Posts for dwangoAC

Posted: 9/17/2010 7:43 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
Posts: 1007

I've never played the game (I didn't even know it existed) and I agree with the high points and low points of the previous submitters. On the downside, the tutorial is pointless to watch even if you've never played the game before and the matches, while interesting, are repetitive. The flip side of the coin (pun intended) is that the RNG abuse is very good and the speed of moving through battles feels solidly in TAS territory. Yes vote from me because of the thorough trouncing of the game, even if it does get a bit monotonous. A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/17/2010 6:58 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
Posts: 1007

Cheezwizz wrote:

Aren't there other pinball TAS runs that you could just follow the examples of? or do those end in the middle of the game?

I was able to take the easy way out on my High Speed pinball TAS because the credits like several other Rare games of the time were prerolled and the ending was on an off-playfield screen that said "You have beaten the system this time". As evidenced by my earlier posts I'm trying to set a precedent for the Epic Pinball series (shareware or registered) of saving the score to disk and allowing the credits to roll on game exit as I feel this gives a better viewer experience. Ideally, if I could have my cake and eat it too I'd go with what

henke37 wrote:

I say, end the file after entering the name, end the timing when the balls drain and end the encode when the credits have rolled.

If the TAS for counter purposes could be considered complete at the frame the bonus is counted it would make Nach happy. If the submission file used to create the encode went on to include the final bonus screen for a few seconds it would make Dwedit happy. If it also saved the high score and exited to roll credits it would make a number of other people happy. One key consideration with JPC-RR is that it's not feasible to view the original file as the emulator cannot play back in realtime with sound so all viewers will be watching the encode. What if the submitted movie was marked as complete at the bonus count frame and the encoded file inserted a pause immediately after, annotated via subtitles why and indicated the final frame of counted input, then resumed normal speed to allow the credits to roll? In this way the same file could be used for the submission and the encode. I recognize how controversial this suggestion is so note that this is only a suggestion. This debate has been going for quite a while and I apologize for continuing to spur it on with my long-winded posts. Thanks for everyone who has provided feedback thus far - I know Nach appreciates it _{(er.. OK, I assume he appreciates it - this is Nach we're talking about after all :).} A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/16/2010 10:01 PM

Post subject: Can anyone give some context on these four submissions?

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dwangoAC

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Joined: 9/14/2008
Posts: 1007

LSK wrote:

Why are there two videos of this game, one 40 minutes faster than the other?

Are you referencing this other submission? If so, that's SaGa 2 vs. SaGa 3 for SNES. Having said that there's very little context between these four submissions. I'm hoping someone can post a bit more history on them as it's very interesting to see all four of them submitted at the same time... A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/16/2010 9:40 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
Posts: 1007

boct1584 wrote:

...pinball has always been a lot of fun for me. I guess I just don't care to WATCH it as much as DO it.

I completely understand that. For me playing emulated pinball let alone watching it isn't nearly as good as playing the real thing no matter how good the simulator is, hence why I own 5 pinball machines at the moment (although I'm selling my beloved High Speed at the Pacific Pinball Expo on the weekend of October 1st). With that said, I do like that a pinball TAS is uniquely different than a TAS on platformers or RPG's and I like that no two runs will be identical as the number of possible "routes" are endless in contrast to many other games which have settled into the same tired route. To come right out and say it, I'm hoping that this run gets accepted and that it is subsequently obsoleted at some point with a run that completes the game in a completely different way so they can be compared and contrasted.

boct1584 wrote:

The ending is extremely abrupt.

It is still probable that a future run could align the ending of the physical systems tests with bringing the android to life which would give the run a much more defined ending but as I mentioned before that amount of luck manipulation is non-trivial given the current emulation speed limitations of JPC-RR so I wish anyone who attempts it the best of luck.

boct1584 wrote:

What if, after successfully activating the android, you get a standard Game Over instead of (I think) skipping your other two balls, and also slowing the pace down so we can see that you're done?

Hmmm.. it wouldn't look good at all to end the game by losing two balls in a row but perhaps it would be possible to justify losing a ball at a couple of points during the run to "warp" to the top of the playfield by virtue of the ball being placed back in the plunger lane. With that said I don't know if there would be a significant speed or entertainment advantage and even if all balls were lost to get the wavy "game over" text it still wouldn't be on the screen any longer than the current "Quit Y/N" text that this run triggers assuming the high score is still entered to save the score to disk and the game is exited to display the credits. Whether or not to do that is still a topic that's up for debate for which Nach is still soliciting feedback. Thanks for your well thought out comments! A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/13/2010 7:23 PM

Post subject: Credits or no credits? Viewer feedback appreciated!

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
Posts: 1007

Nach wrote:

1) Why not just exit the game as soon as you start it and claim achieving your end goal in 2 seconds?

Because this would not achieve the stated goal of bringing the android to life. :)

Nach wrote:

2) This requires TASing both the shareware and not shareware versions as it has different "credits" as you call it. Further, it means the table used is irrelevant.

To your point the shareware version contains significant differences from the registered version (including the credits) and thus I treat it as a completely different game. In fact, I intentionally chose the shareware version to avoid the difficult discussion currently going on around F-Zero regarding whether individual levels should be submitted as individual runs or if all levels (or in this case, tables) should be completed in a single run.

Nach wrote:

3) This is not one of the 4 options we provide for ending a game.

The rules state that the movie should "end when the last decisive action has been delivered" and "It must be able to reach the credits or end screen without the viewer needing to do anything". This additional stipulation compels me to provide enough input to "reach the credits" - while I agree that the shareware version contains advertising at the beginning of the credits it's definitely a credit roll as the developer's names are listed sequentially.

Nach wrote:

I believe it needs to be truncated sooner.

As the person judging the submission you have the most say over this but I would still appreciate some feedback from less biased viewers than ourselves on whether or not the credits are interesting and should be retained. As noted I am OK with the submission file being truncated if that is the preference of viewers so I'm looking forward to additional feedback on this topic. Thanks! A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/13/2010 6:39 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

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Nach wrote:

There is a debate as to when to stop exactly which you can see on our wiki. But going out of your way to show some info on who made the game, which is mostly please buy the full game advertisements?

Because the run already contains some entertainment and speed tradeoffs in order to demonstrate glitches and other elements of gameplay it made sense to me to write the high score to disk and from there add enough input to exit the game to show the credits which bring back nostalgia for those who played shareware games of the time. The history of what shareware looked like in that era is as fascinating to me as the run itself but I'm probably a minority so I'd say it's definitely a topic that's up for debate. The current submission file could be truncated at the point the end-of-ball bonus is counted but this would not save the score to disk; this may be of no consequence but it feels incomplete to me. My preference is to leave the game exiting input in but I'd understand if it needed to be removed based on viewer feedback. Thanks again for taking the time to review this, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/13/2010 4:59 AM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

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Nach wrote:

Why not end it when you complete your goals, why is the buy the full game advertisement ran?

Per the submission text: The time it takes to exit the game properly is minimal given the game length and I feel it is a much more natural way to complete the game but the run could just as easily be considered complete the frame the bonus is counted. After the advertisement the actual game credits run so it felt like the most natural thing to do after finishing the game, plus the credits music is pretty good. When I was younger I used to hex edit the credits file to say all kinds of strange things and discovered that the game crashed if the length of the text changed but I digress...

Nach wrote:

I might also add this doesn't play the Android table but the Super Android table. The Android table is different, for example no slot on the far left.

Thanks for bringing this up - I did a little more research and determined that version 1.1 of the shareware game which can be found at http://www.classicdosgames.com/game/Epic_Pinball.html shows only the word Android on the playfield (and as you indicated does not contain the left ramp diverter or sinkhole). Versions 2.0 and 2.1 of the shareware game which both sync with this TAS say Super Android on the playfield but continue to list the game's official advertised name as Android. I've updated the submission text to note the different versions. I'm not particularly picky what name is used for the table going forward but both seem equally valid depending on your perspective. Thanks for the feedback, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/9/2010 5:31 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
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creaothceann wrote:

How do you play the TAS in the emulator, by the way? When I click "Snapshot"->"Load"->"Movie" and select it, this message appears: http://img840.imageshack.us/img840/6500/loadsavestatefailed.png

Those are the right steps so the error message has me a bit puzzled - I took the files to a different Linux system and it started OK. You may want to save that stack trace and get it to Ilari - it's possible the problem is that your version of jpc-rr isn't recent enough. The movie file should sync in any version of jpc-rr later than r.10 based on an IRC conversation I had with Ilari but I did take a hotfix to resolve a stability issue so he may suggest a newer release. I know there are better dumping controls in the latest builds... Best of luck, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/9/2010 5:07 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
Posts: 1007

Pointless Boy wrote:

...it would be cool if you made a TAS of a pinball game that had an actual goal recognized by the game.

In that case, have a look at my High Speed run which has a definite ending (but also has really, really annoying unskippable cutscenes - I'd recommend using the Lua script I created and linked in the submission text to fast forward past them). As far as Epic Pinball Android is concerned it's definitely possible that a future run can test the final physical system AND bring the android to life at nearly the same time which would give it a slightly more solid ending than what's there now. I'd gladly encourage someone to make another run that attempts to do this although I'd suggest waiting for jpc-rr dumping controls so it's easier to play back what you've already done in realtime (not being able to see what things really looked like was a significant handicap when making this run). Thanks for the feedback, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/7/2010 6:05 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
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Patashu wrote:

Out of curiosity, are any of the non-shareware tables good? I seem to have memories of playing the crash and burn table, though I'm not sure how.

Most of the other tables were far more shallow and none of them have the depth of rules that the Android table does. A few of them do stand out - I always had a soft spot for Enigma because it experimented with the concept of dynamically disappearing and reappearing targets which would be impossible (or at the very least highly infeasible cost-wise) on a real machine. I don't think I'll try taking on any other tables in this series so you're welcome to take a stab at one of them if you feel so inclined but take note that the nostalgia factor of the paid tables is far lower as a lot fewer people have seen them. Thanks for the feedback, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/7/2010 5:58 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
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jlun2 wrote:

Dwedit wrote:
Could you let the final score remain on the screen for at least 5 seconds or so? Kind of anti-climax to see you get so many bonuses, then the high score goes away in several frames.
Wouldn't extending the movie for 5 seconds contradict with the site's goal of ending input ASAP? Or did I misunderstood something?

I agree that it's unfortunate the score can't really be seen but at the same time I'm already pushing my luck by entering my initials for the high score as it is. :) I think a good compromise would be to take some screenshots of the final bonus screen and/or the high score screen. Unfortunately I won't have time to do this this week so if someone else wants to take that on please feel free to do so. Thanks for the feedback! A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/7/2010 5:55 PM
(Edited: 9/7/2010 6:12 PM)

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
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hopper wrote:

I see that you used DOS Games Archive as the source for your copy of the game. DOS Games Archive is a good site, but I recommend using my own site as the source for DOS games for TAS runs

Thank you very much for pointing out your site! I've been there before but I didn't even think to check to see if you had Epic Pinball on there when I started the run. As you mentioned there are some significant benefits to your site as you list the various different versions of the game which answered the burning question I've had of which version I was using. I compared the MD5 hash and it looks like I luckily used the most recent 2.1 shareware version. I've updated the submission to point to your site as the primary reference and I've updated the ROM name to use your naming mechanism as it's far more descriptive. Thanks again and I'm glad you enjoyed the run! A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/7/2010 4:41 AM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
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Undie wrote:

The run looks great, a bit difficult to grasp what "route" to take in a game like this. What planning did you do?

Well, I started by planning on getting the android alive as quickly as possible hence the early emphasis on completing the AI but then I realized it didn't really finish the game enough so I kept going to finish off the physical systems while placing strategic shots to max out the various game elements as quickly as possible. With that said, "route" planning in a pinball game is a bit of a fallacy. :)

Undie wrote:

I strongly recommend you have a look at Pinball Fantasies and its 4 levels if you consider doing one of these runs again =)

I'm starting to be known as the guy who likes to TAS pinball games but I suppose I may potentially be up for taking on Pinball Fantasies - I played those as well when I was younger and there are some interesting tables in that series. It'll probably be a month or two before I try to take on another TAS project however as I need to make sure I spend some quality time with my family. Anyway, thanks for the feedback and for mirroring the encode, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/7/2010 3:16 AM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

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GuidMorrow wrote:

Would it have helped for the game to end after receiving the maximum jackpot value (*e.g. "You Have Beaten The System")?

I grappled with the best way to end the run. Per the submission text: "Also, despite the fact that it's not the highest scoring award in the game it may make sense in a future run to bring the android to life as the last task instead of halfway through the middle of the run." With that said I've had some.. er.. difficulties in the past ascertaining when I've "Beaten the System". It's funny that you should use those words. :) I'm curious if there's something I'm not aware of in this table that specifically says "Maximum jackpot" - if there is, please let me know. I accomplished all of my stated goals and I'm happy with the result but if there's another objective that should be aimed for in a future run I'd be interested in hearing about it. Thanks, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/6/2010 9:58 AM

Post subject: Final WIP before submission! Feedback appreciated.

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dwangoAC

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Greetings, Here's the final WIP .jrsr file (which contains a re-record count that's a little on the low side): http://sonic.net/~ac/tas/dwangoAC-WIP-Epic-Pinball-05.jrsr I've also encoded the entire run through to the exit to DOS; please note that the file is 33 MB and I have a 1GB bandwidth cap per month so if you download this please consider leaving some feedback: http://sonic.net/~ac/tas/dwangoAC-WIP-Epic-Pinball-05.mkv Some quick notes: - Aims to max out every game counter (bumper value, Power Up value, bonus multiplier, Physical Systems tests, and AI) and bring the android to life - Manipulates luck - Makes entertainment and speed tradeoffs It turns out that bringing the android to life takes a lot less time than maxing out the game counters and thus that event actually takes place about halfway through the run. It also turns out that finishing the final physical systems test provides a very, very large score (although I haven't figured out if it's an arbitrary value or not) so there's still a halfway decent ending. I opted to allow the ball to drain to allow the bonus to be counted, quit to the menu, enter my initials for the high score, then quit the game to allow the credit sequence to roll. It feels like the most natural way to end the run and doesn't add a significant amount of time based on the overall movie length of just over 5 minutes. With that said I'd appreciate feedback on whether the ending feels natural or not. I should note that this run does contain some entertainment and speed trade-offs - if you look carefully there are a fair number of very significant glitches, some of which are unavoidable even when playing in realtime. A partial list (which will be fleshed out in the submission text): the ball can fall off the playfield, usually out of the far-left diverted ramp sinkhole, the drop targets on the left don't register being hit, sink holes frequently have balls stuck in them which must be cleared before shots to them register, and getting two-ball multiball when two balls are already on the playfield moves all balls to the plunger lane, which may be a "feature" but sure is unnatural. There are some potential improvements in a future run for better "route planning" as it may be even more entertaining to do everything else first and bring the android to life as the very last event. With that said this is fairly close to the most optimal you can make this run without making entertainment sacrifices or going crazy looking for luck manipulation improvements. Anyway, let me know if the run and the encode are good enough for a submission. I'll probably submit the run sometime tomorrow unless there's a strong opinion against it. Thanks for any feedback you may have, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 9/2/2010 12:34 AM

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dwangoAC

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The soundtrack was awesome. I somewhat appreciated the cheesy video at the end. Modern gaming systems can handle video so easily in comparison... :) Of course, voted yes. I'll avoid using the word Epic, however. A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/27/2010 4:57 PM
(Edited: 8/31/2010 9:45 PM)

Post subject: Interesting DOS NetHack random seeds list

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
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After discussions in #tasvideos about brute-forcing random seeds for the DOS version of NetHack I offered to volunteer some CPU time to brute-force seeds using an expect script that ais523 hacked together which looks for a character that has "one cream pie and gloves" but rejects ID'd leather gloves as "we need unIDed GoP". I started four executions at a time between a couple of different systems and came up with 5 seeds that matched: Start seed of 107121391 found 107743635 Start seed of 109000000 found 109073336 Start seed of 112000000 found 112781909 Start seed of 115000000 found 115168678, 116323878 ais523 has gone through the script a few times with the following known results and I've added my new unidentified results at the end: 1070719748 (multiple pies) 1070719784 (one pie, cloudy potion on starting <) 1070719807 (one pie) 1070719946 (one pie, Barbarian not Tourist) 1070748611 (healer with cream pie on staircase) 1070756800 (healer with cream pie on staircase) 1070941740 (Barbarian with pie and IDed leather gloves) 1071015600 (Knight with cream pie and potion on staircase) 1071026630 (Monk with cream pie on staircase) 107743635 109073336 112781909 115168678 116323878 EDIT: ais523 discovered that all of the seeds above were found on a new moon which may complicate things; see his post here. It looks like I've been brute-forcing seeds in the distant past based on the fact that my starting digits are one lower than ais523's, possibly as an accident in cut-and-paste from IRC. I'm going to re-start with a more current random seed of 1071026631 and let it keep going from there as it'd be a bit nicer if we found a seed that is after 1070719677 (6 December 2003, the date given for NetHack 3.4.3 in its changelog) but before today's date, which I believe is somewhere in the range of 1282848486. The only problem is that it keeps stopping every time it finds a potential seed that may be of use so rather than babysitting this thing I think I'll make some kind of modification to append found seeds to a file and keep searching. I'll update this post with additional seeds of interest as they are found. EDIT: I hacked together an ugly bash wrapper script to launch ais523's original expect script multiple times and log the result to a file and keep going which worked but ais523 updated his script to do the same thing in pure expect which made things much easier. I started the script on multiple machines / cores and found the following seeds (which unless noted should not be from a full moon): 1073469071 1074193552 1150335537 1150368371 1150977167 1151929040 1171505432 1171734503 - Full moon seeds 1203687140 1204989551 1204994951 1205441505 1205660527 1205825602 1206024989 1206304187 1206488125 - This is right around the last seed found in a full moon 1206758104 - GoF 1207823470 - GoF 1208976226 - GoD 1210602737 - lg 1213569620 - GoD 1214758597 - GoF 1215538585 - GoP 1215862154 - GoP 1216149256 - lg 1216915650 - GoP 1219489417 - GoP 1220492288 - lg 1220896430 - lg 1221790901 - GoF 1221941425 - lg 1222084383 - lg 1223450403 - GoF 1223790555 - GoP 1223894567 - lg 1225159852 - GoF 1225857590 - GoF 1226122120 - lg 1227538877 - GoD 1229026754 - lg 1229437110 - GoD 1229842120 1230921242 1233946070 1236619270 1237004845 1239061859 1239108100 1239768400 1239848274 1240918488 1241176038 1241771814 1242041467 1242317606 1243016619 1243047658 1244825036 1245062392 1246109782 1248011078 1248672010 1249669799 1249898170 1250304166 1250413472 1250544757 1252055562 1254908732 1255167369 1256267150 1257020092 1257879514 1259562743 1259814550 1261053706 1262027291 1262328922 1263123466 1264240126 1264356191 1267048451 1267350854 1268990719 1270099964 1270967362 1272068310 1272471964 1272685898 1272895332 1273136150 1275317670 1275588546 1275757441 1279049859 1280699404 1280946304 1281856820 1282112604 1282907342 1282920203 1284136433 1284297066 1284428175 1284576866 1284696010 1285748615 1287026466 1287201143 1287859241 1288063267 1288521517 1288773662 1289485706 1291870358 1292335011 1292923318 1293403775 1293441120 1293561256 1294808366 1294852889 1294861145 1294866384 1296736346 1298221282 1300286222 1300347691 1300777505 1301092096 1302450390 1303527282 1303965034 1304628161 1304864594 1306085266 1307077048 1307761692 1308023562 1308833349 1309508546 1309687528 1309877671 1310107786 1311392174 1311817083 1312126592 1312924966 1314242688 1314714261 1315166750 1315886074 1317602646 The ones I've identified list whether they were leather gloves (lg), Gloves of Fumbling (GoF), Gloves of Dexterity (GoD), or Gloves of Power (GoP). The hex core i7 system stomped the rest of my computers as far as seeds tested, starting at 1200000000 at 6 PM PST Friday and traversing through 1317910677 as of 2 PM PST on Tuesday (~5 days) representing 117,910,677 seeds tested (rerecords? :). The records table on that system was very interesting as well: 3.4.3 451 0 1 1 14 14 0 20100829 20100829 1000 Ran Gno Fem Neu pqa,quit 3.4.3 441 0 1 1 12 12 0 20100831 20100831 1000 Rog Hum Fem Cha pqa,quit 3.4.3 423 0 1 1 12 12 0 20100828 20100828 1000 Hea Gno Fem Neu pqa,quit 3.4.3 423 0 1 1 14 14 0 20100831 20100831 1000 Mon Hum Mal Law pqa,quit 3.4.3 420 0 1 1 18 18 0 20100828 20100828 1000 Val Dwa Fem Law pqa,quit I don't know if I'll have time to appropriately identify any of these seeds but hopefully there's something interesting to be found in there. I'll let the hex core keep going as it's really covering a lot of interesting ground (EDIT: I let it run too long and finally got around to killing it after 5 days - I think I'm finally done updating this poor post :). A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/17/2010 8:03 PM

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

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I'm sorry but I couldn't get through it either. It does look like you put a lot of effort in to it but somehow it isn't all that interesting to watch. I voted No. Best of luck on your next TAS, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/15/2010 7:50 AM

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dwangoAC

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Voted yes. This was a well made run. I'm very happy that the Swordless Challenge category was created, if only to give more meaning to Swordless Link's username. :) A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/14/2010 8:48 AM

Post subject: New WIP - pinball faster than it should be experienced

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dwangoAC

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The latest WIP is up at: http://sonic.net/~ac/tas/dwangoAC-WIP-Epic-Pinball-02.mkv It's re-worked and it's definitely faster although I'm not positive if it's more entertaining just yet. :) The fun part will happen when multiball starts. Feedback is welcome, as always. Thanks, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/9/2010 8:26 PM

Post subject: Would "coinless" be considered a low%? :)

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dwangoAC

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After deliberating for a while I opted to vote No on this. Despite statements from some that call the goal choice arbitrary I'd say it's well defined, just misplaced - as Warp mentioned earlier there are too few places where the goal choice comes in to play. Additionally, there are some situations where frames could have potentially been saved (although that claim is as of yet unproven). Regarding making a coinless, warpless run I'd only vote Yes on it if there were ample opportunities to show off near coin collisions or creative solutions to getting through sections without collecting coins. I'd generally consider myself an inclusionist so long as the highest rated content is still sorted to the top. In other words I'd still like to see some way of sorting one-off runs that are entertaining albeit potentially redundant without cluttering the published movies page - not exactly a B-List, just "additional constraints" type runs. This is a tricky topic so I'll stop polluting this thread any further. :) Again, I encourage you to keep making runs. Best of luck, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/8/2010 5:28 AM

Post subject: Inverted logic, or why pushing things doesn't always work

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dwangoAC

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moozooh wrote:

Can't you then nudge the table as you are using the flippers to impart additional momentum to the ball?

You would think that would be the case but so far all I've found is that it slows things down - if you nudge before you hit the flipper the act of the flipper hitting the ball appears to impart less momentum and if you nudge right after you hit the flipper it appears to have very little effect at all. The other consideration is that every time the table is tilted the entire view moves rapidly which might make for a jarring viewing experience. With that said I need to do some more testing to see if there's a way to get more momentum out of the ball. Setting the table to High Angle instead of Normal Angle results in an increase in the acceleration of the ball toward the bottom of the playfield but that typically translates to an inversely higher resistance when shooting the ball toward the top of the playfield and the gravity just "feels wrong" somehow. Anyway, I'm off to see if I can abuse the RNG to make the ball go where I want it as that currently seems like a better tool than nudging for the time being. I'll be sure to post here if I find any specific tricks that don't involve cheat codes, however. :) A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/8/2010 12:12 AM

Post subject: Luck Manipulation, or how to abuse physics and win friends

Quote

dwangoAC

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Joined: 9/14/2008
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moozooh wrote:

So far there is some major repetition. Can you accelerate/decelerate the ball by repeatedly bumping the table?

I agree on the repetition part - one aspect of this is that some of the opening shots are required to start the first mode in the game but at the same time there's a lot more that can be done to break that up. If my stated goal is to bring the android to life AND get all of the various scoring elements to their maximum (i.e. maximum IQ, maximum "power" which is scored by the middle slot, etc.) it opens up a lot more potential variety. In other words, what you see here is purely driven toward stepping through the modes to bring the android to life as quickly as possible but I'm discovering that perhaps it's worth it to expand that goal a notch to allow more creativity and entertainment. Regarding nudging the table it has surprisingly little effect unless the ball is sitting on or near another object. I know from playing my own pins in the real world that if you nudge the pinball machine while the ball is touching an object the object will exert force on the ball but if the ball isn't touching an object the playfield will move underneath the ball. With that said only the former force appears to be applied in Epic Pinball so nudging is only really useful when the ball is near some other object. A far more interesting element to this game is how much the ball's velocity (literally - speed and direction) are affected by the RNG. In the opening plunger shot performing a keyhit causes the ball to behave wildly differently when it reaches the rollover lanes above the bumpers (I think the WIP I posted above presses the right control key at a specific frame to obtain a more favorable bounce). I have some work ahead of me to sort through dump files looking for memory locations - ideally, it would be very useful to know what values change when the ball is more likely to go left vs. right. Making some kind of script to help find a more "optimal" solution will be very, very tricky, however - what's "optimal" is very hard to pin down at any given moment but as a very obvious generality you're either trying to go more to the left, neither left nor right, or more to the right (and always at the fastest speed possible). That entire sentence sounded... well, ridiculous if I'm being honest with myself but it highlights that with a game like pinball knowing what you want to have happen next and being able to articulate it are two very different things. :) I'm going to work on breaking up the opening sequence a bit more and on finding the RNG so I'll post another WIP once I've got something else interesting to show. For the record, there are a number of "cheats" that can be enabled including controlling the ball with the arrow keys by pressing escape, b, and then j; I'm choosing to use the default angle settings and no cheat codes to make the gameplay as authentic as possible. Thanks for the feedback, A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/7/2010 6:28 PM

Post subject: Epic Pinball

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

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Greetings, With much help from Ilari I've created a very, very short WIP of the Epic Pinball Android table using the default settings. This WIP is just long enough to show what the gameplay will generally be like, although the first goal is a bit heavy on only the left and right ramps. The encode can be found at: http://sonic.net/~ac/tas/dwangoAC-WIP-Epic-Pinball.mkv And for those who are interested the raw file (with an incorrect re-record count and no file extension at the moment) is at: http://sonic.net/~ac/tas/dwangoAC-WIP-Epic-Pinball The stated goal in the game documentation is to bring the android to life by completing various goals printed on screen. I'm hoping these goals will be entertaining and can be made even more entertaining through the use of creative shots and luck manipulation - lots of luck manipulation. As always, feedback is welcome. Thanks for looking at this WIP! A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.

Posted: 8/5/2010 5:21 PM

Post subject: #tasvideos voted - please change my name to dwangoAC

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dwangoAC

Experienced Forum User, Moderator, Published Author, Senior Ambassador, Experienced player (898)

Joined: 9/14/2008
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This is a completely selfish request but nevertheless the #tasvideos IRC channel was in unanimous agreement that the best presentation of my name should be "dwangoAC" to best break up the DWANGO part (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DWANGO) and my initials (AC) which are both generally uppercase. Darkpsy indicated that this might be non-trivial and may require editing the database to change the name on both the site and the forum but I'm hoping it won't be too difficult. Thank you in advance for the consideration! A.C. ******

I was laid off in May 2023 and could use support via Patreon or onetime donations as I work on TASBot Re: and TASBot HD. I'm dwangoAC, part of the senior staff of TASVideos as the Senior Ambassador and BDFL of the TASBot community; I post TAS content on YouTube.com/dwangoAC based on livestreams from Twitch.tv/dwangoAC.