Posts for slamo


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Level 5 WIP: Link to video This could very well be the best way to do this level, but I'm not totally convinced. There are a lot of places I got bottlenecked, and I know some of those are unavoidable but maybe there's a faster way. About the last gem - I did try just falling off the edge and landing on the lower floor to grab it, and that would definitely be faster, but it just didn't work. Sucks that this is how I had to get it.
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Yes, but it's difficult for a plan to predict where a missile will be at any given time. I'll either have to go ladder-to-ladder waiting for missiles to pass to do the floors in order, or just go up and come back down later if it's faster. Tough to say right now, I'll have to play around with this.
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So, is it even possible to plan this level? I could make an optimal route and everything, but it's very unlikely that the missiles wouldn't get in the way. It seems like this one will be trial and error. Maybe if I post a WIP it can spawn some ideas.
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New level 4, faster by two whole frames: Link to video Used the alternate route involving the red switch. This is the first level I've actively luck manipulated the trackbot by doing random phases to make it turn around. If you still wanted to see the trackbot mocked, you won't be disappointed. :)
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Nach wrote:
Well, those are my thoughts too, hence why I suggested it. I'm just wondering if due to acceleration and so on, perhaps you were right originally?
It's just a matter of distance traveled, nothing weird with acceleration going on. If anything, I'd have to slow down to get over the big wall if I got it on the way up. Here's a WIP of level 4 (glitched sound) Link to video I'm going to test other routes so I don't know if this is going to be the final version or not, but I thought I'd post it anyway. I thought it was kind of funny how I dealt with the trackbot.
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Nach wrote:
Grabbing the center gem above the door later like this turned out faster than the other way though, right? Or was that not tested?
I didn't test it, since the gem is 4 blocks away if you get it on the way down instead of 5 blocks away if you get it on the way up. It's gotta be faster, especially since the gem hitbox is biased towards the left side (I should post this on the RP actually).
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Svimmer wrote:
Are the extra uses of the phaser for manipulation or for fun in this WIP?
Just for fun. It doesn't make a difference and it makes it look a little more interesting.
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Level 3 (glitched sound): Link to video Watch as I come hilariously close to dying multiple times. I tried Nach's route but it wasn't faster, it was off by about 0.8 s.
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Awesome work going on here. With Ilari's acceleration/speed data I've added some graphs to the page. (Excel file here) Should be helpful with theoretical routes, I hope.
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creaothceann wrote:
Nach wrote:
Can someone go play ahead for say the next 5 levels, and grab decent PNGs of each of them?
Fortunately, GameFAQs has a skip level code :) http://www.mediafire.com/download/mxsh8083o9lqsco/Jetpack_screenshots_of_levels_00-99.zip
Thanks dude, that's a big help. About the page, I just don't want people stepping on other people's feet when it comes to posting on it, although I guess that's just a result of it being built up so quickly. When the dust settles it can be neatened up. I will do some research tomorrow when I have some time to fill in the blanks on the wiki. There's probably some constant acceleration the jetpack dude flies at (velocity graphs would be neat?) which will answer a lot of questions, and I'll check out enemy speeds as well. And crank out level 3 hopefully.
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BrotherMojo wrote:
Um, so I still think that this should be faster for level 02... I think the only potential issue is fuel, but in this route you cover less ground as mentioned, and you end up falling down that long column on the right rather than flying up it. Plus if necessary you could use the yellow teleporter twice to pick up the other tank, if that doesn't use up enough time that you run into the worm. Also, is it not possible/not faster to touch down on the conveyor belts that actually are travelling the same direction as you, and only fly over the ones travelling the other direction? Even if it's not actually faster it could be considered as a way to save a little bit of fuel. And similarly, even though it's a bit slower to run, for long horizontal stretches like the top it may be worthwhile to touch down if that can save you a detour to pick up more fuel. Even if my route ends up slower, you could also experiment to see if it's possible to save enough fuel on your route to need only one tank. EDIT: So I just played through the level at full speed. Even with my human inefficiency, I easily made it to the yellow teleporter before the worm reached it, and even without picking up the second tank I only barely did not have enough fuel to reach the exit on one tank, though that was with walking along the top and the conveyors to save fuel. I wouldn't be surprised if taking a quick jump through the yellow teleporter would save more time overall.
I did try this route first - it's necessary to get the second tank, and by the time you get near the exit the worm is perfectly getting in the way of the last 5 gems, and you can go around but it costs time. It's about a 0.7 s difference between the video I posted. Thanks for fleshing out the page a lot Svimmer, although I think some of the things should probably be discussed before being posted. I think there should be a way to streamline this planning process a little better but I'm not sure how. Here are the files I'm using in the image:
+IMAGEMD5 e4287f2e7f9d079de869be13eeb18642
+COMMENT(Entry: N/A            N/A                                      20 /)
+COMMENT(Vname: 19900101000000 N/A                                       0 jetpack)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 ec918833fd1032a59cda01d8d5eac55f       2306 /JETDEMO.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 2fb5d8421b228975b622162be33a6b4d      50602 /JETLEV.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 351d5f7893180e2925901c10b29dc1b6     141152 /JETPACK.EXE)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 1d1d658ed7e42225be4af6ad69afca7c      43559 /JETPACK0.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 a8f4cc17364adf2c51de655508d59eb8      30487 /JETPACK1.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 8f0b6d6797346fffd3a3c49782787508      33739 /JETPACK2.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 1d9472cea0da9bb049f40a27d71d9c25      38840 /JETPACK3.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 5944201eb8e997db20f57d7c3137710b      21048 /JETPACK4.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 70d1ab65d2807e59f76ba4cbcedd3447      17686 /JETPACK5.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 a958ca5da57a325119d3cbac70b116e5        785 /JETPAL.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 8a70bb766a132bed263ebb7df53ccaf0      72273 /JETSOUND.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 4b753c31504703a90bf1bfc737f1a4fb      11182 /JSWITCH.EXE)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 eee0c3907ac09624f7546ddd1464b266      40235 /SCLM.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 93b885adfe0da089cdf634904fd59f71          1 /_JETP_.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 3effbc43f424e28b2df650830ef05f9a         15 /_JETP_A.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 1d1d658ed7e42225be4af6ad69afca7c      43559 /_JETP_A0.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 50ae15f8c01a635f9de9e8c2a0a1c8fe         17 /_JETP_B.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 2f17ff3db151a0bae81b0902491ca5e7      43704 /_JETP_B0.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 0bf84430538b172a7d32530361209e4d         15 /_JETP_C.DAT)
+COMMENT(Entry: 19900101000000 4c310670bdab05b99b77de2a9b8331fd      42811 /_JETP_C0.DAT)
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Level 4 is quite "complex" (hoho) and warrants some discussion. Some things to test:
    How to handle the start - phase down? Get the jetpack ASAP? Phasing up from the red switch or going around Entering the "red gate" room from the top or the right How much the trackbot will troll, and how to deal with it
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I'll get some numbers up there about phasing blocks (the ones I've reached, at least) I believe getting the middle gem on the way down is actually faster now that I look at it. The idea with the upper left corner involves phasing 3 blocks instead of 2 so I would not favor it, those suckers take a long time to break through.
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Perhaps you can save frames by misdirecting the trackbot, but the death exit actually saves some frames by positioning your corpse perfectly in front of the door without having to land. Plus it looks way cooler. And a Jetpack page! Really cool, it's good to have all that stuff in one place. Level 2 (glitched sound): Link to video The worm caused some problems here, and fuel was actually an issue as well, I had to pick up both tanks. The worm got in the way of both routes, so the one I used here has the least hindrance from it. Time to get thinking about level 3: It flows pretty logically to me, I can't think of any other drastically different route that would work.
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Nach wrote:
Well, if you were to move left at start, this would be the route:
Interesting route. It does cover the same amount of ground, but keep in mind that there is some delay in teleportation - about 20 frames worth - and doing this 3 times adds about a second of time loss. Here is the new level 1 video (glitched sound): Link to video The trackbot caused some trouble in this new route as you'll see, but without it the ending wouldn't be so nice. It's perfect for anyone not familiar with how the game works :)
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I like traveling down on the left side rather than up, just because falling down the stairs is so much quicker. There is a bit more distance to cover though, so it'll be close. The worm could also foil the CW route so it may not even matter. EDIT: The CW/CCW in this context is after you fall out of the tunnel, by the way.
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That's a good idea, I was just looking at some future levels. Here's my plan for level 2 up for criticism: Parts of the level necessitate a jetpack so get one ASAP. I have a hunch it's faster to do a counterclockwise loop rather than a clockwise one, but I'll test both ways. EDIT: Also the worm will get in the way of some routes so keep that in mind
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Wow, that route is about 3 seconds faster. Thanks Nach, looks like momentum doesn't have as much of an influence as I originally thought.
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Here was my reasoning on routing: I try to keep as much momentum as possible, and as you can see I can get the top 6 gems while only turning around twice. There are also little factors that make me favor a certain route, for example I can ladder-boost to the top right gem which will give me altitude quicker, and also getting the two gems at (13,2) in this order sets me up beautifully to snag the gem I get while falling down. I do multiple tests to see what's faster in the smaller rooms, like what I came up with in the bottom right. If you do question whether a route is optimal or not, feel free to offer suggestions. I understand that not everyone will have an intimate knowledge with the physics, but it can still give me some ideas. I kind of like that route Nach, I'll give it a try and see how it compares. That is less distance travelled for sure but with more momentum shifts, should be a good test.
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Interesting, all the sounds effects are indeed there if I start dumping from the beginning. I'll keep this in mind for future videos, although for individual level videos I'll probably skip the sound.
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It's detecting Sound Blaster upon starting, yes. The SoundCard module is also loaded. I never realized there were so many sound effects missing...I've got no idea why.
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Level 1, now with sound: Link to video I thought the teleporters would be useful here, but I just couldn't see a good route involving them. I'm pretty happy with what I came up with, especially getting the last gem. Fuel was tight but didn't hinder the route.
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Ilari wrote:
slamo wrote:
Setting the CPUDiv to anything above 50 doesn't seem to work for me...I can get into the game and everything, but when I press "S" to start at the main menu it doesn't respond.
http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/6878890210379818 Settings & co: - CPUDiv is 125 (8MIPS) - Memory size is 384 (1.5MB) - FPU is disabled. - SB is detected. Enters level 0 (spams up to make warpin animation faster, don't ask why). Important addresses (valid for this startup): - 00027022 X position - 00027019? Y position - 00027040 Fuel
This is perfect, thanks so much for doing this!
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Setting the CPUDiv to anything above 50 doesn't seem to work for me...I can get into the game and everything, but when I press "S" to start at the main menu it doesn't respond. In a strange twist, Sound Blaster will only be detected if the CPUDiv is set above 50. I don't think I have much of a choice but to go with Adlib for sound, hopefully there is not a huge quality difference.
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Svimmer wrote:
By the way, I'm not sure what is more standard in coordinate systems, I was thinking of the screen as having the origin on the bottom left (like the Cartesian plane), but the principle is the same if you place it on top left. And yes I meant using negative numbers as a short hand.
I've found that the game considers the upper left hand as (0,0), so we can use that as a standard to avoid confusion.
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