...somehow, when they said a simpler game, I don't think they had something like Paper Mario in mind. ;)
Anyways, I haven't posted here in aeons, but I thought I might check up on how the OOS/OOA runs were doing. I should probably pick up my OOA NG+, but then again, I'd probably drop it again. (By the way, feel free to use me as an example of a newbie TASing failure, if it helps, cause I certainly don't disagree with you guys having experienced it firsthand.)
With the Ocarina Glitch, would it be possible to clip through the books and get into Librari's place without returning any library books? I'm not really sure how it works exactly, but it's an idea.
Whee. Just checking in. With a combination of christmas, twilight princess and my computer breaking down, I haven't had any time at all to do anything in the realm of speed running, so yeah, forgive my inactivity.
It's good to see these games are still being worked on. :) *scurries off to read what he missed of this thread*
I also found out with Ricky that you don't need to charge the punch to destroy bushes that are at a hole. Ricky can jump and hit them in the air without losing any time.
You actually do lose some frames when punching with Ricky in midair. I am not sure exactly how many, but it's noticeable even in realtime if you're looking for it.
Hmm, I have done a bunch of testing with general movement comparisons:
For the Animal Regions, in Ages: Moosh is slowest, then Ricky is slightly faster. Dimitri is MUCH faster than both, over 2000 frames difference. I have not tested the Seasons regions.
For general travel, Moosh walks and flies at the same speed as Link's walking. Dimitri swims at Link's walking speed (though faster than both of Link's swimming methods), but walks on land slower than Link. Ricky walks fastest, but Link's running is still faster than that.
That travel info is pretty much useless for Ages, because there is almost no chance to take advantage of your animal's speed. As I told Tompa on MSN, between the time you attain Ricky and the time you attain the Pegasus Seeds, there is barely any time to take advantage of Ricky's speed, and even then you can't take Ricky in most of those places anyway. As for Dimitri, there is a huge swimming section of the game, but most of it requires regular diving and time-warping, rendering his swimming capabilities inappropriate. Moosh is totally useless.
However, I am not as familiar with Seasons, so there may be a chance to take advantage of the general movement bonuses (though the regions speed is obviously much more of a deciding factor, especially since the Seasons regions are huge compared to the Ages regions).
As for Link's swimming technique/s, I have been testing those, but I am not final on it. I will get back with the results later.
I have diffrent route as you have. What is your time when you exit the level. I tell when my test run is finished
My best time with that route is 10:25, without drowning at the end. Drowning cuts off about 15 seconds more.
Also, notes on TTC. Nothing major, but maybe a few seconds can be saved:
Leaky only requires 2 eggs. You put in 3, and almost made it to Bottles before the cutscene -- maybe you could skip the cutscene by reaching Bottles in time, and also save an Egg.
Also, I saw that you fixed up the entry into the top part of the pirate ship -- I was going to tell you about this with your test run, but good job.
After the witch switch, is it faster to go into Talon Trot while falling down to the notes, instead of doing it before going over the ledge? It looks like it is worth testing, even if it does not turn out faster.
I think getting the second Extra Honeycomb Segment can be optimised. You can save a Red Feather by not going so low, and it would look more impressive anyway, even if it is not really much faster.
Other than that, excellent job. I may steal bits of the route to improve my own run. :P Can't wait for Clanker's Cavern.
Now I start make a Clanker's Cavern test run. I don't even bother make a map because only who can understand it is me :D
Haha, my own route (Line 134) cuts over 2:30 off marsh's, and I only skip the honeycombs (and walk right past both of them anyway). You're not the only one who knows this level. :P
Meh, I watched your TTC test run, and had some notes on that, but I noticed you uploaded a new wip, so I will watch that before giving my notes, so I can see first what you changed. I have not had much chance lately for speed running, on account of I am sick and busy with a site, but I should be able to watch this soon.
Though I should note, inside Nipper's shell in the test run -- awesome. Seriously, you just trot in there all casual-like, pummel one crab and swipe the other, grab the Jiggy and walk out of there while they're still writhing around on their backs. Total badass. :D
dezbeast: Oh... haha, thanks for the explanation. It seems there is more to it than I thought, which is not really unusual. :/
Tompa: Thanks for that. I'll get to testing.
Crap. I missed two pages. :( Anyway, I read a couple of posts. I guess I will still make more maps of levels, but I doubt any will be better than Spiral Mountain...
bkDJ wrote:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He4ZI8qHWrI Yay, proper library book skip in AVI format. :P
VBM of it: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/Zelda-OoA_LibrarySkip.vbm (I seriously need to stop using my site for hosting this kind of thing.)
I have a question: How do you manipulate item drops and enemy behaviour? I have figured out how to manipulate enemy location (it's decided on the frame you enter the room), but the other two baffle me...
Also, Tompa, do you use IRC or IM? lol
Tompa wrote:
Nice dungeon maps alert! I was wondering in dungeon 1... With the moving platform and the two buttons. Can actually jump down and start pitwalking there?:O.
Until I read Vespa's post.. I didn't even know. I just drew a line over the general places you go to. This philosophy should be applied to all my maps, like when it looks like I say to activate a switch, I might mean to hit it from afar or something. I only really covered the basics, mainly out of laziness. :/
Tompa wrote:
I must say that your way in dungeon 5 wasn't the best one really. And what do you mean by skipping a key...? There's no place you can skip a key:O? Or which key lock did you mean really...? Beacuse in your route you passes 5 key locks, and collect 4 keys, huh?
Uh... whoops. Yeah, get the key I skipped. I didn't actually test the routes properly, I just put the maps together and drew up the routes based only on that.
Tompa wrote:
And I can't see how it would be faster to go to ladder a in the beginning instead of shooting with the seed shooter on the switch and take ladder b at once, hmm... I haven't timed the two routes, but I can honestly not understand how your way could be faster.
It's not. That's what I said I screwed up with. Going to Ladder B is faster, I did not notice until after I uploaded it.
Tompa wrote:
I shall look up the bombs to see if you really need to take the bombu upgrade. I think it's better to manipulate an enemy to drop, or just lift from a bush or similar... And the rings, you will swim quite a lot during the game, isn't the swimmer ring a good idea then?
[snip]
Thanks for researching the bombs. I guess I will just not get the upgrade and manipulate where needed. About the swimmer's ring... meh. I can get it later in the run if I really need it that badly, but I don't need to use a secret to actually get it. I'll probably get the ring box upgrade so I can carry a power ring and also another ring that I will need. Also, about swimming in general, can you test how many frames is optimal to hold in a direction with the mermaid suit? Like, hold right for 10 frames, release for one, etc. one frame on and one frame off does not work.
Tompa wrote:
will it be worth taking a heart container later? The best place taking one would be in dungeon 3. Guess you can easily manipulate some heart drops whenever you need...
I know you weren't talking to me, but do Heart Pieces refill your health? Getting those would probably be more convenient than Heart Containers. But then, it's still probably faster to just manipulate heart drops from enemies you kill anyway, like you said. :/
pirate_sephiroth wrote:
uh... which animal friend will you choose?
Personally, I'm not sure yet... I thought Moosh, but I decided I am going to test it before doing any more of the TAS.
Vespa wrote:
Yes, you can jump down and start pit walking but you can't get onto the center from the pit for some reason, so I had to press the other switch then pit walk onto the moving platform.
Bah, this sucks. I guess I will keep it in mind for when i get up to this place. Too bad we can't use the conventional route, eh.
http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/spiralmountainwtf.jpg
LOL, what the hell? This is hard. While outputting VRML, the game lags like crazy, but for something to be outputted you actually have to look at it in the game so that it loads (and is thus outputted): it's not just loading up an area, outputting, done. What you look at loads, then unloads when you move the camera or something. A few exceptions are some Mario 64 levels and some other places in certain games. But this is ridiculous. No matter how thoroughly I explore the area in laggy bliss, some stuff still manages to not be outputted. :/
I wish Mupen had a plugin for this, that actually worked well. That would be more convenient.
Woo, more references:
Rafting over Whirlpools (Failed): http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/Zelda-OoA_RaftOverWhirlpools.vbm
Jumping while being sucked into a Whirlpool on a Raft (Failed): http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/Zelda-OoA_WhirlpoolRaftJump.vbm
I have been trying different stuff with whirlpools. For the second video, while I was making the first video I noticed that the Raft disappeared before Link got sucked in, and he was standing in midair for a frame or two, so I tried to exploit that by jumping on the free frame. No luck. But I KNOW there is something you can do odd with the whirlpools.. I CAN JUST FEEL IT. :( I know it's probably useless for the run, posting all these failures, but referencing it here will save other people testing it later. :P
Tompa wrote:
Floating over pits, the pit glitch!
LOL. Sorry about that, I always refer to that glitch as Pit Walking (which is actually what it is. :P), so I got confused.
Tompa wrote:
If you float in the air while lifting a block. Is that really impossible?
Yep, it's impossible. What I tested before works the same way as pit walking.
Tompa wrote:
Anyway, while talking about Moosh, is it faster to fly instead of walking...?
I haven't tested it, but I am pretty sure it's the same speed as normal walking.
Tompa wrote:
Nice. I actually made route maps last night for half the levels, but you got a few things I missed. Though, you didn't write a route for OoA Lvl1 (Edit: I just noticed you did that in a post)! I think it's obvious enough, just SQ when you have the Power Ring. Links to the maps, if you want to analyze them:
Level 1: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/maps/SpiritsGrave_Route-EA.gif
Level 2: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/maps/WingDungeon_Route-EA.gif
Level 5: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/maps/CrownDungeon_Route-EA.gif
Level 8: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/maps/AncientTomb_Route-EA.gif
Level 2 skips two keys and Level 5 skips one key. Note that in Level 2 I screwed up the route: when going to activating the rail gate, it should be the same as I drew coming back from the rail gate. Also in Level 5 I douched up the route between the first and second keys: you can just take the first ladder to get to the key, the same as coming back from it. By the way, Tompa, I'm pretty sure that bit is faster to not SQ after the second key. Every SQ costs about 300 frames, and the distance is almost exactly the same. Later in the level, when you get the boss key, it may be worth SQ'ing, but I wasn't sure how much time it would take, so I just drew the conventional route (upon checking it over, I'm actually sure it would be beneficial to just SQ at the boss key). Level 8 is same as normal... just TAS it up.
Tompa wrote:
Nice. I saw where you noted I should take the Noble Sword upgrade: I'm also considering taking the Bomb, Seed and Ring Box upgrades, to eliminate some limitations. But aside of the Ring Box, I can always manipulate to eliminate the limitations, so I dunno how much time it would save.
dezbeast wrote:
I doubt there's a way to keep from falling,
True, but there are places that, if you remove a rock, you can get to bits early and skip other stuff, and falling into the pit with a removed rock would be faster than not skipping. (Example: Getting into Cheval's Grave by skipping Moosh.)
Actually, it seems most items cannot be used over pits. In Jabu-Jabu's Belly, I tried using the switch hook to skip some stuff by pit walking and doing the long switch hook pit early, but it did not work. I'm going to try all the items over pits to see what works and what does not.
The floating glitch? If you mean floating with Moosh, I tested that and you can go a maximum of about 1.5 screens with him before he just drops, no matter how accurately you press A.
Aboutthe password generator, I was already using it. :P It does not matter what rings you put into it because they are in the same spot on the collection screen anyway.
Thanks for clearing that up about the secrats. I didn't know how to use them and freaked.
There was still one thing I wanted to be tested: If you can lift rocks while hovering :D. I guess you can't, right?
Not possible. You can grab onto the rocks, but there is not enough time to actually pick them up before the pit pulls you in. I actually tested this months ago when we were discussing the OoA Segmented, because I wanted to see if you could skip Moosh at the graveyard. Well... you can't. xD
Tompa wrote:
After I'm done with the routes for Seasons, I will go to Ages and do the same. Is it something els that you want me to do, e_alert?
That would actually be quite welcome. I was going to research routes myself, but two minds are better than one, and we can throw around ideas. Collaborate! :P
Tompa wrote:
And by the way e_alert. Which animal will you get with the linked password you were using? I belive it is faster to use Dimitri than the other two. Not? And you shall also use the password for the lvl 2 sword. The bombchus may also be useful... Not sure yet.
I used Moosh, because I seemed to remember from the SDA OoA thread that someone said Moosh was faster. Actually, if you are not 100% sure Dimitri is faster, could you test it? It's not too late for me to restart...
Something I noted about the passwords was that you actually had to find all the people IN the game, tell them the Seasons passwords, and then tell the passwords they tell you to Farore. I wonder if it's possible to get the passwords ahead of time and not have to visit each person? If so, then I could get the Noble Sword right from the off, as soon as I talk to the Maku Tree after rescuing her in the past, and coupled with the Power Ring Lvl3... One-hit-kills for all. :D But if you can't tell Farore the secrets before actually visiting the people, then I'm going to have to wait until after Jabu-Jabu's Belly before I can get the upgrade, or even after Ancient Tomb if I follow the optimal route.
I don't really see the bombchus being much use, unless you can set more than one at a time. I seem to recall that they walk through objects, but there aren't really many places where that's useful/quicker than just going the conventional way. Still, a 5-character password takes, what, a quarter of a second to input tas-style? :P
The sad thing is that I have to test this password crap myself, because my game has unique passwords. *sigh*
Heh, apparently my knowledge of the game engine is not what I thought. I tested these last night and like dezbeast said, they are not possible. Here are my test videos for a reference:
Jumping: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/Zelda-OoA_WalkOverPits-Jumping.vbm
Hovering between screens: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/Zelda-OoA_WalkOverPits-ScreenToScreen.vbm
Swimming over whirlpools: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/Zelda-OoA_SwimOverWhirlpools.vbm
I did not test the early pirate ship, because I had no way of getting into the ship. I'm going to use GS cheats to access it tonight and test it, even though it is pointless in terms of a run, because I want some clues so that I can figure out more of how the game works.
About the hovering between screens, I think I understand how it works (or why it doesn't work, if you prefer). Consider the following image that I drew up:
http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/Zelda-OoA_PitWalkingAnalysis.gif
The reason for the odd zigzag with the actual movement is because every second frame, Link does not move in the direction he should be because the pit is pulling him back from it. The reason you cannot change screens while pit walking is because you need to be pushing against a screen edge for two uninterrupted frames. So basically, you can press against the screen edge for one frame, wait as many frames as you like and then push again one more frame and Link will move on to the next screen, as long as nothing happens in the dead frames. Link can't move on to the next screen while pit walking because the pits pulling him away every second frame interrupts the requirement for moving to the next screen. Of course, though, without any way to move forward, Link will simply keep hovering on the spot until you decide to stop the pit walking process.
Tompa wrote:
Oh, snap. This reference is invaluable. I thank you with many internets.
I have a question concerning the Carpenters bit of Ages. I noticed that the landscape with Ricky is composed mainly of bushes and single rows of pits that Ricky can jump across. Is it possible to skip using Ricky at all for this section by pit walking? If so, it may be faster than the Moosh landscape. [EDIT: Uh, scratch that. I just noticed that you have to leap up cliffs, which can't be done without Ricky. Still, it's an idea.]
heh, nitsuja pretty much hit it in one. I think I have played around with the apps enough to understand this (1964 is totally useless, I ended up using a plugin for Project 64 instead). Should have a few maps uploaded tomorrow (sorry, I can't do it at the computer I use the internet on).
Sami: Sounds awesome. Can't wait. :D
1. Can you walk to the next screen? Like in dungeon 3...
2. Whirlpools, is it able to swim or take the raft past them? What happens if you enter the ship without having the scale?
3. Can you jump out on the holes and start walking?
1. It makes sense to be able to, if my understanding of the game engine is correct. Want me to test it?
2. Again, it makes sense to be able to get past these too, since whirlpools are essentially just an underwater pit. About the scale, I don't think it would work, because you actually need to give it to the Captain. I'll test this too.
3. Probably. I'll try it.
Also, Tompa, it took me about 10 minutes to perform the pit trick, and a couple of hours to perfect the technique. I can now do it every time, and coupled with hex editing, this consistency is made easy. Here, I'll run you through my technique:
1. Start recording a VBM.
2. Align yourself perfectly along the seam of the floor grid, on solid ground.
3. Using frame advance, inch your way into the pit. As soon as a frame starts sliding Link sideways into the pit, stop recording the movie.
4. Load the movie in a hex editor. I use this one: http://www.zshare.net/download/tasedit-rar.html (thread with info: http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3829&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0)
5. Edit the last frame of the VBM so that the input is toward the pit and ALSO in the opposite direction of the way you were sliding when you stopped recording the movie.
6. Duplicate this last frame four times, then make more frames after these that alternate between directions so that the input zig-zags. Make as many of these zig-zag frames as you need.
7. Save the VBM and test it in VBA.
Seriously, hex editing makes this MUCH less of a hassle than doing it in VBA itself with input.
They're created from ROM info. It's simply a matter of playing to and loading an area, saving the 3D info to a file, and loading that into a 3D editor.
That's about as much as I know at this point. I'll have more time tonight to learn all the quirks and processes necessary to do that.
EDIT: Here's a link to the post -- http://www.zeldauniverse.net/forums/showpost.php?p=619707&postcount=365
Just posting to say I am working on an OoA Linked TAS. This isn't really a serious run, just something to do in my spare time, so I don't know how fast the progress will be. I'm working on a non-TAS (whatever that is called) Banjo-Kazooie Any% run as a major speed run project right now, which is taking up most of my time and thought. When that's done I could probably work on this a little more, but like I said, at this point it's just for fun.
If you want, the current WIP: http://www.speedrunguild.com/stuff/Zelda-OoA_TAS_EA.vbm
So far, there's a few mistakes, but none of them cost any more than a frame or two. If you're wondering why I chose the Power Ring L-3, it's because I figured the huge power bonus would definitely be worth it, considering I can manipulate luck to never be hit (so I would never experience the extra damage side-effect). I'm considering other rings for various parts of the game, though. Whimsical Ring seemed pointless so early in the game when one hit kills for everything anyway.
Thank you. Heh, the map itself was fine, but the lines all over the place was confusing, in terms of what you do where. Your explanation cleared that up fine.
I'm actually downloading some tools now that I'll use for 3D map creation, for the purpose of Banjo-Kazooie. I was told how to do this a while ago on another forum but never had a use for the directions; but I hunted down the post, and I'm going to try it out. If it works, I'll let you all know. :D
Do you want me to PM you my full programming error/trick list?
Actually, that would be awesome, thanks! :D
bkDJ wrote:
I remember reading earlier in the thread that you do not need to become the walrus just for the cave jinjo in FP.
Oh? Well, I was thinking that you need to get the Wozza Jiggy with the Walrus to get Wozza out of the way so you can enter the cave and get the Jinjo as Banjo. Unless there is some glitch to get past him that I missed? :/
Sami wrote:
As with last time, very smooth, and very impressive. I like how you cleaned up the beginning of Mumbo's Mountain to make it faster and look more professional. The only thing that I could possibly criticize is that you could have fed the JuJu faster, and saved a 2-3sec rotation. Even so, 5:08 is VERY nice.
Sami wrote:
Yay, first post. Well, I finally read the entire thread. I actually joined these forums because I am working on a Banjo-Kazooie Any% run over at SDA, and I thought I'd get involved here to see what tricks/glitches could be ported over to console, not to mention get myself acquainted with TAS.
Pretty much everything in the thread I have little to say about, except the transformations dealie, which I thought rather unresolved (or otherwise incorrect). Cue the obligatory comments:
qqwref wrote:
A little transformation synopsis:
1. Mumbo's Mountain - Termite (5 tokens). 2 Jiggies, 6 notes necessary, 6 notes made easier.
2. Bubblegloop Swamp - Alligator (10 tokens). 1 Jiggy, 6 notes necessary, 1 Jinjo and a bunch of notes made easier.
3. Freezeezy Peak - Walrus (15 tokens). 3 (!) Jiggies necessary, 9 notes made easier.
4. Mad Monster Mansion - Pumpkin (20 tokens). 2 Jiggies, 5 notes necessary, quite a few notes made easier. Required (grr) for unlocking Rusty Bucket Bay (?).
5. Click Clock Wood - Bee (25 tokens). 2 (?) Jiggies necessary. Only active in Spring.
1. Read whole thread for skip plz. :)
2. This is needed for at least 2 Jiggies and 10 Notes, and also gives access to 3 otherwise unreachable Mumbo Tokens. (You cannot get under the mud hut platforms without this.) Additionally, there are quite a few Notes and at least one Jiggy on the way to Mumbo's Hut, which I imagine would be skipped if the Crocodile is. As a side note, I think it is possible to get to the maze Jiggy's platform from the outside by jumping from a nearby pole. I have tested this on console, and got to the point where I catch on the edge of the ledge, hang there for a good few seconds and then fall. Someone care to test this TAS-style?
3. As far as I know, the Walrus is required for 4 Jiggies. 2 Jiggies are directly got with it (Sled Race/Wozza), and 2 more require the intervention of the Walrus before Banjo can pick them up (Jinjo/Foot Race).
4. I'll assume this is correct. I can't think of anything else that the Pumpkin is required for in MMM, and to be honest I spend as little time in this level so I wouldn't know more than I need to. I hate the graveyard area. >.>
5. Bee is required only to collect the CCW Witch Switch Jiggy. All Jiggies within the level itself can be collected as Banjo (for the super-high ledge, fly up as Kazooie in Winter).
Bag of Magic Food wrote:
Are you SURE it's slower than all the others?
Well, I am. This is easily the longest Jiggy in the game, and the only one, save the witch switch, that absolutely requires you to enter Winter.
Sami wrote:
Very smooth. I actually watched this before fully reading the thread, and gaped the whole way through the Termite Mound. I then proceeded to try it on console. I got as far as the final ledge (the one that comes level with the egg ledge) before the second story. It took about 20 minutes from the start of the level. I think it's possible to do this in realtime, with an insane amount of luck. At any rate, I am 99% sure that getting to the third storey in the Mound will be MUCH easier than the second storey, and I almost got there.
Another thing: (remembering I watched this before reading the thread) Spiral Mountain confirmed for me that the spiral Bottles can be skipped. I've come very close just through experimenting for my run on console, and this has confirmed to me that it is possible. I predict that in terms of console runs, this will be Banjo-Kazooie's Lakitu Skip: requires luck, but is early enough in the game and is cool enough that people will be willing to retry a file over and over until they make it, even though it only saves a few seconds.
Well, good luck with the run.
Well, I think that's a formal-enough introduction *bows*. And a question: does anyone have/can anyone point me to a bunch of save-states in this game? It's not utterly important, but it would make things quite a bit easier in terms of searching around the game and testing stuff.
Consider me a part of this discussion. :P
