Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
Regarding the Japanese version of the game: please don't bother, I'd rather wait out the game over screen on the USA version; the Japanese version is too much easier.
Lobsterzelda wrote:
Since PAL runs at 5/6 speed to NTSC, a PAL run of this category would finish in about 22 minutes. As such, it would be much slower, even ignoring the 10 seconds of time gained from not gameovering.
It's true that the PAL version runs slower, personally I think that's fine and I most likely wouldn't even notice in practice. I wasn't suggested to run the PAL version to save time, but rather it seems more appropriate for the 2-player category. No big deal either way though.
mklip2001 wrote:
If the run could be more entertaining, that's nice. But honestly, why is there such an uproar about the playaround? We're talking about someone finally completing a massive improvement on a very old movie, with significant work done to mitigate lag.
I think entertainment has more value than mere obsoletion-of-an-old-run. Do note however that this reasoning hasn't led anyone to vote no on the submission so far, this TAS is for sure a quality submission, possible improvements not-withstanding.
feos wrote:
Skipping those 2 levels is subjectively more entertaining too, because they're mostly autoscrollers, and there's not a lot you can do to be creative there after everything we've seen in the current run. It'd be basically the same thing, with little to no complex gameplay to optimize.
I do generally agree that autoscrollers are boring and worth skipping. But with TAS shenanigans - at least in the case of battletoads - they can be legitimately entertaining. Plus when it comes to warpless runs, I feel like the idea is to show off the full game, not to meet the arbitrary goal of not touching mega-warp objects. Also I wanna see the surf city mid-stage boss fight :D
Lobsterzelda wrote:
I wanted to get some audience feedback in advance before I reach level 7. More specifically, is including the message that I do in the level worth the time? Or should I scrap that to do something else?
In case you didn't notice, at 9:22 in my encode of this submission, I spelled out "Lobsterzelda was here" on the screen using the movement of the toads' jets.
I, too, was unable to notice nor decipiher that message; I would suggest scrapping it. As a possible suggestion, I really enjoyed watching the previous TAS' DVD icon bouncing approach, especially if you can get it to work out for the fireball / missiles bits for example and make the game look trivialised as a result, strong superplay vibes :O
Anyways, I don't wanna be asking too much of you. The run is in an acceptable state as is, though I appreciate the effort you've gone through already to receive feedback and improve on the entertainment aspect.
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
I'm hyped to see an improvement to the existing run, this is my favourite category for sure; having watched the run though, I was pretty disappointed.
Standing on its own, the run is OK, it certainly looks well optimised. My favourite bits are when the toads never stop moving, and my least favourite bits are the down-time sections. Arctic Caverns stands out as a real polished gem of a level; Karnath's Lair wasn't particularly worth even sitting through.
In comparison to the previous run, it's clear that the entertainment factor has significantly diminished in most levels. Karnath's Lair went from my favourite to my least favourite and I'm super bummed that we didn't get to see Turbo Tunnel and Surf City. Arctic Caverns, Intruder Excluder and level 12 (including the boss fight) are notable exceptions and I thought they were genuine improvements in every way.
I have voted yes on this movie, because it really feels like an improvement (and obviously it's faster). But I would like to see an entertainment focused version of this TAS in the future. That said though, I want to stress that I really am bummed out that Turbo Tunnel and Surf City were skipped, kinda defeats the point of warpless even if it's not a warp in the technical sense.
Unrelated to all the above: are we open to considering the PAL version of this game for two-player runs? Seems silly to wait for player 2 to game over on level 11, and then we don't even get to see a two-player playthrough of that level...
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
P.JBoy wrote:
Spikestuff wrote:
All I know is that I'll be publishing this, much like I've done in the past for SM.
Sniq just get in contact with me about when and what is required for the fixed graphics.
The lua script for fixed graphics is here, the script is for BizHawk, so you'll need the equivalent BK2 file. The changes are purely visual and works in real-time, no set-up required.
I have a view on letting the camera follow Samus off-screen, I just need to work out some problems involving sprite drawing (or lack thereof), but I wouldn't delay publication to wait for that feature.
And after a lot of hard work, my lua script has unlocked the camera. I'm not planning on working on this script any more, so consider this the final version.
Result.
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
Spikestuff wrote:
All I know is that I'll be publishing this, much like I've done in the past for SM.
Sniq just get in contact with me about when and what is required for the fixed graphics.
The lua script for fixed graphics is here, the script is for BizHawk, so you'll need the equivalent BK2 file. The changes are purely visual and works in real-time, no set-up required.
I have a view on letting the camera follow Samus off-screen, I just need to work out some problems involving sprite drawing (or lack thereof), but I wouldn't delay publication to wait for that feature.
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
No flaw, but do note that the case for n = logr(2) for r = 1/2 gives n = -1 which does not satisfy n > 1 which is a condition for the premise.
What we find is that n = logx(2) for co-rational (x,n) is satisfied by x = 2k for any integer k != 0:
log2k(2) = 1 / log2(2k) = 1 / (k log2(2)) = 1/k
We also note that -1 <= 1/k <= 1 for integer k.
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
Warp wrote:
Which, in conjunction to the previous postulate, means that logx(2) is never rational for rational values of x?
Not quite.
logx(2) is rational iff log2(x) is rational (for x != 1).
log2(x) = a/b iff x = 2a/b, and we note that b must be one, so x must be a power of two (including negative powers).
In particular, log1/2(2) = 1 / log2(1/2) = -1
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
Warp wrote:
Prove that 21/n is irrational for any integer value of n > 1.
Suppose 21/n is rational, then it may be expressed as a/b for coprime a,b, b != 0.
21/n = a/b
2 = (a/b)n
2bn = an.
From this we see that an is even, so it must be the case that a is even, which in turn implies that b is odd as a and b are coprime.
As a is even, a = 2c for some integer c:
2bn = (2c)n = 2n cn
bn = 2n-1 cn
Thus if n > 1: bn is even, which in turn implies b is even, but this contradicts the condition that a and b are coprime, thus 21/n is irrational
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
How did you get that $91C505 routine to execute? Some reverse engineering tells me that routine can only be executed by the Eye enemy (the thing that shines light at you after getting morph ball), and even then, I'm not sure if it's ever executed under normal circumstances
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
boct1584 wrote:
As far as Plasma Beam before Draygon, I thought Kejardon said back when he was first testing the OOB glitch/X-Ray Climbing that the Plasma Beam doesn't spawn until Draygon is dead. Am I misremembering?
No, it's possible. Indeed it's the majority of the items in the Wrecked Ship, including the Gravity Suit, that don't even exist until Phantoon is dead.
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
Oh wow, that's nice; that might be the only place in the game where that's possible too. Normally slopes have a special solid block underneath them to prevent that sort of thing, but in that room the slopes are of the very bottom row of the room, so that's not an option
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
So it turned out that the cheat code I gave wasn't sufficient to turn on stereo, I know exactly how to fix it, but it turns out that it does cause desyncs due to variations in the lag caused by door transitions.
The movie file could be changed to add or subtract a frame to fix these by hand, or a lua script made that records the amount of lag of each door transition, and another one that plays back the movie with the cheat code on, and determines if there's any difference in lag and creates a new movie file with the necessary change as a result.
The question is, would this new movie, with no difference in non-door transition time be valid for encoding?
Note: I can't be completely sure that door transition cause the only desyncs, e.g. Metroids might as well
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
The set of good tools are for that purpose, the tool will name your ROM in such a way they will have a (B) if it's a bad dump or (O) for overdump etc..
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
First thing to explain is how to jump through the door blocks in the Wrecked Ship shaft. It requires opening the door at the top so that the ghost can appear there later, but first you need it to appear on a different screen, so jump down to that platform just above the shot blocks. The ghost needs to reappear under the door low enough so that Samus can unmorph without setting off the door transition. To get the ghost to appear low enough, you need to do a wall jump at a precise height and immediately morph, so Samus narrowly misses the top platform and the ghost appears before she lands. You need to freeze the ghost at its lowest point of hovering (if you can't double bomb jump onto it, it's too high), Samus should be able to unmorph and not activate the door transition. Use the X-ray scope to force stand without setting off the door transition, now because Samus' head is above the door, you can move upwards freely without triggering the transition.
When falling, vertical collision detection is done with Samus' feet. Once above the door, falling into the transition blocks from the other side will cause the transition to happen while Samus is above the room, i.e. she has Y-position of ~0x0FE0. All the door transition does to Samus' position is change the screen she's on, then add or subtract just over half a screen to it (I presume), so instead of the door placing her at ~0x00B0, it places her at ~0x0180, which is below the floor.
The loaded room (the room above the shaft) is 7 screens long and 1 screen tall, that's each 'screen' is 16x16=256 blocks, each block is 2 bytes of level data (which is the type of block, and its graphic), so the room loads 0xE00 bytes of level data, immediately following it is the room's BTS for each block (BTS is the parameter for the block's type), each block is 1 byte of BTS, so there's 0x700 bytes of BTS; if the room has a custom background, that will come next and is also 1 byte per block (this room does not); then there's 0x6400 - 0xE00 - 0x700 = 0x4F00 bytes = 0x2780 blocks of solid block. After that comes the BTS again, but this time, any BTS from previous rooms is kept that the current room doesn't overwrite, and eventually the custom backgrounds of previous rooms again.
All co-ordinates from this point on will be in blocks rather than pixels. Suppose the game needs to know what the block at (x, y) is, the game calculates that block as the nth block in the room, it does y*0x70 + x (0x70 is the width of the room). This formula holds when Samus is off-screen too, so when Samus is to the right of the room, the nth block is y*0x70 + (0x70+x) = (y+1)*0x70 + x, this has the effect of being in the same room but one block higher. Travelling right the width of the room 16 times is the same as travelling one screen down, in this 1 screen tall room, that means she will be 'under' the room.
When Samus is under the room, BTS is being read as level data, fortunately, most of the BTS is just 00, which corresponds to air. When Samus goes left of the room, that's the same as going right 0xFF screens and vice versa, i.e. going right 256 screens brings you back to the start. Going 'above' the room is the same as going down 0xF screens and vice versa. In this Wrecked Ship room, the data above the room is background data (always air).
With the knowledge of all of this, I can explain what's going on. Coming into the room, you're below the floor in BTS-data land. As Samus is travelling right, you get to see those two slope blocks over and over, the distance between consecutive pairs of slope blocks is 3.5 screens (because BTS data is half the size of level data). Because each time a room-width is travelled, every block is raised a row, Samus gets higher and higher until she's actually on top of the room (when there stops being solid blocks above her). A further 5 room-widths are travelled with Samus on top of the ceiling, with each room-width travelled removing a layer from the 5-row ceiling. Finally, Samus is inside the room, and it's only a matter of finding the door transition blocks for the left door.
Just as a note, when Samus reaches those purple blocks, that's actually uninitialised data, and in theory, that means this really shouldn't work every time.
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
Kriole wrote:
drops such as Super Missiles and Power Bombs could magically change - they could differ depending on how much lag you added. Meaning, that if there is a Super Missile drop 30 frames after you enter the door, adding 5 frames of lag means that it should drop after 25 frames.
Could you post a couple of SMV (or BKM) demonstrating this? I was quite sure lag frames didn't affect the RNG
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
You might already know, but the timer decrements aren't random, they're determined by the current frame count ($0945). What you can do to determine the next decrement is calculate [$0945] AND 0x7F and use that as an offset to this table:
0102 020102 020102 020102 02 020102 020102 020102 0201020102 020102 0201020102 020102 020102 020102 02 020102 020102 020102 0201020102 020102 0201020102 020102 020102 020102 02 020102 020102 020102 0201020102 020102 0201020102 020102 020102 020102 02 020102 020102 020102 020102 020102 02 020102 02
You want to have as many 01's as possible between door transitions (or alternatively, as many 02's as possible during door transitions). Ideally you would come out of a door on the last 01, but from what I understand, you can only make delays of up to a couple of frames, so I suppose the best you can try to do is come out of door on a 01
Yeah.
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
Ok, I've update the script (same link) with the bomb count, speeds, charge beam counter, the booster counter, the shine timer and in-game timer, but not the shinespark cooldown (which I can't find a timer for). For invincibility, I decided to have the script show the recoil timer for Samus before showing the invincibility timer, but that can be removed if undesirable
Joined: 3/25/2006
Posts: 850
Location: stuck in Pandora's box HELLPP!!!
I tried adding something more complex a while ago, but it never came to fruition; since then I've never really planned to upgrade the script. I could add those things you listed quite easily
