nitsuja, ok I will make a frame perfect short vid sometime soon to help test desync issues with, frame advance doesn't work but I'll just use really slow mo.
ballofsnow, good time for BWT5b, have you tried BWT5a? You'll most likely be able to do it faster. The trick AI into dropship is a good tactic, I have been trying to do something like that to kill goliaths in BWT4 using the wraiths to help clear the way for a drop. Also you know the glitch that still exists in 1.13, observer turret, where you put an observer right over a turret and the turret will not shoot anymore? It works with anything, not just observers, ie wraiths engineering bays, etc. Also a similar glitch might work against goliaths, but would require super micro, basically with a wraith keep moving in very small circles around the goliath and it will have to continually turn and never have a chance to get a shot off (not sure if this really works but I think it will).
Walker Boh, that is quite hilarious and I have never heard of that before, but it makes sense because in a somewhat recent patch blizzard made it so if you land a building on a stationary object, that object is destroyed, this was to prevent the glitch where while landing a building you move a seige tank under and put into seige mode to make it invurnerable from melee attacks (until the building is destroyed anyways). I read somewhere that another way this can be exploited is if there is a spell you don't want, ie distribution web or darkswarm, you can just land a building on it to make it disappear. So in the n64 version this won't work but the seige tank thing will, thanks for the reminder :)
EDIT::
Oh yeah forget to mention that in BWT4 with the build anywhere glitch to get them to kill their own buildings, if you build an engineering bay, you can cancel it fast enough so that their buildings get hit and you get most of your money back. So this means the level can probably be beaten in under 2 minutes, but there is a predicament because this will make the next level alot slower I think. Not sure which way has the lowest total time, this will require alot of tinkering.
I could try BWT5a, but first BWT4 needs a fast time with the phys labs and a 1.13 strat. I read your strat from the previous page, so I'll try and get that to work.
I knew about the observer trick, but not that it works for anything. I'll have to be on the lookout for places to implement this.
Ok, I am still working on a BWT4a strat too, (from now on I'll call BWT4a: BWT4 killing physics labs, and BWT4b: BWT4 killing nuclear silos). I'll give what I've got so far, its not much but it might spark some of your own ideas.
If you can manage to get a dropship to the top right, 2 tanks up high will kill all the physicals lab in about a minute, the AI is too stupid to figure out how to make an attack on these tanks, since it can't drop units on the high ground they are on. I already mentioned this, but I have confirmed it now. The only problem getting tanks there is really hard, sometimes the marine is placed so you can drop em both there immediately though. The 2 wraiths might help stall dropship death, but I think it will require more time than that, so I dunno.
Also surprisingly it is possible to use your BWT4b strat to do BWT4a, it should be just as fast actually. To do it, use the same build, but meanwhile use your wraiths to take out the two seige tanks on the cliff at the 1 oclock position. Some AI trickery is needed but its not too bad. Now sneak cloaked ghost in from the top middle. Your goal is to get right next to the minerals, but there is 1 turret you have to walk right by and a tank is in range to shoot you, I think you can get by with only 1 seige tank shot, but there are other units nearby that will add enough to kill, so possibly 2 ghost are needed if you can't manipulate them away with the wraiths. When next to the minerals launch the nuke in the middle of the physics labs. Next shot should be closer to the one that was farthest away before, it is possible to take them all out in 2 shots, but you have to be fast because scvs come to repair these. I was surprised because I didn't think the ghost could nuke somewhere it can't see, but as long as you comsat it at the beginning it lets you do this.
ok I will make a frame perfect short vid sometime soon to help test desync issues with, frame advance doesn't work but I'll just use really slow mo.
Oh yeah, I forgot you were having both problems.
EDIT2: Try v7 of the emulator. Frame advance should work for you now. And I'm not sure about this but it might also fix your desync problems.
Cool thanks for fixing frame advance. The blublu's movie desynched in the exact same fashion as before though :(. So I made a frame perfect movie that selects BWT1 and changes game speed to fastest. File.
I might have made a mistake making it frame perfect because I am not totally used to the emulator yet. There are two frame counts in the bottom left, one seems to take many steps with 1 frame advance sometimes, is this because the computer cannot emulate the n64 fast enough, or is this the way the n64 works, it stops accepting input for a short spurts?
Also if anyone wants to play on battle.net lemme know, my name is f10esq, on useast and west, I haven't played a real game in a long while, but it would be fun to get back into it.
Holy shit! I think I found a crazy strat for BWT5a!
Get scvs mining, do not make extra scvs, research spider mines, make 2 vultures, lay spider mines at the top, when 2nd vulture is done, raise factory and float to the top. This kills about 5 or more ghosts, saving you a bunch of units including 2 tanks.
At first I tried blocking the ghosts by floating the buildings but Blizzard cleverly put burrowed zerglings to stop you. They didn't catch the vulture strat though. :)
Hopefully this will save some time.
edit- well damn. I managed to get the 2 tanks to the command center using saves, but then red drops about 5 ghosts on the platform..
edit again- I figured out the end part with all the enemy ghosts. You have to bring scvs along in another dropship and attack enemy ghosts as soon as they land. The ghosts will react by using lockdown on the scvs instead of the tanks. With this strategy you can get 4:21 or lower.
The blublu's movie desynched in the exact same fashion as before though :(
Try turning off "Raw Data" in your Input Settings, maybe that is causing the problem.
flagitious wrote:
There are two frame counts in the bottom left, one seems to take many steps with 1 frame advance sometimes, is this because the computer cannot emulate the n64 fast enough, or is this the way the n64 works, it stops accepting input for a short spurts?
The N64 doesn't check input every frame, so frame advance fast-forwards through frames where it doesn't check input. The leftmost frame count is "real-time frames" (each is 1/60 of a second in an NTSC game), and the frame count to the right of that is "input frames" (number of input checks made).
Turning off Raw Data worked!! I can now start a time attack woot!!
The vulture mine trick is superb!! In a time attack it could probably be exploited even more and save almost all if not all of the units. Making this level done extremely fast indeed.
Is it enough though to make up for the previous level? I don't know but it will be close, I estimate the make em kill their own buildings trick will be over 2 minutes faster than killing the physics labs, but this vulture trick will easily make this level 2 minutes faster than the other version. Its looking like we will just have to try both methods and choose the faster.
!!
The vulture mine trick is superb!! In a time attack it could probably be exploited even more and save almost all if not all of the units. Making this level done extremely fast indeed.
At the top, I somehow managed to kill 3 ghosts with 1 spidermine, try to figure out how to do that.
Is it enough though to make up for the previous level? I don't know but it will be close, I estimate the make em kill their own buildings trick will be over 2 minutes faster than killing the physics labs, but this vulture trick will easily make this level 2 minutes faster than the other version. Its looking like we will just have to try both methods and choose the faster.
I got BWT5b in 5:39, and BWT5a in 4:21 (using saves) with 2 tanks. If you can somehow save more tanks, it'll go even faster, and possibly not needing to bring the scvs along to deter the ghosts.
I think your dropship strat for BWT4a might be possible. The problem is that when I did my testing, there was always these 2 wraiths that came to attack the tanks about halfway into the siege. Hopefully there's some way to avoid those wraiths, maybe by luck manipulation, or AI manipulation. I got fed up and used power overwhelming just to see what kind of time you would get without those wraiths, and it's somewhere between 5:20 and 6:20, I say this because I forgot what time I got.. But I know it's roughly the same as my BWT4b 5:52. Here's the strat:
- Work your way up to 2 dropships and 2 tanks, 1 in each dropship.
- Bring dropships and wraiths to the right edge of the map, below the red base.
- Move dropships up to platform that is touching the edge of the map.
- Use wraiths to take enemy damage (use luck manipulation here, sometimes the A.I. gets stupid)
- One of your dropships should be taking more damage than the other, use this one to drop the first tank.
- Use the tank to kill the marine on the platform to make room for the second tank.
- Kill the bunker that is firing at your tanks.
- With the tank on the left, use comsat scan so it can destroy the farthest phys lab. 4 comsat scans will be just enough.
- Pray to god that the enemy wraiths don't destroy your tanks.
edit- The strat works, did it in a test run using a save before the drop. This gets 5:25 or lower.
edit2- Ok, this works for sure, just recorded a 5:13. :) Took me 100+ tries.
Hey sorry haven't responded in a while, I have just been wasting my time playing UMS. And I started making my own UMS which I hope will be very fun. During this I played two maps, True Tricks, and Can you do 20 Tricks?. They are very cool maps which require you to use glitches to continue. I was able to do all of the True Tricks, but on 20 Tricks, I am stuck at #15. I have learned alot of tricks from this, I doubt any will help for terran missions, but for zerg definitely. Ironically the trick I am stuck on is one where you have a factory, and you can turn vision on/off with yourself (to stack). And your objective is to crush an enemy acadamy. However I can't get it to work. It is possible that blizzard has fixed this glitch, so I don't know if it is beatable or not. And just landing on it doesn't work, they will be there overlapped. I can post these maps or something if anyone wants to play them.
ballofsnow, I look forward to watching the 4a 5:13, but I haven't been able to get any of your vids to work, they require ffdshow right? Is this available for mac? Is there any other way to view?
So I have not started the actual time attack yet, I am rather intimidated by the sheer number of options, so much different that previous time attacks I have done. Another idea I have to further improve the first mission, is instead of getting seige mode: use Duran as a blocker as before, use tanks to shoot units and move back out of range to confuse. Make all your scvs attack their command center. The goal is the enemy units will view the tanks as their priority so they ignore the scvs. But this method is probably rediculous.
Doesn't this site use x264 for its new videos? I use x264 from the doom9 forums with virtualdubmod.
There is no FFDshow for Mac, maybe you could try Mplayer.
Anyways, here's BWT04a encoded with divx6: http://rapidshare.de/files/7639689/BWT04a513divx6.avi.html
I don't think your BWT01 strategy will work, but it's worth a try.
Hey, its been along time and I still have not started. I am sorry for this, it is rather obnoxious of me, and an extra apology to nitsuja for all his work on the emulator that I am not taking advantage of.
I have been deterred due to the comlexity of the game, but some time hopefully in the not too too distant future I do infact hope to put all the planning and help that I have received to good use.
On a related note, a reason that I have not been working on this time attack is that I have been playing the multiplayer PC version alot. Recently I made some macros using autohotkey.exe which is a really cool open source project (only for windows though). You can find more info about those at http://www.darrenks.com/hobby/sc/autohotkey.html Unfortunately when I posted these at wgtour they just called me a big cheater, oh wells.
Hmm, well? Feeling motivated to start yet?
I would LOVE to see this game being made. Since it rocks, and I've actually played it as opposed to the rest of N64 games that are being talked about. And there are loads of cool tricks and micromanagement possible.
How about now? :)
Hey, still haven't started the run, but while not even looking for it, out of sheer coincidence I found the .scm files of all single players mission files.
http://www.staredit.net/index.php?download=1857
I am looking at them now, this is interesting, perhaps useless, but it is a good way to make sure there aren't any shortcuts for missions that we could miss.
Yeah, it's interesting but most likely not very helpful, I'd think. Though I guess knowing the exact sizes of the locations for triggers could be nice for knowing what to expect.
Joined: 6/13/2006
Posts: 3300
Location: Massachussetts, USA
I was able to have this game run perfectly, the menus do seem a little problematic however I can easily skip them, and really fast and therefore I've avoided all problems. I'll consider this if my current runs fail or if no one else attempts this, I played the PC version alot when I was younger (I was a kid so of course the cheat codes were used.)
My feeling for a TAS of this is to run the campaigns, those most closely follow what a TAS of this should be. I have a strong feeling all 6 should be played, although most likely I'm sure that the best one of the 6 will A) be watchable and B) be acceptable, since it's technically beating the game and C) won't drive the runner completely insane.
The controls were a little weird, I'm wondering what Frame Advance will do for this game...
And there are many parts of the game where nothing is happening, like building up resources and units, so interesting stuff to do during then will be required, maybe setting units up to spell words or making them do silly stuff?
The more I think about this game the more appealing it's becoming to me... I'm actually thinking either one campiagn of either TBW/PBW, or just all 3 brood war campaigns, because the Zerg one, while it has 2 more missions, can lead to some spectacular zergling assaults. I'll definetly reserach this and try it, it seems like frame advance and other strategies I'm formulating in my head will make this very good.
Flagitious would you mind if I end up doing this?
Joined: 6/13/2006
Posts: 3300
Location: Massachussetts, USA
I'd hate for you to speak for him... but that's good to hear
if all goes well I'll start doing test runs and see what happens, a change in avatar might be in order...
Hey, I am very glad to hear someone is interested in working on this because I don't intend to do it anymore and I would really like to see it.
I will help out as much as I can with strategies, feedback (assuming I have 50 mp), and whatever.
Joined: 6/13/2006
Posts: 3300
Location: Massachussetts, USA
The menus are in fact quite choppy, the waiting periods in between, not at the actual menu itself.
I've found glide64 plugin to work much more smoothly for me than Jabo, so that's the one that'll be used.
Here's a quick .m64 of navigating through the menus, I've decided to skip past the normal starcraft campaigns and start with Protoss Brood War. Once that campaign is done I'll do Terran BW campaign, then finish with Zerg BW, all in order (how nice that it works out that way.) TBW, PBW, and ZBW will all be represented, I think the zerg campaign will be mighty interesting and require some extreme micro/macro managing skills. It has 2 more missions, and has the best ending and is technically the end of Brood War the game so that'd be an acceptable ending I hope, despite skipping the first 3 campaigns of normal starcraft.
Edit: WIP not quite working yet
hmm it desynching a little and choosing normal starcraft terran campaign, I'll try to fix that
Edit: Working menu navigation
I barely lost any frames to get it to work, like maybe 4-5, so no biggie. Beforehand it was going succussfully to the Terran normal Starcraft campaign, but that's not what I want :P It should all work now, lemme know if it doesn't.
I really want to see this project done. I guess this means I will have to get into N64 emulation...
I think only doing 1 race campaign would be a publishable movie, if you do 3 in a row so much the better. Since they are not connected or dependent on each other in any way, perhaps splitting it into 3 movies would be preferred, since I guess they will get pretty long.
Joined: 6/13/2006
Posts: 3300
Location: Massachussetts, USA
I want to do the 3 Brood War campaigns since those are the best, and it'd amount to roughly 3 hours I think. I'm not sure if they'd be as 3 seperate submissions, or 3 different movies or whatnot, but let's see what happens if/when I finish the first campaign.
it also feels a little weird to be doing the final 3 campaigns and skipping the first three normal starcraft ones, but maybe the first three can be a seperate submission since technically it's a different game.
