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The average question takes 5-6 seconds
An "eye" question takes about 10 seconds
The Zubba challenge in question takes about 20 seconds from starting the square.
Holding A+B seems to be the fastest way to get questions to scroll, it reads a line at a time or something.
All questions including challenges change extremely frequently (maybe per frame?) I would guess the best way to choose a question would be to walk onto the square as normally (you spend like half a second traversing the square and it doesn't matter where on the square you hit A) and then hit A to trigger the question on the shortest question in the interval with the answer at the top of the list.
Interesting fact: You can only move by walking with Banjo once on the board. You can walk onto the board in any other form of movement (Invincibility, Kazooie), but you can only trigger questions while walking/standing with Banjo anyway.
POSSIBLY USEFUL: It seems that if Banjo is running in a direction, if you turn around and crouch upon turning around you seem to gain more speed than when banjo is walking. This may be the best method of traversing the board. I didn't test this using frame advance, it definitely seems faster though. If Banjo chooses a square while crouched, after the square is over he will be standing as well. (Banjo cannot roll on the board to my knowledge. Banjo normally cannot do his standing B attack, but if you quickly turn around and do it, it sometimes works. You may be able to apply this knowledge to get him to roll, but I couldn't.)
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After some testing, every question is about the same length except "Eyes" and "Clocks". Music/SFX questions can have the music canceled before the sound even begins for extremely minimal time loss. Eyes can be canceled shortly after they begin, but the game takes 4 or 5 seconds before it registers this.
There seem to be two good routes
The Right Route:
Grab the jokers left of the start, cancel a "clock" and an "eye". Go a little out of your way and grab the jokers on the mid right. use these to skip another "clock" and another "eye". (Going out of your way to answer two fast questions is almost surely faster than getting two eye questions.)
Right Route
21 Normal Questions
3 Eyes
41 Squares Traversed (Counting is kinda subjective, but relatively this one takes more steps.)
The Left Route:
Grab the jokers left of the start. The joker on the middle left takes one less question to grab than the one in the top left. Cancel 3 clocks and 1 eye.
Left Route
21 Normal Questions
3 Eyes
39 Squares Traversed
Other Notes:
I assumed that bypassing a clock is faster than an extra 2 questions or so. I may have miscounted something, or I may very well have not taken something into account, so feel free correct me.
I think the left route is better, I may be bad at counting, music questions may take a split second longer than the average question, but I didn't take that into account.
Skull questions throw you off into the lava in a semirandom direction. It is possible to hover just before you hit the lava. I could not find a way to abuse it, but the fact that it throws you in a semirandom direction is worth noting.
The question given at any point in time changes multiple times per second.
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Constructive solution much appreciated.
Realize that I was not asking anyone to spend half an hour to make me a savestate. I would've thought after all of the discussion that someone had one available, which apparently was not the case.
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Could someone upload a savestate outside Furnace Fun for my leisure testing pleasure. My other options include beating the game or holding tab on a movie for half an hour
EDIT: I would have figured someone already had a savestate (that would take like 45 seconds to upload) after all of the discussion.
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I did some messing around as well. I got to a room where I'm stuck dying, and then I just demonstrated how to get to a bunch of rooms that aren't that interesting.
The room with the elevator shaft where I'm stuck dying in the first video may be useful. I got tired of testing.
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1967852583/Stuck%20Dying.fcmhttp://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/635852407/Messing%20Around%20Falling.fcm
The first video I get caught somehow behind an elevator shaft and die 3 times in a row.
The second video is basically just me exploring a bunch of rooms for anyone curious. There is a room in the beginning of the video that has a skull in it that may be abusable. Nothing too productive overall. I did manage to clip into one block of a wall somehow at the end.
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Plenty the former, and plenty the latter if we designate it as politically *apathetic*.
In all seriousness, many times when I hear news on television I have to go look up objective sources online to correct the media's obscured portrayal of events. The American news stations probably contribute greatly to the ignorant American stereotype.
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I think a more interesting method would be to impose a time limit. Making it a shorter game and saying you can only spend 5-10 hours on the run (over the course of a week or two) would make it less of a "free time contest". I also agree that it should probably be a game that no one has done yet.
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I think it should stay, it gives the site some nice character. I think if it really does take up that much CPU usage, it should be modified to allow a disabling option (perhaps in user profile options?). Or perhaps the script should be modified to only run for a set amount of time (maybe the first 30-60 seconds a page has been open?).
I'm just trying to provide possible solutions, I don't know anything about coding. I would hate to see the Mario/Luigi get scrapped, it's so cool.
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I'd like to see Warp Room, Dark Prison, and Killer Gate after/as you finish them.
As I said before you need to hit the switch as early as possible in Warp Room, perhaps with a bomb kick. In Dark Prison the routing is going to be important because of that stupid back platform. If you can get on the platform as soon as you need to, the route is probably pretty efficient.
As I mentioned before Killer Gate is going to require some intensive position and height manipulation to appear optimal. On that note I wonder if it would be feasible and more optimal to drop the first bomb earlier and have the bomb that actually delivers the first hit to the submarine explode early from the first bomb. If you are extremely low to the ground for the first hit you may be able to do this, but you can't hit yourself with it.
Also once you get to Baruda, make sure after you deliver the first hit he never gets too far away to hit him as soon as his stun time is up. It SHOULD be possible. There's a small chance that it isn't though.
I just mentioned this because I think it would be good to collaborate on these levels as you're doing them so that they appear optimal before moving on.
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Majora's Mask is extremely interesting, and it is also a popular game. It is probably better suited than Ocarina of Time because Ocarina of Time's upcoming run will pretty much butcher the gameplay. The upcoming submission that Swordless Link is work on will be a phenomenal run once completed, and I also think the current run is quite worthy as well.
With regard to Megaman runs, perhaps to avoid repetition we should only choose 1 Megaman run. If people see that run and really enjoy it, they will obviously look up the others. I would suggest Megaman 2 because it is often viewed as the best and most popular in the series.
I also think Rockman & Forte 100 CDs is one of the best movies on the site. The action packed zipping is beyond impressive. Though the game itself is somewhat unheard of, anyone who has played any game in the Megaman series will appreciate the run.
EDIT: King's Bounty is a little weak. It requires you to read the submission text to understand what is going on. I think it's awesome that a complex game can be beaten in 10 seconds. Without that, the video itself is pretty weak, and most people who aren't familiar with TASing will just end up confused.
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After about 5 minutes of watching videos I finally concluded that I haven't played this sequel.
I thought I saw in a video that you can latch onto walls with your tongue. Can this occur anywhere or just on certain walls, and is it useful?
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Since you were looking for more opinions, I watched nineko's encode. Having never played this game before, this movie is pretty interesting for the first ten minutes or so. The minigames bring some interesting viewing, and the playable portions of the run are fairly action packed with some pretty good music.
I would think this movie is quite impressive to people who have played this game before. I myself went through about half the run without fast-forwarding, and I found it all to be entertaining up until it got pretty repetitive.
5/9
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Wall of Text:
Baxter wrote:
SMB3
Currently the any% run has a star. This is the current version of Morimoto's famous movie, and has a lot of history.
Perhaps for that reason alone this run should stay starred.
Baxter wrote:
Super Mario 64
Currently both the 0 star run, and the 120 star run are starred.
I think the 0 Star run should stay starred because of the simple fact that it beats the game without any regard for what one would normally have to do to complete the game. It may be becoming old for us because we've seen it so many times, but for a newcomer I think it would be a phenomenal sight. The current 120 star run is becoming dated. I think the next production of the 120 star run will definitely be worthy of a star. The current one is questionable.
Baxter wrote:
SMW
Super Mario World has two starred movie
The awesomeness of the small only run came from watching the authors juggle 2-3 items at once in order to accomplish impossible feats to get to the exit. I found about 80% of this run to be quite entertaining, which is pretty good for the length. The regular run is pretty good as well. I don't think a hack should get a star though.
Baxter wrote:
The two Zelda stars
Currently, "The Legend of Zelda", and "Zelda: A Link to the Past" have stars. Is AlttP too long for this kind of run?
After Tompa is done with LttP, it will be more than worthy of a star in my opinion. Every 10 minutes WIP is like Christmas. NES Zelda is more interesting to me than SMB1 running in a straight line personally. I don't know that the game itself is in the league of these other runs, but it is quite good.
Baxter wrote:
Excitebike
Is it the best choice for this racing game to have a star or are Biker Mice From Mars or Super Mario Kart better options?
Excitebike is short, quick, and broken. Super Mario Kart is somewhat slow paced and repetitive. I'll admit there are moments that are awesome, but there's a lot of load times and a lot of strategies repeated on a lap per lap basis.
Baxter wrote:
SMW2
It's quite a long run, and besides some interesting strategies, is there something really extraordinary about this run?
While the run is done very well from a technical aspect, most people can't see anything but running in a straight line messing around. Also, to my knowledge, not that many people have actually played this game as compared to other Mario runs.
Baxter wrote:
Mega Man X & X2
While it shows off a very interesting concept, the question is, is it really entertaining to watch?
I think this run is very good material because it shows off a unique aspect of TASing. Another duo game run may be better suited for this, but this is probably the best run we have for now. (See my previous post about Megaman 3-6 Quad.)
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Is there some place documenting exactly how to not make these sorts of complicating errors when making an N64 TAS? I skimmed through the FAQ and found nothing of particular interest on the subject. Perhaps I'm not looking in the correct spot?
Basically what I'm saying is if I were doing an N64 TAS, which I may well be doing in the future, what things should I look out for to make your life easier. Feel free to link me to this information if it is hiding from me somewhere.
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KennyMan666 wrote:
No, you spin faster the farther away from the pole you are when you grab it. And I'm pretty sure the tongue stretches faster than you can walk. So grabbing them from as far away as possible is the fastest way of doing it.
I understand that it is faster to grab the average pole from as far away as possible. I was discussing this with regard to the specific rooms in kids' land. I'm talking about the "step on the lit up platform" rooms. I would think getting your tongue to hit the pole as soon as possible would be the fastest. I would also think that no matter how far you are away from the pole it takes the same amount of time to rotate a specified angle. I may be wrong, but he chooses neither the minimum or maximum radius so surely something is wrong.
Thanks for addressing my other question.
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This looked much better than the previous run.
I must say I'm somewhat hesitant on the optimization in this run. Not noticing that the other levels are over 2 minutes faster is a fairly large oversight. The other two levels were then redone in 1-2 days which seems to be a pretty quick redo.
One particular part I'd like to point out is in Kids' Land when you spin around the pole to land on the specific platforms. I would think it would be faster to spin around the minimal radius possible.
There were a couple rooms where it seemed to me that you chose a bad spot to start eating enemies from while walking across a room. This could be you using luck manipulation that I couldn't see though.
In ghost castle is it possible to vault up to the next room in the spinning room faster than you jump up?
A couple movements and strategies seemed a bit suboptimal, but overall the run was pretty good, and I have been wanting to see a TAS of this for some time. I'm glad to see this run completed.
7.5 / 7
EDIT: Is there any potential for an all crowns run? I think it would make many rooms a lot less linear. We would also get to see all the levels in one run. You can eat crowns with your tongue right?
Here's the only FAQ on GameFAQs. It mentions a few things. http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/n64/file/196896/6844
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klmz wrote:
No doubts:
* NES Megaman 3+4+5+6 (I haven't watched Megaman X1+X2 yet.)
Unfortunately, people I show that video to will often sit and argue with me that it isn't played with one controller. For this reason I think it would be better to keep X1/X2 on the list and perhaps link to Megaman 3-6 in the movie description. I do think X1/X2 is a good candidate for the list because it is an interesting demonstration even 3 years after creation.
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A few comments regarding some of the points being brought up here.
I think JXQ's input animations during his Super Metroid 100% run would actually be confusing or misleading to newcomers. We all understand that it is all done through the emulator, but some people may just see it as pictures put over the encode. Newcomers aren't familiar with the emulator interface.
As for the Super Mario Bros run, I think we all understand and respect the amount of effort that has gone into optimizing that run, but numerous people have brought up that it's hard for a newcomer to see those things. The flagpole glitch is definitely impressive, but a newcomer may be watching the movie and say "Hm, that was weird, the flag didn't go down." This movie is pretty borderline when looking to show "obvious" tool-assistance to a new viewer.
A list of games I think definitely make great starring material from personal viewing (in no particular order):
*This list only contains material I am familiar with.
Mario 64 0 star
Mario 64 120 stars
Majora's Mask
SNES Zelda LttP
Rockman and Forte 100 CDs
NES Megaman __ (no preference)
NES Legend of Zelda
Super Metroid (in some form, not so much the xray glitch one.)
I think it is also worth considering Donkey Kong Country 2/3 EDIT: I guess I'm biased like you Super Mario Bros kids. =p
Regarding the point that some of these are waiting to be obsoleted, I think it would be fine from some of them to be omitted from the list until they are obsoleted.
Regarding lesser known material, I honestly don't know if viewers will be able to understand the tool assisted manipulation of the game if they aren't familiar with TASing to begin with.
So I guess I would say somewhat popular material is good, I would also say the run should show obvious tool-assistance throughout.
I honestly think somewhat popular material is better suited, but that's just me.
There is definitely more debate to continue on this matter.
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If I recall correctly, standing still in front of pison for 3-4 frames advances the RNG each few frames. The RNG advances constantly while in dungeons, just not DURING a dungeon fight.
I tested 4 or 5 Pison fight sequences in my old Test Run and I believe to get a different sequence only required a few frames of waiting.
What I was saying is the RNG for the beginning of the fight is locked as soon as you open up the menu to talk to him.
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I think King of Kong is definitely something all serious video game players should feel required to watch at some point.
I'd give it a high rating because it's the only intense video gaming documentary I've ever seen. If someone has seen something better I'd like to hear of it.
Also, a useful piece of information that I got from the documentary is that Twin Galaxies is pretty lame.
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ThMrksman wrote:
Also i now know that it is definately possible to get the phone in Fog Route without losing health or wasting any time, (might lose a frame or two lining him up for the gap but nothing worth wasting life over).
Yeah this is good, skip that heart in Rock n' Road then. We literally don't waste any time grabbing a heart throughout the entire run now.
ThMrksman wrote:
What i really want to know is, should i go for this style where i try to do something different most times, or should i try something else?
The bomb combos were nice. You did some cool stuff with the music.
One of the times you hit Nitros he is a bit off the ground initiating an attack. That may or may not be losing frames, you should check that.
If that's not an issue I think it looks great.
In Dragon Road at about 19500 did dropping the bomb preserve your forward momentum while falling? That's how it appears to be at least. O_o If not I wouldn't worry about fixing it.
EDIT: 100th post. Awesome.
2nd EDIT: The thought about dropping the bomb to preserve forward momentum may be useful in water pool when falling into the tunnel area. I doubt it will help actually, but I thought I would mention it.
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I'm really enjoying this run. I haven't seen the previous full run for comparison, but the optimization and the glitches are just phenomenal.
Every new segment brings new entertainment. ^_^
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After 3 months of no progress on this run I decided I am going to finally crack down and finish it over this next month or two.
Here is my WIP through stage two.
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/571931247/Bad%20Dudes%20WIP%20Semi.fm2
Stage 1: The pattern of jump - jump - glitch rejump spin kick gains about 1 distance unit each time it is used. I confirmed this with memory watch. This stage is nearly frame perfect to my knowledge.
Stage 2: Entertainment up to par? I tried to demonstrate as many glitches and precise hits as possible. I lost 17 frames throughout the level compared to my previous run, but I think the entertainment factor will be higher if I ignore lag and focus on entertainment. I'm not really willing to put in the effort to minimize 17+ frames of lag over a minute and a half. The boss fight was just thrown in as a demonstration, it is not frame perfect at all. I just didn't feel like doing it tonight.
Any feedback for Stage 2, or things I should focus on in the other sidescrolling level? (Stage 5)
If you are interested in viewing my entire test run it is in the above post. I saved about 2 seconds in the first level and lost about 17 frames in the second level as compared to the previous run.
