Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
Nah, it doesn't need anything special, I'm not sure what the problem is, based on your description. My goodset doesn't show any bad roms... Find another rom or redownload the emulator? If neither of these fix it, the problem is somewhere else in your system, I guess. Good luck with it-- although this isn't exactly a game worthy of much attention
Symbolic X: Update: At the first frame of the cement factory (screen 5 I guess? City, Apartment, X-Ray, Subway, Cement Factory) I'm exactly 540 frames ahead of your latest WIP, or nine seconds. This is my best work on this game yet! I lost a few frames in lag getting sodas in the X-Ray machine--let's hope damage boosting can be found frequently enough to make them worth it.
At this rate, though, if I keep this up I'll be under five minutes! I'll probably just submit it when I'm done
Don't forget about the racing area in Mars as that can be the main source of lag. If you can discover any glitching techniques that might knock the other cars and people off the screen, you might recover out of the lag and knock more time off. Impressive for 9 seconds! Just remember to thank me in the end. =)
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
966 frames ahead after the factory--16 seconds now. I've been doing that boss hobo battle all morning. I'm happy enough with it now, but I feel like I'm just giving up for the sake of continuing. And yes those sodas were very necessary here, I don't have a single pip of health left in reserve after two points of damage (I do NOT want to wait for those spike balls on chains to get out of my way, that's silly)
Some facts:
* Boss hobo's HP address is 2c5
* Everywhere I look, they say that the gun is useless against the boss hobo. As it turns out, it works beautifully (doing 3x the damage as punches as always), the problem is that his damageable hit box is his head and ONLY his head. The punch has a much larger hitbox and so clips the head when standing--the gun's bullets go well under. So because of that, it turns out that the gun IS the right weapon to use in NORMAL play, but punch in TAS is best.
* The punch-spamming-while-jumping glitch works because the game creates multiple fists, up to 6 I believe. Each one is its own object that follows Arnie's position and then stack, causing lag and taking priority. A new object that is created has no room because of all the fists and so is thrown aside. This is why, say, the sitting hobos disappear when you glitch punch them--they die and create a walking hobo, but if there's no room to walk, they just...disappear. The important thing is that they stack--if you glitch six fists when you punch the boss hobo in the head, you'll actually do 30 damage instead of just 5 from one fist. This is obviously useful, but balancing it with preventing lag makes things tricky.
So anyway now I just need to manipulate some health like you got in your latest run and then do some driving. Free sodas there will be nice--if I absolutely have to I can grab the ones in the windows at the start of the following Mars area but we'll have to see. Sub-5 minutes is guaranteed now, but 4:30? Geez that'll be tough
You can take excessive damage to save time, but the thing is that as long as the Soylent Sodas are not there when you need them, that's where any TAS attempt can get jeopardized.
Nothing else, go into one of the backalleys of the first stage and there should be a soylent soda that maximizes health. Even though it may kill a ton of frames, taking damages to save time might make a difference.
And I already know about the multiple fists, but thanx for reminding!
The punch-spamming-while-jumping glitch works because the game creates multiple fists, up to 6 I believe. Each one is its own object that follows Arnie's position and then stack, causing lag and taking priority. A new object that is created has no room because of all the fists and so is thrown aside. This is why, say, the sitting hobos disappear when you glitch punch them--they die and create a walking hobo, but if there's no room to walk, they just...disappear. The important thing is that they stack--if you glitch six fists when you punch the boss hobo in the head, you'll actually do 30 damage instead of just 5 from one fist. This is obviously useful, but balancing it with preventing lag makes things tricky.
Let me also explain something fishy in the beginning of Mars. It's about the floating UFO's. If Arnie fires a gun above the windows at a certain point, that's where either the floating UFO's will appear as soon as bullets catch them or easily disappear glitch-wise. Review my FCM and you'll find that I only caught two instead of four. Possible glitches I did (simple turbo-firing) was the reason I only found two UFO's. But after such glitch, the doors to the next room/transit hub would open with ease.
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
yeah, the punching keeps them from spawning. The doors open because you kill the martians, I'm pretty sure. I intend to do that, too!
The full-health soda in the second alleyway is really hard to get to when not TASed, but it would cost a large number of seconds to get so there's no way it'll help in the long run. Good suggestion, though.
BTW, did you manage to display Arnie floating in the air after coming out of the Subway X-Ray?! If you got that, perfect! That's my favorite glitch I've seen and done! It takes autofire-A while jumping around the exact area of where the x-ray glass will break, it may also take luck manipulation (a few extra re-records) to do that. I don't know if Arnie can do multiple punches while jumping around there, but it could help.
Abusing programming errors like that is your foot in the door toward a successful TAS!
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
Yes, but don't you need to be punching for that to work? I forget, but if so, too bad. It is a really cool glitch, though, I'll work it in if it can work. Just hex in a change is all it'll take.
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
You're right--punching is not required. The glitch is caused by making the automatic jump wait. You jump just before Arnie jumps out of the machine by himself, causing him to just jump up and down. When he hits the ground, he starts jumping forward. Then, when he would've hit the ground had you not tampered with the intended programming, Arnold starts walking like as if he was on flat ground. Instead, he's still in the air. This looks cool and all, but every pixel or two upwards this glitch gives requires a frame or two of jumping beforehand, so the glitch requires sacrificing frames. I've got an .fcm where he's definitely walking on air (though only half as high as in your run) and it only costs 6 frames. Given the game in question, I think it's worth it to add. Good idea.
When testing this, I ended up with one .fcm where Arnold first ends up behind the smash effect, walks really high off the ground, and then never leaves the stage because, I guess, he's too high. So he just walks into the wall a little bit, and the whole game freezes. Jolly good!
another test: Invincible Arnold! http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1473033982/Total%20Recall%20%28U%29%20trest.fcm
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
Been a few days but I got to work on it again. Somehow, I've gained almost zero frames from the last WIP, so I'm going to just redo these three scenes--I should probably just start from the boss hobo fight and redo it all through. What I did in the first Mars room should be easily faster in a few different places, and the car race didn't slow down as much--with the exception of the god-awful lag.
But anyway here's a WIP. With a fantastic ending. Game programming for dummies. http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1510486402/totalrecalldumbdriving.fcm
Hey, if you said you can defeat the cement factory boss using guns to his head, don't you think you would be sacrificing too many frames to even get the gun?
I have one more thing that I never tried before. On the driving stage, I always held down the forward (right) key. When you get there, try tapping it and see if that could speed things up a little bit. I still know how to maneuver through the narrow spots toward the end of each racing segment (see my video).
966 frames ahead after the factory--16 seconds now.
Not to ask, but I was wondering if you been peeking at this here and there? Even if you're not completely done with the game, I still know the rest of the optimized techniques beyond the driving stage (timing, firing, jumping). Your WIP + my input beyond the driving stage can be at least 16 seconds faster now than it used to.
I know that for our work and everyone else's contributions, we can still look at 5'05 or even try to break the 5 minutes. We just have to re-play the game again and use all we know just to get to that point. If push come to shove, I might re-enter this project and make final adjustments before I consider things done from my side. There's no telling how deeper things will go beyond under 5 minutes. But after I saw your WIP, I think we can simply take this game like a sheet of paper and just run it down the shredder.
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
I haven't touched this for a while, I got excited about Ultima: Quest of the Avatar, and then got excited about Blaster Master. I need to re-examine the driving section to see where I lost so many frames to lag and see what I can do to fix it. I might just be able to work this game in a little sometime this week, who knows, but it has been on the back of my mind!
I need to re-examine the driving section to see where I lost so many frames to lag and see what I can do to fix it.
I thought that looked as well-optimized as mine, if not, a few frames faster. We ask the following question: Is it faster to take the upper routes (my WIP) or the lower routes (yours)?
Another thing I saw, you grabbed a few soylent sodas while driving - I already told everyone there were about 2 or three hidden ones at the beginning of... what I call now... Lunchbox city!!! Because think about it, doesn't those buildings in Mars (after the driving stage) look like lunch boxes?!! Grab the two Soylent sodas after the driving stage and you should recover that way while saving some time.
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
You have to make extra steps to get those. If you can get them while driving, you're saving time. UNLESS they create lag--which is part of what I'll be investigating when I look at the run again sometime soon.
Lower routes SHOULD be faster because you spend more time going full speed and less time slowing down to move up and down.
Yes, my run did go just about as many frames as yours did--I was hoping to save time, though, but if I can't improve the lag (by, say, convincing the little men that shoot the bullets to shoot more vertically so that the bullet goes off-screen sooner, thus less lag) then I'll just have to settle for saving time not grabbing the hidden sodas in the next area (since I already grabbed them while driving, as you noticed).
Yeah, after I saw your drive, I have to agree. But it's too bad that Arnie can only shoot forward. And that sux, because in the actual movie I saw, yeah, Arnie and his crew did some firing toward the sides and the back. I think Acclaim/Interplay made a mistake there.
twisted eye wrote:
Lower routes SHOULD be faster because you spend more time going full speed and less time slowing down to move up and down.
For the first time ever, this should fix everything and close the deal. If I do work this game again, it will simply start off with your input going toward the last driving stage of Mars.
From there on, I can take over (before you crash) - try to re-work Lunchbox city, Last Resort, and the final boss. I would say my first ever double-WIP compilation and I just might submit it altogether. We'll both get credit! I mean, we already know that you pulled at least 16 seconds of improvement! It's that we just haven't got the time to implement our inputs into one whole movie yet and that's what's keeping everybody waiting.
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
I dunno if anybody's waiting all THAT much but yeah, my computer COMPLETELY died recently, so who knows. I've tossed around the idea of asking you to just finish it because I'm so dang busy these days, so it's interesting that you posted this around the same time that I was thinking it.
I'm waiting for this, and I'm happy to hear the amount of improvement you have found. Anyways, you can take all the time you want, guys, there is not deadline to miss. Just wanted to say that there's public for this run.
I was messing with the subway boarding stage (after passing security checkpoint), and the same hundred-hand punching thing done at the right time allowed the game to not dispatch the dogs! And that could be error abuse and luck manipluation. On the other hand, hundred-hand punching before a certain stopping point would get Arnie stuck.
I did the same thing at the mining stage where I punched before Digger Dan showed up. It glitched me through and I was able to get the laser gun, but that boss did not appear and the scene did not lock in.
Even at the last boss stage. Boss disappeared but the game didn't lock in and kept going.
Joined: 10/17/2005
Posts: 629
Location: Seattle, WA
The glitching is caused by lag, and lag means lost time, and time is all-important. For the dogs, they don't cause lag alone, so it's better to just avoid them or whatever.
For cases where the game locks in, it might be helpful IF it's not a boss-type encounter, because those need to be killed legitimately for the game to continue. If glitching to prevent the jetpackers from appearing in the last stage works, though, that's a lot of time saved! and I was JUST thinking today about working on this
--nope, all screen stoppers are boss events and must be cleared. Don't work. However, being stuck on a screen with infinitely respawning enemies and a turboed lazer got my high score up to 999850 before I reverted back to 0 and had to start over ;)
I'll put some time into this tonight. If I finish, I'll submit. I've given myself nearly a dozen projects over the last few months so one out of the way will be a welcome feeling :)
