Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
I have the AVI encoded and ready to go, so whoever needs to set up a torrent or something you can get the file from me in IRC.
YouTube for the lazy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuC1JXp8AS4
- okaygo
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
I just wanted to rant a little, I understand the book has plot holes, but it's a book. I mean come on, humans make mistakes, but overall the books are a worldwide hit. I remember my childhood dreams... I used to want to be able to do spells and stuff. I didn't think of explaining details. You have to remember that while writing a seven book series, you have to keep it going. Maybe she will release a small book filling in the gaps? Who knows, but who cares... they are books.
Enjoy them for what they are worth ($20 US).
- okaygo
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Bisqwit wrote:
anubis wrote:
The line
$result[$id][$name] = (float)$data['value'];
is the same exact thing as
$data = (float)$data['value'];
O_o
You are right. I wonder how I overlooked that. And when did I introduce that error? And did it "work" before?
Thank you. And thanks to others who tried to (and did) help :)
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
yes ignore me, I was confused for the first set of posts, and the last half were guesses. however I don't feel as bad knowing that I'm not the only one confused.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Bisqwit wrote:
foreach($array as $key => &$value)
Does not assign $array as a reference to $value. It assign $value as a reference to the particular $array element at each iteration of the loop.
This is how I believe you had it set:
&$value = $array[key];
0 = $array[key];
EDIT: Nevermind my second half, I don't believe you're ever supposed to initialize a reference, which is what you were doing. You can not set a memory location equal to a value unless you are doing this.
&$value = &$array[key];
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Sorry Bisqwit, I meant $ratings.
When you use ampersand you are referencing a variable to another. Once you initialize a variable using the ampersand it becomes a direct reference to its origin. What you were doing was this $result[$movieid] => null;
For some reason, it registers the 'Count' as 0, even though print_r() reveals that the 'count' members in $ratings[] are nonzero.
Explicit casts to int/float don't help.
EDIT: Hmm, removing the & from &$data made it work again. So why did it stop working when I upgraded PHP, when it worked just perfectly before? What else did break?
It broke because you were setting the array contents to a pointer of $data which doesn't make sense in its own right. If you need help with PHP, I can provide some assistance.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
ShadowWraith wrote:
Actually I think he was talking about re-writing the game so that you don't need to emulate it.
I think the word is porting, which can be quite tedious when you don't have source. However, to start you would have to have an emulator dump the needed files (sprites, maps). Then from there use a debugger and reverse the code to a HLL.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
DK64_MASTER wrote:
Kabuto wrote:
(2) You can also reverser engineer the game's internal algorithms and rewrite them in a modern language such as C++ which will then run much faster than any emulation (and also allows you to cut away anything you don't need, e.g. your score).
[...]
I've already done (2) but be warned: it's very, very complicated.
Can you clarify something for me? I always thought that emulators/ROMS were written in some sort of assembly language, which is among the most efficient (but painfully slow) ways to program. Wouldn't programming in a higher level language hinder this efficiency? Perhaps I didn't understand the statement.
I'm pretty sure ROM's just comply to the consoles SDK, which can be bought for a pretty penny. You can reverse them, and emulate them (like an emulator does). He is just saying, that he would write a specific emulator for Super Mario Bros.
Which would give him total control of the game.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Maybe I'm missing something, but for a bot... using any form of visual screen for non-debug is sub-optimal.
Using heuristics will only yield results as good as the human who programmed it, this really is the best place to start. At this point your computer has benchmarked a level.
The next step would be applying heuristics to segment the game into zones each representing a 'challenge'.
The computer would then run a compare state algorithm using mutated random input.
The computer would compare the data with the previous, building it's own set of heuristics for each zone.
So whiling running might be the fastest originally, eventually it knows that at start of zone 1, jumping backwards provides a lower frame count when entering the next zone.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
zdude255 wrote:
okaygo wrote:
Pick the fighter, put it on skill 5, then try to get through the Seven Portals. I had a hard time fighting the last boss with cheats on skill 3.
Are you referring to the room with tons of Wendigos? Yeah, that one is a pain for any character. Korax isn't going to be that difficult for a TAS to do. May have to figure out how to manipulate him a bit, but he shouldn't be that hard unless the other enemies that he summons become a problem. He should be dead before the second wave is unleashed. If anything, good use of items will make the run successful, as they can heal health and mana instantly when needed.
One thing I gotta ask, is the hardest difficulty going to make this run more entertaining, or will it just drag it on as the player slaughters more and harder enemies?
Gotta think about how much time the hardest mode is going to add for each enemy killed. Hexen has a lot of enemies too... Of course the run will be dashing past a ton of them as well. Hardest means fewer items as well, though this may not impact the run quite as much as the increased enemy HP.
Any room that requires you to skill monsters on Skill 5 for the fighter is near impossible. The last boss with the cleric can be killed in sub-1min (skill 4). As for being on skill 5, thats a good question I wanted to go on skill 3 in the first place, but it really ends up being a walk in the park.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
adelikat wrote:
I redid all of episode 1, this time with low resultion and zoom. I improved every level and as a result this movie is 13416 frames (3.72 minutes) faster.
Another bonus of changing the graphics resultion is that the bridge in fire 1 is not graphically messed up.
While this is much faster, this is still our test run. So there are many things that can be improved.
I am very pleased with outcome of our test runs, I know for a fact that a few hundred more frames can be saved from obvious mistakes we made in this route. (collisions, hitting to many switches, not aggressive enough)
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
PC speed is about two times faster then N64, and the game play is a tad different.
Differences:
Loading times
Control Scheme
Strafing
Running
Jumping
Character Speed
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Perfectacle wrote:
This movie is very good !
Your new to TAS?
Anyways, I watched about 30000 frames, the video is played at a experienced player human reaction, I see no frame optimization attempted. Many times it seems clear that the way Kirby moved wasn't the fastest, sometimes he hits walls, or floats to move straight. The end of the level is really confusing, do you aim for the high score, or the low score? The low one is faster, but you do both! The video is also boring, as you seem to run around on base Kirby for the first 10 minutes or so... hardly using any of the faster abilities.
Also for anyone who cares, the video is the (E) [!] version.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
FreshFeeling wrote:
zdude255 wrote:
I'm not sure if this justifies the mage for the rest of the game, but it can skip a section of the first level by shooting the bell without even opening the tower.
This might not be practical for a 1P run, but someday when some ambitious person starts the 4P co-operative run one character should definitely be the mage for this reason!
I honestly thought the fighter would be the best choice, mainly just because of the best running, jumping and speedy flechette use. He's also much better at killing centaurs who can really get in your way in the Guardian Of Steel and Caves Of Circe maps.
Pick the fighter, put it on skill 5, then try to get through the Seven Portals. I had a hard time fighting the last boss with cheats on skill 3.
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The jumpy can get very tricky and some of it needs to be done in frame advanced. Sometimes you need to strafe for extra speed, it is doable in frame advanced or low speed.
