This is my 1st and may be my only TAS. I wanted to get a registered movie of Sim City SNES, since I love this game and it seams no TAS of this game is already done.
Note about encode: Temp Low Quality encode (After 47:50 I watch some of the city informations, this is not in the TAS and souldn't be in the final video)
Game objectives
Emulator used: BizHawk 1.4.1
Getting 600,000 people
Fastest last input
Comments
I saw that a unsubmitted run was done, and this game that I'm liking looked good for trying to do my first TAS. The rerecord counter is low, but I did many text editing at first before doing frame by frame buildings because it's less frustating (Because Sim City sometimes add some waiting frames).
I used my own pattern that I tested to see if it can reach 600,000 with snes9x before starting the TAS.
I didn't named the city because I started without reading the rules (I had to restart near the begining because I used debug menu...) and now I'm fear that changing it may dessynch the run. Also it win some frames so why not.
If you know money glitch you'll see that I stoped before getting 0 and I didn't go back in tax screen. What I did is simple, I keep enouth money to keep all fundings to 100% then, when the tax screen apear, I press L and keep it until I build something. Then, later I just have to let a single frame without input to make the money in a negative value (which makes it 999,999)
Other comments
You have to wait about 2 min near the start because I need to wait for the money glich and inputs froze the ingame timer so that's why I did nothing.
The last input is at frame 24766 and 600,000 people is got at frame ~170000
Since it's my 1st TAS, maybe some moving could be inproved ? I'm also not sure if switching R/police/R while building the Residential part could be faster than building all police centers at the end.
thanks, read your second post, it was ealy interesting,
technicaly speaking,this game got some great potential
how much time would it save to reach 600K just by scrolling the screen on a part of the map where there is less animation ?
Joined: 8/16/2013
Posts: 20
Location: Vire, France
Just saying, I did not found the new way of doing the money glitch, I just read it somewhere on this forum (some old post in SimCity thread), and used it to save some time. I don't want someone miss thinking I find it myself.
What do you mean by "It is not good" ? Is it that bad? I'm a newbie so it may be possible I did some mistakes... Do you think it could be easily beaten? I believe TASes are made to be beaten somedays. Getting a registered run could give more interest to this game. I know you are also a person which is more for in game time, so it's not the same goal as last input, too.
Redoing my Sim City TAS (New faster way to build Zones)
Nice, good to see more SimCity. Kilaye thought of a way of doing the 999999$ trick by just getting once in the menu after we finished the tool-assisted-something we did last month, glad someone else did.
My opinion: the whole strategy (read: the pattern used) seems good, though we managed to get to 600.000 while leaving two 3x3 blocks unused. But it took longer to get to 600.000, faster TAS, longer RTS. I think the choice here is better though, this is a TAS and I think perfection of the pattern is what should be aimed (and what is aimed in this specific TAS).
So yeah, I think this deserves technical credits, if not entertainment. At least that should be vaulted, because I don't think anything can beat that, besides what FatRatKnight intended to do.
And funny to see someone living so close to me interested in wrecking the same game :p
By that, I mean I see clear ways to improve this run, under an identical goal that you've used.
Between the fast camera pans while building stuff, you can take just one frame to move the cursor. This will help to build a lot of things faster, as well as speed up construction around the edges by a good amount.
I'm curious if it's faster to just switch to the Police Departments while placing R-zones, rather than going through later to put them in. It also looks like an unnecessary amount of Police Departments. You might even be able to replace a few of the more inner ones with C-zones, which would be faster to select with the proposed method, and it doesn't appear that Land Value is dangerously low in those places (but I'm not positive about this). R-zones have a proper destination either way.
This puts this submitted run on a poor outlook, with known potential improvements.
I wanted to avoid stating this, as I hate to discourage anyone, especially when I'm looking for any potential partner in TASing. I know a lot from my earlier attempts, but knowing my habits, I won't make use of them alone. I believe if I have someone to work with, no matter the difference in skill level, it will help to keep me focused, as long as the partner shows willingness to keep trying. I do want to see a highly optimized SimCity run, after all.
Is it possible to figure out the amount of known improvements? Like, how many frames could be saved on a certain segment. Neither me, nor Moth know this game, so it'd be really hard to get the optimization level.
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.
Joined: 8/16/2013
Posts: 20
Location: Vire, France
Between the fast camera pans while building stuff, you can take just one frame to move the cursor. This will help to build a lot of things faster, as well as speed up construction around the edges by a good amount.
OMG yes... You're true, that can win 1 frames per building built like this and less "slow moving" near the border of the map...
I think I may have to restart just after mass trafic is done (Since you can't do that with 1*1 blocks I belive)
Should I cancel this submition or can I keep it for upload a new movie file when done ? (it will took some days to do I think)
I would like to keep the thread opened so you could say me other problems while you're at it. I think I'll keep my moving unless you see a major thing that can be changed too.
I think I'll credit your name in description if I got optimised version published.
For your idea of fastet in game time I would have to learn how to use memory viewer and how to find the way an RNG works and how it is used in game... That surely won't be easy at all :\
Redoing my Sim City TAS (New faster way to build Zones)
A great man once aid, "If it was easy, it wouldn't be worth doing."
I haven't watched this yet, but here's what I think based on the feedback so far.
If you want SimCity to be the only thing you TAS, this move might be sufficient.
If you want to eventually learn to TAS other games, learning how to use memory-watch and figure out RNGs will be invaluable.
I'm perfectly willing to help more directly. You don't need to TAS things alone, an advantage of being able to share progress with a partner. We can be co-authors, with my knowledge and your eagerness to get things done, we might actually have a better run done. But it's fine if you prefer to try it yourself, but I will still give a few test movies for you to look at.
I'm also quite happy that you'll take constructive criticism with cheer. I was afraid of the opposite, but it seems the fear was unnecessary. Hope to see an improved run soon!
Liked it, but then you're statistics at the end gave away a problem. It says you used Game Level: Easy. Unless there's no difference, you should be using the most difficult game level possible. I'll be voting no for this one (and any subsequent one that uses easy) unless you can tell me that it makes no difference.
Liked it, but then you're statistics at the end gave away a problem. It says you used Game Level: Easy. Unless there's no difference, you should be using the most difficult game level possible. I'll be voting no for this one (and any subsequent one that uses easy) unless you can tell me that it makes no difference.
IIRC the only thing it changes is money, and you have infinite money anyway.
IIRC the only thing it changes is money, and you have infinite money anyway.
List of effects of difficulty:
- Starting cash
- Chance of disasters
- Transit maintenance
- Money gained from taxes
- Effect on RCI-meter by taxes
- The I portion of RCI-meter, beyond the taxes effect
... A lot of these wouldn't affect the TAS. The RCI-meter just needs a more strict ratio of zones, and the disasters can be manipulated away. Money-related things would have no real effect due to money trick. I haven't seen other effects of difficulty.
Joined: 8/16/2013
Posts: 20
Location: Vire, France
Setting game level to hard will not make the TAS harder to do, Just changing how many things you built before doing the money glitch. However, it would make the waiting after the TAS is done to 600k screen longer, and it's already too long :/
Redoing my Sim City TAS (New faster way to build Zones)
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.
Joined: 8/16/2013
Posts: 20
Location: Vire, France
I'll probably do, I already started a little, but actualy I'm stuck with a AMD XP1800+ with 1.25GB of RAM computer which can't run the emulator (It runs at less than 1fps...) I'll have a good computer after this week but I'll have to go back at school.
Also, it may take more time than what I expected because I started to encunter more lagframes from the game when doing like this so idk if the improvement will be as good as I though, and that's not realy motivating. :\
Redoing my Sim City TAS (New faster way to build Zones)
But it took longer to get to 600.000, faster TAS, longer RTS. I think the choice here is better though, this is a TAS and I think perfection of the pattern is what should be aimed (and what is aimed in this specific TAS).
How about trying to get the shortest input time as a main goal, while reaching 600k as fast as possible as long as it doesn't interfere with the main goal?
IMO the timing used should be when 600k (or 500k) is hit, not when input ends, as that's what Sim City RTA uses. It also results in a wildly different strategy - wanting to make the perfect, fastest growing 600k (or 500k) city, not just the minimum required to eventually get 600k (or 500k). For example, what if you found an input that just baaaarely hits the population count and takes years to do so?
I'll probably do, I already started a little, but actualy I'm stuck with a AMD XP1800+ with 1.25GB of RAM computer which can't run the emulator (It runs at less than 1fps...) I'll have a good computer after this week but I'll have to go back at school.
Also, it may take more time than what I expected because I started to encunter more lagframes from the game when doing like this so idk if the improvement will be as good as I though, and that's not realy motivating. :\
Looks like it won't be done too soon. In this case, you will need to cancel this submission. Because it won't be accepted with such known improvements anyway.
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.
Joined: 8/16/2013
Posts: 20
Location: Vire, France
Are you sure that's true ? o_O
I don't know this site, I only uploaded my video over youtube, and 88k views in 4 days seams impossible...
Anyways, I put this in descision : canceled and will post new version when done.
Redoing my Sim City TAS (New faster way to build Zones)
Joined: 10/12/2011
Posts: 6342
Location: The land down under.
Arnold0 wrote:
Are you sure that's true ? o_O
I don't know this site, I only uploaded my video over youtube, and 88k views in 4 days seams impossible...
Anyways, I put this in descision : canceled and will post new version when done.
It's niconico anything is "true" or true.
Good luck on improving.
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
+fsvgm777 never censoring anything.
Disables Comments and Ratings for the YouTube account.Something better for yourself and also others.
