This topic is for the purpose of discussing #4012: Palidian's NES Tiny Toon Adventures 2: Trouble in Wackyland in 13:13.11

I guess it's the same movie, just trimmed properly. That's a nice run to me thanks to the new tricks, but it still has a good room for optimizing. You should do time-critical actions as soon as possible, like searching for the first frame where jumping from one platform to another would work, and which option saves more frames. Even the last hit on the final boss was not made as soon as possible, I just moved it a dozen frames back and it still worked, getting the final time 13:35.92.

This is my first ever TAS, so I'm still learning about stuff...for example resubmitting this so that there weren't 10000 extra frames while the credits rolled. I was timing from power on to loss of character control.

No need to cancel, you can just post an improved version here and we replace the submission file. As for the first TAS ever, were you using TASEditor? It gives a nice assistance in testing first frames for actions and is quite newbie-friendly.

I used TAS editor to cobble together two sections of video after I found out a way to save even more time on the log ride after I was already most of the way through the fun house. I was just worried that this game wouldn't be interesting enough to make it to anywhere but the Vault, so I didn't optimize too heavily. Thank you for the tips, too.

Being only eligible for Vault does not mean you can leave unused time savers while they are not hard to use. Vault is for movies that were not liked by enough people, but that tier exists for people whole still like such movies! So there are always people who would like a Vault movie, in this case it's me. And I advise you to revisit your last level and just check which moves can be done sooner. For example, there is a spinning platform that starts moving as soon as you jump on it. Then do a jump earlier on the ground to get onto that platform sooner, it must start moving sooner. Another tip is that jumps usually increase vertical speed, so if you need to get to a lower platform sooner, you can not just walk off the upper one, but jump from it. It is a common TAS trick that works in a huge majority of games. Other tricks can be read about here: http://tasvideos.org/GameResources/CommonTricks.html And here is the overall guide: http://tasvideos.org/TasingGuide.html Also, I meant not the externall application called TAS Movie Editor (that allows copypaste), but the internal FCEUX tool that allows heavy editing and watching in real time.

All right. I rerecorded the last level, utilizing a shortcut pointed out to me by Yunshui and optimized the rest of the level. I uploaded a new version of the movie to the link you provided. Got it down to 13:19.92 with 48074 frames. Can the submission be updated or is the new one too different?

Even with these improvements this run can still be improved through simple menu navigation improvements. You get to the first level on frame 830, Yunshui started on 779. You finish the roller coaster level on frame 9656, Yunshui finishes on 9517. You start the bumper car level on 10025, Yunshui starts the level on 9873. I didn't go through the whole game but just up until the third mini-game you could save at least 160 frames. That is almost 3 seconds and there is more menus and things following. I know you do beat his time substantially but these simple things add up and losing 3 seconds to menu and text halfway through the run leads me to think there are other parts where it was not fully optimized. Additionally there is another strategy to beating the game that (if my calculations are correct) could save an additional 37 seconds seconds off of your fastest time. The strategy is that you can either beat all four levels or get enough points to acquire 50 tickets to face the main boss. To get enough points to get 50 tickets is the equivalent of beating the bumper cars 8.5 (round up to 9) times as it averages around 4.8 points per frame which greatly beats any of the other events. Beating the bumper cars 9 times and then trading the points in for tickets in total would take up up to roughly 35,500 frames. At this same point of entering the boss stage you are at 37,720 so even if the bumper cars took an extra second a piece than I am estimating it would still be over 30 seconds faster. Now there are some drawbacks to this approach. First, as I have discovered in starting my own run, the bumper cars are by far the most random and annoying part of this game to beat. Second, it would require you to beat the same level 9 times which is not very entertaining. My thoughts on those two drawbacks are first: TASes are supposed to be hard and frustrating, otherwise we would have all of the game already beat with ideal time. Second: as this is almost certainly going to be going into the vault entertainment shouldn't matter. If you want you can give this another shot optimizing the menus and trying this strategy, otherwise whenever I finish this (assuming I do since I have had so much less time lately) it will be obsolete. EDIT And I have the math if anyone wants to look into it themselves. The post was just getting long as it is.

I didn't really know what I was doing when I started out. I had just been comparing times using the in-game timer instead of the frame count. I could go back and keep optimizing, but I think I've spent enough time with this game. I have more pressing matters I should be attending to. I accomplished my goal of beating the posted time and I learned a few things along the way. I had considered earning 50 tickets the way you suggested, but holy crap do I hate that level. If I do another one of these, I'll be picking a better game.

Well, since in this run there are many places where it is slower than the existing one, and it is only faster thanks to new shortcuts, it has a low chance to be accepted as an improvement. But not zero! I'd encourage the Author to try out more improvements, thankfully no one keeps them secret.

I've messed around with it a little more and after fixing the menu selections and the roller coaster, I've saved about 125 frames. Any tips on not desyncing the entire rest of the run when I paste something? I'm making sure to paste on the same frame, but I'm getting lag frames on the bumper cars and I think it's throwing it off.

Try entering the cars level 1-5 frames later, maybe they will syncronize.

How is it going, Palidian? If you manage to resync the improved movie I will gladly accept it.

Nice run... particularly like the roller coaster and log ride improvements. This game is kind of dumb but I played it a lot anyway. Thanks for this!

I'm still not having any luck fixing the desync. I'll have to rerecord it, but I'm not going to have time to do it before the end of the week. Celebrating my anniversary. :)

Then I'm setting it to delayed, since the improvement is being worked on actually.

It's done and uploaded, so please replace the file. I basically re-recorded the entire run using the TAS editor. I couldn't get the changes to sync properly, so I had little choice. Certain sections of the bumper cars are a little slower (there is so much lag in this level, it isn't funny), but finished faster overall. Levels are all entered on the first possible frame. I also finished the log ride a few frames sooner and shaved an additional few seconds off of the final level. I love the last level of this game. In total, shaved about 500 frames off of the old run. Have at it. It's 7:30am. I'm going to bed. SGDQ destroyed my sleep schedule. :)

It's 7:30am. I'm going to bed. SGDQ destroyed my sleep schedule. :)

Your not the only one... wait I actually had a sleep schedule