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Hetfield90 wrote:
So is the reason probably just because of hardware differences? I remember a couple of people were able to sync the last runs I made of this game.
Including me, on my previous machine (and native WinXP)!
Hetfield90 wrote:
For the run to get accepted, does it need to be synced by a tasvideos encoder? Or could I try to find someone w/ similar hardware to mine to prove sync and then just give my raw avi dump to an encoder?
This happened a lot with Dolphin, ideally it would sync for some TASVideos member other than you, not necessarily staff or encoder. That person would need to make a lossless dump, send it to us, and then we would properly encode it.
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MAME script to display Mario X and Y position.
Language: lua
local function getscreen()
for k,v in pairs(manager.machine.screens) do return v end
end
local screen = getscreen()
local space = manager.machine.devices[":x1_cpu"].spaces["program"]
local function framecount()
x = space:read_u16(0xe23a)>>5
y = space:read_u8(0xe23c)
screen:draw_text(0, 0, string.format("X: %3d\nY: %3d", x, y), 0xffffffff, 0xff000000)
end
emu.register_frame_done(framecount)
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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Tried tweaking everything again (in the game, VM, and Hourglass), getting different desyncs but nothing helps at all.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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It would be a better idea to cancel it for now then.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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Any progress?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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MUGG wrote:
I noticed this page https://tasvideos.org/HomePages/MUGG/MLSSLuaScript abruptly ends after the Download section.
The Instructions, Upcoming Features and Ideas , Known Issues and Feedback sections are not shown.
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Drag-drop ROM then drag-drop movie?
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Getting this no matter what I tweak (game matches, settings too):
VMWare:
VirtualBox:
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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I improved the first level by 414 frames... by slowing down and turning around.
User movie #638359921219033424
I still don't understand when the level ends, so I couldn't improve the last level, and the later levels overall look quite solid. But 400 frames on the first one is kinda a lot IMO. BTW I killed most of the humans there which gave me 24 frames among those 414.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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Αsumeh wrote:
I could go on with a few extra key takeaways that I feel is worth mentioning, but that would pose the risk of me mini-modding
We don't have a problem with users explaining correct things to other users.
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I think console sync is a good reason to have a slightly slower movie, as the primary publication or at least as a secondary file if we value absolute fastest known emu record.
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Captain_Forehead wrote:
I decided to make some personal TASes of my own (because that's what I do) and wanted to encode it into an AVI file. When I do so and end it, I took a look at the file and found my entire AVI file had been separated into separate smaller files. Each file contains a portion of the movie that is roughly about 3-4 minutes. I don't think I made an error when setting up the AVI recording, but would there be any reason why this is happening? I'm stumped.
They are most likely split on 2GB mark, which is where windows AVI writer breaks if you exceed that, so emulators split it before 2GB. You can view them all combined in VirtualDub if you open the first one and then open the next one using File - Append AVI segment (that would append them all). Exporting from VD won't break them at 2GB because it uses newer tech.
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Letting enemies fly away and then waiting for them to return (sometimes from different sides of the screen) is a huge waste of time.
-161 frame in the first level-160 frames in the first 3 levels of the last loop
Just like all your other submissions I've checked, I can't consider this run a finished product. While manipulating everything to behave perfectly would be a giant project, even slight tweaks to your actions can make the flies change their behavior in your favor, it should just be planned out at least a little bit.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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On Discord, Merl_ wrote:
feos wrote:
These messages tell you that you've actually played the game "til the end" and "finished" it. Showing them subjectively feels appropriate for a game titled Unlock Everything.
There are tons of instances where I skip unlocks to save time. This doesn't make sense to me.
You don't skip unlocking those 2 messages though.
Merl_ wrote:
Also I would consider the jukebox and time trial mode to be post game "content"
The modes themselves are, but the messages are part of the ending sequence.
Merl_ wrote:
feos wrote:
If showing the ending dialogs is valuable as opposed to skipping them, we can have an alternate movie for encoding that doesn't skip anything but slowly goes through those dialogs.
I'm not sure what you mean by valuable?
Worth having in the encode without skipping them ASAP.
Merl_ wrote:
By an "alternate movie for encoding", are you talking about the extended input thing spikestuff suggested?
Yes.
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2 movies are still fine, especially if it's justified in some way and not just absolutely random (tho absolutely random would maybe still be fine lol).
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g0goTBC wrote:
I have a question regarding verification movies that are used to verify TASes that start from dirty SRAM.
Can the verification movie consist of two bk2 files, which would be played one after the other?
We've never limited this so I think there's no problem in having multiple movies, but since you can resume recording from a playback mode, why start a new movie?
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Since the faster you shoot the enemies, the sooner the boss spawns, killing them optimally is the main point of the game. Each time you shoot you fire 3 bullets, so it may look like shooting is not done very precisely, but this can't be helped (however it can be used to our advantage since there's more room for rotation adjustments).
Manipulating enemy positions is actually very easy. You shoot way in advance and then after shooting and before the enemy spawn, you adjust your direction to make the enemy spawn right where your bullet already is. Since enemies tend to get farther away from you as you rotate, you need to rotate in a different direction when the bullet is already around the edge of the screen.
108 frame improvement of the first level.
Link to video
I haven't checked if the frame the object spawns in memory has any relation to the frame it gets onscreen and to the angle (is it faster to spawn/kill them in corners or in the middle?). Neither did I check if delay between their spawns can be manipulated. But since your progress is displayed on the screen, it makes sense to compare different strategies on certain progress chunks. If the new chunk can't be accessed earlier anymore, that means the pace is good.
Once again I don't think this movie is optimal enough for publication, and attention needs to be paid to actually trying to kill enemies ASAP.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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Merl_ wrote:
Am I allowed to disagree with what you deem to be the endpoint? I think unlocking the ending is pretty clearly the end of the game. There isn't any gameplay after that either. It seems pointless to go back and skip through the cutscene
Here's how we resolve it in our movie rules:
Movie Rules wrote:
The movie must be complete
Your submission must play the game from the beginning, and must finish the game, or reach the most suitable endpoint the game allows. [...] Examples of suitable endpoints are:
A definitive ending, such as a credits sequence.
See how the game itself responds to your further actions:
These messages tell you that you've actually played the game "til the end" and "finished" it. Showing them subjectively feels appropriate for a game titled Unlock Everything.
While the credits don't automatically start, I think a perfect way to end the movie in a climactic (and definitive) way is to manually launch them at the end.
If showing the ending dialogs is valuable as opposed to skipping them, we can have an alternate movie for encoding that doesn't skip anything but slowly goes through those dialogs.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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Scribble wrote:
Go for an "as pure as possible" approach, removing savestating, slowdown and/or RNG pathcing
How would you TAS it then? Or do you mean sync compatibility with an untasable version of the game? So then again, how do you ensure sync?
Scribble wrote:
or take the opportunity of being allowed to modify the game and make a pleasant TASing experience?
Pleasant TASing experience is the most important thing, because it attracts more people and incentivizes better works. And guaranteeing sync is a part of that. But we also don't want it to be a hell to maintain for the developer, so we don't demand anything unsustainable (at least not anymore). Accuracy and authenticity are nice to have, but not at the expense of devs and TASers.
In other words, we always sacrificed accuracy for determinism.
Scribble wrote:
The game also uses multiple rng variables:
Each entity has their own RNG that they call
A "World" RNG that is responsible for chunk generation as well as block RNG
The world RNG is somewhat tricky as you have to watch out to not disturb world generation, but make block RNG deterministic...
But the main thing I am getting is that I should rethink my RNG patching, which I will gladly do...
Is it possible to change what system time the game reads whenever it decides to roll RNG? libTAS controls that and it's quite robust, unless games do non-deterministic crap in other threads.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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InputEvelution wrote:
CD loading times in particular seem to present a difficult hazard for TASing, as loading earlier savestates after PCem has started reading from the CD image seems to cause desyncs, and even strange errors from XP itself on some occasions:
Running the movie from the very start seems to give consistent timings without errors, but combined with XP's strange lag inconsistencies, it seems game installation in particular is likely to be a pain to optimise.
I think this proves that game installation deserves to be in a separate movie if a CD is used. Do you know if floppy disk installation has the same problem?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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Looks awesome!
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
VirtualBox:
These messages tell you that you've actually played the game "til the end" and "finished" it. Showing them subjectively feels appropriate for a game titled Unlock Everything.
While the credits don't automatically start, I think a perfect way to end the movie in a climactic (and definitive) way is to manually launch them at the end.
If showing the ending dialogs is valuable as opposed to skipping them, we can have an alternate movie for encoding that doesn't skip anything but slowly goes through those dialogs.Running the movie from the very start seems to give consistent timings without errors, but combined with XP's strange lag inconsistencies, it seems game installation in particular is likely to be a pain to optimise.