
Here's another few offsets I discovered:
- 0xA91A: Wario's current state. These are written whenever Wario does something (eg., jumps, walks, dies). Here are the appropriate values for this offset:
- 00 do nothing
- 01 walk
- 02 crouch
- 03 ??
- 04 swim
- 05 jump
- 06 on a ladder
- 07 bounce off of a door (treasure/goal/gate in course 40)
- 08 jump?
- 09 die
- 0A don't know, changes to 05
- 0B bodyslam
- 0C bounce backwards
- 0D running jump
- 0E shifts a few pixels forwards
- 0F throw something, changes to 10
- 10 ?
- 11 get stuck, jump to get out (quicksand?)
- 12 get treasure
Any higher values will cause the game to reset or freeze.
- 0xA942: Scroll direction. 0 = scroll up, 1 = don't scroll yet, 2 = scroll down. This can be used to warp to odd glitchy places, but could also be used to get the screen to scroll.
Joined: 9/2/2008
Posts: 289
Location: United Kingdom
On your 2nd list. Number 11 (Quicksand) is very likely to be from Course 3 (before the floods comes in).
I wish I knew how to read memory from the cheat search menu (It nearly gives my mind a headache working out each one but I get it what they mean when it's revealed like Jet's Fuel counter).
Some of those unknown states are probably holding something, holding the hand up, jumping with hand up, ground slam, flying posture, dragon flames shooting, crouching, crawling, gloating at treasure/coins... etc. ... in fact, the fuel counter, or a slot near it, could also indicate how many frames of bodyslam or fire are left.
New bug found.
hurf durf
Doesn't save much time in this context (in fact takes a tiny bit more), but that may be because this run was just a test and wasn't intended to be optimal. Maybe someone else can optimize it, but meh.
Joined: 9/2/2008
Posts: 289
Location: United Kingdom
The bug is old as it is possible to start a mid-air body slam attack after finishing the former one in real time (at least once) but it is the first vid I've seen being used in the entire course. Looks interesting.
Joined: 9/2/2008
Posts: 289
Location: United Kingdom
Cool you've managed to defeat the final boss without any cloud support.
The ladder room would be hard to optimise because using the Hyper Climb (the one I first used on course 30) would cause problems when you enter the door in the top of that room.
I was trying to find a way to get 3/4 interactive sprites to go on screen at once which should remove the Knight's Skuill door but I didn't have any luck of it happening.
Another thing to look up is the extra coins for the final coin countdown.
Lets say I collected 100 coins on course 39 I would wait for around 100/150 frames for the coins to countdown and an extra 120ish frames to wait til it starts. If I got the extra coins on course 40, it wouldn't matter because the last required input is the final B button against the boss.
This is what I've made from my word document in November 12th 2008:
(102 X 8 =) 816 course 27: 6684
() 999 course 30: 7683
(54 x8) 432 course 31: 8087
(82 x 8)656 course 33: 8779
999 course 36: 9778
(79 extra + 72) (10078 at final level)
Things to do: make a TAS of completing the final level as Jet Wario.
Around 72 = probably 151 coins removed. Maybe 82 – 19 ish to prevent loss in frames.
Secondly: Work out the coins to make up the required target for the last level.
Final plan!!
Course 33: Get 71 coins and X 8 (Coin bonus game)
Course 36: Get 999 coins (Get as many coins as possible without losing frames and get 300 from the boss battle).
Course 40: Get 73 coins (1 will be from the first Spear Man or a small delay fall).
I haven't done this TAS for nearly 6 months (sorry SwordlessLink for giving you inaccurate info back in 2008) the main reason as well for not submitting it is mainly because: The ladders before Course 30 did not use the Hyper Climb trick.
Course 4 could have a lot of coins to manipulate that I can use as a replacement instead of collecting the ones from both Course 31 and 33.
There are some better optimisation on revisits of the same level, most notably the Sherbet Land stages.
Those 1 block tunnels I learnt a faster entry but on the revisit I also performed a faster exit.
On Course 30, I forgot that I checked every other frame on the Boss' reward section instead of checking all of the possible frames which coin is what.
Course 5 was an obvious error, I didn't work out the cause/manipulation of getting big coins which is why I didn't even get 999.
And for any of you lot wondering what I did instead during the TAS absence well.
I've been making a Super Mario 64 DS run to submit to SDA which has got accepted and it might get published soon (possibly after the Easter Holidays), right now I'm speed running A Link to the Past (GBA version) and an 100% Segmented Run oF New Super Mario Bros.
Reminds me of the SMB2US glitch where you throw down 2 enemies in quick succession near a wall and they end up flying upwards... :p
EDIT: D'OH I forgot was looking at the end of page 8