This game is such a trip to watch. The movement patterns may not look as complicated as in, say, the DS Castlevanias, but the trajectories the protagonist takes are just weird.
It's just a shame that you have to replay several of the levels since they boot you out after you get the upgrades. Oh well.
Congrats on finishing the TAS! Nice work, and an easy yes vote.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Okay, that's interesting. How does it work? Go OOB, navigate blindly to the room behind Mother Brain's room, use the X-Ray scope to reset your position, walk to ship, fly away?
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Doesn't Akuma have abilities he doesn't have when he's selected as a secret character in Street Fighter?
I'd say it's very uncommon for a fighting game boss character to not get nerfed when they become playable. It does happen, but usually the boss gets advantages in damage dealt/received and may have special moves that the player simply can't access.
Fighting game bosses can also be guilty of reading the player's controller input, which means they can e.g. always know which way you'll go with a fakeout move, or react to you starting a move before your sprite even updates. And they can sometimes do things that are physically impossible with a controller, like performing a move that requires you to hold backwards on the controller, while walking forwards.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
My idea for an April Fools submission had always been a "true RBO" run that kills MB first, then Ridley, GT, Draygon, Botwoon, Phantoon, Crcomire, Kraid, Spore Spwan, bomb Torizo and finally Ridley on Ceres with the help of Space/Time beam. The problem is that it would be an insane amount of work (probably longer than the 100% run) for a joke submission. Not entirely sure that it's possible to escape after killing MB either but it definitely might be with Space/Time.
I'm pretty sure that Space/Time can toggle the bit that determines if the planet is exploding. At least, I'm nearly positive I've seen a run that "wins" by triggering the escape sequence without ever going to Tourian; if you can set the explosion bit to 1, then you can probably set it to 0 as well by triggering the glitch in different circumstances.
The place where I did the reset-items/bosses glitch on console is the side area from the Old Tourian Escape Shaft (where you have to freeze some monsters, then run over them to charge a shinespark). Since you'd have to do space/time anyway to stop the planet from blowing up, you might as well reset the items at the same time.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Ehh, I'm inclined to say that the "arbitrary code execution" TASes should be limited only in that they must accomplish everything via controller input. Everything else is fair game. I really do think they're on a different level compared to the rest of the site.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Also the idea of forcing the TASers into making it into a "rickroll" is dismissive, insulting, and not even possible with the tools available.
I once got tricked into downloading an SNES ROM that implemented a rickroll. Admittedly a fairly low-res one, and the music was MIDIfied, but it was recognizable. As for making that the end of an arbitrary-code-execution TAS, I'd be more interested in seeing something like turning Samus into NES Samus in sprite and physics.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Tub put things very well in his/her post earlier:
Tub wrote:
That being said, I think it is exactly the GT code that makes the remaining gameplay interesting in this run. Making a beeline for the most dangerous territory in the game, ignoring any roadblocks the developers placed on the way, with a complete disregard for her own life - and even her own death.
Saturn's GT code run suffered, because the second half was very similar to existing runs. A GT-less ACE run would suffer, because the first half would be very similar to existing runs. Combining both makes for an awesome and unique run.
To trigger the glitch, you need to have both Spazer and Plasma beams. You also need to have a large number of super missiles and a certain (lesser) number of power bombs. These are all easily obtainable without using the GT Code; the problem is that then you have a run that doesn't dive into the hardest section of the game with nowhere near enough equipment and yet somehow survives anyway. In fact, you wouldn't even see Lower Norfair (where the GT Code is performed) at all! Instead the game would be played normally up through Draygon (the giant shrimp boss in the underwater area), the Plasma beam would be acquired, and then the glitch would be performed.
Well, maybe you can X-ray climb to get the Plasma beam early, but then you're probably talking about doing a Gravity Suit-less underwater section to get there without killing Draygon, which is going to be awfully slow (Samus' movement speed is drastically limited when underwater without the Gravity Suit). And you'd also have a lengthy segment of doing the X-Ray Climb glitch as currently demonstrated in the published any% run. It's interesting from a high-level view but tedious to actually watch.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
It could be an issue with subpixels not being cleared, maybe. It sounds like the physics engine is extremely sensitive to minor variations in position.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Didn't complete the game in a negative amount of time, no vote.
Seriously though, this is fascinating stuff, great work! I don't even care about the use of a debug code (the GT code) because it's been put to such neat use.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
I was grinning practically the entire time. This was awesome. Easiest yes vote I've made in ages, and IMO this should be starred. Great work, all of you!
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Python is actually really solid. You can build general desktop apps using PyQt or wxPython.
I do work in some programs where we mix C/C++ and Python, but that's mostly because my job sometimes requires detailed control over memory use, which Python doesn't give you. Most tasks don't require that level of control though.
If you want to learn a new language once you feel you have a handle on Python, you might consider branching out into the "weirder" languages like Scheme or Haskell. To some extent, programming is about training yourself to think in new ways, so languages that are drastically different from the traditional "imperative" model (which Python uses) can be good exercise for your brain. The techniques you learn can also be applied in more traditional languages.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Why don't you use the same path to get the Hammer as you do to teleport to Maze Island? They both take you to the end of Mount Doom, and it seems like the former path is faster than the latter one.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
That was impressively quick and clean. Like JXQ says, this is much less "sloppy" looking than the two-player run simply because of all the lag removal (even though I know the 2P run isn't sloppy at all, the lag makes it feel slow). Nice work!
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
So how does the glitch work, anyway? Are you just doing the walljump glitch (i.e. embedding yourself in a wall) and then somehow entering the pipe because you're "standing" on it? I thought you had to be standing near the middle of the pipe to be able to enter it though. I assume the reason you're able to enter it at all is because the game uses the same sprite object for pipe caps regardless of if they're on top or on bottom, and chooses the direction to send you in based on the direction you entered the pipe from.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Anything specific to a given game should be posted in that game's thread, as a general rule.
Examples of other stuff that was "left in" a game but in a normally-inacessible way: the "Hot Coffee" thing in GTA San Andreas, the option to not defect in Deus Ex, the Crystal Palace zone in Sonic 2, etc. Check out The Cutting Room Floor for more details.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
(Notwithstanding that this should have been posted in the Crystalis thread)
It's impossible to know what the devs were thinking. My best guess is that this is some leftover code from before they'd decided on the current quest order. They just left it in because it wasn't doing any harm, and taking it out could potentially have introduced bugs somehow. That kind of thing happens a lot in videogame development, since they don't write the game content in the same order in which it is played.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
So you glitch yourself an "I Win" button, and then mash that button in every fight in the campaign? This is pretty dull (aside from the first few minutes when you're still setting up); I didn't manage to sit through the entire thing. It's nice and fast, sure, and the garbled graphics are kind of entertaining, but it gets really repetitive.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
I'm impressed by the pseudo-3D in the first stage, complete with showing the sides of buildings when they're near the edges of the screen. The actual gameplay is pretty bland, but seemed to be well-executed; at least, I didn't see anything obviously out-of-place. Nice work, Johnnypoiro!
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Cpadolf: I don't think you need to worry about in-game time here. Whether you use the death pause trick or not, the final ingame time can be whatever we want. Why not go for 00:00.00? It's just a memory address like any other, so we can set it to any value.
On that note, the run really ought to go for more than 100% completion.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Final Fantasy Mystic Quest would probably be easier than Pokemon Red. Heck, when you fail a battle you're given the option to retry that battle then and there, and the AI partners can actually carry the protagonist through most of the dungeons.
...though, do you have to hold a button down to climb on walls? I forget. That could be a problem.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
I've updated the Super Metroid page with technical details for the glitched beams and arbitrary code execution now.
This was pretty fascinating to read. Even if a run using these techniques doesn't end up being faster than existing runs, I'd still love to see it. Good luck, everyone!
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
Depending on the glitch, it may be possible to verify that the glitch is possible on console without verifying the entire run. Obviously difficult for frame-precise glitches, but I seem to recall seeing a camcorder video of the NextDelay glitch in Megaman 2 being console-verified, for example.
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
