This topic is for the purpose of discussing #5891: adelikat's AppleII Zork I: The Great Underground Empire "Fastest eaten by a grue" in 00:15.00

Quick! Everyone vote 'Yes' to thwart the goal of the TAS!

I doubt that'd work as it'd just affect judge feedback. I'm interested in who'll count as judging the movie, though (the Grue itself, perhaps?) and/or what happens if someone tries to claim it.

This is a good joke.

If I still had a backdoor / admin access to the site, I would make a post in Grue’s name to approve of this submission. So, instead, imagine that it happened.

truly, there's no justice in this world

Quick! Everyone vote 'Yes' to thwart the goal of the TAS!

But then the TAS would not fulfill its goals anymore, and.... would need to be rejected. Well played, adelikat :)

I'll take this one.

Can't wait to see if this disappears as scheduled

om, nom, nom... gruey!

Even though this submission is a joke, there are ways to improve it. Here's a movie that reduces the time from 900 frames to 500 frames. User movie #638874688943283518 Link to video These are the inputs used in 5891S:

go e
go s
go e
open window
go in
go u
go u

These are the inputs used in this new run:

s.e.open.in.u.u
[Plus an extra Return to dismiss a [MORE] prompt.]

The improvements are:

• Removing the first go e command, which steps into a blocked door.
• Removing go from all commands. Just s works the same as go s, for example.
• Shortening open window to open. This is one of those commands that will infer an object.
• Entering the commands all in one line, separated by .. This doesn't make YOU HAVE DIED arrive any faster, but it allows ending input early. Because all the commands together produce more than a screen's worth of output, we have to spend an additional 2 frames to buffer a Return input to dismiss a [MORE] prompt.

The new combined command string hits the RNG differently, such that the final u command doesn't actually result in getting eaten by a grue, if you enter it as fast as possible. I had to insert 2 frames of delay at the beginning for RNG manipulation.

Modification	Change in frames
Remove go e	−46
Remove go everywhere	−25
Remove window	−22
Join commands with ., end input early	−309
RNG manipulation	+2

For fans of Lua integration, this TAS is another that was done using the data-oriented savestate manipulation technique I have been developing. That means the entire run is driven programmatically by a Lua script. (In this case, it's actually a Fennel script, which compiles to Lua.) See zork.zip or zork.bundle for source code. If you find any improvements, you may be able to implement them by editing the main script file grue.fnl and re-running it. A difficulty with the trick of concatenating commands with . is that currently released versions of BizHawk have a bug with the Apple II core where . inputs are not properly recorded in .bk2 files. So after recording the movie, you have to manually edit "Input Log.txt" inside the .bk2 file to restore the missing inputs. It will be fixed in a future release of BizHawk.

Even though this submission is a joke, there are ways to improve it. Here's a movie that reduces the time from 900 frames to 500 frames.

Here's a 1-frame improvement to Post #536873: User movie #638886542790751703 The difference is clearing the [MORE] prompt with the Space key, rather than Return. The previous run had to release Return for 1 frame in order to press it again; now that's not needed. Source code is at https://archive.org/details/zork-appleii-tas-grue-20250721. The diff in grue.fnl is just:

Language: diff
diff --git a/grue.fnl b/grue.fnl
index 3811692..6e8c42e 100644
--- a/grue.fnl
+++ b/grue.fnl
@@ -86,11 +86,9 @@
       ;; re-added to Input Log.txt in the .bk2 movie file, at least as of
       ;; BizHawk 2.10: https://github.com/TASEmulators/BizHawk/issues/4391.
       (enter-commands ["s.e.open.in.u.u"])
-      ;; Buffer a Return press to clear the "[MORE]".
+      ;; Buffer a Space press to clear the "[MORE]".
       (savestate.next-frame)
-      ;; Add a blank frame because the previous frame was also Return.
-      (savestate.next-frame)
-      (savestate.joypad-press-release "Return")
+      (savestate.joypad-press-release "Space")
 
       ;; Sync the emulator to the state after entering all commands, for the
       ;; purpose of saving a movie.

Here's a further 3 frames of improvement over Post #537069: User movie #638888257478152075 The difference is entering the house with w instead of in:

s.e.open.w.u.u

On its own, that would only save 1 frame, but it also happens to tweak the RNG such that the 2 frames of delay for RNG manipulation can be removed. I learned that w would work to enter the house from bug #25 at Graeme Cree's Zork I bug list. Source code is at https://archive.org/details/zork-appleii-tas-grue-20250722. The diff in grue.fnl is:

Language: diff
diff --git a/grue.fnl b/grue.fnl
index 6e8c42e..48d5a34 100644
--- a/grue.fnl
+++ b/grue.fnl
@@ -81,11 +81,11 @@
       ; (enter-commands ["go e" "go s" "go e" "open window" "go in" "go u" "go u"])
 
       (wait-for-keyboard-ready)
-      (savestate.next-frame 2) ;; Delay for RNG manipulation.
+      (savestate.next-frame 0) ;; Delay for RNG manipulation.
       ;; Enter the schedule of commands. NB the "." inputs need to be manually
       ;; re-added to Input Log.txt in the .bk2 movie file, at least as of
       ;; BizHawk 2.10: https://github.com/TASEmulators/BizHawk/issues/4391.
-      (enter-commands ["s.e.open.in.u.u"])
+      (enter-commands ["s.e.open.w.u.u"])
       ;; Buffer a Space press to clear the "[MORE]".
       (savestate.next-frame)
       (savestate.joypad-press-release "Space")