The question at the top of the page asks the viewer if they found the movie entertaining. It does not ask if the viewer thinks the movie is entertaining to a variety of people nor it does not ask what tier they think it belongs to. Some people may find it not entertaining for seemingly trivial or even personal reasons. Separation of art and artist may be seen as ideal to some but as far as I know is not an explicit requirement for voting. The question of the poll does not care what your reason is, as long as you express your opinion.
I wasn't talking about how people voted. I'm talking about comments where people make a mountain out of a molehill.
Memory wrote:
HappyLee: I believe you stated you wanted to create the perfect Mario movie. If that is TRULY your goal, you should you be glad to receive criticism, even if it seems small, because criticism provides a chance to make an even better TAS as a form of art.
You can only make a movie technically perfect, which this run is (as far as we know). You can't make a TAS artistically perfect because art is subjective. If he were to change the movie based on the criticism in this thread, there would be a new round of criticism from people who preferred it the way it was. There's little point in making artistic criticism because the author would be foolish to make the suggested changes unless there was near-unanimous agreement that the change would be an improvement. Therefore, feel free to comment about what you liked and didn't like about the author's artistic decisions, but it's not fruitful to criticize those decisions because that's just your opinion, and you could be alone in that opinion. Opinions are, after all, like assholes.
Vote however you like, for whatever reason. Criticize technical imperfections; those need to be fixed. Politely state your opinions of the author's artistic choices, remembering that everyone else in the world might disagree with you.
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Don't like the way the waste-able frames were wasted? Make a better run. Voting based on your opinion of one of its authors? Grow up. Have anything else irrelevant to say? Keep it to yourself.
I'd like to say that requiring everyone who criticizes a work to make something better themselves is not being receptive to criticism. You don't have to be the cook to criticize the food. I would like to believe that the point of the workbench is provide constructive criticism to submissions, though replies like these unfortunately show that some users do not wish this to be the case.
Hold on there! I'm not trying to suppress helpful suggestions. Just remember that there's a line between a helpful suggestion and petty nitpicking. There's no question that this run is publishable because it's an improvement to an existing run. The entertainment factor is only going to determine tier. The current run is Moons, so this run would have to be noticeably less entertaining to not be Moons. The tier is usually predetermined by the game itself and not the TASer's artistic decisions, so I would expect the tone of the conversation about those decisions to be commensurate to their importance -- basically, a trivial aside. How are there pages of debate about the merits of an auto-publishable run? This should be uncontroversial, but I see people complaining about trivial stuff -- and yes, I'm using the word complaining, as opposed to "helpfully suggesting". By all means, make a helpful suggestion! Some people seem to have a compulsive need to find fault, while others seem to be making this personal. That ruins the fun for everyone -- especially the people who worked hard to make the run. I'm really just asking people to be civil and objective.
And yes, if you absolutely can't live with a TASer's artistic decisions, make something better!
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Wow! A run gets posted that will automatically be published for being a time improvement to an existing run. What could be less controversial than that? I come back a few days later and there are three pages of debate about it.
Whether it's more or less entertaining than MrWint's run is irrelevant; this one is two frame rules faster. Almost everyone has voted Yes to the entertainment question at any rate. So what's all the fuss about?
Don't like the way the waste-able frames were wasted? Make a better run. Voting based on your opinion of one of its authors? Grow up. Have anything else irrelevant to say? Keep it to yourself.
Can we publish this now?
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Warpful SMB1 is just mini Mario running through each level, largely avoiding enemies. Warpless SMB1 is Fiery Mario going on a killing spree. I love how much action there is, and the creative ways you maximize kills. Congratulations on finding a way to make a great run even better.
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Just watched Mothrayas' run, and the physics look horrible! Nice graphics. It looks like this could have been a decent game if they could have gotten the movement to match the physics in Mario games.
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I don't have a copy of this ROM to watch the video. I was just reading Mothrayas' comments, and then I noticed the author's name.
donnaken: it looks like you've given up on Yars' Revenge and decided to try a different game, but you're not going to have better luck if you don't study the craft of TASing and listen to the advice of judges and experienced players. There are basic things that you have to do to stand a chance at getting published.
You have to play on the hardest difficulty level.
You have to really understand the game and pick the best strategy. You're being told that collecting a mushroom and fire flower is faster than staying as small Mario.
You have to compare your work to existing movies and make sure that no part of your run is slower.
When you have the right strategy, you have to be frame-perfect. If anything is improvable, your run will be rejected.
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WTF? That was almost A Boy and His Blob weird. This looks like an amazing game! A huge world to explore, and really interesting boss fights. I particularly enjoy watching the guy get barfed out of one lizard and then climb into the mouth of another. I just love this movie.
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A friend and I discovered this game in the late 90s or early 2000s and had a blast playing through it. We're experienced gamers, but we couldn't got stuck on a boss level where we couldn't hit the boss without power-ups, but there were no power-ups in the level. Eventually we had to give up and use a Game Genie. A pretty good game and a hidden gem.
After all the work we put into it, it's both amusing and kind of disappointing to see a run where you beat the game by dying as quickly as possible. I give it a Yes vote, but it should be a separate category (glitched) to the run that actually beats the game.
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Oops, I'm wrong. It is the SELECT screen, with the word "SELECT" overwritten with "HSWWSH". I mis-remembered the JMP instruction. $00 reveals that, on Frame 614, bits 8 and 7 flip from 0 to 1. 8 means "game over", and 7 means "select screen".
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I mean the same actions that you can do on the SELECT screen you can also do on that easter egg screen, and their result is identical. So it is functionally a SELECT screen with some changed graphics.
Pressing the Select lever at any time takes you to the select screen -- the Select lever will end a game in progress -- so, by that logic, the levels are also part of the SELECT screen. I have disassembled source code. The HSWWSH is the score screen under "game over" conditions. I'm not disagreeing with the rejection, but I can disprove the assertion that the Easter Egg screen is the SELECT screen.
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This Easter egg basically brings us to the SELECT screen. Can we call this an ending?
I have to disagree with that. The SELECT screen says "SELECT" and shows the game number. The Easter egg leads to the score screen, which only occurs in two situations: before a level begins, and when the player runs out of lives (game over). Indeed, reaching that screen ends the game. It's actually the only way to end the game without running out of lives.
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I forgot to subscribe to the thread and, as of yesterday, no one had commented. Thanks a lot for the encode!
TheProJamer wrote:
Great run, was cool to watch. Unfortunately, it's so short that I lean a bit towards a Meh on the grounds that what there is is entertaining, but there's not enough. Nonetheless, I voted yes.
I'm actually working on a "fastest to the hardest difficulty" run, but feos encouraged me to make a "fastest ending" via the Easter Egg for April 1. The longer run will be repetitive, but there will be times when I'm beating levels in less than a second. I hope it will be entertaining.
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You can make a TAS in a day if you have something novel to show off. If it's an April Fool's TAS, I don't get the joke, and if it's a serious submission then... yeah, you can't do SMW in a day.
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I don't know if it's exciting to play, but it's boring as hell to watch! 18 minutes of repetitive levels and repetitive boss fights. Square needed to add more variety. Looks well-optimized, though.
TASing or playing back a DOS game? Make sure your files match the archive at RGB Classic Games.
Yes, it says in the instructions that the color changing lets you know when the Qotile is about to change to Swirl, and I had already identified 0x34 as the attack color. So, you're saying that killing or not killing the Qotile/Swirl is the only thing that affected the time to the next attack?
It will be disappointing if the timing isn't random. Based on not finding a way to alter the Swirl's attack time, I've been adding to the WIP that I posted. I'm too busy with exams right now to give you anything tonight.
No need to reject the current run for having too many waves. Reject it for not being optimal. There are many waves where Yar kills the Qotile before it becomes the Swirl or before the Swirl attacks, taking 1000/2000 points for the kill instead of 6000. I doubt it would ever be faster to kill the Qotile right away than to wait for it to attack and sextuple the value of the kill, but I suppose it could be justified for a particularly long wait.
Of course, the wait wouldn't be so long if it was Game 6. Also, through the use of TRONs (which can be collected during the time between waves), you can already have the Zorlon Cannon when you start the next level. So reject it for not using hardest difficulty, and for the fact that harder difficulty level would be faster!
The strategy that I proposed works. If there's no randomness to manipulate, I can produce a publishable TAS to an appropriate score in a few hours. donnaiken can, too. One or the other of us will produce a much faster run than the one that's currently up for judgment.
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At 70,000 points (when the shield turns purple), the Swirl attacks three times as frequently. At 150,000 points (grey shield), the Swirl launches toward you, stops, and then launches again at your new location, but attack frequency returns to normal. At 230,000 points (pink shield), double attack and triple frequency are both on.
Yes, you can get the Easter Egg on the first level. I'm thinking about submitting such a run as a "fastest ending" run. I can do it with a final input of about 4 seconds.
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When difficulty is set to A, the Zorlon Cannon will destroy the Destroyer Missile if it hits it (instead of passing through it), and the Swirl will move much faster.
Let my WIP play out and then do nothing. The Swirl will begin to attack on frame 1379. The Swirl will attack in a straight line, which usually means x decreases by 4 pixels per frame. The Qotile's x value will display:
96,90,8A,84,84,7E,78,72,6C,66,66,60,5A,54,4E,48,48,42,3C,36,30,2A,2A,24,1E,18,12,0C,0C,06,96
It visibly moves on every frame, but every 6th frame the value isn't updated in $2A. If you toggle the L difficulty before frame 1379, the x value displays:
96,92,8E,8A,8A,86,82,7E,7A,76,76,72,6E,6A,66,62,62,5E,5A,56,52,4E,4E,4A,46,42,3E,3A,3A,36,32,2E,2A,26,26,22,1E,1A,16,12,12,0E,0A,06,02,96
It displays the same odd behavior where the x value doesn't change every 6 frames, despite moving visually, but now it finishes crossing the screen on frame 1424 instead of 1409. Difficulty B = 4 pixels/frame, Difficulty A = 6 pixels/frame (+50%).
Incidentally, when I made my WIP, I had to make the Yar follow the Zorlon Cannon from above it instead of below it to prevent the Destroyer Missile tracking Yar downwards and crossing the Cannon's path, destroying it before it hit the Swirl.
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I did a run-through of the first stage. I can select the A difficulty and Game 6 and start the game in 10 frames. When I did that, the Qotile became Swirl on frame 190, which is way more time than I needed to collect my 5 TRONs, so I used up the time taking out the lower half of the shield. Nothing I did during the level changed how long it took for the Qotile to become the Swirl, or for the Swirl to attack; it seems to be set before the level begins. The Qotile attacked on frame 389 which, again, was way more time than I needed to load the cannon, so I took out some of the upper half of the shield as I headed left, and got most of the rest of it while the Zorlon Cannon was crossing the screen. That ended the first round on frame 393 with a score of 11,206.
I then tried adding random inputs for Player 1 and 2, and messed about with the difficulty switches, etc., to see if I could get the Qotile to change to the Swirl on a different frame, or attack on a different frame, to get an idea for how and when the random attack time is calculated, but nothing I did had any effect. I then tried taking an extra frame to start the game... and the Qotile turned Swirl on frame 191 and attacked on frame 390. Delaying starting the game by 2 frames caused the Qotile events to be delayed by 2 frames, 3 frames delayed 3 frames, etc.
Also, no matter what I did on either joystick during the explosion, the Qotile attacks on the same frame in the second round. No luck yet figuring out how to affect the wait time.
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You need 5 TRONs to use the Cannon. You get 1 for each cell of the shield that you eat, and 2 for each frame that Yar touches the Qotile. We should discuss your progress in the Yars' Revenge thread I created.
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More good news!
First I thought you only got 2 TRONs for each time you touched the Qotile, so I figured that you could only get 2 TRONs every other frame.
Then I found out that you get 2 TRONs for each frame you touch the Qotile, so that cuts your Qotile time in half.
Well, guess what? You can collect TRONs during the level transition/explosion by touching the "Ghost of Yars", the black vertical line where the Qotile died. You get 2 TRONs every second frame, which is enough time to collect 218 TRONs! So, in fact, you only need to collect 5 TRONs during the first level, and then you can collect all the TRONs you need for an unlimited number of instant kills between levels.
TASing or playing back a DOS game? Make sure your files match the archive at RGB Classic Games.
Hi folks. Inspired by donnaken15's Yars' Revenge submissions, I decided to study the game and possibly make my own run. I'll give him/her a chance to make a proper TAS of the game, and then I'm doing it mysef.
I'm going to use this first post to keep track of what I've learned about the game, so it will see many edits. Please bear with me as I work on this, my first serious TAS.
Movement
Joystick input (directions, fire button) is checked every second frame. Whether this is the even or odd frames depends on what frame the level started on.
Yar gets to move 4 pixels every 2 frames: 4x, 4y, or 2x+2y.
Energy Missile (bullet) gets to move 4 pixels every frame: 4x, 4y, or 2x+2y.
Difficulty B: Swirl gets to move 4 pixels per frame in 16 directions: 4x, 4y, 3x+1y, 3y+1x, or 2x+2y.
Difficulty A: Swirl gets to move 6 pixels per frame (50% faster)
Pressing opposite directions does nothing helpful.
U+D = D
L+R = D
U+D+L = D
U+D+R = L
U+L+R = D
D+L+R = D
U+D+L+R = D
Ghost of Yars
There's an Easter Egg in Yars' Revenge. Wherever you kill the Qotile, there's a black vertical line on the screen during the explosion. Normally the Qotile is up against the right wall, so the line is too close to the edge of the screen for Yar to get on top of it; the Easter Egg is only available if you kill the Swirl while it's attacking. If the Yar is on that line, and in the bottom 1/3 of the screen, at the end of the explosion, the score lists as HSWWSH, which is the author's initials forwards and backwards. The downside to this is that it ends the game (for both players!), which could really tick you off if you were in a high scoring game. Therefore, the instruction manual says: "When you destroy the Qotile, or a Swirl, there will be an explosion, during which the Yar stays on the screen. Use this opportunity to make up your own victory dance. And watch out for the Ghost of Yars! You'll see his mean streak, so stay off it!"
Why is it the Ghost of Yars and not the Ghost of the Qotile? I don't know. But it turns out that this Easter Egg is even Easter Eggier than Howard Scott Warshaw led on. When Yar is on the Ghost of Yars line, it collects 2 TRONs every second frame, and there's enough time to collect 218 TRONs! Your TRON count is never displayed during the game, so there was no way to know this before it became possible to watch the RAM while playing the game in an emulator.
RAM addresses
All numbers are hexadecimal unless otherwise stated.
Well understood
$
Purpose
Observed values
00
Game mode
High nibble = game state
Bit 8=Game Over
Bit 7=Select screen
Bit 6=Swirl triple frequency
Bit 5=Swirl attacks twice
Thus:
0 = Brown shield (0)
1 = Gray shield (150,000)
2 = Purple shield (70,000)
3 = Pink shield (230,000)
8 = Game over
C = Game select/Easter Egg screen
E for 1 frame when Game Select triggered on Game select screen.
Low nibble = 0-7, matches game mode.
01-10
Qotile shield (active player)
Binary representation of 8x16 shield. Rotating shield begins as all 1s. Solid shield begins as:
Addresses go from bottom to top ($01 is bottom row) and right to left (Bit 8 is right-most pixel), so image is upside-down and backwards.
11
Neutral Zone status
00 = no Neutral Zone, FE = Neutral Zone
12
Destroyer Missile speed
Starts at 04 in Game 0/1, 03 in Games 2-7. Decreases to 0, lower number is faster.
13
P1's turn
7C = yes, FE = no
14
Qotile status
Bit 8: 1=Swirl active
Bit 7: 1=Swirl traveling
Bit 6: 1=Yar is firing Energy Missile (2 frames)
Bit 5: 0=solid shield, 1=rotating shield
Bit 5 remains when Qotile becomes Swirl, and Bit 8 remains when Swirl attacks. So, high nibble:
0 = Solid shield
1 = Rotating shield
2 = Solid shield and Yar is shooting
3 = Rotating shield and Yar is shooting
8 = Solid shield and Swirl
9 = Rotating shield and Swirl active
A = Solid shield and Swirl active and Yar is shooting
B = Rotating shield and Swirl active and Yar is shooting
C = Solid shield and Swirl traveling
D = Rotating shield and Swirl traveling
E = Solid shield and Swirl traveling and Yar is shooting
F = Rotating shield and Swirl traveling and Yar is shooting
4-7 are impossible because Bit 7 is never 1 without Bit 8=1.
Lower nibble observed values are 0 and 9-F. Changes when Swirl attacks, unchanged when Qotile returns, and when Qotile becomes Swirl. Might have to do with attack frequency?
16
Zorlon Cannon status
04 = not loaded, 44 = loaded, 64 = in-flight
17
Yar status
Bit 8=dying, Bit 7=imploding, Bit 6=exploding
Bits remain set during each phase of death process. Thus:
00 = alive
80 = dying
C0 = imploding
E0 = exploding
1F
Yar y
04-AE
20
Yar x
08-95
21
Unused
Always 0
22
Yar movement
00 = Yar stationary, 03 = Yar moving
23
Yar appearance
Changes every 3 frames if not moving, every frame if moving.
Facing up, wings down = 8E, wings up = BB
Facing down, wings down = 6A, wings up = 97
Facing left/right, wings down = 7C, wings up = A9
Facing up+left/right, wings down = 85, wings up = B2
Facing down+left/right: wings down = 73, wings up = A0
25
Energy Missile y
02-BE. Does not reset.
26
Energy Missile x
01-9F. Yar x+4 when not firing.
2A
Qotile y
Goes up and down from 36-74 when not attacking, changing 1 every 2 frames
2B
Qotile x
96 when not attacking
2E
Destroyer Missile y
0C-B6
2F
Destroyer Missile x
0C-9A
39-3C
Unused
Always 0
47
Life count (x8)
Life count for P1 in 1-player game, for P2 in 2-player game. Starts at 20 (4 lives). 18 = 3 lives, 28 = 5 lives, etc. 50 = 0 lives.
49-58
Qotile shield (inactive player)
Binary representation of 8x16 shield for P1 on P2's turn, P2 on P1's turn. Not used in 1-player game.
5B
P2's turn
7C = yes, FE = no
5D
Background color
00 (black) during gameplay. Cycles through palette during attract screen
60-62
P1 score
Each nibble is one digit of score. $12 $34 $56 = 123456
63
P1 life count
High nibble is life count, thus Lives * 10. High nibble is Game during Game select screen, thus Game * 10.
64-66
P2 score
Each nibble is one digit of score. $01 $23 $45 = 12345
67
P2 life count
High nibble is life count, thus Lives * 10. Always 40 (4 lives) during 1-player game.
69
Game timer
00-FF, +1 every frame
70
TRONs
00-FF in all game modes
71
Easter egg can be revealed
00 = no, 01 = yes
73-7B
Unused
Always 0
282 (PIA)
SWCHB (console switches)
Bit 8 = Right/P2 difficult: (0=B, 1=A)
Bit 7 = Left difficult (P1): (0=B, 1=A)
Bits 5,4,2: Unused
Bit 3 = Color/B&W toggle (0 = Black&White, 1=Color)
Bit 1 = Game Select (0=pressed)
Bit 0 = Game Reset (0=pressed)
Not well understood.
$
Purpose
Observed values
15
?
80,82,88,8A,C0,C2,C8,CA
1B
?
Cycles from 07 to 00, -1 every frame
1C
?
Goes up and down from F7-FF, by 1 every 16 frames. Spends 2 frames at F7, 22 frames at FF.
1D
?
Always 09
35
Probably for audio
Alternates between A0 and A4 (sometimes B0 and B4) every frame when not in Neutral Zone, E0 and E4 (sometimes F0 and F4) when in Neutral Zone, 20 when displaying score
3D-46,48
Unused?
Repeating pattern. 3D,3F,41,43,45 = 50; 3E,40,42,44,46,48 = FE
68
Qotile color
34 = Swirl
7E
Probably for video
Alternates between 6B and FF during gameplay: 6B when Neutral Zone and Destroyer Missile display, FF when shield displays. 1B during score/lives display, 8A frame gameplay resumes.
7F
?
Normally 00. Alternates between EF and F0 when Yar is dying. F6 frame before score/lives display.
Odd things observed
If you press Reset without pressing Select, game defaults to 2, not 0.
I mention $282 because it shows us that, by default, BizHawk sets SWCHB to 3F (B difficulty for both players, Color). In Difficulty B, the Zorlon Cannon passes through the Destroyer Missile. In Difficulty A, the Zorlon Cannon destroys the Destroyer Missile (which reappears at the Qotile's location as soon as the Qotile is not in Swirl mode), and the Swirl moves much faster. To play this game at the "hardest" difficulty, Game 6 should be used with Difficulty A.
Whenever you destroy the Qotile in a solid shield level, whatever is left of the shield begins rotating through memory. 01-10/49-58 don't change to all 1s until the level begins, so you can watch the 0s and 1s dance for you in the memory viewer during the explosion and score/lives screen.
TASing or playing back a DOS game? Make sure your files match the archive at RGB Classic Games.