Joined: 6/23/2009
Posts: 2224
Location: Georgia, USA
Alright, I got to watch this. Although the dual gargoyle fight is a little slower, I think it also looks more impressive. I like the asymmetric nature of the two when you defeat them. (It definitely gives the impression of a risky player.)
Here's my other comments.
Guardian of cave before Lethe:
* That's a really good-looking fight. That guy is a bastard in normal play, and it's really cool that you stay in his face while he waits for his shot to return. Heck, that battle may give a good screenshot.
Cave before Lethe: No comments
Lethe's palace of mirrors:
* It looks like you took my suggestion of having the tornados released lower in jumps. It looks good, especially in the giant vertical room (the third one, I think)! Overall, this stage really gives a chance for masterful Tornado usage to shine.
* Good idea to take the lower route in the room with the falling bridge.
* YES YES YES you got the Doppelganger to stay in his true form! That battle looks awesome. (The submission comments may want to remind users that he's not vulnerable until he shows his true self... attacking the gargoyle form damages you, actually!)
Naga's Path and Loosekeep:
* Much better route through the last vertical stretch (on the first travel through the path)
* I find it amusing you visit Verona first in Loosekeep, just because I always went to Rushifell first. I trust you did the fastest thing (or it's an arbitrary choice).
* On the return through Naga's Path in the last ascent, I'm guessing the time you gain from Tornado doesn't make up for two extra weapon switches, but I'm not sure. I imagine you tested this.
Goza's stage:
* I find it stylistically attractive how long you drift with the wings in places before landing. It's probably faster too to land less often, I'm guessing... it seems Firebrand has sticky landings.
* I really like the Tornado ascent where you damage-boost off the ghost, and he later dies in your Tornado :-) The weapon switches look like they produce as little lag as possible (stupid laggy Buster for the bricks...)
* Out of curiosity, is it less laggy when the stage is in darkness? If so, you could kill the second candle ghost earlier.
* The breaking of the last brick wall looks sort of bad... you wait a little for the second block on the ground to be destroyed before jumping. Would it be faster to blow up one ground, then two on middle level, and then the last one on the ground? In other words, you use the order
2 3
1 4
instead of
3 4
1 2
* Goza was completely pwned. His battle would also yield good screenshots.
Breager's stage:
* Wow at dodging the arrows in that vertical rise while jumping between Tornados. That's hardly possible in real-time, I think. Actually, all of your vertical shaft rises are quite impressive.
* Did you stand on the edge of a spike without taking damage? :-o
* The last vertical shaft seems to have slower jumps because you're taking them higher. Is this necessary to dodge the shots by the wall monsters?
* The King Breager fight is always a slog. I can't really see any better strategy though. Tornado doesn't seem like it would help you at all.
Anyway, that's all I have.
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically.
Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.)
Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html)
Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature!
Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
Thanks for the feedback mklip2001. You have really helped make this run better.
Alright here is my reply:
Dual Boss - Yeah, only 8 frames so it isn't very noticeable. Plus the fact that they are more aggressive might make the fight more interesting.
Guardian of cave before Lethe - Thanks. I think the best part of my redoing the run is the boss fights are (excluding the dual boss) they are all faster or at least more interesting which really gives it a superplay feel.
Lethe's palace of mirrors - Yes, that was a very good idea. I still have to fall for a couple frames for each tornado but the average vertical velocity is much higher as I spend almost no time only traveling up 1 pixel per frame whereas before I spent almost half the time going that speed.
The Doppleganger fight was like the opposite of the dual boss fight. Whereas in that fight I struggled and couldn't manipulate to working correctly, on this one my jumping worked so I got an extra shot off early on and then he never changed without me having to change my position. The submission text is going to have a lot (I need to start writing that) and due to the questioning I actually have detailed explanations for anything people would need to know.
Naga's Path and Loosekeep - Even if I didn't change anything except using tornado more this run would still have been far better than the original version.
It's actually arbitrary, but if there is entertainment without me even having to try than that is just great.
Yes, that one was slightly different because it really only would have benefited from one tornado but you still have to move a ton so it worked out not switching was quickest but just barely.
Goza's Stage - Thanks. It does look better to have the glides be long, and it saves time. The "sticky landing" is the same jumping rules in that when you are jumping or falling your x-velocity slows down so each jump and fall slows you down for an amount of time whereas gliding is equal to walking speed.
The weapon switching portion is actually way more interesting that it looks in the video. When you shoot the tornadoes and the blue balls that allow you to jump on spikes they stay present for a while even when they are out of the screen. Only two tornadoes and two "shot weapons" (blue balls, original spikes and the buster move) are able to present at the same time. This means that if you have to use a large ascent but in a quick time you can't actually just use tornadoes or just use blue balls as you would have to wait for a long time in between firing. This is why the brick portions are so stupid. There is only able to be 1 buster on screen at a time for a lot of the blocks and busters are considered on screen until the block and fire that results disappears. There is a chance this means your new order could save about 5 frames because I would be a little bit further forward when the last block is destroyed but this may have to be the only possible improvement I don't implement because I am not ready to redo the last 20,000 frames to save 5.
Goza's fight was fun. Other than the epilepsy inducing screen the lag isn't bad other than the one spot where I land is as fast as could possibly be imagined.
Breager's stage - The vertical dodging arrows is hardly possible is TAS Time. It is basically a lag frame for every 2 or 3 normal frames and if you shoot the tornadoes a pixel above where they are or hold jump for a frame more you hit the arrows. That section took me about as long as the rest of this stage.
Yes I do. For some reason those 4 spikes right when you fall don't hurt you and act like a normal platform.
Yes, it is necessary. It is a bit of a combination of to avoid and the "only two tornadoes" rule I mentioned earlier. I was hoping to take damage on the rust spikes and then not have to move all the way to the right at the beginning but those spikes are instant death so it wasn't an option.
For sure. Flaws with that battle: You can only have one shot on screen at a time. They force you to use a suboptimal weapon (technically it is the strongest but it only allows one on screen so another weapon could finish in about 1/2 to 2/3 of the time).The large circles that he shoots at you destroy your shot so if you hit one it wastes your one shot that is on screen. It has a ton of lag compared to any other level. The only "safe zone on screen" is far to the left so your shots take forever to hit him. Also the "safe zone" doesn't actually work because if you are in the safe zone he is no longer on screen so your shots don't hurt him. His hit zone is minuscule in comparison to his total size, almost all other bosses can be hit anywhere. Finally the lag increases even more so when you move so that moving for 5 frames adds 5 lag frames. Basically the only benefit of this fight is that you can float forever.
Thanks again for the feedback. I am going to start the submission text now and submit it hopefully tonight.
As a side note between the original and this run there are 544 less frames of lag, so even if I didn't manage lag better there still would have been a 3759 frame improvement.
Nice run but sorry to ruin it saying you can improve almost 2 minutes abusing death. I am planning to do a non-tas run of this game and you can warp from desert Sittem to near king´s palace doing a game over. Before that you have to get a password in Gibea (the house near the king's palace). When you get game over the game sends you back to the password guy. Also 15 seconds saved in Lethe parth also abusing same trick (when you get the magic claw and other stuff). Mind that the fastest way is to die 2x in a easy part like the beginning of Gaza valley and when you destroy the sand frog just go back to the frogs palace and die there. For the Lethe part you can die 2x in the beginning of the level where to twins are so its easy to drop to the bottom spikes later in the cave and do a game over when you are going back to see Lethe.
Nice run but sorry to ruin it saying you can improve almost 2 minutes abusing death. I am planning to do a non-tas run of this game and you can warp from desert Sittem to near king´s palace doing a game over. Before that you have to get a password in Gibea (the house near the king's palace). When you get game over the game sends you back to the password guy. Also 15 seconds saved in Lethe parth also abusing same trick (when you get the magic claw and other stuff). Mind that the fastest way is to die 2x in a easy part like the beginning of Gaza valley and when you destroy the sand frog just go back to the frogs palace and die there. For the Lethe part you can die 2x in the beginning of the level where to twins are so its easy to drop to the bottom spikes later in the cave and do a game over when you are going back to see Lethe.
And I finally thought I was done with this frustrating game. I hadn't realized how big of a difference death could make in the run. My run still stands as long as I have my stylistic choice of not allowing death but you are correct in saying that route would be faster. It is going to be around 2 minutes (maybe less because death does take time and talking to the password guy does take a few seconds). In short it is worth the effort but will be frustrating because of how frustrating this game is.
mklip2001: As the resident most knowledgeable on this game, what do you think about this change. Do you think the game would be more entertaining as a 25:43 run with death or a 27:43 without death? I ask because this game will take me a lot of work because the lag and boss randomness will not line up even a little bit and I do not want to waste time if people will not like it because of death.
I think it works fine without the death -- you can readily claim that it's a stylistic decision even though you're making that decision after the fact. :)
Pyrel - an open-source rewrite of the Angband roguelike game in Python.
I think it works fine without the death -- you can readily claim that it's a stylistic decision even though you're making that decision after the fact. :)
That's what I was thinking. What is crappy about it is that other than seeing the character die 4 times (which could look strange and a bit repetitive) and talking to the password guy (which only adds like 15 to 20 seconds) the run might actually be more entertaining with this change. It still forces you to go through all courses you just don't have to backtrack as much.
I will probably experiment with it and maybe give it a shot later. This game is just so frustrating. Adding 1 frame at any point means redoing the entire rest of the game as how many and where the lag frames occur, and the jumping height and speed for each jump changes due to the randomness.
I think the death abuse should at least be tested, so that we may know the theoretical limit of the game in terms of speed. Hope it'll be less than 25 minutes.
goofydylan8 wrote:
This game is just so frustrating. Adding 1 frame at any point means redoing the entire rest of the game as how many and where the lag frames occur, and the jumping height and speed for each jump changes due to the randomness.
But, if you were practising traditional method of TASing, you'd quickly get used to redoing small and large chunks of input again and again.
I think the death abuse should at least be tested, so that we may know the theoretical limit of the game in terms of speed. Hope it'll be less than 25 minutes.
But, if you were practising traditional method of TASing, you'd quickly get used to redoing small and large chunks of input again and again.
I don't believe it will be less than 25 minutes. The first one could save at most 1 minute 53 seconds if we didn't have to die twice or talk to the password guy so a more realistic estimate is probably around 1 minute 20 seconds. The second one would save less than a minute but I haven't measured it down exactly but it would have to be over a minute 23 to be sub 25 minutes.
I have officially decided I am going to do it, but I probably won't be my usual speed of finishing. I am really dreading dealing with having to redo all of those lag and jump manipulations. Then again, I may try it for a second and get back into it and finish in a week but I wouldn't count on it because I was really starting to hate this game near the end.
I know if I had done traditional TASing I would get used to it but TAS Editor has thoroughly spoiled me so redoing levels after already maximizing them is not something I am used to.
It takes about 1 minute and 58 from Sittem to king. Talking to a password guy takes about 15 seconds and dying about 20 seconds so the first part saves minute and 20-25 seconds if I am right. The second one is about a 15-18 second time saver.
I counted it saves about a minute and 40 seconds. Under 26 minutes it is possible but for 25 mitutes we need a huge glitch and I haven´t found one yet.
Imo its more entertaining with the death abuse cause its boring to watch the same levels again although you got the tornado in the first part. And as in the submission is said it aims for the fastest speed so it kinda ruins your hard work in lag manupulating and other stuff if its not the fastest possible. But it works both ways cause you use creative routes, enemy shooting and fast bosses so the run is great.
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.
Doing some subpixel/lag management, ahead by 165 frames at the end of boss 1.
http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/56066491035663965
Will work on optimizing the boss further.
Notes so far:
* Like other Capcom games the x/y subpixels are retained between levels so I try to max these out at the end of each stage
* Can get a small zip up by jumping part of the way into a semi-solid tile like a tree branch
* Hooded enemy RNG = how close you can get before they pop out of the ground
* Bird RNG = which of 3 flight patterns they use when you get close
* You can stand safely on the very edge of damage tiles
Boss:
* Jumps up to the first platform after 2 seconds or when you press B. So if you fire a quick shot to the left you can get him to approach you earlier.
* Uses Firebrand's animation counter as part of the calculation for determining whether to attack or jump, so you can alter your movement to manip this. Assuming other enemies in the game do this too.
Here is the Lua script WIP for fceux (sorry I'm a sloppy coder)
http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/56066520232591776
Joined: 6/23/2009
Posts: 2224
Location: Georgia, USA
Oh wow, I briefly saw there was progress on this run in the WIP list. I love this game, and it's cool to see some action here after 7 years! I'll check out this WIP when I can, but I doubt I have any technical suggestions. (I mostly just thought of little strategies here and there 7 years ago.)
EDIT: The run looks good so far! I didn't rewatch the previous TAS to make comparisons though. A couple points stand out...
* Nice spike jump as you did the shortcut over the spike wall near the end of the first stage
* The shot to the left in the boss fight was manipulation, right? That's real clever, and the fight looks very good.
I'm not really sure how much optimization is possible in that boss fight given the low refire rate you have with your weapons. Also, doesn't your vertical momentum get reset after the finishing blow lands on the boss? If that's so, you want the final shot to be delivered lower, of course.
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically.
Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.)
Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html)
Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature!
Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/56270277622377794
Another 400 frames cut (565 total) at the end of Boss 2.
Notes:
-Got the enemies in the overworld fight to appear even sooner w/ RNG manip
-If you have the health to spare, you can get across spike tiles slightly faster than flying over by turning left at the last frame to damage boost across them.
-Manipulated the green platform enemies not to shoot any projectiles to cut down on lag
-Big changes in forest stage. In addition to manipulating the green platforms I also manipulate the floating beetle enemies' spawn patterns so they lag the game less. More time saved in the wind tunnel area; I go out of my way to grab the heart so that I have another point of damage to damage boost through the spikes at the end (credit to WhiteHat94)
-Boss 2 pattern is basically identical to published TAS but I cut off 3 frames
Edit: OK I finally got around to watching WhiteHat94's RTA run & I see all the death warps he does that I didn't work into my current WIP at all.
So I will probably have to redo most of what I did so far, unless the consensus is to avoid death abuse for entertainment value?
Joined: 6/23/2009
Posts: 2224
Location: Georgia, USA
Nice run so far. The river of flame is really sexy with how little lag you got.
I like the changes in the forest stage too... though could you get the first two green heads (in the first spike pit) to have their cycles line up better? I'm a little suspicious as well about the first damage boost you take after getting the heart. Instead of using it on top of the climb, why don't you use it to climb the spike chasm faster immediately after the heart? (The damage boost at the end of the stage before the boss is wonderful.)
When you mention WhiteHat94's run, which run is that?
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically.
Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.)
Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html)
Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature!
Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
The current RTA record, it has some tech that improves the TAS:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqAWeoQDWds
I'm redoing the TAS to work in the death warps. I'm managing to shave off some extra frames from my previous attempt too.
* saved some time in the first bridge section by discovering it's possible to fly all the way across the final gap - completely overlooked the possibility before, likely requires a specific subpixel range
* saved more time with lag management in the river of fire (still did the RNG manip but with more efficient movement)
I'm going to end up doing a different route in the Forest now (the RTA takes a death inside the tunnel which spawns you at the top, so I won't have to worry about conserving health)
Sorry I'm not sure what you meant by getting the platforms to line up
Joined: 6/23/2009
Posts: 2224
Location: Georgia, USA
When I mention the platforms, I mean there's a pit at the beginning of the forest stage with two green heads. Your last WIP I saw has you float a little while from the first head to catch the second. I was hoping that you would be able to spend less time in the air between the two heads. It probably isn't possible to improve it unless this new route changes your manipulations a lot.
Thanks for the RTA link. I'm traveling but will check it out in the next couple days.
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically.
Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.)
Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html)
Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature!
Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
So I started looking into this game because I saw stuff being posted about Demon's Crest, so I figured why not give the prequel a look. I wasn't expecting to save any time but I started noticing some small tricks to save very minor amounts of frames. However after reading this thread and learning about subpixels I also realized that I would need to be able to view the subpixels somehow, which I'm not at all good at finding in RAM. Often times I noticed you could jump a pixel higher randomly. This is because you landed with a subpixel range near the top of the Y axis pixel. This is important because when jumping up to do a wall jump you usually want to be on the highest Y pixel. If anyone had a script or is able to make one, I can put it to use by improving this run further. I noticed Jigwally had a script but it's in FCEUX and I'm using Bizhawk.
Anyway, I entered the first boss door 95 frames ahead of the published movie. I believe at least 2 of them are from emulator differences as the training stage starts 2 frames earlier.
Here is the current progress file: User movie #638099523120118925
And for those who want easy viewing, here's an encode of the second stage and boss (still processing atm cause of slow internet):
Link to video
Here are some tricks I found:
- You can cut corners short by releasing your direction until the moment you clear a ledge after walljumping up it.
- You can abuse the weird hitboxes of the sloped ceilings to get slight boosts of anywhere from 8-10 pixels generally. This depends on your pixel/subpixel positioning and is almost impossible to always get 10.
- Jumping moves you less than 1 pixel/frame so you want to cut every single jump as short as you can. Gliding is a good way to do that as you retain your 1 pixel/frame speed during it.
- Not really a trick, but the overworld only polls your input every 8 frames.
Now with all of this said I'm pretty sure it's even further improvable via subpixel manipulation etc. As of right now I'm kind of just fumbling in the dark until the subpixel randomly lines up. I was able to save 2 frames on the training stage by manipulating the subpixels, but I subsequently lost them because of bad subpixels later. I might be able to keep them if I knew exactly where I was changing the subpixels. This is just one example why it is important. Also, I'm pretty sure I didn't get perfectly ideal mage spawns, as they are very hard to manipulate while keeping your improvements from earlier in the stage.
I do have one question though: I TAS'd a little bit of the boss and I wasn't sure if I should take the death here or at a later point. Jigwally's TAS takes a death here, but the speedrun does it on a much later boss. I was wondering what the reasoning behind both choices was.
Joined: 6/23/2009
Posts: 2224
Location: Georgia, USA
Good to see someone making more work on this game! I know a lot of the little details about casual gameplay, but I don't know enough about TAS precision. I wouldn't be any help with subpixels, but it doesn't surprise me that they end up mattering this much. The game does have a nasty habit of feeling inconsistent with jump heights, so subpixels are likely to blame.
Thanks for the video of stage 2. I haven't watched the old run in a long time, but this looks really clean. Great pixel boosts down the sloped roof segments. Not sure about shooting that one enemy during your last fall to the boss room, but if it reduces enough lag, then it's worth it.
Can you point to which RTA speedrun you're talking about when it comes to death abuse choices?
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically.
Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.)
Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html)
Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature!
Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
Not sure about shooting that one enemy during your last fall to the boss room, but if it reduces enough lag, then it's worth it.
From testing it ended up entering the door at the exact same frame as not shooting so I left it in. Probably because the game is already maxed out on lag at that point if I had to guess.
mklip2001 wrote:
Can you point to which RTA speedrun you're talking about when it comes to death abuse choices?
I'm referring to the current world record run on Speedrun.com, by Overswarm found here: https://www.speedrun.com/gargoyles_quest_2/run/me4gn49y
If I had to guess it's easier for an RTA to abuse death at that later boss because you can just damage boost and spam it with attacks. I'm not entirely sure of the level, but it looks like the Jungle boss by observing his splits.
Joined: 6/23/2009
Posts: 2224
Location: Georgia, USA
mklip2001 wrote:
Can you point to which RTA speedrun you're talking about when it comes to death abuse choices?
Exxonym wrote:
I'm referring to the current world record run on Speedrun.com, by Overswarm found here: https://www.speedrun.com/gargoyles_quest_2/run/me4gn49y
If I had to guess it's easier for an RTA to abuse death at that later boss because you can just damage boost and spam it with attacks. I'm not entirely sure of the level, but it looks like the Jungle boss by observing his splits.
Alright, I checked out Overswarm's run. Good stuff, nice work with lag management, particularly for RTA. They play the Japanese version, and honestly I don't really care at this point if that's played over English. I know that TASVideos doesn't care as much when the only timesave for J ROMS is due to text.
It looks like he dies on Death Balloon (the boss in the forest that gives you Night Drop) to set up the death warp after Gremlin Stick in the desert. I would say you do need at least one spare health to take damage from that boss's bubbles and beat it faster. I don't remember if Jigwally's TAS gets to that point with more than one heart. If you get there with only one heart, it's probably faster to die on the spike walls like they do because the boss's breath will blow you slightly faster towards those spikes, but you may have to test the timing to die there as opposed to the first boss fight (Nagus, I think?).
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically.
Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.)
Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html)
Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature!
Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
Joined: 6/23/2009
Posts: 2224
Location: Georgia, USA
Another question: how does death affect the RNG? I think part of the reason for Overswarm's deaths in boss fights was to see about getting a more predictable RNG.
Used to be a frequent submissions commenter. My new computer has had some issues running emulators, so I've been here more sporadically.
Still haven't gotten around to actually TASing yet... I was going to improve Kid Dracula for GB. It seems I was beaten to it, though, with a recent awesome run by Hetfield90 and StarvinStruthers. (http://tasvideos.org/2928M.html.)
Thanks to goofydylan8 for running Gargoyle's Quest 2 because I mentioned the game! (http://tasvideos.org/2001M.html)
Thanks to feos and MESHUGGAH for taking up runs of Duck Tales 2 because of my old signature!
Thanks also to Samsara for finishing a Treasure Master run. From the submission comments:
Shoutouts and thanks to mklip2001 for arguably being the nicest and most supportive person on the forums.
I don't remember if Jigwally's TAS gets to that point with more than one heart.
He gets there with 1 hp. The boss dies so fast that the bubbles are not really a problem. Maybe he manipulated it that way, I'm not sure.
As of right now, I've just decided to take a death on the first boss, but I can probably just make a save state there and test it before I get too far. With how random everything is in this game, I would hate to have to redo a lot of stuff.
Edit: So I did some preliminary testing, and I have found that... they both take exactly 61 frames to take damage on. Amazing, huh? So it really doesn't seem to matter which boss to die on.
mklip2001 wrote:
Another question: how does death affect the RNG? I think part of the reason for Overswarm's deaths in boss fights was to see about getting a more predictable RNG.
Death generates new RNG, at least for the first boss anyway. It would try to sync but sometimes his second jump would go right rather than left. I did notice that you could fire a projectile just as you die (which doesnt cause any lag) and get almost the same pattern. The only difference is slightly more or less lag, and his attack could either be the 3-fireball or the orb attack. I think the 3-fireball is ideal as it actually seems less laggy. I'm not done testing it though.
On another note I decided to take a further look into the training stage, this time I was able to keep at least one of those frames I gained. This of course meant stage 2 will start desyncing like crazy. But upon inspection as I reached each section I started finding ways to mitigate lag. Not sure if some of this is because of the 1 frame difference from the previous stage, but I know a few tricks also worked.
- Sometimes hovering above ground for a bit rather than landing on it straight away would mitigate some of the lag, possibly by not loading some stuff below?
- You can cut each iteration of the push that downward slopes give by doing a glide later, giving you a better pixel value to start the clip.
- Better spawns on the double ghouls on the roof top, and this is where flying just above the roof was discovered to reduce lag.
- Jumps dont always need to be the highest or shortest, sometimes you can jump inbetween and for whatever reason you end up with less lag. This is apparent near the end of the stage.
All in all I saved 1 frame on the training stage and 49 frames on stage 2, improving my previous WIP by 50 frames.
I encoded stage 2 again, without the boss this time (when it uploads):
Link to video
As said before, subpixels are definitely a problem. Sometimes you can get an initial jump off a wall climb to move you up at 3 pixels for the first frame. Usually it starts you out at 2, but a higher subpixel is just enough to reach 3. This doesn't seem to matter as much as the x-subpixel allowing you to cling to walls a frame sooner though. Not being able to view them and just brute forcing it until you get that extra pixel from jumps is not fun either.
