Hi all. I'm new here in this forum, but not in TASes. I've seen a lot in Youtube, and now decided to start to make my own. After a few days of testing (with VBA Re-recording) I understand the concept of Savestates, Frame Advancing, and almost all the stuff.
But I have a problem. The game with I do all testing is Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland. First, I experimented with savestates using the boss rush. 5:40 with no damage, 87 rerecordings. For me it was cool.
But my meeting with frame advance wasn't as friendly as I thought. And.. I need answer to this question, if possible:
-I noticed the input has some delay. Say, I press the A button (X on keyboard) in Frame 1, but the input is recognized in Frame 2. It works that way or am I wrong?
Thanks in advance.
Edit by Raiscan: modified subject title to better reflect content of topic.
- I'm from Spain, but I want you to oppose to the first rule and talk ''complicated'' English. I want to learn and I already have a good level, so.. be rude :3 -
Joined: 4/20/2005
Posts: 2160
Location: Norrköping, Sweden
MarcBelmont wrote:
-I noticed the input has some delay. Say, I press the A button (X on keyboard) in Frame 1, but the input is recognized in Frame 2. It works that way or am I wrong?
Hi, and welcome. This is exactly how frame advance works. If you press the frame advance button on frame X while holding down A, the A input will be recognized by the game on frame X+1. So basically the game detects the input you hold down while pressing frame advance on the next frame. I hope that answered your question.
It does work that way, and it depends on both the system and the game. 1-2 frame delay is normal. Some games have 0 (action is made on the next frame), and some have 4.
But you also need to understand that sometimes the game processes input earlier than the actions are displayed on the screen. In a 2-frame delay game, one frame can be taken up by processing (input) delay, and another frame by rendering (output) delay. So if you press jump on press X in such game, the input will be processed on X+1, the character will jump on X+2, and the character's sprite will change to jumping on X+3. This is always the case for systems like SNES, which have frame buffer (and thus, at least one frame of delay no matter what).
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Thank you Randil and moozooh. Now I get how Frame Advance works, and I like it n_n, it lets me to work with games (for now ''the game'') like it was a form of art. Next subject is luck manipulation, and I'm done. I already have an idea about it, but if some (not-so-)expert on this site can explain it to me I would learn it more quickly, and efficiently.
Thanks in advance again, all help is appreciated. Byebye.
- I'm from Spain, but I want you to oppose to the first rule and talk ''complicated'' English. I want to learn and I already have a good level, so.. be rude :3 -
Well, the whole concept of luck manipulation is pretty simple: [most] games make decisions on random effects (enemy behavior, item drops, other such things) based on the player's input. So, by doing different things — jumping, attacking, moving in different ways or just pressing certain buttons — you can affect the outcome of such decisions. Obviously you can do that in unassisted play as well, but in unassisted play you can't rewind if the outcome is undesirable. Hence why luck manipulation is primarily a tool-assisted speedrun feature.
There's a more in-depth explanation here: http://tasvideos.org/LuckManipulation.html
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Joined: 11/4/2007
Posts: 1772
Location: Australia, Victoria
May I also point out that some games (Such as Sonic 3 and Knuckles and Mr. Chins Gourmet Paradise) don't even have an input based random number generator, it is simply based on how many frames have passed. The only way to manipulate luck is to either pause or wait.
May I also point out that some games (Such as Sonic 3 and Knuckles and Mr. Chins Gourmet Paradise) don't even have an input based random number generator, it is simply based on how many frames have passed. The only way to manipulate luck is to either pause or wait.
Although one can argue that Sonic 3 and Knuckles does have an input-based random number generator called the "subpixel position". While its main purpose is obviously not to generate random numbers (it's simply the fractional component of the player's position), player input does change it in ways that can't easily be predicted, and its value has the effect of making things "randomly" happen or not happen (with no visible diference beforehand).
So when playing or TASing that game you basically have to treat it like a random number generator. Which is to say, if you're playing normally then you ignore it and hope for good luck, or if you're TASing, you intentionally do certain otherwise-useless things to alter its value so that you are able to do certain tricks, and redo them over and over if you didn't get a value that's good enough to let you do the trick. Like luck manipulation in other games, it is not necessary to fully understand how it works in order to get good results out of it, but knowing how to watch the precise value in question gives you the advantage that you can avoid wasting time redoing things that don't change the value.
Well, I think you're right, its RNG (or whatever it's controlling random-seeming gameplay events with) is probably only frame-based. I was just pointing out that the game unintentionally has a secondary "RNG" which is more random than the real RNG and used more often. It's not really correct to call it a RNG because it was not programmed with the intent of generating random numbers, and it's confusing to call it a RNG outside of this context because it already has a more accurate name, but (all that aside) it acts like a RNG from the point of view of someone TASing the game.
(Speaking of which, I believe some games have multiple actual RNGs which are used for different purposes and can be manipulated separately.)
Oh, I apologize for my mistake, when reading the authors comments I had gotten the impression that the RNG was 100% frame based.
Well, this isn't actually correct. My comment wasn't referring to the RNG, but the fact that the RNG didn't affect anything gameplay significant. Instead, things significant to gameplay were controlled entirely by the universal frame counter.
How fleeting are all human passions compared with the massive continuity of ducks.
Thanks for all your messages. I now can se how complicated is to manipulate the RNG of certain games, and I understand the luck manipulation. Seriously, thanks. Today I finished my first TAS video... Kirby Nightmare in Dreamland Boss Rush, in 3:57. It has a lot of improvable things, compared to the one already in Youtube (3:07) but it's mine and for now I'm happy. Should I upload it to Youtube?
- I'm from Spain, but I want you to oppose to the first rule and talk ''complicated'' English. I want to learn and I already have a good level, so.. be rude :3 -
Here it is: TAS try
Finally it was 3:54, no 3:57. Little mistake.
There are a lot of things that can be improved, like the use of Ball instead of Spark. I'm planning of improving my time, being more patient in Luck Manipulation. What do you think?
- I'm from Spain, but I want you to oppose to the first rule and talk ''complicated'' English. I want to learn and I already have a good level, so.. be rude :3 -
Hello MarcBelmont. I'm the author of the 3:07 boss run.
I TAS a lot of Kirby games, especially Kirby Super Star and Amazing Mirror. I'm not very familiar with how luck can be manipulated in Nightmare in dreamland but for most kirby games, you can change RNG by making sprites appear (by running, stopping to run, landing...) and by producing sound (which is the case with Kirby Super Star).
I've attempted to improve the 3:05 boss run on nicovideo, but I failed to manipulate dedede (but I haven't put much effort into the movie to be honest. I might try it again another time maybe).
Here is the movie file of this 3:05 run (japanese version)
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1016482899/knid_bb.vbm
At the time I made my movie, I didn't know this movie was made public - I made my movie just by watching the nicovideo.
Hope you get better at TASing and if you got more questions, I'll be there to answer them.
Thanks for the link, Solon. Next time I'll use it.
I'm glad you posted here, MUGG. Thanks for the tip for the RNG, for the vbm, and for your offer to help. Do I have to have the japanese version to play the vbm? Or it doesn't matter?
I will be training to improve. In this game and in other ones I might play in the future. I like the things I can do TASing n_n
PD to MUGG: If you don't mind, whether you're planning to repeat NiD boss rush, could you let me know about it? Maybe we could do it toghether.. but I'm sure I'm thinking to fast. I just wanted to ask ^^
Farewell
- I'm from Spain, but I want you to oppose to the first rule and talk ''complicated'' English. I want to learn and I already have a good level, so.. be rude :3 -
You'll need to use the japanese version to play back the vbm. You can probably use the US version for your TAS work as I only used the japanese version to directly compare to the 3:05 video and I didn't want to risk disadvantes by delays popping up exclusively in the US version.
Sorry, but to answer your question honestly, I don't think I want to make a serious attempt with someone new to TASing. I can help you out, answer your questions and explain stuff, but optimization in kirby games (including NiD) can be a total pain in the ass when you have to do some rooms over and over to get the right outcome sometimes. It isn't exactly a good game to reach perfection easily. I'm not even sure if I want to redo this boss run, but I'm definitely going to make a new any% run of the game (which isn't less bothersome than the boss run).
Sorry to disappoint you. Maybe we can reconsider this when you get better?
But remember, I can help you out nevertheless (like pointing out mistakes etc)
I understand, don't worry. First I have to get better. I think I'm going for a more serious attempt, and learn more and more by the way n_n. Thanks anyway, for your (future) help, MUGG.
Well, I think this topic's purpose is done already, right? I don't have any questions left, for now.. so, good bye.
- I'm from Spain, but I want you to oppose to the first rule and talk ''complicated'' English. I want to learn and I already have a good level, so.. be rude :3 -
