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GJTASer2018
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Joined: 1/24/2018
Posts: 336
Location: Stafford, NY
Video Description wrote:
Hopefully now that this awful stage is done with, we can resume a more reasonable rate of progress on the Dark Story TAS. Many of the remaining stages have already been labbed out, and are much less frustrating than this. Mad Space worries me... But otherwise, most of the remaining stages should not take excessive time to TAS.
So would it be reasonable to expect the full Dark Story run to be submitted by the 10th anniversary of the Hero Story submission? :)
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...
itsPersonnal
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Posts: 545
So would it be reasonable to expect the full Dark Story run to be submitted by the 10th anniversary of the Hero Story submission? :)
Oh my God... that is terrifying. I didn't realize it's almost been a decade since the Hero Story TAS... The real answer is that it's pretty unlikely to happen. It surely isn't impossible (The Hero Story TAS was made in only ~8 months iirc), but pretty much everyone on the TAS team these days has much more going on in their lives and progress is hindered significantly by that. Sometimes someone is just busy for months at a time and nothing gets done without them. (Not to mention, optimization standards are way higher now). That said, now that we're getting progress made again, maybe momentum will pick up (hopefully). It would be nice to see this project finished.
Completed: 2010-Current | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Individual Level TASes 2014 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 1:05:03.23 2014 | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story (w/ THC98) in 25:11.87 2016 | Metroid Prime - Any% in 00:37 (In-Game Time) 2018 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:42.350 2020 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 0:39:20.10 2022 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:25.567 Currently working on: SA2:B DARK STORY
itsPersonnal
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Posts: 545
As a quick update: We're about 50% of the way through Route 280 now, and I've already gone ahead and labbed a bit on the later stages. Sky Rail, Mad Space, and Final Chase should all be relatively quick stages to produce...Cosmic Wall on the other hand will likely hold us up for some time. Given it's almost September already, I doubt this TAS will finish before the new year. But completion is finally looking within reach -as opposed to painfully distant. I hope it's worth the wait.
Completed: 2010-Current | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Individual Level TASes 2014 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 1:05:03.23 2014 | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story (w/ THC98) in 25:11.87 2016 | Metroid Prime - Any% in 00:37 (In-Game Time) 2018 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:42.350 2020 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 0:39:20.10 2022 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:25.567 Currently working on: SA2:B DARK STORY
Dimon12321
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Posts: 1286
Location: Romania
That's a good piece of news! Good luck to all of you!
TASing is like making a film: only the best takes are shown in the final movie.
Joined: 5/9/2005
Posts: 752
Appreciate the update. From the bits and pieces I've seen scanning through the discord, I'm all but certain the wait will be worth it. I know you know, but take all the time you need with it.
itsPersonnal
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Posts: 545
Sky Rail is completed now. 3 stages remain (plus some boss fights). We're also exploring a little bit with redoing some areas in previous stages... At the moment it's uncertain whether or not we will be able to make edits and have the run still sync. This game has a rather annoying issue with lag frames causing desyncs when hex editing. Hopefully it's possible to make it all sync, even if it takes some effort to reTAS areas effected by lag, because there are a couple changes we could make in earlier stages and I'd like to see them in the finished project. (Saving time in earlier levels will also potentially change optimal RNG seeds for subsequent hunting stages, and that could be either really good, i.e. we get a better layout -or, really bad, if we save a big chunk of time but lose RTA later on needing to wait on manipulating a hunting stage piece layout). Thanks for the luck. I really can't wait to get this project finished and share our work with everyone who's been eagerly waiting all these years!
Completed: 2010-Current | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Individual Level TASes 2014 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 1:05:03.23 2014 | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story (w/ THC98) in 25:11.87 2016 | Metroid Prime - Any% in 00:37 (In-Game Time) 2018 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:42.350 2020 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 0:39:20.10 2022 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:25.567 Currently working on: SA2:B DARK STORY
itsPersonnal
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From what I understand, it seems like hex editing the TAS without desyncs is now proven viable by brianpso, so we are able to go back and reTAS a couple of stages. We're only planning to do this with two stages: Radical Highway (I just want to TAS more Shadow sorry lol I added another 2 months to the release date bc I wanted to have fun. It'll be worth it tho). and Egg Quarters (there's a lot of time to save here with modern movement developments). 2025 release is still looking strong. I really hope we can finish this thing because it's been 7 years at this point since we started it.
Completed: 2010-Current | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Individual Level TASes 2014 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 1:05:03.23 2014 | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story (w/ THC98) in 25:11.87 2016 | Metroid Prime - Any% in 00:37 (In-Game Time) 2018 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:42.350 2020 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 0:39:20.10 2022 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:25.567 Currently working on: SA2:B DARK STORY
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itsPersonnal wrote:
From what I understand, it seems like hex editing the TAS without desyncs is now proven viable by brianpso, so we are able to go back and reTAS a couple of stages. We're only planning to do this with two stages: Radical Highway (I just want to TAS more Shadow sorry lol I added another 2 months to the release date bc I wanted to have fun. It'll be worth it tho). and Egg Quarters (there's a lot of time to save here with modern movement developments). 2025 release is still looking strong. I really hope we can finish this thing because it's been 7 years at this point since we started it.
Cannot wait to see this landmark of a TAS.
Enter the Matrix is a piece of garbage but I'm gonna finish it if it kills me.
itsPersonnal
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Posts: 545
Egg Quarters and Radical Highway have been redone! Considerable timesave on both of them... hehe. Now, in order to get the God RNG layout on Mad Space, we need to reTAS Security Hall to retain our timesave from the stages mentioned above. Hunting stage layouts are tied to frame count on first load, so because we reach the stage sooner -and we want to end it sooner as well for Mad Space RNG- we need to use a different piece set in Security Hall. Thankfully we just learned A BUNCH about how to RNG manip and optimize hunting stages from Egg Quarters again. Security Hall has already been routed in just a matter of a day or so. Now it's a matter of hex editing the movie up to this stage, and then doing about 8 seconds of movement, plus optimizing some RNG. A small pitstop, hopefully. And then we'll be at Mad Space soon enough. I'm so excited it's ridiculous. This TAS is so cool I can't wait to release it!
Completed: 2010-Current | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Individual Level TASes 2014 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 1:05:03.23 2014 | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story (w/ THC98) in 25:11.87 2016 | Metroid Prime - Any% in 00:37 (In-Game Time) 2018 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:42.350 2020 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 0:39:20.10 2022 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:25.567 Currently working on: SA2:B DARK STORY
itsPersonnal
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UPDATE TIME. Security Hall is done. Mad Space is in final drafting. The route and RNG manip is all sorted out, just have about 4 seconds of movement left to optimize and then this stage will be finished too. We're really nearing the end now... :)
Completed: 2010-Current | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Individual Level TASes 2014 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 1:05:03.23 2014 | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story (w/ THC98) in 25:11.87 2016 | Metroid Prime - Any% in 00:37 (In-Game Time) 2018 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:42.350 2020 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 0:39:20.10 2022 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:25.567 Currently working on: SA2:B DARK STORY
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Looking forward to the result.
itsPersonnal
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Posts: 545
Hey guys, update time. I've been kind of quiet for a while because I really wanted this project to be done in March, but clearly that didn't happen. All stages except for Cosmic Wall are technically done. We finished Mad Space a while ago, and I went ahead and TAS'd Final Chase around that time too. After that, it was really tempting to reTAS Radical Highway again since the previous reTAS was so close to a sub-second goal time and we knew it was possible to achieve. That took a while. (The optimization standard keeps increasing <_<). Dry Lagoon has also been redone. Pretty much every non-Eggman stage has been redone at this point, so most of the work we've shared over the past several years though work-in-progress videos is obsolete now. The problem: with these increased optimization standards and the precedent it sets, now the dark story TAS team wants to redo most Eggman levels before release too. Personally I'm not a huge fan of these stages, and I've been super burnt out on TASing after tryharding nonstop with all my free time on this project since June 2024. So, I've been on hiatus the past month. Not being able to release the TAS yet kind of has me down.... there's still a lot of work left in it if we're doing all these Eggman stages. And the other members are on break at the moment too, for various reasons. Busy with school/work, or personal stuff. Progress has halted more or less, and I'm not sure when it will pick up again. I just figure I should update people here. I'm super proud of the work we've done and I want to get it finished so everyone can see. But at the moment it's hard to say when progress will pick up again. This TAS is going to be huge when we it does come out tho haha.
Completed: 2010-Current | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Individual Level TASes 2014 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 1:05:03.23 2014 | Sonic Adventure 2: Battle - Hero Story (w/ THC98) in 25:11.87 2016 | Metroid Prime - Any% in 00:37 (In-Game Time) 2018 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:42.350 2020 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Any% in 0:39:20.10 2022 | Spongebob: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Cheat% in 1:25.567 Currently working on: SA2:B DARK STORY
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