Topic by josh_l.

Posted: 12/4/2004 2:11 PM

Post subject: Arkanoid: Doh it Again

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josh_l.

Player (101)

Joined: 3/25/2004
Posts: 189
Location: Austin

I liked NES speed run of Arkanoid, so I'm surprised I haven't seen this game mentioned here. Granted, all the Arkanoid games are pretty similar, but there are new powerups to make optimal use of, a multiball that gives you 8 balls instead of just 3, and also a few boss fights. Overall, it was a pretty cool and overlooked sequel... much better than the rather wretched "Arkanoid Returns" arcade game. I actually made my own run of this and uploaded it to http://omake.studio-zoe.com/dohitagain-joshl.zip (uses the USA rom). I did the best I could with it, but it's a little inconsistent on the whole, and I don't think it's good enough to submit properly. But y'all can use it to judge whether a time attack of this game would be entertaining or not. It only includes the first 33 levels. There are 99 total. ^^;

http://girlyyy.com/ The El Viento TAS is the only decent thing I submitted here.

Posted: 12/4/2004 8:16 PM

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Blechy

Former player

Joined: 6/27/2004
Posts: 550
Location: New York

Haven't seen your movie. But I know it's on phil and genisto's list. If there are 8 balls available, that should look great.

Posted: 12/5/2004 6:27 PM

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josh_l.

Player (101)

Joined: 3/25/2004
Posts: 189
Location: Austin

Oh, so it is. Well, I'm sure they can do a much better job with it. I didn't even know there was a 2-player simaltaneous mode. Of the ability to speed up the paddle in the options mode, for that matter... heh.

http://girlyyy.com/ The El Viento TAS is the only decent thing I submitted here.

Posted: 12/6/2010 8:52 PM

Post subject: Arkanoid - Doh It Again

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mmarks

Banned User, Player (143)

Joined: 8/30/2010
Posts: 500
Location: Argentina Bs. As.

Hi, again another issue, this is the game "Arkanoid" (This the list of ideas). Here I have a test of the game's first level. Enjoy This game contains 99 or 100 levels (so they say). And there is a level of battle of 2 player (Contains a password) that may be found here. It also contains the passwords for all levels of play I hope that comment on this topic. :)

[18:51] <scrimpy> Oh, nothing [18:51] <mmarks> oh [18:51] <Nach> I think scrimpy is just jealous of you mmarks

Posted: 6/17/2011 5:03 PM

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StripeyDope

Joined: 6/16/2011
Posts: 12
Location: U.S. of A.

Holy buttered beans, this is a long bump. Well, better to bump this one than make a whole new one ...right? But anyways, I am about to TAS this game, and I wanted to know something. Since there are three endings in the game (one for every 33 levels) I was thinking I could do a TAS for each set of 33 levels. Is this acceptable, or should I just wing it and do all 99 in one TAS?

Current Run: U.N. Squadron (SNES, U); minimum kills. WIP Segments: [1] [2]

Posted: 6/17/2011 6:37 PM

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BigBoct

He/Him

Editor, Former player

Joined: 8/9/2007
Posts: 1692
Location: Tiffin/Republic, OH

I think it's acceptable, since there is an actual ending after each set of 33. Whether or not all three get published, however, is a different story. I would expect that whichever one the site audience seems the best would be the only one to be published.

Previous Name: boct1584

Posted: 6/19/2011 9:55 PM

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Baxter

Skilled player (1402)

Joined: 5/31/2004
Posts: 1821

This is always a difficult decision... it is of course cool to have a movie complete basically all there is to complete in a game, but people might think it's too long. On the other hand, people might think it's an unfinished product if the last 66 levels are not completed. I would suggest starting with the first 33 levels, and try to get feedback then. You can always decide to add the rest of the levels later to the movie. I don't think there is a big chance that more than one movie is published, as people might wonder why the levels aren't completed in a single movie.

http://tasvideos.org/Baxter.html

Posted: 4/6/2012 7:10 AM

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Patryk1023

He/Him

Joined: 3/1/2011
Posts: 288
Location: Inside out house.

Hey. Sorry for posting here almost year after Baxter did, but I'm just trying to do a TAS of this game. Right now I'm in round 11 (as it says, it's a boss) and I died and I must to rerun this part. Here's the movie for USA rom. (It might desync in 8th round...)

<Nach> scrimpy is fretty with her sunglasses on I'm here. never visible.

Posted: 4/6/2012 10:25 AM

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Baxter

Skilled player (1402)

Joined: 5/31/2004
Posts: 1821

I got a desync in round 7. Always nice to see someone who wants to make a TAS of this game :). I'd really like a good submission of this game. Unfortunately, I do think the quality of your wip is very subpar. I don't think the laser is used optimally, and it suffers heavily from the syndrome where it takes a long time to find the right angle to hit the last block. Genisto also ran into this problem quite a bit in his NES TAS, and I improved his movie by over 4 minutes, partly because I did my best to avoid this. It unfortunately requires a lot of work to deal with this problem. Sometimes, a setup that does not look good in the beginning can be cleared very fast in the end. It takes a LOT of work to produce a high-quality Arkanoid TAS. (I'm not sure if the 40 rerecords are the actual amount you used, but even 4000 would be a very low number of rerecords for the levels that you completed.) I don't mean to discourage you; I wish you the best of luck. If you have some questions, feel free to ask :).

http://tasvideos.org/Baxter.html

Posted: 4/13/2012 4:20 PM

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Patryk1023

He/Him

Joined: 3/1/2011
Posts: 288
Location: Inside out house.

Today I found (with help via IRC) some usefull values to the game. That values are: 7E044F (1-byte) and 7E044E (2-bytes): both are the paddle position from 16 to -113 (starting position is always 32) 7E0457 (1-byte) and 7E0456 (2-bytes): both are the paddle speed, which contains 2, 4 and 8 (both plus and minus, 1-byte) or 512, 1024 and 2048 (both plus and minus, 2-bytes). If I'll get more usefull values, I'll do the edit of this post. :) Thanks to Ilari, natt and Lil_Gecko for help.

<Nach> scrimpy is fretty with her sunglasses on I'm here. never visible.

Posted: 4/14/2012 2:37 AM

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Blechy

Former player

Joined: 6/27/2004
Posts: 550
Location: New York

I've actually been racing this game recently. Does anyone know how to raise the odds of getting particular powerups? At this point we know what powerups are available in what stages, and roughly from what blocks, but we don't know how to make it assured we'll get what we want.

Posted: 4/14/2012 2:56 AM

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John11

Joined: 3/4/2012
Posts: 74

I played through this game yesterday for the heck of it. Then today when I saw Patryk1023's post I decided to look for some useful values in case anyone wants to try TASing this. I don't really feel like working on a TAS for this, but I was thinking I might try to make a bot for it like Bobo the King has done for Super Mario RPG "Beetle Mania". Incoming data dump: (all values are 1 byte unsigned unless otherwise specified) primary ball X: 7E0271 Primary ball Y: 7E02B1 Each life starts at 47 x position and 195 y position for single player Each life starts at 47 x position and 179 y position for two player simultaneous Multiball 1 Y:7E02B3 Multiball 1 X:7E0273 Multiball 2 Y:7E02B5 Multiball 2 X:7E0275 Multiball 3 Y:7E02B7 Multiball 3 X:7E0277 Multiball 4 Y:7E02B9 Multiball 4 X:7E0279 Multiball 5 Y:7E02BB Multiball 5 X:7E027B Multiball 6 Y:7E02BD Multiball 6 X:7E027D Multiball 7 Y:7E02BF Multiball 7 X:7E027F When you break up one of the ball enemies, they form balls that bounce around as well. Their locations are: Enemy Ball 1 X:7E02A7 Enemy Ball 1 Y:7E02E7 Enemy Ball 2 X:7E02A5 Enemy Ball 2 Y:7E02E5 Enemy Ball 3 X:7E02A3 Enemy Ball 3 Y:7E02E3 If you break more than one (giving 6 balls on the screen) I'm guessing that the next would be: (but I haven't checked) Enemy Ball 4 X:7E02AD Enemy Ball 4 Y:7E02ED Enemy Ball 5 X:7E02AB Enemy Ball 5 Y:7E02EB Enemy Ball 6 X:7E02A9 Enemy Ball 6 Y:7E02E9 X posision of enemy one: 7E2001 Y posision of enemy one: 7E2003 X posision of enemy two: 7E2021 Y posision of enemy two: 7E2023 frames since the ball last hit the paddle? 7E0196 (2bytes) Blocks for the level: address: 7E0FRC (read as hex) where R is the row (0 to F) and C is the column (0 to 9) on the board values in hex of the form XY: If X = 1 then the block is of type breakable in one hit In this case, Y is the color of the block and if it has an item S color 0 white 1 orange 2 lightblue 3 green 4 red 5 blue 6 pink 7 yellow 8 white with item 9 orange with item A lightblue with item B green with item C red with item D blue with item E pink with item F yellow with item If X = 2 then the block is of type breakable in mutiple hits In this case, Y is the number of hits left on the block If X = 3 then the block is a gold unbreakable block 00 means no block is there p1 paddle position values: paddle position: 7E044F These are also values that have to do with the position. My guess is that they are delimiters on the paddle that determine the angle at which the ball bounces off? I haven't checked though. 7E1600 7E1604 7E1608 7E160C 7E1610 (only non 0 when an extender power-up has been collected) 7E1614 (only non 0 when an extender power-up has been collected) 7E1618 (only non 0 when two extender power-ups have been collected) 7E161C (only non 0 when two extender power-ups have been collected) These values below seem to always be 4 more than the values above 7E1700 7E1704 7E1708 7E170C 7E1710 7E1714 (only non 0 when an extender power-up has been collected) 7E1718 (only non 0 when an extender power-up has been collected) 7E171C (only non 0 when two extender power-ups have been collected) 7E1720 (only non 0 when two extender power-ups have been collected) p2 paddle position values: paddle position = 7E0451 (16 to 143) (16 to 127) (16 to 111) paddle position = 7E0492 (28 to 155) (I don't know why p1 doesn't have a coressponding value at 7E0490) These are also values that have to do with the position. My guess is that they are delimiters on the paddle that determine the angle at which the ball bounces off? I haven't checked though. 7E1628 7E162C 7E1630 7E1634 7E1638 (only non 0 when an extender power-up has been collected) 7E163C (only non 0 when an extender power-up has been collected) 7E1640 (only non 0 when two extender power-ups have been collected) 7E1644 (only non 0 when two extender power-ups have been collected) These values below seem to always be 4 more than the values above 7E1728 7E172C 7E1730 7E1734 7E1738 7E173C (only non 0 when an extender power-up has been collected) 7E1740 (only non 0 when an extender power-up has been collected) 7E1744 (only non 0 when two extender power-ups have been collected) 7E1748 (only non 0 when two extender power-ups have been collected) power-up pills: board location of the current power up dropped from 7E0496 (Hex RC [RowColumn]) board location of the second power up dropped from if there are two on the screen at once: 7E0494 (Hex RC [RowColumn]) So if it is 46 in hex it came from row 4 column 6 if it was A8 in hex it came from row A column 8 pixel locations: current bottom of first pill: 7E16E5 or 7E16E9 or 7E16ED current top of first pill: 7E16F1 or 7E16F5 or 7E04A6 current bottom of second pill: 7E16D1 or 7E16D5 or 7E16D9 current top of second pill: 7E16DD or 7E16E1 or 7E04A4 Pill type of first pill 7E049A Pill type of second pill 7E0498 blue 01 ???? 02 red 03 gray 04 orange 05 pink 06 light Green 07 magenta 08 dark Green 09 light Blue 00 Level specific power-up drop list order: Legend blue E dark green T Red L Orange S gray P light green C pink B magenta M light blue D random R Stage 1 power ups: T E L R E T Stage 2 power ups: C L S C M L Other notes: each block is 16 pixels wide and 8 pixels tall size of the paddle is 32 size of the paddle with 1 extender is 48 size of the paddle with 2 extenders is 64 Your paddle can only be extended twice diameter of the ball is 4 There can only be two power-ups on the screen at a time power up pills are 8 pixels tall by 16 pixels wide The next power-up that appears is not dependent upon the block you hit (only that you hit an item block as described above), but a list of predetermined power-ups for that stage. An option for that list can be "random" it seems. These random power-ups are where you can possibly get a warp power-up or an extra life power-up. It seems like some stages do not have random power-ups and that each one is predetermined (but I haven't tested enough to be sure). Things still to find: enemy type ball speed some sort of formula for how the ball bounces off corners of blocks How bouncing off bosses works Check the paddle position values to see if they have something to do with the angles the ball bounces off from the paddle and what that angle is. Try to figure out stuff with the RNG and how it relates to enemy movement and random power-ups (not even sure where to start with that) The power-up order for other stages and which are random Last note: If anyone is seriously planning on TASing this and would like me to create some sort of LUA HUD for it let me know and tell me what kinds of things you'd like to see on it. I'd like to familiarize myself more with the LUA stuff and this would be a good excuse to do it.

Posted: 4/17/2012 6:59 PM

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Patryk1023

He/Him

Joined: 3/1/2011
Posts: 288
Location: Inside out house.

Instead of writing it myself, let me copy from IRC chat: <Patryk1023> now I know that Arkanoid - Doh It Again has 99 rounds, not 100! <Patryk1023> it ends with Doh <Patryk1023> I managed myself to use pass to skip whole game to round 99 and fight the boss, results are here: http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1948941482/ARKANOIDSNESPASS.smv

<Nach> scrimpy is fretty with her sunglasses on I'm here. never visible.

Posted: 4/17/2012 8:11 PM

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NitroGenesis

He/Him

Editor, Experienced player (551)

Joined: 12/24/2009
Posts: 1873

seen http://tasvideos.org/3394S.html ???

YoungJ1997lol wrote:

Normally i would say Yes, but thennI thought "its not the same hack" so ill stick with meh.

Posted: 2/23/2013 1:31 AM

Post subject: 4 level WIP

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Baxter

Skilled player (1402)

Joined: 5/31/2004
Posts: 1821

I've been interested in this game for quite a while now. Unfortunately, there has only been a submission that uses a password to skip to the final boss. As John11 said in his last post, he'd help out anyone who was considering doing a TAS for this game and that was no lie. He did some amazing research on this game, completely figuring out how the item drops work, and he made a very nice lua script as well! This lead me to make a WIP of the first four levels, which can be found here: 4_level_WIP.bkm (Small note, rerecords aren't very accurate, I TASed it mostly on Snes9x and then used the best strategy I found when creating the bizhawk input file.) The game works as follows: All levels are regular Arkanoid levels except for: Level 11: boss A Level 22: boss B Level 33: boss C followed by a 2 minute unskippable cutscene leading into level 34 Level 44: boss A with more HP Level 55: boss B with more HP Level 66: boss C with more HP followed by 3 minutes of unskippable cutscene / credits leading into level 67 Level 77: boss A with even more HP Level 88: boss B with even more HP Level 99: boss C with even more HP, the game ends after beating this boss To everybody who watched the WIP, I would love to know in which group you would put yourself: 1) I did not enjoy the WIP. 2) I enjoyed the WIP, but 33 levels of it is probably too much. 3) I enjoyed the WIP, I would probably enjoy 33 levels but 99 levels is probably too much. The movie should stop after 33 levels. 4) I enjoyed the WIP, I would probably enjoy 33 levels but 99 levels is probably too much. Completing 33 levels doesn't really finish the game though, so you should TAS all 99 levels anyway. 5) I enjoyed the WIP and I would probably enjoy 99 of these levels. The TAS should complete all 99 levels. Please be honest... I'd much rather hear what you think about it now than later. (If you haven't watched the WIP, but want to comment on this matter, feel free to do so as well of course ;)

http://tasvideos.org/Baxter.html

Posted: 2/23/2013 8:35 AM

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Cooljay

He/Him

Active player (392)

Joined: 5/1/2012
Posts: 468
Location: Canada

This is a tricky question in choices, but i will try my best to answer. Overall 99 levels would rack up a lot time even with item manipulation. It would probably head for the vault tier regarding entertainment. I'd have to go with 4. The TAS should still show the final ending and credits. As well as ending on a weaker boss wouldn't look as good as ending on the boss who reverses your controls, and causes massive frustration.

Posted: 3/2/2013 5:56 PM

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Baxter

Skilled player (1402)

Joined: 5/31/2004
Posts: 1821

Only a single reply in a week, and exactly the reply I feared: all 99 should be TASed, but that's probably too many levels to remain interesting for the entire duration of the TAS. Making this TAS would require way too much work to end up in the vault... it seems like my efforts are better spent elsewhere....

http://tasvideos.org/Baxter.html

Posted: 3/12/2013 4:28 PM

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zaphod77

Joined: 1/13/2007
Posts: 335

Well with optimal play (and heavy use of the ball splitting/8 ball powerups), the levels will go by really quickly. and beating levels quickly is entertaining, I think. :)