Posts for Winslinator


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Ah, I was unaware you guys don't use the corrected AR for screenshots. Everything looks fine then!
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I'd just like to thank everyone who helped me gather the knowledge base for getting my first TAS published, and for everyone who wrote such nice comments (100% yes WOW!!) Big thanks to Alyosha and everyone else who worked on the Intellivision core as well, I'll be having quite some fun with this in the future :) Publication's got a nice, crisp encode too. Only comment I have about it is the publication screenshot has the incorrect aspect ratio, which should be 277x208. I guess you could just copy frame 686 from the final encode and it'd be fine?
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Ok, thanks for the feedback, Fog. I had a feeling this would be the end result, as the ambiguous ending here could be interpreted as insufficient game completion. Or maybe it wouldn't, I figured I'd find out :) No matter, there's not too much to fix. I'll probably have a complete run available by the end of the month.
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Yes
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Thanks, submitted it without a problem this time! :)
Post subject: Can't Submit Movie
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I'm trying to submit a movie of an Intellivision game to TASVideos. I have only the .bk2 in a .zip file, but I still get an error: "No acceptable movie file found in the ZIP" Accompanied with that error is this: Archive: /tmp/phpG1Wb9Y inflating: /tmp/nesvzip_1492192018_153/AD&D Movie.bk2 error_handler: errstr=Undefined variable: fp errfile=/home/tasvideos/public_html/formats/bk2.php errline=204 error_handler: errstr=fclose() expects parameter 1 to be resource, null given errfile=/home/tasvideos/public_html/formats/bk2.php errline=204 error_handler: errstr=Undefined variable: infinite errfile=/home/tasvideos/public_html/formats/bk2.php errline=315 error_handler: errstr=Division by zero errfile=/home/tasvideos/public_html/formats/bk2.php errline=317 error_handler: errstr=Undefined variable: fp errfile=/home/tasvideos/public_html/formats/bk2.php errline=204 error_handler: errstr=fclose() expects parameter 1 to be resource, null given errfile=/home/tasvideos/public_html/formats/bk2.php errline=204 Any help as to what this means would be greatly appreciated!
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The first ending (the one you get in the TAS) can happen on any level? Or does it only happen on the last level?
Not sure what you mean by level (I'm assuming you mean board), but the place I reach at the end of the movie is the designated end of the map, and is the ONLY place where one of the endings can play. Therefore, I now think this does qualify as beating the game. I should clarify my previous post by replacing all the times I say "beat" with "win" instead. All boards must be completed to even see an ending, as there's no way to skip any of these. Whether you win or lose them, however, determines the ending you'll get. Just one lost board and you'll get the first ending (as is the case in this TAS). Perhaps that makes my explanation a bit more clear.
For language differences, we generally prefer US versions of games unless there are version specific glitches and tricks
Ok, I'm actually kinda glad about that because that saves me a lot of effort of redoing an entire TAS. I'll just leave this submission as is then.
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Alright, so I'll detail the three different endings here: The ending in the current movie is what plays when you have not beaten all the boards nor unlocked all the minigames. Christopher Robin tells you there's still more left to explore. No credits play, but it's the fastest way to reach the end. A different ending plays if all the boards are beaten, but not all the minigames unlocked (the scenario you bring up). In it, there are extra cutscenes and the credits play. Christopher Robin tells you there's still more left to explore. Achieving this ending will probably only require an extra minute and a half of gameplay. The best ending only appears after beating all boards and unlocking all four minigames. It plays out exactly the same as the previous ending, (extra cutscenes, credits, and all) except Christopher Robin tells you you've found everything, and there's an ending image reading, "I have graduated from the 100 Acre Wood!". Since the minigames are long and on large tangents, this ending would probably require twice the length of the current movie. *VERY IMPORTANT* So I just discovered like yesterday that there exists a Japanese version of this game. As expected, the text scrolling is way faster, and I would like to redo the entire TAS on that version. Therefore, I do plan to cancel this submission. Before cancelling, however, I would like your input on whether the end goal I chose here is deemed "sufficient game completion" by TASVideos. I assume it's a case-by-case basis, but upon further inspection of the rules, I'm unsure whether or not the site considers this an "incomplete" ending or just not the "best" ending. Thanks!
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Hey, I was trying to record an AVI of some of my intellivision TASing work thus far now that Bizhawk 1.12.1 has been released. Only one problem, the AVI files all play back in that squished 176x208 frame. Do you know what settings I would need to apply in order to get the normal 277x208 frame? Thanks!
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Ok that makes pretty good sense. I went ahead and booted up my Intellivision with a CRT, and the image dimensions seem to match up perfectly, so you've got me convinced! I just want to make sure - have all the sound bugs been ironed out yet? I can still detect many sounds being slightly different than how they are on console. Since jzintv sounds nearly identical to how the sound is on console, I decided to do a short comparison video of some sounds between Bizhawk (current dev build) and jzintv, so it's easier to show what differences I'm hearing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SI6IcnOjqXs Hope this helps!
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By the way, what is the correct aspect ratio for the system? I've seen differing values from the one I wrote two posts ago, 318x192. I've also seen 320x192 and 192x160, and I can't find the exact value you put in for the current aspect ratio, but it looks different from these as well. I actually went out of my way to do some careful measurements of my own and physically count the number of pixels on the screen. I can say with a very high degree of certainty there's 176x104 pixels after counting. So to me, this value would make sense as the proper one. I'm just curious as to which one is correct and how would we know?
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Yeah, I don't know what the specifics of it are either, but you must've done something right regardless, as I was able to successfully pull off what I wanted! So I actually did some extra research about this glitch, and unfortunately, it appears to be more of a cheat than anything really: http://www.intellivisionworld.com/english/faq/#_Toc140592042 As you can see, most of the games in the Intellivision library have some type of weird combination of buttons involving the reset button that can either bring up an alternate title screen, credits, a special screen, or in the AD&D case I was talking about earlier, an INSTANT WIN!!! (probably not some crazy weird game-end glitch like I once thought lol) Thanks for fixing the sound and aspect ratio, man. While the rat still sounds kinda wrong, I can live with that as my TAS won't even see any. I'm really pleased with how collecting the crown sounds now, it's an AWESOME sound and it can't be butchered for the TAS :)
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Just randomly decided to check this thread again, and you really finished this core quick! I've already started work on an Advanced Dungeons & Dragons TAS, so this is awesome stuff. As far as any bugs I can pinpoint, I have noticed some problems with sound emulation. With all the games I try, all sounds seem to be slightly higher pitched than normal. Jzintv's sounds overall seem to be nearly identical to how they are on console so that emulator is a good reference. Some AD&D specific sound problems include no audio for when trying to move to an impassable area on the overworld map, the sound that the rat makes when on-screen is far different than what it should sound like, and the audio for collecting the crown at the end fades out way too quickly. Additionally, the default aspect ratio should be changed to reflect the console's original aspect ratio, which is 318x192. Other things I'd be interested in seeing are: A Power/Reset button in tastudio, like there is for other consoles. Interested in this because there's a glitch that can be done which requires a soft reset. The Intellivision console framerate added to this page (if the value is known): http://tasvideos.org/PlatformFramerates.html Would be useful to know for TASing purposes, and listing it there makes it easy to look up. Thank you for reading, and I hope some of the things I brought up are addressed. Fantastic work on this core once again, Alyosha.
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I decided to take a look at this again after a bit of creative inspiration this past week, and I was able to shave off 294 frames from the last movie! http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/36009974368461154 I cut 9 frames from BLW2 due to a better helmet collection, and the majority from just barely being able to pull off the bounce from the second to last tank to the top of the incline (made possible with better air drag reduction). More importantly, this saves an extra HP for Plethora. The rest came from a massive overhaul on the Plethora fight. Due to the extra HP, getting Micromax is no longer necessary, saving 112 frames from transformation time alone. I then experimented on several different methods with Red Stealth, the best outcome actually being far away from the flag, due to the arrangement of obstacles between that area and the flag. In the previous movie, I had to jump off a platform to the flag 75 frames after Plethora was defeated, but now the last input is made 70 frames BEFORE Plethora is defeated. Additionally, I found a funny side-effect of running off moving platforms while ducking every other frame, which teleports me instantly above Plethora, saving some frames (if you don't know why it happens or why it's useful, I could explain it if you'd like). I'm aware that the title of the bk2 says the time is 1:21.95, but when using the actual console framerate, it's actually 1:22.07. If I can get the latter time below 1:22 (-5 frames), I'd be satisfied with the outcome. But right now I'm at the point where new frames to save are really hard to come by, and I was wondering if you can offer any insight as to where further saves are possible - if you have the time of course. My .tasproj file still has branches of other Plethora methods I did that didn't end up being faster. If you want to experiment with those as well, I can link that file here too.
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It says I'm missing the needed firmware files to load a ROM, although when i set up jzIntv, all I needed was the execrom.bin and the grom.bin, and it looks like they're both present in the firmwares list. Is there anything else I need to do?
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Hey where can I dowonload the latest dev build for this?
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YESSS!!! This is great news to me as well, can't thank you enough for this I'll finally be able to break down some of the first games I've ever played. Seems like good progress so far!
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Sorry I couldn't reply earlier but I got loaded with work these past few days. Just wanted to let you know that I think I've found everything I can find, so I'd be ready to publish the TAS whenever you are. But if you're confident there's more left to find, by all means, keep looking for improvements and take your time. Ya can't rush art!
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Is there any progress with Intellivision core in Bizhawk as of late? I've been thinking about TASing Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Cloudy Mountain and Tron: Deadly Discs.
Post subject: Intellivision Emulators?
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Hey, does anybody know of any Intellivision emulators that have TASing capabilities? I've been wanting to make a TAS of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Cloudy Mountain and Tron: Deadly Discs, but so far, I haven't even been able to get a single Intellivision emulator to even work.
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Ok here's the new bk2: http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/33481442694174900 This was very interesting. So, I spliced in your beginning dragon method, where you gained a lead by quite a few subpixels. Then, I put in my inclines segment, which put me 1+ pixels ahead of you. However, your rubber block pit is just way better than mine, due to the fact that your precise pixel position allows you to be able to tap down one less time than me to avoid "feeling" the rubber blocks. In order to implement this strat with my 1+pixel lead, I unfortunately had to reduce my lead to only ~50 subpixels; only then would it work. Then, implementing the longer jump at the end, the TAS was actually improved by a whole frame! Oddly enough, we're two frames ahead of the old video when the flag is captured, but the load time before BLW2 was one frame longer for some reason, hence only the single frame saved. That being said, what do you know about lag in this game? Not only between level transitions, but also for example between frames 855 and 856, Kid actually moves negative 191 subpixels. It loses over a frame, and I'm wondering if it's lag-caused. I tried everything to try and fix it, but it seems to be related to ducking itself in that spot.
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Alright so here's what our progress looks like so far. This file is 15 frames faster than the last one I linked! http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/33414609093679181 BLW1 - Incorporating the air drag reduction strats Truncated told me about, I was able to improve the level (not including the first section where the diamond is collected) to exactly the number of frames that the current TAS takes, plus two improvements: 1/2 frame saved due to a subpixel manipulation at frame 588, which avoids Kid having to walk up the next incline for one frame. 1 frame saved due to conserving bounce momentum a bit longer. You can see Kid lands on the platform at frame 1137 slightly farther to the right than he did previously. BLW2 - Spliced RandomPie's shooter block segment to the beginning for 1-2 frames saved. The rest of the frames are saved after collecting the Red Stealth helmet. At around frame 2450, we no longer land on the block the helmet came from, and we can move downwards much faster for a big timesave. A couple additional frames are saved thereafter through more efficient jumping. Also got a bit more creative with swordplay :P Plethora - All I found here was getting to the flag 4 frames faster using RTA timing, but really doesn't matter at all since the TAS time was unaffected.
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Oh yeah, I remember reading that information in the guide, actually, but never put two and two together. Seriously that is a genius way to gain time in a way few would have expected. I mean, I've been wondering that since I first watched the TAS back in 2011. Well, with that in mind, I may take a look over what I have so far once again and use this nice little trick in a couple places. Thanks for the explanation, Truncated!
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Ah, that's great to hear! I could easily see one of the improvements you made was activating the two blocks then moving a slight bit to the left, so as to come back right with a higher speed than I would have had hugging the blocks until they disappeared. One thing that gets me about your TASing style is the seemingly random places that you do 1-frame left inputs. I've observed that it is faster to do that in the places it is done, but it is beyond me why it's faster. Also, how are you able to determine the precise time in the jump to hold left? It looks like arbitrary places to me, but I would guess lots of trial an error to obtain the optimal result.
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Alright, since I haven't found any other useful timesaves in a while, I'll go ahead and post two files here. The first file is the one I did pretty much all by myself. The second file contains some sections which have inputs spliced from RandomPie's 12:47 run. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5wBv6IivLIOTVhCUXdPeHVQRnM/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5wBv6IivLIOdzA3T0FEZVphMnc/view?usp=sharing In that file, inputs were attempted to be spliced starting at the first incline of BLW1 all the way to the Red Stealth helmet in BLW2. Due to some pixel misalignments, however, I was only able to do it from after the rubber block pit to the Red Stealth helmet. The spliced file saves 10 frames over mine, and probably another 5 if the inputs between the first incline and the rubber block pit are optimized. So RandomPie, I'd be willing to give you credit as a co-author if you're ok with me using the spliced file, and maybe you could clean the TAS up in a couple areas, as you've got way more knowledge than me on this game. Thanks to your RAM watch file, I was able to save a good number of frames on collecting the diamond at the beginning of BLW1. I also improved the Plethora ending a bit by taking a different route to the flag. Questions: Is there any reason why you hold "X" in the entirety of your TAS? Could my method of hitting the shooter blocks in BLW2 potentially be faster than the method you used? As of yet, mine is barely slower.