FINAL INPUT FRAME: 35,414


first completed tas
very fun to make
will make more
upon initially completing this tas i accidentally discovered a glitch
this glitch ended up being useful for saving frames
glitch is referred to as "door skip" below

GAME OBJECTIVES:

  • delve into caves
  • blow up walls/doors
  • rescue 20 dudes

EMULATOR USED:

  • bizhawk 1.11.9.1

MOVIE OBJECTIVES:

  • fast

FLIGHT:

  • up input has a delay that tends to vary
  • down input has no effect during flight
  • descending in flight can be a waiting game
  • cannot drop bombs in the air

DROPPING RANDOM/EXTRA BOMBS:

  • drop as many extra bombs as you can if stage has under 6 doors
  • some stages require all 6 bombs for 6 doors (level 7-19)
  • only one bomb on screen at a time
  • cannot drop bombs in any of the final rooms
  • bomb count at the end of each stage is 16 frames per bomb
  • bomb drop during stage takes about 1-8 frames
  • don't drop the extra bomb in stage 20 due to inputs/time ending before post stage bomb count

BOMB SKIP:

  • some doors you can perform what i call a "bomb skip" on
  • to do the bomb skip you hover a minimum of 7 pixels over bomb
  • fly passed the door without waiting for bomb hitbox to disappear
  • there is a threshold where this will work or not depending on how long ago you were descending
  • bomb skip works on all doors in horizontal rooms with appropriate setup
  • i counted 36 bomb skips in this tas (possible more could be added to future tas)

DOOR SKIP (GLITCH):

  • some doors can be broken via a bomb placed on the previous screen
  • place bomb and move to new room before it explodes
  • bomb is carried to x position 147 on new screen <--BASED NRGZAM FIGURED THIS OUT
  • x position 147 hits the right side door in all horizontally linked rooms
  • there are 8 door skips in this tas (i believe that is the maximum amount possible)

STRATS PER STAGE:

level 1: drop 1 extra bomb
level 2: drop 3 extra bombs
level 3: drop 3 extra bombs - blow up wall/enemy at same time
level 4: drop 2 extra bombs - 1 bomb skip
level 5: drop 4 extra bombs - wiggle passed the turtle head this skips 2 doors (this is the only turtle head you can skip.. i know it's a snake)
level 6: drop 1 extra bomb - 1 bomb skip
level 7: (begin 6 doors and horizontal rooms) 2 bomb skips
level 8: 2 bomb skips
level 9: 2 door skips - 1 bomb skip
level 10: 2 bomb skips
level 11: 3 bomb skips
level 12: 3 bomb skips
level 13: 5 bomb skips
level 14: 3 bomb skips - 1 door skip
level 15: 4 bomb skips
level 16: 2 bomb skips - 1 door skip
level 17: 3 bomb skips
level 18: 1 door skip - 1 bomb skip
level 19: 3 bomb skips
level 20: (5 doors) 3 door skips

CAN THIS TAS BE IMPROVED?:

  • this is my first completed tas so yeah probably
  • there are probably a few frames i missed
  • optimizing flight movement is kind of awkward
  • could possibly add more bomb skips i might have neglected?
  • possibly more glitches i'm unaware of

THINGS YOU MIGHT WANT TO KNOW?:

  • this is a one hit and you're dead kind of game
  • there are no damage boosts you can do without dying
  • when you die, you respawn at that same area and continue on
  • i was really hoping death could be abused in this game to save frames
  • unfortunately dying takes too much time and was never beneficial in testing

feos: Replaced the movie with a trimmed one, also judging...
feos: So I examined the comparison video posted by FractalFusion and went to the frames where this run looked like it was losing frames. And it was... losing frames... due to falling longer. I tried improving this run in such places and I couldn't. The physics just got sludgier after heavy core improvements by Alyosha. So this run is no sub-optimal, it's a real gameplay improvement, as even with those emulation slow-downs in some places, the final time is still shorter.
Accepting as an improvement to the existing run.
I also looked at the bottom of all Moons movies sorted by entertainment, and the existing H.E.R.O. run is far from the bottom. This game also gets positive feedback once again. So I can't downgrade it to Vault, even though the actual entertainment ratings aren't 6+. It still seems the cutoff is fairly unreliable, and the decision is up to the real human. So Moons it is again.
Fog: Processing.


Player (176)
Joined: 8/15/2015
Posts: 56
Location: USA
eh i give up.. leave it for the next guy
Site Admin, Skilled player (1255)
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Posts: 11495
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StarvinStruthers wrote:
eh i give up.. leave it for the next guy
Lag differences don't count when comparing the runs for optimality. Only the actual gameplay. If the game allows you to do some action later on a more accurate emulator, do it later, and we'll only compare how optimal that action itself is. Can you discard the lag and just adapt the better strats from the old submission?
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.
Player (176)
Joined: 8/15/2015
Posts: 56
Location: USA
feos wrote:
StarvinStruthers wrote:
eh i give up.. leave it for the next guy
Lag differences don't count when comparing the runs for optimality. Only the actual gameplay. If the game allows you to do some action later on a more accurate emulator, do it later, and we'll only compare how optimal that action itself is. Can you discard the lag and just adapt the better strats from the old submission?
i have no idea leaving it for the next guy doesn't mean i want to delve back into this game
Alyosha
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Joined: 11/30/2014
Posts: 2834
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It will probably be pretty difficult to seperate emulation differences from strategies unless you can resync the original run (which would also not be easy) The old run was made at a time when 'frames' were whatever time passed between v-blanks. This is some what variable in A2600 games. At some point frame definition got changed to 262 scan lines . Hero uses 263 scan lines per frame. I briefly tried to resync the run and did not make it far , so probably other emulation changes are effecting this run .
Post subject: Movie published
TASVideoAgent
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Posts: 15628
Location: 127.0.0.1
This movie has been published. The posts before this message apply to the submission, and posts after this message apply to the published movie. ---- [3351] A2600 H.E.R.O. by StarvinStruthers in 09:51.01
GJTASer2018
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Posts: 308
Location: Stafford, NY
Necroposting to announce I intend to produce a resynced file for this submission in BizHawk 2.3. I have several reasons I intend to do this: 1. To check if the door skip is an emulator-only glitch (not an unreasonable concern in light of what happened to morningpee's Seaquest submission). If it is, then it would render the submission invalid, and considering this is in Moons a problem here would arguably have a greater impact than the Seaquest submission (in the Vault) did. 2. To serve as a basis for an "extended" version of the movie that goes all the way to one million points. This game, like most Activision games, stops at one million, but because this game has clearly-defined levels you wouldn't need to go that far for a TAS according to the current submission rules. Nevertheless, because the one million threshold is the stopping point for other A2600 Activision submissions, I have decided to try to make such a movie file in case there is a policy change down the road. (It won't be put up for submission unless the policy actually does change, just left in my userfiles.) I had intended to start this several months ago, but held off because there was no clear policy on resync submissions. Now that there is one, I intend to just put the final bk2 in my userfiles and have someone else use that as the basis for an updated encode. Wish me luck!
c-square wrote:
Yes, standard runs are needed and very appreciated here too
Dylon Stejakoski wrote:
Me and the boys starting over our games of choice for the infinityieth time in a row because of just-found optimizations
^ Why I don't have any submissions despite being on the forums for years now...
Post subject: Re: #5381: StarvinStruthers's A2600 H.E.R.O. in 09:58.04
nymx
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Editor, Judge, Expert player (2255)
Joined: 11/14/2014
Posts: 933
Location: South Pole, True Land Down Under
Radiant wrote:
Nice run! I hope somebody will also run this port of the game...
:)
I recently discovered that if you haven't reached a level of frustration with TASing any game, then you haven't done your due diligence. ---- SOYZA: Are you playing a game? NYMX: I'm not playing a game, I'm TASing. SOYZA: Oh...so its not a game...Its for real? ---- Anybody got a Quantum computer I can borrow for 20 minutes? Nevermind...eien's 64 core machine will do. :) ---- BOTing will be the end of all games. --NYMX