It seems that just the act of grabbing at something (without actually grabbing anything) can influence boosting. It might be worthwhile to just experiment with dash jumps and grabbing like a maniac for a start...
Already did, found a way to extend the jump length slightly which is useful for small optimizations, but nothing of the "beat the level 30% faster" variety.
Spacecow wrote:
I do have an idea. You know that flying move I use in the Jump video, where I cancel upwards boosts into grabs so I can boost again sooner? I think it's a combination of that boost canceling and the extended slide jump technique... I noticed that canceling your boosts into grabs seems to stop them from disrupting your slide jump momentum so much. You still get full boost momentum from a cancelled boost.
In the normal extended slide jump, I can get two boosts during the sweet spot on the ascent. If you could do that without slowing down, maybe you could keep on going indefinitely. I've only done a few minutes of testing on a console, so I could be wrong. But if you want to try to figure it out, there's my speculation.
And I haven't actually asked either of them about it, which may be the easiest way to figure it out, if you can find them. I wanted to see if I could figure it out myself... just haven't gotten around to it yet.
OK, thanks, I think I've figured it out now. Basically, the trick is to boost up instead of sideways in that extended slide jump, and grab as soon as possible after that boost, then wait 13 frames (about 0.43 seconds) and repeat, while holding the directional pad up and sideways the entire time. It decreases your horizontal speed slightly each boost if the timing isn't perfect, with more of a decrease the larger the gap is between doing the boost and canceling it.
In the test I did, I think I overused it to the point of slowing down a bit, but I still got 6'37'' on 1-1 with it. It's actually easier to perform (probably in real-time, and definitely in a TAS) than the normal extended slide jump, because you don't actually have to time it exactly in that sweet spot part of the jump, it works basically anywhere in it.
EDIT: This move pretty much breaks the game... It also has the advantage of not making Marina yell repeatedly, but it's a little boring that it's almost always the fastest thing to do. Still, I don't see how it's possible to get sub-14 seconds on 3-1 with this. Sub-17, yes, if you start flying immediately and use it to fly over the whole level...
So does this mean that this game going to get done?
Hopefully... I'm more than halfway done already (up to 4-1 now). The WIP is located here.
I haven't updated the table of times yet, but they're almost all much faster now. The levels I'm not so sure are optimal are 3-1 and 3-4, and to a lesser extent, 2-11, 3-10, and 3-12. They're good enough, I think, but making them even faster would be nice. Except 3-10, because the festival is so incredibly tedious.
The way minibosses take damage in this game is really strange... Each one seems to have a different nearly-impossible-to-replicate circumstance that deals far more damage to it than normal. I wouldn't be surprised if it is possible to OHKO Taurus or even Lunar.
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
Very nice work, nitsuja. My only concern so far is whether you could manipulate the Migen Jr fight. Last time I played against him, I would always take a punch in order to make him do a shorter second combo. Any thoughts?
Wowzers. That boost grab trick works wonders for this game. It even allows you a certain level of 'flight', bypassing many of the game's obstacles and netting you some insane times.
A few of those 'war' levels in the third area lagged the movie to hell with the explosions in the background. Didn't desync it though. It's a pity you're skipping all the skippable cutscenes, I can understand why, but some of em are amusing. A lot of the charm of the game lies in the humor... but if someone wanna see it that badly they can play it themselves.
I love how you owned Cerberus Alpha, you made fighting it look easy. I always had trouble with that boss, ALMOST as much as Phoenix Gamma.
So seeing how awesome this trial is turning out, how do you think the prospects look for a 100% run, collecting all the Gold gems? A 100% run would hopefully differ enough from this one to warrent it, and we'd get to see the full ending. This was all discussed before, of course, but I'd like to see a 100% run. Also, the 'age' you input alters one of the final parts of the ending, as well. Just an aesthetic thing, more than anything else though.
Joined: 6/21/2004
Posts: 247
Location: New Hampshire
Hahahaha, wow. That trick is ridiculous.
Amazing work so far nitsuja. You have no idea how glad I am that someone as qualified as you is doing this game. :)
A few of those 'war' levels in the third area lagged the movie to hell with the explosions in the background. Didn't desync it though.
That's actually the video plugin doing something computationally expensive. Some of the plugins are a lot more efficient at whatever it is than others (they might cache the results so that only the first explosion is slow). It's not actual lag of the kind that will show up in an AVI, which unfortunately happens pretty often in other levels, more often than on the real system. (I try to minimize it, but it's often unavoidable that the framerate will drop to 15 FPS.)
Zurreco wrote:
My only concern so far is whether you could manipulate the Migen Jr fight. Last time I played against him, I would always take a punch in order to make him do a shorter second combo. Any thoughts?
You mean purposely get hit? I tried it but it made his next catchable punch happen so much later that I don't see how it could be worth it. I could've missed something, but I did manipulate luck on every punch in that battle to make the next catchable punch happen as soon as I could make it.
Spoony_Bard wrote:
Wowzers. That boost grab trick works wonders for this game. It even allows you a certain level of 'flight', bypassing many of the game's obstacles and netting you some insane times.
I actually dislike how it makes everything so easy. Before, I was able to bypass most of the same obstacles anyway in trickier ways (to get slightly-slower times). Now there's not as much use for grabbing an enemy to act as a mid-air shield since I can just fly higher to dodge the attack, or grabbing a bomb to use the explosion knockback to get over a wall, since I can just fly over the wall, etc.
Spoony_Bard wrote:
I love how you owned Cerberus Alpha, you made fighting it look easy. I always had trouble with that boss, ALMOST as much as Phoenix Gamma.
It's definitely my favorite boss fight -- really fun to play, and with so many crazy things going on in it. There's not much of a chance to see that here though, since I make such short work of him.
Spoony_Bard wrote:
So seeing how awesome this trial is turning out, how do you think the prospects look for a 100% run, collecting all the Gold gems?
It's probably worth doing, not sure when it'll happen though...
BTW, does anyone know if the age affects anything besides the ending? Because I'm starting to suspect that entering 90 has made the game's random number generator effectively biased toward unhelpful results. Especially the "ball" event -- I've never seen such a high ratio of bombs to white balls before, and I kept getting a score of 1 or 2 until finally luck-manipulating it up to a mediocre 6.
I've never heard of age affecting anything other than the ending, but I suppose it's possible. It'd would take some testing. Unfortunately the festival is far enough into the game that restarting it over and over again to try out different ages would be a pain. You could always try hex-editing in different keystrokes in the beginning to select a different age. But if the age DOES affect more than the ending then the different randomization would desync the movie pretty quick, I'd think.
Regarding how the boost-grab trick makes the game so easy, perhaps another seperate run could be made without it? If the trick could be lumped under the same category as, say, holding left and right in the Tiny Toons Adventures game for the NES it could be justified. You may not need a modified controller to do it in real time, but it would also be downright impossible to manage in real time to the extent you pull it off in your movie. So if a run made without boost-grab were done you could make a case for it if it differed enough from the run with boost-grab, which I imagine it would.
Buuut, get this current one done first. Then we'll see what the reaction is, eh? :)
I've had to play Ball dozens of times to get a good (11+) amount of white balls to appear, so I don't think it's the age affecting the randomizer so much as bad luck trying to get it to do what you want. Did you try varying the order of events to see if your luck changed, or entering the level at a different time, etc?
Spoony_Bard wrote:
You may not need a modified controller to do it in real time, but it would also be downright impossible to manage in real time to the extent you pull it off in your movie.
The same could be said for just about every TAS, you know.
IMPblackbelt wrote:
The guy simply said he ran up, grabbed the guy, tossed him down, and got an S rank. 3 seconds, or thereabouts. If I can, I'll get more info on it ASAP, but please try testing and stuff. ;-;
I doubt a OHKO on Tarus is possible, at least not the way you described it. It would be quite simple to replicate, as there's nothing there except Tarus and ground, but throwing him down doesn't even damage him. Sorry, but "a friend of a random person on the internet" isn't a good enough source for me.
...especially since you said he also got a gold gem from it, and you get the gold gem from throwing him against the wall, not from beating him without getting hit. I suppose it could be possible to get him into a certain spot right at the corner of the wall and the ground where he takes extra damage from buggy collision handling or something, but that's not "ran up, grabbed him, tossed him, got an S-rank".
nitsuja wrote:
I actually dislike how it makes everything so easy. Before, I was able to bypass most of the same obstacles anyway in trickier ways (to get slightly-slower times). Now there's not as much use for grabbing an enemy to act as a mid-air shield since I can just fly higher to dodge the attack, or grabbing a bomb to use the explosion knockback to get over a wall, since I can just fly over the wall, etc.
I can't get the boost grab to work very well in realtime. I can do one or two to get a bit of extra distance, which will be helpful, but I slow down real fast after that. And I don't gain height as fast as the extended slide jump (though I can go on for longer). I'll watch your WIP and practice it some more, but I doubt it'll replace every other trick the way it seems to be doing for you.
P.S. Nitsuja: You're more than welcome to do an unassisted speedrun if you think this is too easy. ~_^
I doubt a OHKO on Tarus is possible, at least not the way you described it. It would be quite simple to replicate, as there's nothing there except Tarus and ground, but throwing him down doesn't even damage him. Sorry, but "a friend of a random person on the internet" isn't a good enough source for me.
...especially since you said he also got a gold gem from it, and you get the gold gem from throwing him against the wall, not from beating him without getting hit. I suppose it could be possible to get him into a certain spot right at the corner of the wall and the ground where he takes extra damage from buggy collision handling or something, but that's not "ran up, grabbed him, tossed him, got an S-rank".
I just got a bit more info from my friend. The way he's making it sound, it might be the way you described it: tossing him into a wall and glitching. It may also be possible that it's something like tossing Tarus INTO one of his rocks. Sorry it took so long, he's just now remembering some info about the fight. Apparently it's been so long, and it was on a rental cartridge... He wishes he could find the cart so he could get his record back.
Edit: Apparently, he remembers something about shaking Tarus. O.o;
Edit Edit: After some research and testing, I found it. (Found it on Gamefaqs, of all places) You have to grab his punches and toss him into a wall to do massive damage. If you toss him with one of each punch he does, then you'll kill him in 2 shots. (Sorry guys, no one-shotting Tarus. D:)
Edit Edit: After some research and testing, I found it. (Found it on Gamefaqs, of all places) You have to grab his punches and toss him into a wall to do massive damage. If you toss him with one of each punch he does, then you'll kill him in 2 shots. (Sorry guys, no one-shotting Tarus. D:)
And I'm sorry if you think you've discovered anything, but this (as well as everything else about this game on Gamefaqs) is well known. You can't even get the S-rank without doing so.
The WIP doesn't look bad. Maybe you'll hate me for saying this, but I'm glad the boost grabbing works so well... it'll leave more fun stuff exclusively in the domain of us speedrunners. I don't hate tool-assisted runs, but I do find them kinda boring in comparison.
I liked how you were able to use momentum from those springs to get through some areas real fast. There are a couple things I'll have to see if I can duplicate in real time.
Against Marzen 64, did you try letting a bomb guy get out? I seem to kill him faster with one of those guys helping than just by throwing enemies at him as soon as they appear.
You're only one frame faster than me on the 200M dash. ^_^
Hmm... now I'm unsure how far back I should go to redo things. (Hex editing works well for some levels, but not for minibosses or when there's any interaction with the enemies.)
StrangenessDSS wrote:
Maybe you'll hate me for saying this, but I'm glad the boost grabbing works so well... it'll leave more fun stuff exclusively in the domain of us speedrunners.
No, I agree on that; it's at least something to differentiate the TAS from a speedrun. (And it is fast, after all, so I really shouldn't complain.)
StrangenessDSS wrote:
There are a couple things I'll have to see if I can duplicate in real time.
Note that it's possible to step through and look at the input if you're not sure what buttons I pressed for any particular part. (BTW, I've noticed that any throw move can be made much faster than normal by double-tapping the B button and holding it down the second time, was this already known?)
StrangenessDSS wrote:
Against Marzen 64, did you try letting a bomb guy get out? I seem to kill him faster with one of those guys helping than just by throwing enemies at him as soon as they appear.
I didn't see one come out until I waited quite a while, and by then I could've already killed him, but maybe it can be manipulated to appear sooner.
StrangenessDSS wrote:
You're only one frame faster than me on the 200M dash. ^_^
Well, boosts can only happen every so often, and the game queues up the next boost if you press the button for it early, so it doesn't take perfect timing to nail every single boost as soon as possible (except for the very first one). Not that I could get close to that time normally anyway...
Wow. Amazing. o_o;
Keep up the good work. I expect to see great things in the near future. :)
Oh, and as for the age thing, it's easy enough to hex it in and try it, and if it desyncs, then you can hex the old number back in and maybe try a different age in a different run. Unless you think it would help a LOT more to try a different age (which means you'd be starting over. >>;), I think your work looks excellent as is.
As for suggestions, I think you can save a few frames in the Jump part of the festival by making the minimum required jump (maybe even manipulating the comp so he doesn't jump as far). That's about all I can see.
Excellent job so far. It's just amazing how fast you can get Marina going, especially when launched off of a spring or something like that. Looking forward to the rest!
I am just a silhouette, a silhouette of a memory of a solitary night .. nothing more.
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
.m64 files are huge!
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
They shouldn't be huge. I believe .m64 files are just simply data on what button to press and when.
But I think it's more complicated than that, but I'll let the pros here explain. XP
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
Maybe the Analog Stick makes a complex input data.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
It's partly because it has to store 4 bytes of input per frame (from there being so many buttons + analog), and because there is no compression built into the format, and because the emulator was set up to store a frame of input every time the game checks for input. For some reason, Mischief Makers requests input multiple times per frame, so they all get stored in the movie even though the game seems to ignore most of them. The file compresses extremely well, anyway.
For some reason, Mischief Makers requests input multiple times per frame, so they all get stored in the movie even though the game seems to ignore most of them.
This reminds me of something you mentioned earlier... that 13 frames was a bit less than half a second. Is the game running at 30fps on the emulator? It ought to be 60fps...
This reminds me of something you mentioned earlier... that 13 frames was a bit less than half a second. Is the game running at 30fps on the emulator? It ought to be 60fps...
Hmm, no, my mistake, it only runs at 30fps when it's lagging, normally it runs at 60fps. Certain levels such as 2-3 (sink or float) always lag to 30fps, and more of them lag to 30fps whenever there are too many sprites onscreen, such as most of The Day Of. So, 13 frames is a little over .2 seconds unless it's currently lagging like that. And I'm pretty sure it doesn't lag that much on the real system, anyway.
Sorry, not yet. I'm easily distracted. Also, I'd rather have a video plugin ready that does a better job of rendering the game before submitting anything.
Better job? The only real mistake I can see is that the rock in that one level and....in a couple of places there's some weird outlines. Beyond that it seems okay to me....
I am just a silhouette, a silhouette of a memory of a solitary night .. nothing more.
