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Awesome. I tried searching Nico Video a little ways into my run, but I don't know how to type Japanese characters. There was also only one search result when I tried 'Pachio', and it happens to be a pachinko game TAS by yourself, TaoTao. The video of the hard mode run is only 15 minutes long even though the title says the TAS is 25 minutes long, and there's no part 2 to click on. -Edit- Nvm, found part 2.
That spike glitch is neat, and I think there are some spots where it would save time. I also can't believe I missed the fact that I could jump off the arms of the boss of stage 2; that will certainly save a handful of frames. The thought of getting all of this added and re-synced hurts my head. I'll see if I can get a new submission file in the next day or so, but I'll just add it to the Possible Improvements section otherwise.
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Err, just realized that the little blurb next to the published run is copy/pasted from the original run which gives credit to Magus and claims this is still the first run.
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Fantastic! 181K rerecords O.O While you were busy mastering this game, I was putzing around and found a couple additional tricks that can be added. I've uploaded a WIP with all of the details in the description section. It's a 33 frame improvement. If you want to just replace the submission file, then I would like a co-authorship. If you can improve most of these optimizations even further, then I would be fine with just an honorable mention :)
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Yes.
I'm also having issues with the auto-save feature. Since there's no way to turn it off, I've set it to the maximum allowed time which is 1410064 seconds (just over 16 days), but it still saves the game every 2 minutes.
Edit - I've reduced the time down to just 5 day intervals and it seems to be working properly now.
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http://imgur.com/gallery/c4AyMwi/new
This is a more clear showing of what I mean. I pause the game > change an input > and a green arrow shows up next to where the game last left off. I then un-pause the game and it only runs right up to the green arrow and automatically pauses itself. It only started doing this in 1.11.6 and on.
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feos wrote:
WarHippy wrote:
If I pause the game and go back to change an input, then TAStudio marks where it last left off with a little arrow... and the part that truly throws off my rhythm is that it will pause the game once it hits that arrow. Is there a way to stop that marker arrow from being created?
How would you even optimize if it never pauses at the last position? How to compare the outcome without this ability to return to the same exact frame?
Pausing and unpausing playback with the middle click on the scroll wheel has been perfect for me and has been fully ingrained into my actions. After every time I go back and change something I usually click the scroll wheel to try and pause the game again at roughly the same time the game auto-pauses which then causes the game to unpause and just keep going. There are also plenty of times when I go back to change something and the effects of it won't be known until well after the game auto-pauses, so I have to reach back and unpause the game every time for those situations. It's a burden to the point that I would just go back to 1.11.4 where that "feature" is not present.
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Yay!! All of my hidden columns actually stay hidden when I re-open TAStudio :D
WarHippy wrote:
If I pause the game and go back to change an input, then TAStudio marks where it last left off with a little arrow... and the part that truly throws off my rhythm is that it will pause the game once it hits that arrow. Is there a way to stop that marker arrow from being created?
This is still something that I don't know how to deal with. Any way to turn this feature off?
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I was excited for BizHawk 1.11.6 hoping that all the bugs were fixed in TAStudio, but it's made TASing nearly impossible for me. The scariest issue I've had with it is that if I save the game while the Seeking... status bar is going then it throws up a huge I/O error and sometimes something about it not being thread safe. It says that it can't read beyond certain value and a giant red X replaces the TAStudio screen (but the file will still save, but with problems -->) Sometimes it will clear random frames of input from my save file, so I'll get a surprise de-sync and have to figure out which input is missing. So one might think, "Just don't save while it's Seeking, dummy." This would be fine, but a new feature in 1.11.6 keeps my status as Seeking almost all the time, and I can't figure out how to turn it off. If I pause the game and go back to change an input, then TAStudio marks where it last left off with a little arrow in the far left column. TAStudio will be in Seeking status until the game progress back to that arrow, and the part that also truly throws off my rhythm is that it will pause the game once it hits that arrow. Is there a way to stop that marker arrow from being created? I had deleted my previous version of BizHawk, and I can't seem to find a way to download and re-install any of the older versions in order to try and work around this quirk.
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Fine run. Yes vote from me. Just one tiny thing I noticed; on Level 1, when you paused at the chimney to fall through the roof tile, would it be a couple frames faster to do a mini-jump before the tile crumbles away so that you fall through the gap even faster?
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Hey Flip, for some reason my PM's aren't showing as being sent to you. They just keep going to my Outbox instead of the Sentbox.
I was wondering if you wanted to work together on the next Eek! the Cat submission by exchanging ideas, tips, tricks and so on.
If not that's perfectly fine; the idea of a (slow) frame war is also exciting to me.
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After reading all of the posts and reviewing the Vault requirements, I believe I understand why this submission was rejected.
It seems that all non-serious game choices are automatically rejected unless there's serious entertainment value. There's nothing wrong with that.
The problem that I have is that in the very first two lines of requirements for Vault submissions says that the purpose of this category is to focus on collecting tool-assisted speedrun records. I'll even quote the bullet point in the Overview section which is right below it "Its purpose is to fulfill the site's goal of being a TAS records site, and a central repository of tool-assisted literature and information." This statement alone should mean that we accept EVERY submission of an actual published game. This is assuming that it follows the rest of TASVideo's rules. Since there are some games that won't be allowed on this site, even in the Vault tier, then the goal of becoming a full TAS repository will never be accomplished. It seems like eventually there will need to be one of two changes.
The first would be to simply change exactly what the Vault category is trying to accomplish (i.e. games with slight entertainment value that can potentially be optimized to be beaten faster). The second option, and the one that I feel would work best in the long run is to create a fourth tier of games (Basement Tier or something). This tier would be a repository for every game that doesn't make the cut for Vault with absolutely zero regard for entertainment value. This would also be a nightmare for the awesome publication team on this site, so I also propose that no encodes need to be made for these submissions (if the creator wants to add a temp encode to the submission text, then kudos to them). As long as they sync, then they're in.
Creating a fourth tier would make this site's stated goal be much more realistic.
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Flip wrote:
I intend to prove you right.
Neat :D Also, I found an extra 4-frame improvement on stage 4-3 (the policeman stage) through a different route at the end in the sewers instead of the 1-frame cop-out I did last time. I just uploaded a WIP with the new .BK2 file. Hopefully it can be switched before it gets published. It ends up being a 5 frame improvement b/c one of the later stages now loads 1 frame faster.
EDIT - Updated the temp encode
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Wow, I didn't think my time would get beaten so quickly. I currently have a 20 second improvement in place, but this blows my mind. I have many of the smaller tricks in place for my new run (like pressing down on the sliding animation as well as the saved cycle on 4-3), but the complete route changes are sweet. The time save on 3-2 was brilliant, I've tried for so long to not have to get the egg stuck in the middle. There were a couple parts on my first watching it that I noticed could be improved, but by no more than 1 second total. I'll certainly look into it when I have more time.
Yes! Vote
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I have had the distinct pleasure to have never played this game on console. After looking at all of the reviews for the game, I wasn't able to find anything that mentions the graphics being too dark or hard to see.
Secondly, I am quite sure that I have no idea what any part of your second sentence means. What's virtualdub?
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That's certainly a fine idea. I'm not certain if that task would fall to me or to the person processing it, though. I'm currently trying to find out how to make a good encode so that more people can review and vote on a new TAS.
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I was never really sure what was going on with it. There were times where it seemed really dark, but then other times it seemed normal (maybe because I just got used to it?) I already have a much improved version in the works. I'll see if there's any way to offset the darkness (or at the very least find a bright screenshot for the game's profile).
Edit: When you use frame advance, the game is nice and bright and clear. When running at 60 fps, it all blends together to form a dark muddled mess.
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Samsara wrote:
Verifying the fixed file right now. WarHippy, are you okay with Spikestuff being added as co-author? I can do that alongside the replacement with your permission.
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Exonym wrote:
In the first stage, it's a lot faster to take the low route if I recall. Back when I did the test on Snes9x it was about 120 frames faster than going up. I'm not sure how much of that is emulator difference though. Your version of the second level is definitely faster though, I like the insta turn around trick. The rest of the run looks good as well, especially considering how frustrating the controls are.
Oh wow, you're right. You just opened up a whole new aspect of the game that I didn't pay attention to. I assumed that there was only 1 route to the exit on every level. Looks like I need to explore some more. Taking the lower route is 124 frames faster, but the movie only ends up being 115 frames faster due to extra lag in the stage transitions.
I soon after realized another route change in 3-2 that could shave off a couple more seconds; the idea is to get the egg into the center from the right side (the same way I get him back out at the end of the stage) instead of going all the way around from the left.
There could easily be more route optimizations I need to make, now. I'm just so burnt out on the game; I'll probably come back to it in a month or so.
