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Aqfaq wrote:
I don't know what to vote... Maybe "meh".
I'm sorry, but I changed my mind and voted "no". Mostly, because the goals are not good for a Gods movie.
There are also some parts, which could be done faster. For example, it is faster to kill the 2nd boss without the jewel, because with the jewel, the boss flies higher and the spears don't hit it so well.
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Hello to you, VolcanoStormWind!
I think the quality of play is good in your run, but the goals might be a bit arbitrary. Like, what is the point of collecting some of the stuff, if you don't collect everything? Why should ordinary gems not be included in a 100% run?
I agree that an extra movie category for this game is reasonable, because the Genesis movie skips a lot of the game and the gameplay is normally oriented more to the item collecting. However, in my opinion, the movie should aim for truly 100% kills/treasures, not just treasure rooms and special gems.
Your movements are precise and you obviously know how to handle the emulator tools, so I would be glad to see more stuff from you.
I guess I did enjoy watching the movie, after I understood what you aimed for, but with these goals, the movie is a bit confusing and bland. I don't know what to vote... Maybe "meh".
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moozooh wrote:
Seems like most new games, especially on NES, are nowadays TASed by Chinese and Japanese players (not without a reason). Or by Aqfaq, if talking about Genesis.
Yup, I suppose that's more or less correct.
However, unfortunately, I must inform you that you've probably seen the peak of my submissions recently and it is very unlikely that I make another Genesis submission in 2008. I have destroyed enough Genesis games already and they offer me nothing new anymore. I might do a short NES TAS sometime, but probably not. There are a few PC games that I would really like to record with consistent tools, but it is not going to happen anytime soon.
Well, maybe if general TAS methods and tools evolve further in some surprising/inspiring way, I might record more (Genesis) stuff, but at the moment I'm not interested.
Also, maybe if/when someone improves my movies, I might fight back a bit or cooperate with the initiator. :)
Otherwise, I'll probably just lurk, post a few messages every now and then and make an occasional edit at somepage.
(Ofcourse, it is possible that I'll submit another sixpack of obscure movies this year. You never know...)
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tool23 wrote:
I think you also used the magic carpet once more than I did?
Yes. That was the fastest way I managed to skip the fight with the troll.
tool23 wrote:
One thing I noticed was that it seems like you went straight through the long spider web corridor without moving from side to side. Does it just look like that or were you actually moving up and down?
I move down at some point, but only a pixel or two, so it is practically unnoticeable and looks like I go straight through the dangerous webs. :)
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JXQ wrote:
There are some secret levels. I'm not sure if these should be visited or not in a TAS.
If it is faster, then yes. (This is a usual strategy in Doom 2 speedruns, where level 15 secret exit is easier to reach than the normal exit.)
For a game like this, there's always room for an additional 100% kills/secrets run, so there's no reason to visit the secret levels in an "any%" run, unless it saves time.
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Warp wrote:
If one single author controls both playable characters, I think that's a feat deserving its own tag.
You may be right, but I think it should be mentioned in the movie description only, because it does not affect the actual content of the movie. It is just an interesting fact about how the movie was created.
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Thank you for encoding and publishing it adelikat. One thing though: The movie does not manipulate luck. (Apparently I can't edit the movie tags myself...)
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I spent some time trying to find shortcuts in this game, but failed completely. I did find out that you can perform an air-jump in 2-player mode, because the dead player respawns where the other player is located, so if you die and respawn when the other player is jumping, you can respawn in the air and jump immediately. However, the screen won't scroll upwards in any of the places where this could be used for a very effective shortcut. The game designers were clever this time. I give up.
Anyway, this game might be slightly faster with 2 players, even though the mage walks slightly slower. For example, in the very beginning, when the game starts, the 2nd player is a bit farther to the left than player 1, so if player 2 takes the faster character, the door on the left can be reached faster. The player 1 would have the mage and he could die when he is not needed. There are two continues, so he could join the boss fights and then die again. The faster character needs to stop to kill some enemies anyway, so the slower one would catch up in most places. Also, when visiting the shops, the player 2 could do the shopping while player 1 waits at the door and exits immediately after the shopping is done. Some parts would be slower with 2 players, but overall it might be a bit faster. Maybe about 20 seconds could be saved with 2 players.
Otherwise, this movie seems very well planned and executed and I would be very surprised if someone could improve the route.
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Is it possible to make a script that automatically fast-forwards cutscenes, elevators and item pickups in Super Metroid?
Is it possible to make a counter that counts how many times a certain memory address has had a certain value? (It could be used as a shot/death/kill/hurt counter for example.)
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Some movies have this category attributed to them: "One player controls two characters". I suppose it was written a long time ago. It should be changed. Here are a few reasons why I think so:
- It does not matter how many players control the characters of the game, because it's a TAS. There may be many authors or a bot may have played some parts. The relevant information is how many characters are used, not how many players/authors there are.
- If it's not changed, why isn't there a category for "two players control one character?" I think it is an equally impressive feat. (I even heard some 4 guys managed to control 1 character, in a record time!) Also, with spliced input, the author may actually never have controlled the two characters simultaneously. Maybe there should be a category for "one player controls two characters one at a time..."
- It may give misleading info for people who browse the movies for the first time, because when you read "one player..." you see a player playing a game in your mind. I think some part of the FAQ says "we do not just play here", but the word "player" gives the impression that someone is just playing here.
- The movies on this site look like they are being played very well by someone, even though nobody is actually playing the games, they are just input files. Actually, you could say that "an elephant with superhuman reflexes controls two characters", because it's a TAS and it does not matter who or what you think the superplayer is. I think the FAQ says/said somewhere that "...as if God was playing the game" or something... Why restrict the imagination of the viewer by saying that there is some "one player" who is playing the game?
- The only good thing I can think of the expression is that it gives special attention to the generally harder task of making multiplayer movies.
I think those multiplayer categories should be changed to simply "#-players", "controls # characters" or something like that. The current expression is not even consistent with other attributes like "aims for fastest time" and "abuses programming errors...", so if it is not changed to something completely different, it should be changed to "controls # characters" for consistency. Even the multigame movies have it in the form "# games in one movie", not "one player in # games".
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I improved the movie by 21 frames.
- 1 frame was saved in level 3. (Stupid mistake.)
- 6 frames were saved by jumping higher to the wall in the first bike trick room.
- 14 frames were saved with Foda's suggestion! Foda is awesome!
I'll send the replacement file to Bisqwit.
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FODA wrote:
Man, are you human??? You made a movie like 10 people were working on smb1 :)
Haha! You are a funny guy, Foda. Oh, but anyway, it feels good to hear such a thing. Thanks a lot. :)
The motorbike on the helicopter level was clever, but the glitches in the last level are insane, how did you find that? hats off to you!
I found both tricks completely by accident while trying to find a faster route through the castle. After they occurred once, I tried to figure out places to use them efficiently.
Ok, on the last level, right after your first use of the bike, when you deactivate it, couldn't you have done a crouching punch and passed through the block and keep the momentum, instead of getting up to a total stop?
It might be possible, but I fail, because I have too much speed, so I can't hit the block with a fist before Alex hits it with his body. Anyway, it is something to look into for future versions of the movie.
Also, at the first rubber blocks part, couldn't you cut directly to the right?
It is not possible to get far inside the walls. As you can see, I actually never go through a wall, I just use the walls as platforms to rise upwards.
Oh, and when you use the bike on the helicopter level, couldn't you keep it a little longer on the first use?
I tried, but either fell too low and died or crashed towards an enemy and died.
Otherwise, there may be a better route on the castle, but not by more than 1 or 2 screens, for what I could notice.
I also believe there might be a better route through the castle, if more bugs are found or some of those bugs can be done in better places. With my current knowledge, the route is the best possible.
Oh and did you try to get out of the map boundaries?
I managed to get on top of the castle, but not horizontally outside the castle. It is also possible to use the helicopter to come through the castle ceiling back inside, because the top boundary of the area does not damage the helicopter, but pushes it downwards.
Thanks a lot for the comments! I hope we see future improvements to this someday. :)
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Oops, I may have noticed a mistake in the movie... Foda, can you notice it? Please tell me if you see mistakes, since you know the game well. :)
Edit: Oh, never mind... I was wrong. I thought one jump was unnecessary around 4:26:00, but it was not a mistake as I thought. It just happens too often to me that when I verify that the submitted file works, I spot a mistake. :)
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emu wrote:
Woa, I'm wondering how you found that glitch.
I just happened to notice that the elevator moved 1 pixel off. Then I tried to repeat it and realised it had something to do with the screen scrolling. It took some effort, but eventually I found a way to do it consistently, so that the elevator moves 1 pixel every 7 frames: I press right-right-left-idle-left-idle-left to move the elevator 1 pixel. There might be other wobbling patterns that could achieve faster result, like 3 pixels per 20 frames, but I can't test every possible pattern.
