'September 21, 1998: "The future of gaming can be summed up in two words -- Pong and Joust." ...with these prophetic words in the Usenet group rec.games.video.classic, "Otter" planted the seeds for the game you have before you now. Two of the greatest names in the history of video games have been brought together at last on your Atari 2600. FlapPing is an old school round of Pong (the original deathmatch!) combined with the famous "Flap" button of Joust. Pterry the Pterodactyl is here to keep things lively, and even the walls from the Atari Classic 'Warlords' make a cameo appearance.'
Took less time than any other TAS I've ever worked on
Game manual
Comments
Nach recently asked me in IRC to take another look at Jouster 5 for Windows but I've been so busy at work that I didn't want to commit to a big project trying to get Hourglass to behave. Instead, I gave myself 30 minutes around lunchtime to speed TAS this game (of course, I later spent more time documenting the run than I spent on doing it so my plan didn't quite work out the way I intended, but I digress). I have a soft spot in my heart for Pong for various reasons and I seem to have a ratherstrangeobsession with Joust, so this was a perfect fit. I opted to go with the "Poorlords" mode which adds in breakout / Warlords style walls behind the winged paddles as described in the game manual above. This provides for a more interesting game as you have to break through the walls before you can score, and it provides more of a volley effect which is more entertaining to watch.
Since I gave myself a tight timeframe I opted to see how quickly I could end input and still win the game *without* allowing the opponent to score points (lose a ball). I experimented with moving rapidly up and hitting the ball at a high speed - while it did accelerate the ball it also caused it to travel up and down which wasn't all that helpful. I was coming up on my timelimit when I discovered that I could trick the CPU into moving too far up and allowing the ball underneath him even if I was at the bottom of the screen (as movement has an indirect effect on the opponent's movement). After a bit of experimentation, I found a way to end input very early by "backhanding" the ball, using a method where I hit the ceiling and fall onto the ball, clipping it with the paddle's wings and starting a beneficial trajectory. I'm thrilled with how short I was able to make the input, although I'm curious if there's another way to end it even earlier. It's only a single button, perhaps someone should bot this as a potential improvement in a future submission. :)
I happen to find this oddly entertaining, but given my history with these kinds of games I'm obviously very biased. Regardless, I hope you enjoy this game, and thanks for watching!
Noxxa: This is a pretty nice attempt for a game like this, and the early ending input is a nice touch. Entertainment-wise, it was received quite well. Alas, this run is bested by a 20 times shorter one.
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Aqfaq wrote:
Ace'd it!
Heh - not exactly, but I'm amused at the idea all the same. :) Truth be told, because an Atari 2600 only has 128 bytes of RAM I agree with p4plus2's belief that there will never be an ACE run on that console. Also, 5 buttons, unless you're pretending to be a Breakout paddle. I'd love to be proven wrong, though!
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
While that was short, I feel like the ball acceleration was not utilized more, but I can't confirm since I never played this game. Possible improvement maybe?
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jlun2 wrote:
While that was short, I feel like the ball acceleration was not utilized more, but I can't confirm since I never played this game. Possible improvement maybe?
I was certainly able to make the ball move faster but it tended to cause it to bounce up and down off the floor and ceiling which wasn't as useful for flinging it across the field. I was able to get decent forward movement by hitting it with the wings on the back of the paddle, but then I discovered a particular combination of movements that allowed me to win the game and not press any more buttons so I stopped testing (and I was nearly out of time on my self-imposed 30 minute speed TASing window). There's more than likely a potential improvement here but I'm not sure how much; it might be fun to bot this at some point. :)
I vote No
It need too long time for get a point. I didn't know this game, but I think it can improve more than with luck or make silly AI
Just a good point: Ends input *very* early
There's only one button involved, right? If so, sounds like a great run to test bizhawk's bot on! (I won't be the one to do it though.)
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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FractalFusion wrote:
The submission title is so Aqfaq.
Heh - thanks, I think. :)
FractalFusion wrote:
Did you try messing with the left difficulty switch? I heard it makes the ball go a bit faster.
In BizHawk, the default Atari 2600 sync settings are configured to have both players set with the difficulty switch set to true, i.e. "Expert" mode as it's described for this game. Great question!
49 frames on Expert mode (fast ball, left difficulty = "false")
I was actually hoping that simply starting the game would have been enough (at most 11 frames). However, there are only four starting directions for the ball and no RNG. So there are only 8 possibilities (four starting directions on two difficulties) and none of them give a win without a lost ball.
So the next best thing is to play the ball once. The fastest way to do this is on Expert mode (fast ball) and start with the ball going down-left. Technically the ball going up-left reaches the wall a couple frames faster, but the problem is that it is too high for the strat used.
The horizontal speed of the ball is a single value that depends only on difficulty, and the point of contact with this strat is always the same (it is possible to contact the ball behind the paddle face, but not with this strat). The vertical speed after contact depends only on the vertical speed of your paddle. (Vertical speed of the ball in sub-units is RAM address 0x0E, two bytes signed little endian.) By allowing the paddle to bounce off the ceiling and then the floor, I can get a ball vertical speed of -141, which results in a win without a lost ball.
49 frames was the best I could find; I tried a few other things but they were slower. I tried not hitting the ceiling; this allows for earlier end of input while still contacting the ball, but the lower height and near-zero speed on contact means the ball only gets a vertical speed of -32 or 32 (default values when too close to 0), neither of which result in a win without a lost ball.
dwangoAC wrote:
In BizHawk, the default Atari 2600 sync settings are configured to have both players set with the difficulty switch set to true, i.e. "Expert" mode as it's described for this game.
Actually (according to BizHawk) when left difficulty is "true", the mode is "Novice" (slow ball). To get "Expert" (fast ball), the left difficulty should be set to "false".
Actually (according to BizHawk) when left difficulty is "true", the mode is "Novice" (slow ball). To get "Expert" (fast ball), the left difficulty should be set to "false".
This is counter-intuitive, why would BizHawk's default settings be "easy"? Having said that, I definitely intended to use the fastest speed but given my self-imposed speed TAS'ing window I didn't thoroughly check every dipswitch combination and missed this. Great find, and good job!
