Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Damn, I have to say again and again, the modifications to the screwattack and speedbooster (in combination with overall excellent planning as well as playing) just makes this run so awesome. The game really lends itself extremely well for TASing.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
LazyKenny wrote:
There is a cursed GBA game called Metal Slug Advance. The game itself is a simple run and gun platformer. 5 people have attempted it and they were never heard from again. Maybe you could break the curse?
Isn't the main problem with that one that there are things very early on that you won't know is faster or not until very late in the game, getting some extra weapons that is. I know I would probably do a run of it if it where not for that.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Saturn wrote:
And yeah, the next WIP is on the way, as I finally finished all the necessary tests for the later parts. For those who are curious, but without spoiling too much, it will also introduce a totally new discovery, that I accidentally found just a couple of weeks ago, so there will be new stuff available for everybody, even for the experienced SM-TASer. ;-)
Uh, is it something that could save time for all SM TASes? I kinda have to know, since I don't want to venture further into any runs I am making if I have to redo them because of it.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Saturn wrote:
This is the so called "zig-zag" trick that allows you to maintain some horizontal momentum you got before the jump, but in the opposite direction. Because of that it makes perfect sense that it allows to land even further into a platform than the powerranger boost, if well optimized. I actually took advantage of the zig-zag tech in many other situations in my Redesign TAS as well, but in a much more benefitting way than the platform boost, as you will see in the next WIP that should be out soon. But it's still a good find that will allow to eventually save a frame here or there. Well done Cpadolf.
Yeah, I understood that it was the temporary "momentum boost" from turning around that made it work, and I have used the zig-zag trick in both my 100% run and in SM:I (not to mention that it is what allows to get stuck far enough into the door when skipping the statue room without speedbooster).
Saturn wrote:
However doing so in the early frames will slow down Samus' running animation, which means that it takes more time until the first speed boost level is reached, making you end up with a longer charge distance anyway. But apparently the running animation speed isn't affected if using dash in the later frames, which for some reason I never bothered to try, so it can still be used to slightly shorten the distance.
You can use it in the early frames as well, depending on how the stutter pattern you use looks. If it starts with 2 then holding dash for the first 3 frames will prolong the stopping animation without delaying the first booster check (and if you start with 4 then holding dash for frame 1-4 will help). But the optimal pattern I found didn't get any use of this. Either the game only puts in "extra frames" in the running animation at specific points, or it only does it when you have been running for a set amount of time (don't know which), so that's the reason dash can be held in the last few frames.
Oh, and it is great that your next WIP is nearing completion!
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Well potentially it could save a frame in a few places. At the spark after ridley and the big metroid for example you have to run back a shorter distance after charging, and before botwoon for example you can have a higher speed when speedboosting through the first blocks.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Lol, found a 1/8th of a pixel shorter charge :)
It goes 3-3-4-4-6 (alternatively 2-4-4-4-6), and if you count the first frame you hold forward as frame 0 you hold dash for frame 23-25 (release forward on frame 24), instead of just frame 25.
I can only imagine all the new possibilities opening up with this might discovery (hint of sarcasm detected)!
EDIT:
Okay, scrap that.
3-4-4-4-5, and dash should be held for frame 21-25. It is one and 1/16th of a pixel shorter. It would have been cool to have this bruteforced to see what the actual best pattern is, but I've run out of ideas to make it shorter now anyway.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Derakon wrote:
What happens if Julius kills Chaos? What ending do you get?
I don't think that he is there, because the fight gets trigged by Somas conversation with the other characters in that room, and that won't take place when you play as Julius.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Well that's really cool, but I don't know if it should be in the run. The setup is ugly and would probably take a lot of time even if optimized, and since the fight is completely unintended it shouldn't really count anyway. That's my opinion at least.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
What about the current SDA route?
It goes Creaking Skull, Big Golem, Headhunter, activate teleport in Inner Quarters and exit down through the top floor, Manticore, Great Armor, teleport to Castle Corridor from the Chapel, Legion Balore, Death and then Graham.
I think eternaljwhs suggested route is shorter, but you will have to fight Death Balore and Legion while still quite weak, which should cost a lot of time due to the massive health of those bosses.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Okay, so if there is any real interest in a full Julius run (to either obsolete the current one, or get rejected, whatever)? If there is I would be interested in doing it if I could just get help with making up a good route.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Heh yeah, that is pretty extreme. I made a run of the first two stages of Trampoline Terror with the L+R/U+D glitch to see if it was interesting, which it was somewhat at least. It seems that you get warped 256 frames worth of walking when you use it (And if you use it twice, it will bring you back to where you started, it can't be used to go in the same direction twice), and you can use it whenever there is that much ground ahead of you, but if you jump you can use it all the time, but you risk ending up outside of the stage.
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/795088810/!Tramp.gmv
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Where was the big improvement over the old run in the intro stage? I didn't notice anything that looked that big. Was it making Dracula appear in the middle of the room to begin with, or did you find a way to damage the first or second form faster?
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
I found some very very small potential timesaver today. Basically it is the "subpixel boost" made better. If you turn back and forth just the frame before you are going to do a ledgegrab, with the right position (I believe you have to be just a pixel to the left/right of the platform), you will gain a pixel of distance instead of a half. It could potentially save time where the old subpixel boost was not enough to gain a frame, but I have not found such a place yet (I have only looked in crateria before brinstar though, and ceres),
Here is a video of it being done. You can see that I land at 399.65535, while I would originally land at 398.65535, and the usual subpixel boost would have landed me at 399.32767.
Yay for stupid minor stuff.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
The N64 category will probably be filled by the sub 1 hour OoT TAS whenever it gets ready.
All in all I think that this is a very good list to start with, there are a few runs I'm not too fond of but that's inevitable, and in most cases I agreed with your decision when it was up to two or more movies competing for one star.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
- Most often I listen to music while working, it's usually bitpop, electropop or classical.
- I try to focus on one run at a time but if it is a long one I tend to get bored with it after a while, at which point I usually try to find a shorter run I could do while gathering motivation (I think I finished 4 other runs while doing my SM 100% run).
- I make use of all 10 savestates (and depend on it to the point that TASing on dega became impossible for me, because I didn't find hotkeys for that, only for changing which state you are using). 0 is usually not used for playing though, I try to make it so that it is within a minute or two to from where I currently am, and if there is a run I'm comparing too I use 9 for that run the same way I use 0 for the new run.
- Whenever I am motivated to work on a run I can work for very long periods of time, often up to 3 hours. When I'm not though, I work for maybe 30 minutes at a time instead, but try to do so multiple times a day.
- I use 7 on the numpad for frameadvance (out of habit), sounds pretty unusual to me so I thought it was worth mentioning.
- Sometimes when I get really consumed by a run that I love to work on, I often come up with ideas for improvements in earlier areas when I'm trying to get to sleep. And if I do I always need to test it right away.
- I don't take notes unless it is absolutely necessary. I can usually keep the necessary numbers in my head for as long as they are relevant, as they rarely are very complex or needs to be remembered for a long time.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Earlier in this thread wrote:
moozooh wrote:
By the way, Kejardon, can you shed some more light on the nature of space/time beam and the reasons it fucks up the game that much? How can such a simple thing do that much various effects, all of which mess up everything so badly?
Honestly, not much. I know that the beams use a simple index to find just about *all* their relevant data, and so when you overflow the index (which happens with any combination of plasma + spazer), the game starts pulling data and *code* from essentially random locations. What it does from there is anyone's guess. No, let me rephrase that - what it does from there, nobody can guess. >_> The only way to know would be to read the game's programming.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Well in a 100% run you could use the space/time beam to start the "escape the planet" sequence immediately after getting all items, which would save some minutes.
But it has been decided not to do so, partly because it is a hardware glitch, and has different results on different emulators, and partly because it's nice to actually show the whole game in a 100% run (also I'm not completely sure that you can do that specific space/time beam trick on snes9x).
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Skilled player
(1431)
Joined: 7/15/2007
Posts: 1468
Location: Sweden
Namespoofer and I are working on two runs. The ingame run that we have been working on for some time and an updated version for the glitched run. Now the ingame run faced a restart a while back, which killed a lot of motivation. It is up to phantoon now, and due to having to get extremely good drops to not slow down later that fight is probably the hardest part in the whole run (last time we did him it took ~30000 rerecords), so naturally we are not too eager to work on him. The glitched run is almost up to tourian, but that part will probably take a long time for the same reason phantoon is taking a long time in the ingame run. After the metroid rooms though, the rest of that run will probably be done in a days work.
