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Yeah, Man vs Machine, the eternal struggle... lol
won't work though (yet)... fceu allows only normal input or bot input, not both at once :( plus bot input only goes at super fast turbo mode
maybe the next release ;)
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Yeah, it amused me...
Andypro wrote:
Definitely you'd want to avoid taking damage at all costs early on so that you could maximize the amount of money you spend on engines and acceleration
I could probably figure it out myself, but do you mean that taking damage lowers your winnings, or that you need to spend money on repairs? Also, it seems that you make more money the faster you race, so it seems like you'd need to strike a balance between damage/speed (like most games I guess ;)
I'm hunting for ram addresses, got speed down but would like damage, direction, and a timer on the nitro boosts (both how long it lasts and how long you have to wait to get a new one); think I'll keep chipping away, it's a pretty addictive game...
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Yeah, Tetris hurts my brain even thinking about ;)
I had briefly considered Q*Bert but your post spurred me on. Here's what I know so far:
Q's position is not a traditional x/y pair of memory address, but one address that holds a different value for each cube he stands on.
The top one is 4, the second to top one on the left is 11, and the one to the right is 12. For each descending row, the leftmost cube's value increases at intervals alternating 7 and 8; the 3rd row is 19, the 4th 26, and so on. Each cube to the right of these increments by 1, so the third row is 19, 20 and 21. So right there you have a pretty complex pattern for telling where Q to go... for example, what is the method of getting from location 4 to say, 52? It's doable though.
The good thing is that the enemy locations are stored using the same values, so it is fairly easy to write something like "as long as the enemy is not where you are about to move, go ahead and move. otherwise, try somewhere else"
The other cool thing about this is the way the game stores whether the cube has been stepped on (you have to change the colors of every cube by stepping on it). Starting with a base value of x700, if you add the value of Q's location you have the address for whether it has been stepped on. So for the top cube, look at x704.
Anyone have a general strategy for completing the levels as fast as possible? My idea was to run down one edge (either one), and then go along the bottom, then work my way back to the top.
I want to come back to this but I'm working on a different game right now that has my attention...
Keep those ideas coming, and let me know if you want to know more about how these are done! The judicious use of bots can be helpful in any TAS in my opinion (for what that counts ;)
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Mach Rider!
This game is hilarious. Early NES motorcycle racing/shooting game. I picked it for the "solo" course with no other motorcycles.
Here's the movie of the first track
He wins but just barely ... he's trying to go 22 km before the timer runs out, and does so with 2 time units left ;)
I chose to ride on the left side of the road as there were fewer oil slicks to run over, but he still hits a couple of explosive barrels.
BasicBot code:
A:
1000
Hold A to go fast!
Up:
(frame%20)=10
Up shifts up gears; this is a simple way to do it at the beginning and after the crashes.
Left:
((mem(x9)>=0)&(mem(x9)<150))+(mem(x9)>204)
The x location of the cycle is annoying; dead center is 0, and increases going to the right. At a certain point the number wraps around, and it increases to 255 which is just left of center... Basically this line moves left if it is to the right of where I want to be (riding the left rail)
Right:
(mem(x9)>150)&(mem(x9)<204)
Move to the right if need be
End when:
frame=1000
Couldn't figure out how to find the oil slicks in memory, and gear shifting could be much better probably... I want to work on this again at some point as I think it would really cool at top speed dodging stuff, but for right now this one's frustrating me! I'm also getting distracted by other games...
Thanks for watching again :)
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I liked this movie since I played this game a lot and it seems you abused it very well (even the parts where you're not skipping levels entirely ;)
I also vote yes for a 1.2 run!
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Yeah, street fighter 3 would probably be better for that, I think urban champion would be a block-fest ...
Any other game ideas? I was working on space invaders before uc, have it so that it runs back and forth and shoots randomly, having trouble with a formula to shoot only when an invader is in range. Also dodging incoming bullets. The memory addresses seem really hacky in that game :(
Wow, that's a really weird game. Never heard of it before. For those like me, it is a street fighting game (but from 1986). You have a quick punch and a heavy punch, and you can punch high or low. You can also dodge high and low.
My current strategy is to run towards the opponent, when in range throw quick punches at the opposite of the where the opponent is currently blocking. In other words, if the opponent is up, punch down, and vice versa. Of course the opponent can change while I'm punching but it usually doesn't (esp early on). If the opponent punches, I try to block.
BasicBot code:
A:
((mem(x263)-mem(x2A3))<=17)&(mem(x321)=1)
A is quick punch. Basically, the first part sees how close to the enemy I am, and the seond sees if I can throw a punch successfully.
Up:
(((mem(x263)-mem(x2A3))<=17)&(mem(x321)=1)&(mem(x314)=1))+(mem(x313)=3)&(mem(x312)=4)
The first part, before the +, is similar to A. It checks to see if enemy is in range, if punch can be thrown, then if the opponent is "down". If it is down, then the bot holds up to punch "up"... The second part is for blocking -- essentially if the opponent is punching high and is in the part of the swing where you need to hold up to block, it does so.
Down:
(((mem(x263)-mem(x2A3))<=17)&(mem(x321)=1))&(mem(x314)=0))+(mem(x313)=4)&(mem(x312)=4)
The opposite of Up, really.
Right:
(mem(x263)-mem(x2A3))>17
Moves right if you are too far away :)
End when:
frame=1000
as usual
This bot does really well initially, then starts getting challenged, and finally dies in round 17 (I think the game is endless and stops counting at 99?)
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/5738/UrbnChmpBot.fcm
With better strategy and some fine tuning I'm sure this bot could set a time record or some sort (though it's an incredibly boring game :( )
This game is 2 player--someone could program controller 2 with another bot and we could fight ;)
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Pinball movie
... as suggested by FODA (again)
Sorry to flood the forums but I'm having fun :)
This one was pretty simple; check to see if the ball needs to be launched and do so when it does, then flip the flipper when the ball is close. (that's pretty much how I play too...)
To play at home:
A:
((mem(x7)>145)*(mem(x7)<175))?((mem(x9)>189)*(mem(x9)<226)):0
B:
(mem(x7)=225)*(mem(x9)=154)*(mem(x125)!=4)
Up:
((mem(x7)>110)*(mem(x7)<138))?((mem(x9)>189)*(mem(x9)<226)):0
End when:
frame=1000
For A and Up, the ball's x position is x7 and y is x9, so playing with the contstants those are compared with changes the "hit box" for the flippers. If you wanted to get really fancy you could in theory turn the box into a more complex shape, but yeah, it's pinball, I think this is about as good as it gets ;)
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I actually worked on this a bit more too and changed to something similar to what you describe. It still has a tendency to die when the ball is moving faster than the paddle can since it gets outrun.
I was thinking about writing something that would instead of trying to stay under the ball, predict where the ball will be when it comes back down. Given the bricks, enemies and walls that gets super complicated. For the simplest case though where the ball is falling and will not contact anything, you can calculate this with something like:
desired x location for paddle = current ball x position +- (distance left to fall)/(y speed)*(x speed))
I have memory addresses for all those values, but writing that formula in basicbot speak is giving me a headache... and this is the simplest case. throw in the other variables and it gets evil ;)
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Worked on smb a bit too.
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/5690/Super%20Mario%20Bros.%20bot.fcm
It checks it's position relative to enemies and jumps accordingly. It also jumps if it's speed is low (ie stuck and can't run forward).
I was stymied by the pit though, anyone know where this info is in the ram?
In case you want to try yourself:
A:
(((mem(x88)-mem(x86))<30)*((mem(x88)-mem(x86))>0))+(((mem(x87)-mem(x86))<30)*((mem(x87)-mem(x86))>0))+(mem(x57)<20)
B:
1000
Right:
1000
End when:
frame=1000
Everything else is 0.
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FODA wrote:
"arkanoid"
Yeah, good idea! An effective strategy to not die is to simply keep the paddle under the ball as much as possible.
22F = ball x location
20F = left bound of paddle
213 = right bound
That's all you really need to make the bot. You can set it up so that when the ball is more to the left than the left bound, move left, or conversely if it is more to the right than the right bound, move right.
Or in BasicBot (in FCEU 16), set Left to (mem(x22F))<mem>(mem(x213))
I also had it push A rapidly to make it "serve" the ball (though it didn't work the second level, oh well, it did something else cool by mistake) Not needed though.
Also, I set End when: to frame=1000 ... if you don't put an ending it only goes about 1024 frames anyways, and it seemed not to record properly without this end condition though in theory it shouldn't be needed.
Here's the resulting movie
Nothing fancy, but (almost) entirely generated on the fly with no rerecords (it says there was 1, but it was me during the start screen)
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Yeah I was thinking about that too. If you started from an embedded savestate right when the first movie stops, it wouldn't really save time b/c you have to watch the whole hero of hyrule/credits thing. Course you could make the savestate later but that sounds cheat-y ;)
The cool thing about adding to the existing movie is you could also easily make one movie that played both quests in well under an hour... so awesome!
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Yup, I enjoyed watching this. Have even watched it a couple of times now. It's a lot quicker than I imagined.
I like upthorn's idea -- that would turn into a bit of a score attack, no?
I would also like to see the other modes of play, the vs mode where you could bury your computer opponent insanely fast or the "endless" mode where clearing the board garners a special bonus (though i suppose "endless" and "speedrun" don't go together well ;)
Digressions aside, great run SuperHappy, very glad you made it.
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I've always wanted to write a bot to play smb and then give it random hacks to test it out. I can dream, right?
I got as far as making (remaking? sounds like Bisqwit did it too...) one that held right+b and jumped randomly, then selecting one that was fast and didn't die. It would have beat 1-1 easily but basicbot caps out at 1024 frames which wasn't quite enough :(
As far as making a tas, depending on the game (like the ones FODA mentions.. and maybe a full run of PacMan?) it seems possible to write a bot to do something relatively mindless over and over again, making it much faster to just write a bot than to hand play.
which reminds of (shameless self-plug) my rampage run that beats the game by holding turbo a the whole time... simplest bot ever! (if you consider StickyKeys to be a bot, which I do ;)
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Well this clearly needs to get bumped.
With Phil and Baxter's jaw dropping run of the first quest I'm salivating over this one now. Hopefully in less than 18 months? ;)
I like their competition/collaboration method; seems like it would be even better with more sets of eyes (or maybe it would just be a headache-inducing morass of argument).
Anyways, get to work y'all. ;)
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Mine's just called PACMAN.NES
Don't know if there are different versions.
I forgot about this thread!
I guess we'll crown Hero of the Day as king of Pac-Man for now (as well as Donkey Kong, Metroid, etc.)
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haha that's funny if ziplock had the same avatar and a gameshow tas site. um, i tried finding nintendorecords and it doesn't exist anymore, right? or i'm slow...
btw the avatar is a portrait of "bob" dobbs of the cult of subgenius. I thought "subgenius" was kind of appropriate for this site ;)
