-ill need to retest the hole lake level and work out exactly how many frames it will cost to get the firepower/health, they may be worth grabbing (bombs are obviously worth getting)
Bombs are actually LESS worth getting than firepower. Firepower allows us to hit things from further away. (Sky room 3 firepower would have been beneficial for hitting the box with the key card, but it wasn't worth the time waste to get it.)
The firepower in the pillar is more "on the path" than the one I grab in the Test WIP.
In the stage with the submarines (where you're the copter) we need at least 3 bombs, and as much firepower as we can afford to get. I think we can have 4 at this point, but I'll need to look over it again.
Also, health rationing is still an issue, as I'm not sure what we're looking at in world 3 yet.
ThMrksman wrote:
-the bomb jump in red cave looks awesome :P
I hope to do more of these. ^_^
ThMrksman wrote:
-Nitros got pwned. Do you think the score of 8220 that you got on the first nitros battle should be repeatable on W2 and W4 nitros's? Because in the second one you only ended up with 8210. Were both optimal or just the first?
Neither was completely optimal to my knowledge. I played it in almost real time. You can probably beat it by 10 or 20 points.
ThMrksman wrote:
-Endol fight looked pretty optimal to me, was funny when you stopped him from firing the lightning ball.
Again I played that almost in real time, don't use the score I got as a gauge.
ThMrksman wrote:
-the routes for Dark Prison and the other key crystal collecting level in area 3 blew me away, high entertainment value there.
Yeah I thought Dark Prison was the most intuitive route so far. You may be better off going to the back half of the level first though. (You'll notice the one platform was in a terrible spot when I got to it.)
ThMrksman wrote:
About my latest WIP, i've only redone the first two levels so far but saved 34 more frames on each. (thats 134 frames total compared to my first WIP at the end of level 2, over 2 seconds) I'll pick up the pace with making it soon!
With these strategy changes this is probably about as optimized as we can get it right now.
I'd like to see your WIP after you complete sky room.
I have a bunch of stuff to do today and an exam tomorrow so I'll look into some more unknowns Friday night. I'll also post the "play by play" of the WIP (what I did right and wrong).
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I would guess that your media player doesn't support a certain video codec in many .avi files. Windows Media Player default has this problem.
I run all of my videos through MPlayer (freeware).
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Awesome mastery of an extremely useful technique.
I almost wonder if Swordless could weave his way up Snowfall with this technique. Here's hoping for ridiculousness.
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ThMrksman wrote:
-in world 2 area 1 level 1(groog hills?) its a load faster to use up two health points flying through the water to the exit so health might be an issue then
I tested jumping from the left half of the level, and taking two damage to get to the right half vs. going through the tree warp, around the left side and taking 1 water damage boost. Doing semi-optimized tests, it appears that going through the warp is extremely close or possibly actually faster. If I had to guess I'd say the warp is faster by a quarter of a second. I'm also at 2 health at the beginning of this level so this is the better option.
I took 1 damage in Fog Route to grab the remote between the two bombs without stopping. I'm not sure if this is necessary or not.
ThMrksman wrote:
-and are you certain that waterway is faster? water slider was used in the SDA run and ive always seen it as the faster course by a long way, on the other hand, if you're sure, then waterway it is :P
If you go to Water Slider you have to fight an extra manta ray. If you can beat him without him pushing you back at all you will gain a second over my best trial, which still leaves the waterway path about 1-2 seconds faster. If you can manage to bomb jump up to the last platform in Water Slider this would make it the better path, but I don't think it can be done.
Captain Forehead wrote:
Heh, I just found out that on the sky room on the second conveyor, it will be faster if you jump onto that yellow fence then onto the tower where you get your card key.
Jumping off the skewer will be faster I'm pretty sure. Unless you meant the yellow wall BEFORE the conveyor. I could not manage a bomb jump from this wall, and I wasn't very close.
If either of you want my WIP contact me on AIM (kirkq1234) or PM me an email address to send it to. Microstorage is still down.
For the record I don't plan on optimizing this run fully, so feel free to implement all my work into a publishable run.
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Once I can upload my Test WIP I'd recommend you redo Area 1 one final time and I think we can call it done. Hopefully with our combined efforts there won't be a need to go back and redo for routing errors in future Areas. Minor stuff can be overlooked later, but this is still so early in the run.
I'm up to World 2 Area 2 on my test run.
Things to note:
- We do NOT get health back between worlds.
- Firepower is not going to make the Nitros or Endol fight any faster.
- Dragon Road was fairly easy to route. I just stay at the top of the level and keep moving to the right.
- I found a couple interesting paths in Great Rock/Fog Route.
- If going perfectly straight in water levels is fastest you may as well just go straight. Water levels are extremely boring as is, so we may as well just get it over with quickly.
- In world 2 area 1 Erars Lake we get two free health which brings us back to maximum at that point. (You don't need the health in Bubble Hole.)
- I tested the Waterway and Water Slider paths. Waterway seems to be faster by a solid 2-3 seconds when you consider the extra manta ray fight in Erars Lake.
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An accounting of stuff in my WIP I do different that you may have missed. (I'd recommend you watch it at some point.)
Battle Room: Shortly after the booster if you jump onto the trampoline to the far ledge, you will save a little bit of time by not having to move upwards.
Hyper Room: I bombed the wall panel like I suspected quite cleanly, it's far better than your previous video. I stay on the conveyor as long as possible and jump to like the third stair because my forward velocity is maintained longer.
Secret Room: Only what I previously mentioned.
Sky Room: To avoid the first conveyor completely, jump down and right and land on the small ledge. (jumping from the yellow side rail.) To avoid the second conveyor jump to the platform over the hole and jump and grab the yellow side railing and climb up.
-I then short jump from the top platform onto the beginning of the conveyor. I run on the conveyor until I get to the knives, run along parallel to the knives and jump from the highest point to the side of the tower and climb up. (I think this is faster, it might not be.)
-I could not manage to bomb the crate from the trampoline with a level 2 firepower. It could be done with a level 3 firepower, but this is too far out of the way to be worth it (the only possibility is in hyper room.)
-I tried jumping and damaging myself from the platform directly left of the exit onto the exit platform and I got extremely close. I spent probably half an hour trying to make a perfect jump and I could not make it with what appeared to be flawless jumps.
I'd recommend you look at my WIP for a better idea of what I did when I can upload it.
Blue Cave: Straightforward obviously.
Hole Lake: I would get up to 4 bombs and 3 firepower here if it doesn't lose time. You may be able to get the 4th firepower in the pillar without losing time, but I couldn't manage to (didn't try very long.).
Red Cave: I managed to make the jump from the platform to the exit by throwing a bomb at the wall and damage boosting to the platform.
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Microstorage is down, but I'm working on a ridiculous jump in Sky Room. I'd recommend you wait before going too much further to see if I can make this jump.
Contact me on AIM (kirkq1234) if you want my latest WIP from today. Microstorage is down.
Also, I just made that jump in red cave ^_^
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I'm working on a Test Run TAS (Strategies optimized, movement not so much) and I'm fairly confident I've found better strategies in at least two spots. I'll upload it after I make some more progress.
Captain Forehead wrote:
Dancing?! You kiddin? I'd rather he moves to Nitros's music than dancing.
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ThMrksman wrote:
By the way with 0:36 at stage 1, doing another jump is faster than holding on to the ledge.
I just remembered, I think if you hold left or right coming off that boost it affects how far you go by a little bit. You probably already knew this. It appears you are doing it optimally though.
ThMrksman wrote:
Jumping is as fast as running on flat ground
and they are equally fast uphill (even though jumping looks faster)
i didnt test for downhill though, so i will.
Thanks for addressing this.
ThMrksman wrote:
2:25 - the jump onto the trampoline was sloppy, ill redo that. However i did discover that randomly throwing a bomb appeared to make bomberman land several frames faster, which is why i threw that bomb. (I'll see if i can get it to hit something to make it look less sloppy but i doubt that it would be practical)
This is an interesting find. If it can't hit something that's fine, as long as it saves time.
ThMrksman wrote:
Damage boosting is going to be a big feature of the TAS but as i don't want to really go out of my way to pick up health
I didn't recall health carrying between levels. Do you get health refills after areas or worlds? I don't recall. As long as you're rationing it appropriately it's fine, but I would check little things as they come up and see how much time they save if you can afford the health loss.
A couple new things:
2:08: Would bombing the switch in midair stop the conveyor before you would normally get off it? (speeding you up slightly.) If that doesn't work I think you should run on the conveyor for a bit so that you only have to jump one time to get on normal ground as soon as possible.
I don't remember how damage affects you really. If I recall there's a substantial stun time, but I'm looking for the possibility of boosting onto a platform or a possibility of getting in the exit faster.
One more thing I'd add. Can you bomb midair without losing time? If so you should bomb enemies to improve entertainment value. (The chicken in Stage 3 jumps out at me among other things.)
I'll play through the first world tonight or tomorrow. I'll particularly look at some possibilities in stage 4.
Also, Bomberman needs to dance to Nitros's theme (such a good track).
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I'm not really an expert on this game, but I have played through it a few times. I'm going to list things that may or may not be slowing you down.
Stage 1: (0:29) Falling down into the pit at the beginning seems to me to be slower than jumping, you should test this. Also, I'm not very familiar with N64 TASing, do moving 'right' and moving 'down and right' give you the same velocity to the right or not?
Stage 2: (0:58) It appears you are running into that wall longer than necessary, is it possible to bomb it from the previous jump or perhaps jump shorter on the first jump making the second one occur earlier. Is jumping as fast as running on flat ground, what if you're going uphill, what if you're going downhill? It appears going uphill jumping is faster like you've done at the end, would this also apply on the conveyors at the beginning? I'm not sure why you don't jump the maximum height at the end though. Your jump heights in general seem sporadic and you may be losing time by not using optimal movements.
Stage 3: (1:38) I think you should not go out of your way to bomb this before getting there. If you throw a bomb towards the right side of the block upon getting there I think you should be able to sneak in through the left side without getting hit.
Stage 4: (2:12) I think jumping on that platform on the right may be faster. (2:20) Jumping from the upper platform directly onto the conveyor may be faster. (2:25) Why do you jump for the back of the trampoline and not the part closest to you?, and opening the box appears unoptomized, (You used a bomb to help you change direction?, Is this necessary?) Perhaps getting a firepower upgrade would be beneficial for opening this box?
Stage 5: Running downhill may be faster than jumping.
Stage 6: If you plan on submitting this run you will need to put some effort into entertainment (though it may be especially difficult to entertain in a boring water level).
Stage 7: Is there any possible use for damage boosting in this game? Perhaps hitting yourself can get you past the bombs at the end better?
Large issues: What is the order of speed on walking, walking uphill, walking downhill, jumping, jumping uphill, jumping downhill, and falling.
If I had to guess I would say you want to walk downhill and jump uphill, and falling appears to slow your forward movement. You definitely want to find out for sure though before you move on.
(A bunch of minor edits to those points.)
Half of that list appeared unoptimized to me, half of it is just my own speculation. Unless you have reasons many of those choices were made, I'd suggest you go back and redo it. This run is going to hugely be affected by movement optimization, and your movement choices only seem convenient/sporadic.
That being said, I appreciate the fact that you're putting effort into this run as I do enjoy this game. If you plan to submit this eventually I'd recommend you test much of this out and redo it.
If I'm wrong about many of my points feel free to tell me so. I'm just going by appearance/my experiences playing the game.
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The technical quality of the run was very impressive after reading the submission text. Unfortunately, the entertainment factor of this category of run is pretty mediocre overall (to no fault of the author). Regardless, this should surely obsolete the previous NG+ run.
I highly anticipate the game-breaking full game run.
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I managed to finish this with no help. I got kinda lucky on level 14. Also, I played the domino level with sound off unknowingly.
An enjoyable half an hour.
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just want to warn everyone that, as of what I witnessed on my friend's console this morning, the xbox360 version MAY (*see below) lag enough to be annoying, and the pause button is set to 'back', making it extremely irritating to pause without stopping while time attacking.
*Quoth someone on SDA: "No, that was live being (rare as hell btw) completely screwed up in the middle of the night, before it came out."
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I managed to get Jewel Man in 1:28 today. The leaderboard scores range from 1:22.xx~1:24.5x.
I'm not even sure how to save 5.5 seconds, I'm literally moving almost the entire level, and I thought I had a near perfect boss fight. I'll probably look at it again tomorrow.
I considered making a new topic about this in the speedrun competitions forum, but I don't know if that many people would discuss speedrunning it.
If anyone is serious about this game, I'd gladly talk strategy for each level as I work on them.
EDIT: I got 1:24.9x like three times today. I'm literally half a second from the leaderboard >_<.
EDIT2: WOOT #9 on the scoreboards ^_^
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Point taken, mmbossman.
Raiscan wrote:
Discussion is fine. Asking a Judge ahead of submission is fine. Clarifying things beforehand is fine. Blindly submitting random m64s/movie files will only result in bad things.
I agree with this statement very much.
alden wrote:
Perhaps this one does not have "enough" entertainment but I don't see how a run like this is not "a movie of a classic console game being played extraordinarily....
I also agree with this. I would enjoy watching unique, breakable games like Mario 64 played 10 different ways rather than seeing the next 60 frame improvement.
This run showcased very interesting new tricks that cannot be applied in the speedruns, but as a whole I would agree it isn't submission material. As stated by the author it is suboptimal in DDD and BitS. What I meant was that this concept should be considered in the future, and next time I will use more than two lines of text to state my opinions =).
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Entertainment has been a goal of previously published runs for other games.
This run offers new exciting content not offered in other runs, so I think (EDIT:) A RUN OF THIS TYPE could qualify as submission material.
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Ferret Warlord wrote:
I'd like to mention that Nintendo's Wiimote+Chuck looks like a really good middle ground.
(EDIT: used this comment to bring my statements into conversation, not really to contract anything said, should've clarified, sorry.)
My biggest problem with the Wiimote is its mild inaccuracy in serious gaming.
Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz is probably the worst offender of this. The game content was okay, but the control scheme had you tilt the remote to control the character which could be inaccurate and hard to control. I didn't finish the game because the control scheme was too irritating.
The motion sensor is fun for casual "motion based" gaming, but if you were going for world records it would be really nice to have the joystick usable.
Super Mario Galaxy's control scheme was fine, but it was almost exactly the same as using a Gamecube Controller besides the spin jump.
I could go into my Twilight Princess rant, but I'll just leave it at "catch 2 fish."
All that being said, I opt to use Gamecube controller in all cases (Brawl, Mario Kart Wii) because it gives more accurate control and it is easier to hold and deal with (cords, batteries, etc.)
On an unrelated note, I hate how I can't play a Gamecube game in my Wii without using a Wii-Mote to bypass the menu. It's a HORRIBLE programming oversight.
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I wish I could view this right now, but I will have to wait for an AVI or publication.
I'm sure this "All dungeons" run will be far more entertaining than the RBA run will be, but I look forward to the completion of that one as well. It is extremely interesting to see the game beaten as fast as possibly, but it seems that it is more entertaining to see the run beaten in it's fullest.
I am humored by the fact that this run is almost shorter than Guanobowl's.
Unfortunately this run is not technically in the same category, so I don't think it can obsolete the previous run.
Almost surely a yes vote, but I will withhold my vote until an AVI gets published (if it gets published before the run is accepted, which it surely will be.).
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The converse of that is "In melee its about get them off the stage for auto death.", which I don't think is a good thing either.
Also, I think you're correct about our playing. I think I played you in friendlies at FC3 or 6, and then at Pound 2 you destroyed me in friendlies, proving that I would lose in a tournament match were it to occur.
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I realize most people disagree with my opinion of this run, but I would like to put my opinion of brawl next to XIF's. XIF is a highly credible melee player, he beat me a couple years ago in a nationwide tournament. I think some of his claims against brawl are a bit exaggerated, though much of his argument is quite clear.
Much of brawl is about offensive and defensive tactics. Generally the character with the better projectile stands back and shoots projectiles while the other character is stuck on the offensive. Yes, a lot of character counters exist, and yes the strategy is quite repetitive/campy at times.
I've been to a few brawl tournaments and I play a very simple-styled ROB. I do very few risky or flashy moves, and much of my strategy is defensive.
XIF wrote:
Metaknight is far and away the best character in that game. He really should be banned...
Metaknight is very good yes, and it is very hard to fight against some of his moves. Tornado is easily the hardest move in the game to get around. I deal with this by standing at the edge of the level at most times so Meta Knight takes a large risk tornadoing off the stage. The Up B should never kill you, simply don't float above him. The infinite down B will likely be banned as a stall tactic, it is of no concern beyond that.
XIF wrote:
There are other dumb characters like snake who can live to 200 and kill at 80%
Snake gets gimped off the edge quite easily, and his game is very limited by some characters such as falco, DeDeDe and in my opinion ROB as well.
XIF wrote:
Falco also basically makes half the cast unplayable...
Ganondorf, Ivysaur, Sonic, and (I'll also add) Ness were already all but unplayable without these issues. Falco can also only chain grab most characters to 40%. All games have terrible characters, brawls terrible characters are just comparatively more terrible than melee's.
DeDeDe is probably the most gameplay quality degrading character chain throwing half the cast the length of the stage.
XIF wrote:
One of the things that made Melee and SSB64 stand out was its in depth edgeguarding game...
Melee is an edgeguarding game, I think it's ridiculous how much edge guarding factors into the game. Marth most often wins by gimping characters at like 50%
Brawl is not about gimping a stock off of your opponent, it's simply a different mentality behind the gameplay.
I think melee can be criticized due to too much edgeguarding, and brawl for perhaps not enough.
XIF wrote:
Zelda's Dins Fire is one move that is just really fast and hits a large area. Pikachu gets almost no lag from his down B anymore, plus its powerful making off the top kills a joke for him. Lucario has the ridiculous aura ability.
You can powershield almost every projectile in the game. Approaching through Zelda's Din's Fire is dash, shield, dash, shield. Pikachu's down B is easy to air dodge through and nowhere near broken, and Lucarios aura really doesn't even make him a great character.
In conclusion, yes there is stupid stuff in brawl. Chain throws, Meta Knight's Tornado, and projectile spamming are among these. I also think that there was a lot wrong with melee.
I know a lot of players who take XIF's side of the opinion, and I know a lot of players who take my side of the opinion.
Brawl is simply a different game, better or worse.
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Upon entering Great Bay, you Goron rolled to the water slowly because you were out of magic. Did you consider methods to fix this, or is gathering magic just slower? I may have overlooked some other factor.
The run is still looking awesome regardless.
