Any news on Ages?
Unless there's a major improvement to Any% Seasons that's been found since the last publication, we can probably just use the current Seasons run as the starting point. A thing I need to check is if the Achievement Get rings track across both games or not. Similarly, unid'd rings are stored in memory as either +64 or as the two's complement (don't remember which) but I've long since forgot the address; I'll pull up the Ages Any% this week and scan it. This hybridized file you speak of... how does one obtain the upgrade passwords? To my knowledge the NPCs only spawn in the starting game.
There is a location for a potential text-warp in Mermaid's Cave. It is in the room with the Scent Seed key. Using this text warp will take you across the chasm, saving 3 to 5 seconds.
Name the specific palette you want and I will use it.Currently testing for sync on the lastest BizHawk release.
Nice job implementing the subpixel manipulation. In some places you can also move diagonally into a wall to save time later on, like after unequipping the shovel or when you regain control when you search for the fairies.
Right after that there's a part where you have to change back and forth between two screens. In that case you can make it so on every screen you move diagonally for only 3 frames and move one pixel vertically every frame. You can get corner boosts when moving diagonally into NPCs. I don't know if you knew that, some of the boosts look a bit odd but not sure if it lost time.
As Tompa said, damage boosts are always nice especially while you're killing stuff. Not getting a damage boost off the guay the first time looks a bit ugly. He was going the wrong way for that but I guess you could have manipulated him into moving down?
35 kills is almost too many. In D2 you have to kill 3 enemies, you're pretty much guaranteed to kill 3 Stalfos with one bomb and there's a lot of Keese and Ropes along the way. So maybe you could cut out some slower kills like the Like-Like. Although I guess that helped manipulating the Goron Dancing since the pattern you got was indeed really nice.
In Maku Road you shouldn't have moved diagonally before pushing the last block.
In D1 when you push that thing that changes colours it moves faster when you are at the middle of it when you start pushing. When a key drops from the ceiling I believe it spawns relative to the camera position so it drops faster when the camera is lower on the screen. I don't think you had enough time to do it here with the manipulation you got. Just a thing to keep in mind for the future. After the miniboss you can kill the 3rd Stalfos with an Ember Seed while slashing the sword. That's faster and you also get a 5 rupee drop. The boss fight is slower than in this WIP: User movie #12996165641066198
You can pick up the Essence a little faster by walking on the side and moving towards the middle when you're close to it. That way it reaches you faster in the cutscene. It is really weird that you can only pick it up every 4th frame in this emulator version. Might have something to do with the new frame timing. After getting the Pegasus Seeds it's faster to go down rather than right.
Anyway, while we're at it, I've done some routing for the rest of the game: In order for the Whimsical Ring to be worth it, it would have to save more than 1000 frames from D4 onwards. I'm not sure if that is possible. Here's an example for the boss fight in D6: User movie #16540268996119658 The jump before Cheval's grave can be made without a bomb boost with really good subpixels. Visiting the Ember Seed tree before or after Rafton costs only 150 frames so it's worth it for the later warp. In the Tokey shop getting the Power Bracelet first saves an equip which should be more than the feather saves in the meantime. There's a different route for D3 that theonly0 came up with: After destroying the second crystal you get the key where you have to kill the two Moldorms. Then you enter the Miniboss fight from the wrong side. After that you step in the warp, get the Seed Shooter and destroy the remaining crystals. Then you deathwarp, get the Bosskey and finish the dungeon. According to my timing this was 132 frames faster than the RTA route. In D6 the key on the right side is faster to get because you can just savewarp (or deathwarp) instead of having to backtrack.
The first thing I noticed was that you could have killed the gels slightly faster in the Maku Road. A few possible damage boosts, such as after the first key in D1. There is a faster way of lightning the torches to get the Bracelets, as seen here in SL's old WIP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmXtWUfPixw&feature=player_detailpage#t=129. I believe it saves like 2-3 frames or so. Or maybe you didn't do it because of RNG stuff? I noticed that was the reason you didn't slash before entering the Maku Road. Except for those, it looks pretty nice!
This looks really good for a first attempt. However, there's some minor issues. Triggering the custcene where Impa examines the stone from below like it is done here is 6 frames faster than your method. You can also manipulate your subpixels to save a few frames here and there. For example, when you push the stone, you can hold up for a little longer, which gives you a better subpixel state for walking up. There's also corner-boosting where you can move into an NPC at a specific pixel and you get pushed one pixel to the side. You do this at some places but not everywhere you could. Now this is obviously really minor stuff so it is up to you if you want to go through the tedious work to get this run super-optimised but if you want to, you can compare parts of your run with my WIP to see where you lose frames. I think the only outright mistake in it (apart from the routing) is when I walk back to the stairs after getting the Graveyard Key. I only tried falling into the right hole but taking the left one makes the camera move less so that's pretty smart. About the enemy kills: From what I remember it is possible to get 6 kills on the Miniboss without losing any time and 9 by losing ~20 frames. You really shouldn't have to farm more than that if you concentrate on killing a lot of enemies along the way (like the crow just before D1). About the rupees: I'd say you need two more big blue rupees after the first one. You should be able to get one while retrieving Ricky's gloves. Now if I were you, I'd skip the second one you got and instead get one at the time portal just before D3. There's no guarantee that you'll get one there but I think you should be able to juggle soft and hard resets on Crescent Island to make it work.
I figured manipulating something else played into it, I just wasn't sure if it was luck-manipulating something else or if it had something specific to do with the rings. Pitwalking in the Gasha Seed room will depend on if the bridge is placed right where it needs to be when you first get to the ledge. Incidentally (as I can't run Bizhawk on my laptop due to rendering shenanigans), what was the ring from Past Lynna?
You need to have at least two tiles of walkable space at both the entry point and the exit point, otherwise you'll just fall into a pit. The reason is that you're switching back and forth between tiles as you pitwalk, which makes the game try to pull you into the other pit. If there's an obstruction to where there's a pit of width 1 you can't fool the game into trying to pull you into the other pit because there is no other pit. EDIT: I'm a complete newbie at setting up Bizhawk; when I tried to play back that file I got this:EDIT2: Never mind, I was using an interim build instead of the official release. Doy. EDIT3: And as it turns out, Bizhawk's Ram Watch and VBA-RR's Ram Watch show different values for the addresses I gave earlier, so it's back to the salt mines for me. At least I have a workable test case for finding Monster 0 HP ^^;....
The Tasty Meat and everything after the moustache is out of the way enough for it to be worth skipping, yeah, but there's a couple of disadvantages to using the Expert's Ring that may make a difference entertainment-wise: range and compatability. The Sword gives you the range to attack at an earlier frame, and can be used in conjunction with other items/rings. The Expert Ring can (as far as I know) only be used when nothing is equipped to the buttons and by nature precludes wearing other rings - and since items get used a lot more in Ages than in Seasons, that could mean a lot of menu-switchingIn short, I agree with you, I just don't like that fact that I do. Still, getting the Noble Sword hinges on whether or not Patch accepts that you have the Broken Sword before L4 is opened up, so it may be a moot argument either way we go. EDIT: Scent Seeds. Is there a way to get them before L6 without planting the Scent Seedling? If there is, it's faster to get the Scent Seed Key in Present Mermaid's Cave than the Switch Hook key by several room transitions and an item switch.
Huh, I'd forgotten that rings were tiered. And now to jump topics again: It's theoretically possible to have the entire trading sequence completed by the time you make the first journey up to Patch's Hideaway, since you can pitwalk to the Old Zora Hermit's cave and you'll have gale seeds by that point anyway, mitigating some of the backtrackery. However, it may be entirely possible that Patch won't recognize that you have the broken sword until you've returned the repaired Tuni Nut. I'll test this and report results. EDIT: It may be unnecessary, as the Expert Ring's punch deals 4 damage anyway.
Password Abuse only works in a linked game anyway, which is when the Red Ring would be viable for Ages. For a non-linked game the Green Ring would be viable since it's something you can acquire with sufficient luck manipulation. Each room has a Monster 0; their HP is at address 0000D0A9 and as far as I can see bosses take the Monster 0 spot. I'll post if I find contradictory results. An unboosted Wooden Sword deals 2 HP damage with each hit.
I didn't know GBA mode was kosher for a GBC TAS. I'm assuming that a Linked Game TAS would be a different beast entirely? The Red Ring is (supposed to be) earned in Seasons for killing the four golden beasts so it's probably better to assume it's unavailable for an Ages-first arc. The Green Ring might be more beneficial since it can be generated legit in either game, reduces the time spent fighting bosses, and allows for more damage boosting. Not to the same degree as the specialized Red and Blue rings, but the potential is there.