Posts for Lex


Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
What projects? I've only heard of the deterministic JPC project in the other thread, and that was really cloudy.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Beautiful! I have a question, though. Could the overhead flying part in Youtube part 3 be sped up by not aiming at and shooting those enemies? It looks like you slow down there. If that was automated/unavoidable, then, it's all good! Voted yes either way. Edit: Never mind. It looks like the screen catches up when you reorient anyway.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
If Cave Story was reverse-engineered and had TAS features added, could it be accepted alongside the emulators as a viable TAS platform, even though it's one which only plays one game? My argument for this would be that it'd be an executable just like snes9x or fceux with reproducible input video playback. This assumes it would meet all the requirements listed on http://tasvideos.org/EmulatorResources/Requirements.html (excepting those disputed by Nach in the comment). I guess the main problem here would be gaining legal rights etc.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Here's another "WTF HOW DID YOU WIN SO FAST?" videos! I was so surprised when it said "Movie End." before the half-way point in the video, I loled. Voted yes.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Speaking of which, please reverse-engineer Cave Story and add TAS capabilites. Thanks. ;D
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
I agree with Kuwaga. To me, it seems piracy has a symbiotic relationship with software and music companies, giving as much as, if not more than, it takes. I've had this conversation a ton of times though, so I'm going to stop here personally.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Interestingly-enough, the SDA rule after the rule I posted above (which I totally missed), could very-well rule out SRAM corruption in SDA unassisted runs where the runner could have gotten ridiculously lucky and turned off his Game Boy right at the point he would have suddenly had 152 Pokémon. The rule doesn't mention resetting the system specifically, but it touches upon similar ideas:
Speed Demos Archive wrote:
Game modification: Removing or altering a game disc/cartridge/files while the game is running is forbidden. Examples of this are the crooked cartridge trick in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and the CD streaming trick in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. If you're not sure what this rule means, think about it this way: don't mess with your system while playing the game, and don't modify the game itself at any time.
I'm not saying that a run that wouldn't be accepted on SDA shouldn't be accepted on TASvideos. This is tool-assisted speedrunning, after all. I'm just saying in principle, it's probably best to rule some things in the same way. All that being said, the Pokémon Yellow SRAM corruption glitch run is extremely entertaining and totally possible on a real Game Boy with the right ridiculous luck (and I'm all about luck manipulation!), which makes me really want to keep SRAM corruption around as legitimate here.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Nach wrote:
Lex wrote:
With SRAM corruption, there's no permanent damage. The game and the system stay intact to be used later.
Oh, I wouldn't say that. Not at all. Certain games were poorly programmed that they rely on having "valid" states in the SRAM for the game to work properly. If you modify the SRAM contents to values other than the initial one it ships with, or those normally set by the game, the game will no longer work correctly. It's annoying for us emulator authors, as we need to figure out to set an initial SRAM image for certain games.
Hmmm. If that's the case, then maybe it is a more permanent modification after all, and possibly therefore not legitimate. Warp may have a point here. Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, if you consider the fact that the game boots and loads the corrupt SRAM again, then that proves the damage isn't permanent, in cases where TASers used SRAM corruption for their TAS. If the same game with the same SRAM wouldn't boot on a real console, though, the run isn't legit.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Warp wrote:
You could as well try to emulate what happens to the game if you smash the console with a sledgehammer. What happens might be interesting, but is it really TASing?
There's a big difference here between SRAM corruption and smashing the console with a sledgehammer or "emulating" the game being plugged into the system through a Game Genie. With SRAM corruption, there's no permanent damage. The game and the system stay intact to be used later. To complete a legitimate speedrun, the viewer must be able to see the end-of-game sequence. In the case of modifying a chip, you can make the system show the end-of-game sequence, but the system is modified and can't be used to play games normally any more. In the case of smashing the console with a sledgehammer, the console and game can't be used any more, AND the speedrun is not completable due to never being able to see the end-of-game sequence. In the case of playing the game through a Game Genie, the original setup is not intact. The Game Genie is interfering with the direct connection from the game to the console required for the speedrun. The fact that SRAM corruption is done only by pressing buttons on the console and not by modifying the game setup (by having the game go through a Game Genie or similar) or console using a screwdriver or similar external tools makes it a legitimate technique in tool-assisted speed running, in my opinion. On SDA, one of the rules written on their rules page is this:
Speed Demos Archive wrote:
System modification: You are not allowed to modify your system or use extra hardware such as GameSharks and Game Genies. These devices let you alter game parameters and can give you an unfair advantage. The only allowed extra hardware are modchips and boot disks used for playing imports, and official add-ons. For example, the PS2 HDD is allowed, while the HD Loader is not.
Using external hardware or modifying the system is very different from merely making the game change the values in the SRAM already present in the system, which it does while playing normally anyway (via saving).
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
That Splinter Cell security story is inspiring. I have always thought there could be very very complex security that could take a very long time to crack. From the sounds of it, the Pirate Party in Finland takes the idea too far. That's absurd.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
AppleWin is an amazingly accurate Apple II emulator. It emulates all the various models of Apple II: Apple ][ Apple ][+ Apple //e Enhanced Apple //e If not for being Windows-only, it would be great for TASing Apple II classics like Lode Runner, Oregon Trail, Karateka, Summer Games, Winter Games, Track & Field, Spare Change, Prince of Persia, Impossible Mission, etc. etc. etc. There are so many great games that could be TASed with a good Apple II emulator.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
LOL, that was great. What did you DO to that cloud castle to immediately destroy it? Hilarious. It's the same sort of entertainment the King's Bounty run gave me. I have no idea what's going on because I've never played the game, but I could see that something ridiculously messed up just happened and something was won much more immediately than intended.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
We're talking about modifying the VM software to add rudimentary TAS support, so yes, you'd have to modify the VM's source. By modifying the VM's source, you can have full control over every CPU cycle, and have input trigger at a specific CPU cycle, making the VM play back the input perfectly. At least, that seems right to me. Computers are predictable, right? I don't think they're as chaotic as you make it seem. I might be wrong, though. The VM might be trying to emulate as fast as possible by not caring about sequencing of events by using multiple CPU cores on its host (non-virtual) machine. I know debugging through each step of any executable is possible. You could use similar technology for input recording/playback in VMs. Just treat each input point the same as you would treat a breakpoint. The lag present on an actual NES is present in NES emulators, and the movies still play back perfectly with the same lag, reproduced. I don't see how a PC VM should act differently from this. If you do the PC emulation right, you really don't have to consider the whole cascading effect input has to go through to get to the game you're trying to play in the operating system your PC VM is running. Maybe I'm just talking nonsense, like usual. I like to think what I'm saying has some merit, though. :x
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
CyberShadow wrote:
On topic: I don't think this is a good idea, because video/input frames on VMs wouldn't correspond to those on emulators. It'd be hell to time the keystrokes correctly to correspond to emulator input frames.
Could the movie format be written to include exact time points for each input, like video subtitle formats are, and have the VM CPU stop until that input is processed completely? Or is that not the issue you were talking about?
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
CyberShadow, a friend of mine who posted on this forum, used a virtual machine to save his states in Cave Story or Within a Deep Forest (not sure which game it was, but both are great) when he played through them. It's definitely possible and probably not too hard for an experienced coder. If someone wrote the tools and started a WIP TAS of Cave Story or a similarly awesome freeware game, I would definitely set up the VM to play it back! Such an awesome idea. :D
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
I didn't say I disliked them for it. I respect Blizzard a lot, and was happily willing to pay for World of Warcraft. If more great games had great security requiring payment, maybe more game companies would make money and not have to complain about piracy. I understand that it's theoretically impossible to make an uncrackable single-player game without having data served from the server, making that option inaccessible for most small game developing companies. I also buy games I REALLY REALLY enjoy, like how I bought EarthBound after playing it on an emulator.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
The only game I've bought within the past 3 years was World of Warcraft, and that's because the security for it required me to buy it. Actually, that's a lie. I sought out and bought Tetris DS and Pokémon Pearl because at the time, I didn't think there was good enough emulation support for DS games. Also, the touch screen is necessary, and I hadn't heard of flash carts for DS yet. ;o
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
FractalFusion wrote:
Baxter wrote:
MUGG wrote:
A comparison video featuring FractalFusion's and 5z98qTHveupDQ5kL's movies. http://dic.nicovideo.jp/v/sm8779719
The submission text says Fractal_Fusions movie is faster, but in this comparison video, the other version is clearly faster... what's the deal?
Interesting video. I had assumed that I was always faster, but ... I'll have to check whether it could be due to emulator differences, or FPS differences (but I don't see why, 60fps is 60fps, unless Youtube messes with the framerate). The other TAS I think was made in a different version (maybe the official, I can't tell yet). Some research is needed.
Note that his copyright screen fades in after yours and out before yours. Either it's a different version with a faster copyright screen or you just didn't know you could make it fade that early. I'm betting it's the former, though it's possible to be the latter. Edit: It's also possibly something wrong with the encode, but that difference in duration is a higher ratio than the gameplay's difference ratio, so I think that's unlikely. Like you said, 60fps is 60fps.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
It's actually fairly simple. You just save a memory diff each frame and keep them for the last ~1000 frames. Then, to rewind, apply them frame-by-frame while holding the rewind key.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Exactly. Nico hit the nail on the head here. I'm not sure if has, but it feels like it's gotten to the point where a lot of TASers who make precise, entertaining, and skillful runs aren't even submitting here.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Thanks a lot. I'm seeding this movie for a while too.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Bag of Magic Food wrote:
Doesn't rewinding mean the emulator has to make a whole bunch of extra savestates without asking?
No. Copy how Nestopia does it, and emulate in reverse.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Baxter wrote:
MUGG wrote:
A comparison video featuring FractalFusion's and 5z98qTHveupDQ5kL's movies. http://dic.nicovideo.jp/v/sm8779719
The submission text says Fractal_Fusions movie is faster, but in this comparison video, the other version is clearly faster... what's the deal?
That looks like a good start for obsoletion/competition right away. If that guy's is faster, he should submit his movie and obsolete this one. Considering this is a very popular mode/movie already, and you've just proven it can be improved despite not having obvious mistakes, and (almost) everyone who watched it was entertained, it seems like an ideal candidate for publication. What more do you need from a run to consider it ideal? Let me list the points again: -This mode is the most popular, and therefore most likely to be run by a human (SDA-style). -It's improvable, but not obvious how (Super Mario Bros. is entertaining in this way, and it's published). -Most people are entertained. Entertainment is subjective. Isn't that why there's a voting system? If not, why not just remove the voting system?
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
That's a good idea. I've been watching some runs with a friend who's new to the whole concept of TAS and haven't been pausing and playing things back frame-by-frame to check specific points, but next time I see something like that, I'll take note of it and post in the appropriate thread. I've been a lurker generally, but I just had to say something about this great TAS.
Lex
Experienced Forum User
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
I just wanted to put this out there. I'm a casual watcher of TAS videos from this site, and I ABSOLUTELY loved this run. I'm also a very detail-attentive gamer myself, and have made many of the fastest Worms Armageddon tool-assisted mission speedruns (check Other Games forum). This run's goals are the most obvious goals for Tetris DS. The entertainment for me comes from being a player who has been practicing Tetris DS for months now, and having been able to beat it in under 10 minutes only a couple times (unassisted on a real DS, of course). With this run, I got to see some really interesting strategies (like how to fix holes at the bottom by utilizing floating tetrises etc.) that I personally hadn't thought of and have a hard time planning out while I'm trying to beat the game quickly. To me, the other modes in Tetris DS are awkward and uninteresting, not to mention very difficult to play on a normal DS, where the screens are ~2cm apart. This mode is straight-forward and classic with a twist. I voted YES immediately after watching this run a few times (sometimes in frame-by-frame in my video player) because of the above. In my opinion, it would be absolutely absurd to deny as straight-forward and obvious a run as this. If Baxter thinks he can do better on these goals with a day's work, I challenge him to beat this run! That's what this site is all about, right? Tool-assisted competition, and what better way to compete than this mode? This mode demonstrates all the classic precision-TASing of yesteryear, where we made very precise changes to save frames here and there, like avoiding using the "hold" can save frames (very precise random-manipulating instead?), rotating off objects to move farther can save frames at max level, etc. Honestly, the only thing I would change about this run's goals is require it to be played on level 20 difficulty, which requires saved data. I know that's against the rules, but that would be most entertaining to me. This run as it is should be published to show the world how fast this mode can be beaten, and to put others to the challenge, because this is hands-down the most popular mode to play in Tetris DS, period. Would-be-double-post edit: I have another point to make. This is no average Tetris TAS where the author didn't take the care to make every line cleared a Tetris, like the bad TAS casuals seem to think is so great here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLu428ppNa4. This is a TAS up to the standards of this site, where every line is part of a Tetris, and the author never made an obvious mistake. That's more than I can say for some of the more obscure published runs I've watched, where I see obvious mistakes where the author could have saved frames.