Posts for PiePusher11

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Joined: 1/5/2013
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I think we can go ahead and cancel this submission. Me and Retroedit are going to work together on a better run.
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Joined: 1/5/2013
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RetroEdit wrote:
I have an idea for reducing the number of bob-omb spawns in Egg Modern, but it crucially depends on whether recreating the RNG necessary for the rest of the movie to sync is possible. I'll make a follow-up edit to this post in a few hours about my findings.
This would be nice if you could come up with something. If you have any ideas for RNG manip in DK Jr Modern too, that'd be pretty huge! Dropping fruit on enemies (especially 2 or 3 at a time) is far more efficient than running through the screen normally, so if there's some better way to manipulate that so I'm always able to hit the maximum number of enemies every cycle, there's probably significant timesave to be had there. Not that I necessarily expect that'll be easy/possible to find, but it'd be nice to get a second set of eyes on it.
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When it comes to the difficulty, Easy is always going to be far slower than Hard in Egg, simply due to slower pace of gameplay, and cookies spawning in less frequently. When I was doing my initial testing for Egg, eating a cookie a little later didn't seem to make the following cookie spawn any differently, and there's not really anything else you can do to manipulate RNG here, besides waiting on the menu and starting the game on a later frame. The two biggest factors that can affect speed are Mini Yoshis eating cookies, and Bob-ombs: 1. Mini Yoshis will eat up to 4 cookies for 5 points each, then walk offscreen. But, if a 5th (or more) cookie spawns in that row before it gets all the way offscreen, it'll also eat that one as well, which, since they give 5 points per cookie instead of 2, would be ideal, and make things go just that little bit faster. 2. I don't really understand how Bob-omb RNG works, but they are worth avoiding if possible. Nothing else will spawn in while a Bob-omb is coming down. In my TAS, I got one near the beginning of Easy, and three in a row near the end of Hard. The Bob-ombs (especially the three in a row on Hard) are probably the biggest place I lost time in Egg. However, like I said above, I didn't really know of any way to impact the RNG to avoid Bob-ombs or optimize Mini Yoshis. I agree upon reviewing it that there's potential time to save there, but going back and redoing it at this point would require redoing all of DK Jr, which was really the big RNG portion of the run. The only thing I can think of to try is to replay the entire Egg section while wasting a couple frames on the menu beforehand, and hoping that that playthrough is faster. But then, like I said, I'd also have to go through all of DK Jr and the games after as well, and DK Jr took more time/effort than the rest of the TAS combined.
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Very interesting ideas! I hadn't even considered Judge 2p, as I didn't know if there was a way to do linked play in a TAS. If that is in fact doable, it'd definitely be better than DK Jr Modern. "24:19 Would it have been faster to move to the right first, trigger the coconut, potentially get 15 points, and then proceed to get the key? I've done this maneuver a lot hen playing casually because it feels like the faster play but let me know if your TASing experience has shown different." There wasnt enough space to get to the fruit first without dying from the goomba. If i tried to climb over the goomba, I'd basically be in the same position as I actually ended up in, but without the key. "26:10 Did not know you could stomp a bullet bill like that if you jump first!" This is a weird one, and i dont fully understand it myself. I got it to happen to the goombas up on the very top of screen 1, too. But only sometimes? I'm not sure how this one happens. "28:12 Did not know you could do that either!" There's only a few frame window to get this, I wouldn't recommend going for it in real time! It's also possible to move sideways or up into a bullet bill and drop a fruit on it at the same time, but that's also only a couple frame window (I forget the exact timings off the top of my head).
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This was cancelled because it abuses an emulator bug. This was an april fool's joke
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Former player
Joined: 1/5/2013
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I suppose his means the DK run should have "uses a sub-optimal character" added, huh?
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I'm considering TASing Jungle Climber, once I'm done with King of Swing. Personally, I'm never going to do real-time speedruns of it, as I kinda hate playing that game. It feels so different, and the level design feels so bland and uninspired when compared to King of Swing. But of course TASing is completely different from RTAs, so maybe I'll give it a try eventually.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q07DzeclwLM Diddy TAS is finished! I went back and optimized a few things, the big ones were the Fire Necky fight and Kremling Kamp 2. Together, those two improvements saved about 6 seconds. The total time ended up being 17:18.667, or 62037 frames. I was surprised that this ended up faster than DK. Going in, I expected DK to be faster because DK gets a ton of banana boosts, and Diddy doesn't have many at all. Even though it's over a minute faster, 35 seconds of that is because Diddy doesn't have to do the tutorial, and 12 seconds is because of the new Congtazuma strat, so it's really less than 30 seconds of difference in actual gameplay.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5W0RkFGfQL0 Here's world 4. The damage boost at the end of Sassy Squatch saves 12 frames. I likely won't keep it, I'm going to try to get a banana boost in Engine instead. Look forward to seeing how that turns out!
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It's been a while, especially since I forgot to upload a video for world 2. But here you go, Diddy's finished up through world 3! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EeK2xK8LIes The Congtazuma strat saves a whopping 12 seconds over playing normally! Unfortunately, this strat was found mere days after the DK TAS was published...
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And I just found a new strat that saves around 12 seconds on the Congtazuma fight. Oh well, at least it'll be in the Diddy and 100% runs.
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I know everyone's on the edge of their seat waiting for more KoS TAS, so here's an update! https://www.twitch.tv/videos/211477577 May have to go back and re-optimize some of this, but it's a good first pass at world 1 with Diddy. Optimizing the end of screens is so much more annoying with Diddy since he's so floaty.
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I labeled it that, because I figured once I finish the run of Diddy, that they should both be labeled for which character it uses. If you think it's better to not label this one anything, fine with me.
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Yes, that's correct. The game keeps track of percentage complete, with a maximum of 200%. The run is very repetitive, as you have to do each of the levels as many as 4 times (once with each character in Adventure, once with each character in Time Attack), so I completely understand it going into Vault.
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Actually, 200% isn't just beating the game once with each character. You have to 100% it with both characters, plus go through all the Time Trials with both characters, plus do the Jungle Jams. I understand splitting them up for tasvideos, but 1. I want to have the entirety of 200% all in one, and 2. Jungle Jams would be left out, as a movie of just that would probably not be accepted (it's essentially a minigame collection). Also, I see why Time Trials would be rejected as well, even though they ARE different from an any% run (you don't get enough bananas to Banana Boost, but instead you can damage boost pretty much anywhere you want). That said, I just started working on Diddy any% today, so I probably won't start anything related to 200% for a while.
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Finished the TAS! Whoo, this sure was a journey. Since my last update, I tested every other possible Banana Boost location, and found that doing one in Ice Castle 3 saved the most time. It saved ~180 frames over playing normally, and since Banana Boosting in Artillery 1 only saved ~120 frames over playing normally, I redid both of those screens. In making these adjustments, I found that the ending of Sassy Squatch perhaps loaded slower or something? Whatever the reason, I lost 6 frames between grabbing the medal and scrolling through the text box on the world map. Once everything was done, I ran into a very weird issue. For some reason, in the K. Rool race, despite none of the inputs changing, pressing start to advance after the race wouldn't work. Then, I don't remember exactly what I did, but whenever I tried reopening the movie and opening TAStudio, the whole emulator would crash. So I tried replaying the movie without TAStudio open, and even though it desynced after the race with TAStudio open, it works perfectly fine without it open. Anyway, all's well that ends well, I suppose. After all these improvements, the new final time is: 18:32.552 (66450 frames)! I'll be posting the video to my youtube channel as soon as I get it recorded, and submitting it once I actually get around to writing up full submission comments, haha
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I'm tentatively done with the DK any% TAS! I got a time of 18:33.959 (66534 frames). I still have a few more things to test before I call it done, though. I need to time how much time the banana boost in Booster Barrel Skyway saves, I need to test almost every screen from Ice Castle to the end with a banana boost, to see if any of them save more time than the one in Artillery 1, and I'd also like to try to optimize the final boss a bit more. I tried to give K. Rool as much of a headstart on the race as possible, but it turns out falling significantly behind him slows him down (You have to wait for him to finish the race before moving on to the fight).
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Quick update on what I got tonight. I redid Contraption Cave with a new strat and optimizations, and saved about 52 frames on screen 3, and 4 frames on screen 2. This put me back 1 banana, so I redid Puzzling Pyramid 3, and got 2 extra bananas, also saving a few frames (I forget exactly how many). Now since I have an extra banana, I could finally skip the extra banana in Necky's Canyon 3, saving 4 frames. Unfortunately, with all of this, Lockjaw Falls 2 desynced (apparently there's some RNG with how the pegs fall). In redoing that screen, I actually lost 1 frame. Then, Davy Bones was still doing that thing where I was losing 6 frames for some unknown reason. I played around with the end of that fight, and saved a little over 30 frames! And on top of all that, there's also the time saved on the map screen!
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WarHippy: I meant going from 1 to 2, 2 to 3, and 3 to 4. Each of those can save one frame. I probably don't have to copy/paste all the inputs, I'm new to this! I'm using bizhawk. At the 9 minute mark? At the end of Risky Reef? That's just charging up a charge attack to break the barrel. There's no RNG manipulation, if i'm waiting around, it's generally because something's moving, and I have to wait for it to move enough to make the jump, or something of the like. The only times I can think of that I do that specifically are in Puzzling Pyramid 1, where I have to wait for the bug to move, otherwise I don't get above it enough to damage boost up, in Kremling Kamp 3, where I have to wait for the pegboard to move up enough to make the jump to the tire, and in Raging Ravine 3, where I have to wait for the Kremling to throw the bomb. (There may be another I'm not thinking of) And yes, as far as I know, there was no change to the inputs besides shifting it all back 3 frames. It can't be loading the boss, because the fight itself synced ok, perhaps it was something at the very end, that made the head fall slower or something...I'll keep looking into that, and I'll try to fix everything I can think of before moving on to World 5. ThunderAxe: Thanks! I'm trying! At the moment, I don't plan on TASing any other games, but I'm definitely considering TASing other categories of this game. My end goal is to have a 200% TAS of this game, which involves 100% DK, 100% Diddy, Time Attacks with both characters, and the Jungle Jams (minigames of sorts).
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aaand here's world 4! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j056ePE8a6U I'm now realizing there's some better strats I could have used in Contraption Cave, as well as some better optimizations. Also, if anyone could give me some ideas on why this might happen, I'd really appreciate it. I noticed after finishing the boss of this world, that you can actually select the "go to next world" on the map screen one frame sooner than I had been. So I tried to copy/paste all my inputs back one frame per world to make up for that, but when I did that, despite the Davy Bones fight starting 2 frames sooner, and still killing him in exactly the same way, I collected the medal 6 frames later. Anyone have any ideas why this might happen?
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World 3's done! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Df8kTWZkQRQ Redid Madcap Mine 1. Highlights of this world are definitely Ship of Souls 2 and 3, and Kremling Kamp 1 and 2. I realize that's practically half of the world, but dammit, world 3 is awesome! Oh, and the Davy Bones kill is pretty cool too
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXE4XCOSwa0 World 2's done! Read description for my thoughts so far. I changed a couple little things in world 1, and I may have to change some stuff in a screen or two in world 2, too. Sorry in advance for the beeping strats, haha
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Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Former player
Joined: 1/5/2013
Posts: 35
Thanks so much! That's exactly what I need! I'll be updating this thread with my progress on this TAS, for anyone interested.
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Deleted the other one. Sorry, I wasn't sure where I'd be more likely to actually get a response. The ROM I'm using is called DK - King of Swing (USA, Australia). It appears to be identical to my cart of the game (The PAL version has a different font for some reason, so I know it's not that one). I just checked 7EAC and 7EB0, and you're right, they do seem to point to DK's X and Y coordinates as well, except on Contraption Cave, they're still doing the same thing, like they're duplicates of 7ED8 and 7EDC.