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I've been using 2.6.3 which was the version my TAS was originally started on. I've just checked them on the latest version of 2.9.1, and the scripts and movies work which is a good sign.
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Well the prepackaged script basically crashes Bizhawk as soon as it's running whilst in a level. The original script spits out a whole bunch of errors in the Lua Output window which prevents frame advancement, ie "Warning: attempted read of 1653891761 outside the memory size of 4194304. Message Cap reached, supressing output." etc, and your recent one still gives the error "NLua.Exceptions.LuaScriptException: [string "main"]:350: unexpected symbol near '<'.
However, removing the <<5 from that line at least gives a working output, just with scaling off. I'll see if I can tidy it up a bit more, thank you.
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Thank you. I've tried both the Jim2bizhawk.lua visible above and the EarthwormJim2 script which comes for free with Bizhawk, which complains about memory searching or crashes the emulator respectively. The Gens script still works, so I've still got an understanding of what it's trying to do, but unfortunately it's no good when TASing on Bizhawk.
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Link to video
New movie was in progress, but I've been dealt a bad RNG hand for the Puppy Levels and I haven't managed to fix the Lua script to help navigate them. Currently it's too annoying and time consuming to try everything blindly, and I haven't managed to find any faster solutions with the RNG calls I've been getting; hopefully I'll get it sorted this year.
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Dimon12321 wrote:
Nice improvement! Why does it sometimes take longer for zombies to die when you're using the grenade launcher. Do they have more health?
Zombies at that point usually have 50-70 health, for which a critical rifle shot can do a maximum of 50 damage, whereas gas grenades do ticks of 20 damage a piece. There's a thread on damage numbers on Speedrun.com with further information.
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Thank you for doing this TAS, it will certainly serve as a good template and should be good enough for publication. However, I too will voice my concerns for movement and certain choices regarding zombies, as after witnessing the horrific lag they cause makes it almost certain that it's beneficial to spend time killing certain packs rather than dodging them. Obviously such improvements can only be investigated and contrasted once we have a template to compare it to, so this shouldn't be held against you.
Just regarding the first major section, after looting the Coolant Fuse you then backtrack and take the eastern stairs, rather than progressing and taking the western set. Given that you need to be going west in the next room anyway, it would make sense to take the left set instead. Granted, I can appreciate that there's a large pack of zombies in the way, but it's still faster to clear them out and spend time to take the extra ammo, compared to wasting time backtracking and yet still needing to sacrifice time to manipulate the other pack out of your way. Plus, on the return trip up shortly after exiting the kitchen, it means that they're not there to cause path problems or the huge lag which can be seen in the current video.
I haven't been able to get Spikestuff's WIP to sync, but here's my WIP for the first few areas, which shows such an example of improvements. First, you can save ~100 frames by skipping another opening screen properly, so that's something which should be edited into the current publication, if possible. You'll see how the pack of 3 zombies guarding the left side are killed and the handgun ammo looted which takes approximately 250 frames longer than the right hand side route does, but it saves 240 frames in the next room by already being on the left side anyway, plus 200+ further frames are saved on the return journey by not having massive lag or needing to beckon the zombies out of your way. In the next room, the first zombie can be avoided without moving him away, and for the lone enemy who does need to be defeated, it's faster to start combat from closer up so that you don't need to spend time moving the slow aiming reticle. There's still enough time to kill him before he does any damage, so I feel that certain future fights could also be started from closer proximity too.
Future runs in this game will need more research into the potential benefits of extra ammo looting in order to kill more packs of zombies, but for now, yes vote.
Link to video
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I would like to see the ability to change the date system from MM/DD/YYYY to the more sensible DD/MM/YYYY please, as I can't seem to locate such a function currently.
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If her savings are in $10, $50 or $100 bills anyway, then there would be no error occurring. There's not enough information in the problem to have any meaningful solution.
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Yes vote, but I'm certainly concerned for the 1:59 level, as there's a lot of idle time, and feel a reroute is in order. It seems like it would be faster to go to clear out the upper section first.
Try RURULULDLUDRDRURDULULDLD. Either clear out the right hand section on your first trip through, or second, whichever is more convenient for enemy placement.
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Well it was said in the previous topic that an "all levels" branch would obsolete an "any%" branch anyway, and so since it's now become the standard movie it wouldn't make sense to give it a separate branch title.
And in regards to level 1, I still don't believe we should take a sub-optimal route through it for the sake of seeing more things. After all, on other levels there's plenty of little alcoves and side routes which we didn't feel the need to dip into. There are also lots of optional areas which we could have visited for the sake of seeing more things, but it wouldn't make sense to do so. Check out a Longplay vid if you want to see those, you can see extra areas at 18:17, 23:10, 24:45, 48:17 for example. The goal is to complete all levels as quickly as possible, which has been done.
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Sorry, uploaded the wrong movie file. 14 minutes would be a bit misleading. This should be the current movie to upload.
Edit, fixed link, added 1 frame to get it to work properly. Let this be the end of it.
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Not at all. The route already effective drops through it when going to the final 2 levels anyway, so hub routing isn't the problem. I would prefer an All Doors TAS to an Any% TAS at this rate, just so our efforts on the skippable levels are not entirely wasted. Obviously the problem is that I'll need to do the 2 extra levels, which I am currently progressing on.
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Upon investigation, it appears Espyo was correct, Levels 1 and 4 can indeed be skipped for some reason, the subsequent levels can be entered early without completing them, which is stupid. It seems they should be edited out as well, since otherwise it seems pretty arbitrary to keep them in. Strange how that wasn't properly sorted in the previous submission, oh well.
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I managed to save 209 frames through this technique, but had to sacrifice 1 frame over the remaining level in order to get it to synchronise properly. A very minimal sacrifice considering what could go wrong, so I'm perfectly happy with that. Main submission text updated accordingly.
Improved Submission (Obsolete)EncodeArchanfel wrote:
I do not wanted to start frame war at Christmas and thought it would be much better to reveal all these improvements to you now instead of doing new submission later...
Well in the interest of fairness, the improvements you've found are new techniques, rather than better optimisations. This means that if you did decide to stay silent on the new improvements and simply submit your own run, you would ultimately be wasting your time. I could just investigate the new techniques further, and discover that there are improvements. I could also simply stay silent on my optimisations of your new techniques, and then submit my own movie afterwards. It would effectively be the same end result of me having sole authorship, but at least doing it now saves everybody some time. I would only consider sharing if you found something which I cannot improve upon, because then I would admit it's a tie, as opposed to me being in the lead.
And Evil_3D, there's plenty of areas skipped which we could have seen by taking different routes, but the point is to defeat the final boss as fast as possible, as such this is an any% run, rather than 100% or an 'all areas' run.
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Well if you need to come to a stop to let the camera pan, it's better to wedge yourself into the slope rather than skidding to a halt on flat ground. That, plus using another landing boost :)
Link to video
Unfortunately, this is not a nice edit; you probably know this as you didn't also provide a movie link this time. This messes up position and speed subvalues such that it doesn't nicely connect into the previous movie, plus the birds are in different positions on the subsequent tiers. Still worth redoing it though, as it is a significant improvement, so sadly this will delay this submission.
And in regards to authorship...you may have an EXTRA special thanks? Thank you for pointing out the potential improvements, but the fact is I've still managed to improve your suggestions even further, to the point where the current run is still 100% my input. Maybe the description on the run's page can certainly give you recognition for your efforts, but I disagree with promoting you to a co-author as a result.
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Excellent work, I know my initial attempts to bridge that gap failed. Further investigation shows it's possible to save even more frames, I've eliminated the airtime hovering for another 6 frames shaved off, plus 2 more frames on the bath ride. Please can the judges update it with movie instead.
Second attempt (obsolete)
I'd like to offer you special thanks for your efforts, which has certainly helped make this movie even better.
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Yes vote, although I feel at ~55:20 it'd be faster to deliberately release some rats on the roof, so they can start marching towards the left hand area and simply retrap/release them later. I feel this would be faster than making 5 full trips there and back to do each trapped rat.
Edit: I was overlooking how releasing a rat destroys the jar, and so it cannot be reused.
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Easy Riddler Classic this week. A typical path can be described as follows: UURUURRURURUUUU etc, where there are 15!/10!5!=3003 permutations. In general, there are (m+n)!/m!n! paths to take.
Upon investigation, it appears Espyo was correct, Levels 1 and 4 can indeed be skipped for some reason, the subsequent levels can be entered early without completing them, which is stupid. It seems they should be edited out as well, since otherwise it seems pretty arbitrary to keep them in. Strange how that wasn't properly sorted in the previous submission, oh well.