(Link to video)
This is a TAS of Super Monkey Ball 2 Expert mode, playing all the way through the Expert, Expert Extra, Master and Master Extra levels.
This TAS uses the NTSC version of the game. PAL version actually has slightly different physics allowing for faster times, but this version was chosen due to its preference in the speedrunning scene and the common demand.
For comparison, the best known non-TAS time for this category is 16:54 (RTA timing) by Jcool114 (as of 03/14).
  • Emulator used: Dolphin 4.0.2 64-bit
  • Aims for fastest completion time
  • Warp goals are used to skip levels
  • Death is used to complete bonus stages faster

Author comments:

byrz:

I decided to start this project after TASing individual levels for a couple months. At first I started this project solo but it didn't take long before I started getting some nice help from other Monkey Ballers capable of TASing. Without the other authors, it would have taken me much longer, if not forever, to finish this, and obviously some stages would have been less optimal. TASing Monkey Ball games has been a really close hobby to me, taking up to 50 hours per week. Now it's time to take a breath and see what's up next.

keylie:

I came to this project when it was halfway done, and worked on a few stages. The level design of this game is more complex than the first episode, leading to some really interesting routes.

Individual Levels

LevelTime leftNon-TAS IL WRComment
E1 Wormhole53.4853.25Looks pretty nice :)
E2 Free Fall55.3055.30Making as little adjustments as possible while falling saves time
E4 Mad Shuffle54.2354.21Yay, saved a frame in a luck based level
E5 Partition57.6557.65Falling out in bonus levels is faster than getting into the goal
E6 Jump Machine48.5646.75Found a new extremely hard and cool strat :)
E9 Toggle55.3055.28Yay, saved a frame in another luck based level
E10 Pachinko58.0558.05Just another bonus level
E11 Combination56.0156.01The Non-TAS WR used to be 56.00 when this level was done
E12 Punched Seesaws54.1054.03Requires some lucky collisions
E14 Brandished56.1556.15This is the easiest record to achieve in the game
E15 Tiers53.7653.20It took a week to reach an old IL TAS of 53.75
E18 Detour52.8152.78Nothing special
E20 Earthquake57.4657.46Just another bonus level
E21 Spiral Bridge48.5347.88This ended up looking really cool :)
E22 Wavy Options54.2054.13Abusing really weird collision detection in this level
E23 Obstacle55.5555.50Nice looking time :)
E24 Domino55.3655.06Damn, never expected improving this stage by that much :o
E25 Sieve48.7348.53Hitting the last thing while going back is faster, even if it looks weird
E26 Flock53.0652.95Surprisingly hard strat
E27 Double Spiral51.3851.25Fun stage and a nice time :)
E28 Hierarchy54.8654.83Annoying stage
E29 8 Bracelets52.1152.08Surprisingly hard to beat the Non-TAS
E32 Soft Cream55.0154.88Wow, got a 55 with a new strat :o
E33 Momentum53.5153.46Surprisingly hard
E34 Entangled Path54.8354.78Cool
E36 Vortex54.1652.96A really hard strat that requires a really specific collision
E38 Trampolines55.1154.91Totally the intended way
E39 Swing Shaft53.3053.16Neat
E40 Fighters57.6557.65Yay, the last bonus stage
E41 Serial Jump55.8555.85Almost looks like .86 would be possible...
E44 Chipped Pipes55.2855.16Pretty cool
E46 Guillotine54.3654.35Wow, actually cut a frame here
E47 Corkscrew48.2647.66A TAS strat discovered a while ago
E48 Orbiters56.0356.00Glitch goal!!!!
E49 Twin Basin54.6154.48Really smooth and low clips
E50 Air Hockey56.5356.53Last stage of Expert, really simple time to achieve
EX1 Charge52.3552.23Pretty hard to optimize
EX2 Strata54.0653.80Dat grind
EX4 Giant Swing54.0653.68Surprisingly big improvement
EX5 5 Drums51.8151.65Pretty hard
EX6 Free Throw53.0052.80Very beautiful time
EX9 Construction54.6554.56Who cares about the huge maze
EX10 Train Worm54.5354.50Cool
M1 Centrifugal55.0355.03Wasn’t easy
M2 Swing Bridges51.1050.98Fun
M4 Passage53.7053.68Easy
M6 Intermittent54.4554.43The Non-TAS WR is really good :o
M7 Long Torus51.2350.60Wow
M8 Spasmodic56.1856.18Nothing special
M9 Double Twin51.7351.15Had to slow down for 3 frames to make the strat possible but it ended up insane
M10 Clock Face55.4655.45Bumper abuse
MX1 Variable Width52.7652.68Basic
MX2 Striker55.3055.30We go to green goal in order to get to a red goal in the next level
MX4 Planets53.1653.15Slowly alternating diagonals in midair helps you reach further
MX7 Synchronized56.6556.63Actually saved a frame in this simple level
MX9 Dizzy System56.4156.41Requires a really lucky clip
MX10 Nintendo30.4130.41The waiting level… Perfect time to play around!

Known improvements:

EX9 Construction: byrz has done 54.76 (7 frames better) TAS of this stage after the movie was finished.
Note: The amount of rerecords in the .dtm file is 30-50% smaller than the real amount of rerecords done during the project.

Ilari: Changed time from 14:08.217 to 14:23.017.
Nahoc: Claimed for judging...
Nahoc: Accepting for publication.
RGamma Publishing...

TASVideoAgent
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Spacecow
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Both of these games are already so unbelievably well optimized, these are REALLY impressive improvements. (A "total saved" row would be nice for the tables.) Easy yes vote, and IMHO worthy of star consideration. Time to copy + paste this exact comment into the other thread! :)
Cooljay
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This was a cool TAS to watch. Was very fast paced and some of the maneuvering looked really really hard to do. Yes Vote.
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Didn't get 56.16 Brandished. Also had a horrible aesthetic choice early in the run. No vote.
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The corrected time for this submission is: 14:23.02 Sync-verified on Dolphin tag 4.0.2 (dsp_*.bin files that came with the emulator) with "Super Monkey Ball 2.iso" (MD5: 29dd871cf4a00b2455c9d03e9328e7bd, SHA1: 36902d42ee1ecea8b2144f3aef2c0fc3a62b71da).
All syllogisms have three parts, therefore this is not a syllogism.
Warepire
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I never realized how optimized the RTA ILs were. This was absolutely amazing! Yes vote and recommendation for star!
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Meh. A lot of the levels were the same: veer off to the side for some speed, roll really fast with some small bounces into the goal straight ahead.
ALAKTORN
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Miles wrote:
Didn't get 56.16 Brandished. Also had a horrible aesthetic choice early in the run. No vote.
is this sarcasm? “EX9 Construction: byrz has done 54.76 (7 frames better) TAS of this stage after the movie was finished.” I don’t see why this wasn’t implemented in the movie? certainly SMB2 is a very hex-friendly game?
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ALAKTORN wrote:
Miles wrote:
Didn't get 56.16 Brandished. Also had a horrible aesthetic choice early in the run. No vote.
is this sarcasm? “EX9 Construction: byrz has done 54.76 (7 frames better) TAS of this stage after the movie was finished.” I don’t see why this wasn’t implemented in the movie? certainly SMB2 is a very hex-friendly game?
Miles is making a "Why didn't you choose baby" joke, because he likes Baby. Also, byrz said in the thread for smb1 that smb1 is not hex-friendly. Same probably applies to smb2.
[16:36:31] <Mothrayas> I have to say this argument about robot drug usage is a lot more fun than whatever else we have been doing in the past two+ hours
[16:08:10] <BenLubar> a TAS is just the limit of a segmented speedrun as the segment length approaches zero
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Fast-paced run with some surprising strategies, yes vote!
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TheMG2 wrote:
Also, byrz said in the thread for smb1 that smb1 is not hex-friendly. Same probably applies to smb2.
I went and read that topic, but all the desyncs he mentioned probably came down to having different lag, which is nothing that would worsen hex-friendliness, what makes games not hex-friendly is an RNG, and I doubt this game has one
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ALAKTORN wrote:
what makes games not hex-friendly is an RNG, and I doubt this game has one
The level-by-level comments in this run's submission text note some entire levels that are "luck based", which I understand to mean controlled by the RNG. I would assume that at least those levels would desync and have to be redone due to different luck.
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CoolKirby wrote:
The level-by-level comments in this run's submission text note some entire levels that are "luck based", which I understand to mean controlled by the RNG. I would assume that at least those levels would desync and have to be redone due to different luck.
Monkey Ball does not have RNG, but it does have some very weird collision that feels like luck. If you hit something at a slightly different speed or angle (or time when the objects are moving), you could get a radically different bounce.
[16:36:31] <Mothrayas> I have to say this argument about robot drug usage is a lot more fun than whatever else we have been doing in the past two+ hours
[16:08:10] <BenLubar> a TAS is just the limit of a segmented speedrun as the segment length approaches zero
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It's simply my favorite TAS I had seen. Both are very nice played. Wonderfull work buys. Said YES !
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Sorry for the confusion. I tried hexing the improved level, that caused me to having to redo nearly every stage after that. At the time every other TASer had already been done with the project, and I couldn't do it alone. Monkey Ball games don't have RNG in the engine but for some reason, entering a stage at a different frame usually gives different output with the exact same input. Sometimes some stages might sync.
ALAKTORN
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byrz wrote:
Monkey Ball games don't have RNG in the engine but for some reason, entering a stage at a different frame usually gives different output with the exact same input. Sometimes some stages might sync.
have you checked whether it’s an issue about lag frames? you should post the movie file for the improved levels, someone may be able to make it sync
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It could be an issue with subpixels not being cleared, maybe. It sounds like the physics engine is extremely sensitive to minor variations in position.
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ALAKTORN wrote:
have you checked whether it’s an issue about lag frames? you should post the movie file for the improved levels, someone may be able to make it sync
Apparently only thing I have left from the improvement is a replay in the memory card. :/ However, I do have a movie file including both improvements for SMB1: http://puu.sh/7DvNK.dtm It's up to EX9 and I can't get that level to sync. If this can be synced, then I might have motivation to give a try to include the improvement in SMB2 too (would have to redo the improvement).
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TheMG2 wrote:
Monkey Ball does not have RNG, but it does have some very weird collision that feels like luck. If you hit something at a slightly different speed or angle (or time when the objects are moving), you could get a radically different bounce.
Sounds like typical physics. With extreme enough situations it might as well be random, video game or not. The game doesn't seem to be in need of invisible walls quite as much, but that doesn't mean that this tas was bad. It's great.
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yes vote! I still want to see a high score run for both of these though :) Plus warpless...
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Weatherton wrote:
yes vote! I still want to see a high score run for both of these though :) Plus warpless...
I understand it would be really amazing to see high score run, high score warpless, time warpless, max banana% warpless etc. But considering a project like this takes 2 months for a 4-5 TASer group, I don't currently have the extra time for that. :/
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Good things are worth waiting for :)
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Really enjoyed both Super Monkey Ball runs. Congratulations! Now we only need Super Monkey Ball 2's Story Mode and we'll have the full package! :)
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Weatherton wrote:
yes vote! I still want to see a high score run for both of these though :) Plus warpless...
I agree with the warpless runs. Good job on both runs!
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I'll consider both runs as one and just say: amazing job. It would be even better (in my opinion) if more levels didn't involve bouncing really fast to the goal, but the games are like that. There is still some variety.