I have a question regarding BIOS options for Abe games. When me and Dooty made the original runs, they were done using SCPH1001.bin which gave us the best sync options for the game. Lately I have been in contact with ViGadeomes and he says my Maximum Casualties update I'm working on this year works better with the SCPH1001 oriiginal BIOS. Now, Ultrastars3000 told me that SCPH7003 is a Japanese BIOS and the original USA PS1 console was SCPH1001.
I feel like maybe it's to do with the games themselves. If you play them on a different BIOS, you will get different sync results? Well, I am making a 100% Exoddus TAS Update on the original BIOS which will make things easier to sync against the 2014 run. There are plenty of new tricks to see in later places like Mudanchee and the Zulags.
Enjoys speedrunning, playing and TASing Oddworld games!
Has TASed:
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee in 12.06.13 (with Dooty)
Oddworld: Adventures II in 20.03.78 (with Dooty)
Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus 100% in 2:08:28.4 (with Dooty)
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee 100% in 1:05:01.65
Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus in 37:18
Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus in 37:15
Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus 100% in 2:!5.44.12
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee any% in 13:01.3
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee any% in 12:59.95
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee 100% in 1:04:16.27
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee 100% in 1:04:01.07
Currently working on:
Waiting for Windows TAS Tools to work so I can TAS PC version of Exoddus.
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GenericMadScientist wrote:
Say a game doesn't have support for any disc swapping, but disc swapping bugs the game out and lets you get otherwise unobtainable items. Would it be allowed to:
1. Use this to set up a NG+ save?
2. Use this in an Any% TAS?
Do you have an example?
Samtastic wrote:
I have a question regarding BIOS options for Abe games. When me and Dooty made the original runs, they were done using SCPH1001.bin which gave us the best sync options for the game. Lately I have been in contact with ViGadeomes and he says my Maximum Casualties update I'm working on this year works better with the SCPH1001 oriiginal BIOS. Now, Ultrastars3000 told me that SCPH7003 is a Japanese BIOS and the original USA PS1 console was SCPH1001.
I feel like maybe it's to do with the games themselves. If you play them on a different BIOS, you will get different sync results? Well, I am making a 100% Exoddus TAS Update on the original BIOS which will make things easier to sync against the 2014 run. There are plenty of new tricks to see in later places like Mudanchee and the Zulags.
I don't understand what you're asking.
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.
I have a question regarding BIOS options for Abe games. When me and Dooty made the original runs, they were done using SCPH1001.bin which gave us the best sync options for the game. Lately I have been in contact with ViGadeomes and he says my Maximum Casualties update I'm working on this year works better with the SCPH1001 oriiginal BIOS. Now, Ultrastars3000 told me that SCPH7003 is a Japanese BIOS and the original USA PS1 console was SCPH1001.
I feel like maybe it's to do with the games themselves. If you play them on a different BIOS, you will get different sync results? Well, I am making a 100% Exoddus TAS Update on the original BIOS which will make things easier to sync against the 2014 run. There are plenty of new tricks to see in later places like Mudanchee and the Zulags.
I don't understand what you're asking.
He is asking if different BIOS can make desync issues and if we could don't care about what BIOS we use (answer is no of course).
He was using SCPH1001.bin for first TASes of Abe's exoddus and Abe's oddysee with Dooty. When I came to help him on his new versions, he said me he was using "SCPH7003.bin" for USA ROMs, me I use "SCPH101.bin" so when he tried to playback what I changed, it desynced. I asked him with an other friend (Ultrastars3000) to change his BIOS but he doesn't understand why he has to.
I think He used this BIOS for a lot of movies before but since he is holding the button to skip cinematics, BIOS changes doesn't change anything. I removed all useless inputs so due to BIOS diffrences, it desynced for him.
Sorry, He was in the subject so he didn't think about what could be understandable for an other person.
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Since we're talking about the core Octoshock, which is based on the core provided by mednafen, it's best to use what mednafen recommends.
https://mednafen.github.io/documentation/psx.html#Section_firmware_bios
This is also what BizHawk recommends over everything else.
As for SCPH-7003. It syncs on SCPH-5501.
ViGadeomes wrote:
He was using SCPH1001.bin for first TASes of Abe's exoddus and Abe's oddysee with Dooty.
Which is also the era of using PCSX-rr/psxjin.
This is also the most common BIOS yes. However, it's also the BIOS/model that has issues such as FMV skipping.
(Also in terms of BIOSes, it's the first and least up-to-date one in terms of the PS1 model lineup.)
And in a bias opinion.
We'd rather avoid encoding anything using the 1xxx series of bioses.
(Yes, this is only the Japanese Bios where it occurs, but the overall picture should make sense)
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Say a game doesn't have support for any disc swapping, but disc swapping bugs the game out and lets you get otherwise unobtainable items. Would it be allowed to:
1. Use this to set up a NG+ save?
2. Use this in an Any% TAS?
Do you have an example?
My example is Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories for the PS1. There's a video of someone performing the disc swap at https://youtu.be/ltwvh_yZbGk. It's not in English so I'll explain. You swap out the disc and put in another one before the end of the duel, and when the game tries to load your drop it bugs out and gives you the 'drop' 000. When this happens, the game takes the bottom card in your deck in the pre-duel menu and morphs it into the card with an ID 256 greater.
This can be used to obtain cards that are otherwise unobtainable, e.g. Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon, the most powerful card in the game. This would probably speed up the Any% TAS, and would allow you to use said card in an NG+ TAS on the NTSC-U version. It can also give you glitch cards with an ID above 722 (the maximum ID of a normal card), and some of these are very powerful.
I'll bring up that you can obtain that card legitimately in the NTSC-J version, but there are two issues.
1. That version is for the most part slower than NTSC-U because it gets through textboxes more slowly.
2. At the moment you wouldn't be able to make a movie legitimately obtaining that card because getting it requires using the IR capabilities of the Pocketstation, which to my knowledge is not supported by any emulator.
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Samtastic wrote:
I have a question regarding BIOS options for Abe games. When me and Dooty made the original runs, they were done using SCPH1001.bin which gave us the best sync options for the game. Lately I have been in contact with ViGadeomes and he says my Maximum Casualties update I'm working on this year works better with the SCPH1001 oriiginal BIOS. Now, Ultrastars3000 told me that SCPH7003 is a Japanese BIOS and the original USA PS1 console was SCPH1001.
I tried reading this once again, and it makes no sense. You were using 1001. You were told that 1001 works better than 1001. Then you were told that 7003 is Japanese, and 1001 is American. And?
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: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11478
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GenericMadScientist wrote:
My example is Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories for the PS1. There's a video of someone performing the disc swap at https://youtu.be/ltwvh_yZbGk. It's not in English so I'll explain. You swap out the disc and put in another one before the end of the duel, and when the game tries to load your drop it bugs out and gives you the 'drop' 000. When this happens, the game takes the bottom card in your deck in the pre-duel menu and morphs it into the card with an ID 256 greater.
This can be used to obtain cards that are otherwise unobtainable, e.g. Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon, the most powerful card in the game. This would probably speed up the Any% TAS, and would allow you to use said card in an NG+ TAS on the NTSC-U version. It can also give you glitch cards with an ID above 722 (the maximum ID of a normal card), and some of these are very powerful.
Sounds like you need a blank disk image as a part of the multi-disc xml, correct? Does this even work in the emulator?
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.
My example is Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories for the PS1. There's a video of someone performing the disc swap at https://youtu.be/ltwvh_yZbGk. It's not in English so I'll explain. You swap out the disc and put in another one before the end of the duel, and when the game tries to load your drop it bugs out and gives you the 'drop' 000. When this happens, the game takes the bottom card in your deck in the pre-duel menu and morphs it into the card with an ID 256 greater.
This can be used to obtain cards that are otherwise unobtainable, e.g. Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon, the most powerful card in the game. This would probably speed up the Any% TAS, and would allow you to use said card in an NG+ TAS on the NTSC-U version. It can also give you glitch cards with an ID above 722 (the maximum ID of a normal card), and some of these are very powerful.
Sounds like you need a blank disk image as a part of the multi-disc xml, correct? Does this even work in the emulator?
It's unknown exactly what type of isos work, but generally speaking small isos do the trick (cheat discs are typically good for this). I've done it on BizHawk with various isos, one member of the Forbidden Memories community has done it by swapping in 'Big League Slugger Baseball', and I've done it on my unmodded PAL PS2 by swapping in an Xploder cheat disc.
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Using any unrelated disk to swap with breaks the rule that demands the game image to be real.
http://tasvideos.org/MovieRules.html#GameMustBeReal
If you use a different image and make it interfere with the original image, fully or partially read by the console, you're no longer playing the same game anymore, you're playing two games, or more.
If you can make it work on the console (and be accurately emulated) without using any other images, we can continue this interesting talk.
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.
Using any unrelated disk to swap with breaks the rule that demands the game image to be real.
http://tasvideos.org/MovieRules.html#GameMustBeReal
If you use a different image and make it interfere with the original image, fully or partially read by the console, you're no longer playing the same game anymore, you're playing two games, or more.
If you can make it work on the console (and be accurately emulated) without using any other images, we can continue this interesting talk.
To my knowledge that rule kills it for Forbidden Memories. Thanks.
I did bring up another issue. Say someone wants to do a NG+ TAS on the Japanese version. My understanding is that alongside the TAS, the user would have to submit a movie file creating the desired save file. However, an optimal save file for FM NTSC-J requires use of the Pocketstation accessory, and its infrared capabilities. BizHawk has no support for the Pocketstation, and to my knowledge no Pocketstation emulator currently supports the infrared stuff. Am I right in concluding that an NG+ TAS with an optimal file is at this time just not allowed in any way under the TASVideos rules?
While my mind is on this, I'll bring up one more dumb thing (disclaimer: I have no intention of doing this, nor does anyone else to my knowledge, but may as well mention it). Someone could want to do an FM NG+ TAS with the cards obtainable without the Pocketstation. Strictly speaking, the optimal way to do this involves buying the Perfectly Ultimate Great Moth card. This costs 999999 starchips, and the only way to get starchips is to win 5 a time from a duel. A back of the envelope calculation suggests a movie file creating a save file with this card bought could be around 5 billion frames long. It's very possible a bot could make this movie, but I wonder if BizHawk would start breaking at this point. What would the policy be on this?
I have a question regarding BIOS options for Abe games. When me and Dooty made the original runs, they were done using SCPH1001.bin which gave us the best sync options for the game. Lately I have been in contact with ViGadeomes and he says my Maximum Casualties update I'm working on this year works better with the SCPH101 BIOS. Now, Ultrastars3000 told me that SCPH7003 is a Japanese BIOS and the original USA PS1 console was SCPH1001.
I tried reading this once again, and it makes no sense. You were using 1001. You were told that 1001 works better than 1001. Then you were told that 7003 is Japanese, and 1001 is American. And?
When I contacted him he was using "SCPH7003.bin". Sorry if you don't understand but now, you don't need to understand anymore, He had the answer he wanted.
Even me, I don't think I understood what he really wanted.
Sorry for the lost of time feos.
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GenericMadScientist wrote:
I did bring up another issue. Say someone wants to do a NG+ TAS on the Japanese version. My understanding is that alongside the TAS, the user would have to submit a movie file creating the desired save file. However, an optimal save file for FM NTSC-J requires use of the Pocketstation accessory, and its infrared capabilities. BizHawk has no support for the Pocketstation, and to my knowledge no Pocketstation emulator currently supports the infrared stuff. Am I right in concluding that an NG+ TAS with an optimal file is at this time just not allowed in any way under the TASVideos rules?
If the game can't be properly emulated, we can't accept a TAS of it, not even a verification movie. Because we can't allow working around this by allowing cheats in verifications.
GenericMadScientist wrote:
While my mind is on this, I'll bring up one more dumb thing (disclaimer: I have no intention of doing this, nor does anyone else to my knowledge, but may as well mention it). Someone could want to do an FM NG+ TAS with the cards obtainable without the Pocketstation. Strictly speaking, the optimal way to do this involves buying the Perfectly Ultimate Great Moth card. This costs 999999 starchips, and the only way to get starchips is to win 5 a time from a duel. A back of the envelope calculation suggests a movie file creating a save file with this card bought could be around 5 billion frames long. It's very possible a bot could make this movie, but I wonder if BizHawk would start breaking at this point. What would the policy be on this?
A 2.5 year long movie? The answer is, it won't work. If you want to know where it dies, just run the fastest core with all the output turned off and see where it breaks.
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.
The current unassisted word record for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time any% category is 17m 07s, made on the Wii VC version of the game. There's an unofficial TAS of the same category that's 15m 43s. This TAS wouldn't be accepted at tasvideos because it's done on a N64 emulator and uses a glitch (the so-called GIM glitch) that cannot be used in an actual N64 console without the game crashing (and the sole reason why it does not crash with the emulator is because of faulty emulation due to a faulty graphics plugin).
This TAS, using the current any% route (ie. the same one used in that unofficial TAS), could be done on the Wii VC version of the game using the Dolphin emulator and, as I understand, this would be accepted at tasvideos.
My question is: What if I were to create a TAS on the Wii VC version of the game that's faster than the unassisted WR, but slower than that unofficial TAS? Let's say, for example, that the TAS would be 17 minutes flat. Would it be accepted?
It would break all existing official records (both unassisted and tool-assisted), but it would have known inefficiencies. What are the rules regarding this?
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Warp wrote:
The current unassisted word record for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time any% category is 17m 07s, made on the Wii VC version of the game. There's an unofficial TAS of the same category that's 15m 43s. This TAS wouldn't be accepted at tasvideos because it's done on a N64 emulator and uses a glitch (the so-called GIM glitch) that cannot be used in an actual N64 console without the game crashing (and the sole reason why it does not crash with the emulator is because of faulty emulation due to a faulty graphics plugin).
This TAS, using the current any% route (ie. the same one used in that unofficial TAS), could be done on the Wii VC version of the game using the Dolphin emulator and, as I understand, this would be accepted at tasvideos.
My question is: What if I were to create a TAS on the Wii VC version of the game that's faster than the unassisted WR, but slower than that unofficial TAS? Let's say, for example, that the TAS would be 17 minutes flat. Would it be accepted?
It would break all existing official records (both unassisted and tool-assisted), but it would have known inefficiencies. What are the rules regarding this?
The run you linked depends on emulation bugs if I understand it correctly, so it's invalid by our rules, which means it won't be even compared to when a properly emulated submission is made.
And Wii VC is legit when TASed with Dolphin, because Nintendo officially released those games bundled with emulators. Those are official Wii game packages, and we consider them legitimate Wii games.
So the answer is, if your movie is optimal in itself, it will be accepted.
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.
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Actually, to extend on that.
For the case of Ocarina of Time there's 3 versions that are the same.
N64, GameCube (Master Quest) and WiiVC.
In what way would obsoleting work and does the site consider that there's enough of a difference between GameCube and N64/WiiVC to warrant it to be a standalone?
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Since the Wii version is going to abuse bugs of the official emulator, it should play differently from the N64 version, even if you submit the movie for the extracted N64 ROM TASed with Bizhawk.
The situation with the GC version would depend on the differences in the ROM itself compared to the above.
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.
The run you linked depends on emulation bugs if I understand it correctly, so it's invalid by our rules,
I think I stated that quite clearly.
which means it won't be even compared to when a properly emulated submission is made.
Perhaps it won't be used for comparison (as in, in a way, to see if the new submitted TAS would "obsolete" it), but it's a clear demonstration of what kind of times can be achieved in the any% category (give or take some seconds). It is my understanding that all of those tricks showcased in that run can be performed on the Wii VC version (if not identically, almost identically.)
So the answer is, if your movie is optimal in itself, it will be accepted.
That's the critical question. If I were to make, let's say, a 17-minute (in terms of RTA timing) TAS, it would contain suboptimalities with absolute certainty. It would be 7 seconds faster than the current unassisted WR, but it's well known that with absolutely perfect play a sub-16-minute time is perfectly possible. (This is demonstrated by the N64 TAS. Even though it relies on faulty emulation on one part of the run, all of the tricks shown in it can be replicated exactly or almost exactly in the Wii VC version.)
So the question is: Would it be enough for the TAS to beat all existing official records (tool-assisted and unassisted) for it to be admissible for publication, or would the fact that it contains known suboptimalities disqualify it?
(Someone may justly ask: "Well, why would you even make a suboptimal run? You have the routing and all the tricks right there in the unofficial N64 TAS. Just replicate it, and make a sub-16-minute TAS on the Wii VC version." That would be a fair question. The thing is, that TAS is amazingly polished and optimized, and replicating everything it does, without all that knowledge and experience, would require an extraordinary amount of research and work. I have no idea how even half of the glitches are triggered. I have seen them many, many times, of course, but personally I don't know how they are done. And even then, the amount of micro-optimization in that run is staggering, and replicating all of it would be a humongous endeavor, especially for someone with little knowledge of the inner workings of the game and its speedrunning, and almost no experience on using the emulator.
Of course one could also be of the opinion that it's better to have no TAS at all than have a clearly suboptimal one, even if it beats existing records. That might also be a fair point.)
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Ah, I see what you mean now. Yeah, if some conditions are identical between a VC version and that inaccurately emulated one, it might be used against a potential TAS. But I really hope that if you start at least some basic work on the VC version, someone might be encouraged to optimize it for real. Which mostly means, try this game out and have some TAS fun with it! Even if your final product is not optimized enough, it will definitely help overall, especially if you discover some differences from the mis-emulated version.
The answer I gave here applies overall.
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.
Hi!
I want ask how about if the run used glitch to make end game soon but after run complete credit and showed FIN/The End/Game Over, it'll freeze game (mean can't continue play what it should be). Have it accept for TAS?
Hi!
I want ask how about if the run used glitch to make end game soon but after run complete credit and showed FIN/The End/Game Over, it'll freeze game (mean can't continue play what it should be). Have it accept for TAS?
Hi, it's me again
I'm have other question for make sure my TAS do correct TAS rules
I'm doing Valkyrie Profile on PS1. This game have 4 ending types and many ways can do end game. With a glitch I can join debug room and choose what ending I want. For do all complete without freeze game, I have 2 ways
1. Choose bad ending. The run just need 1 disk. Later input for skip text because need wait complete some scenes. It'll show Game Over scene then back main menu game
2. Choose best ending. Need 2 disks to do, because best ending just happen after complete game on disk 2. Early input because don't need wait anything. But after show Fin and after credit, it'll logo game and stand here forever. It's not freeze by bug, it's gameplay. Everyone when play in real time when come at here must do soft reset, because it's not back main menu. Example here:
Link to video
So, what I should do for finish my TAS?
But after show Fin and after credit, it'll logo game and stand here forever. It's not freeze by bug, it's gameplay. Everyone when play in real time when come at here must do soft reset, because it's not back main menu.
If it's not freezed due to a bug, then it's perfectly acceptable. Choose the ending that is faster to achieve.
Edit: You know, there are many NES and SNES games that normally freeze after the credit roll, and also some PS2 games like Kingdom Hearts I and II.
It's a problem only when glitches triggered by the player prevent the credit sequence from being executed in its entirely. However, minor graphical and audio glitches are acceptable.
Say a game doesn't have support for any disc swapping, but disc swapping bugs the game out and lets you get otherwise unobtainable items. Would it be allowed to:
1. Use this to set up a NG+ save?
2. Use this in an Any% TAS?
Depends. If you're going to insert an unintended CD, then it's forbidden. If you're going to just open and close the PlayStation lid, then it's allowed.
The Movie Rules have been recently updated about this:
The ROM image must be integral
It is not allowed to make use of images that are not intended to belong to the game being TASed. It is considered intended, if it is endorsed by the game or by its publisher (as an add-on, for example).
For disk based games, breaking the intended order of disk switching is not allowed.
Inserting an unintended image before the main game, or while it is running, is not allowed.
