Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
I have some bad news and I have some bad news. The bad news first, this game desynchs on me even with no sound/full sound or whatever sound. Also not that it matters since znes doesn't have rerecording: the newest versions of zsnes desynch also, but I tried what was mentioned in another thread and that was using version .898c. This version seemed to work fine for recording. And now for the bad news, I have discovered something about the randomness of this game. It will make it difficult to make doing the 2nd crystal dungeon first viable as was my plan. The game has at least 2 variables for randomness. The first is affected by everything you do. Timing and what buttons/directions you press. Interestingly enough if the button has no effect it won't effect the randomness either. This variable will affect if a monster drops an item or not (not what it will drop), it also affects things like what direction an enemy chooses to go. The other variable that I know of affects what an item a monster will drop or what item a bush will have under it. This variable seems to only be modified when it is also checked. Meaning if you have a some monsters and you want to make them drop a red rupee the only thing that I know of that you can do to cause this is to kill other monsters and have them drop items first. There might be some exceptions but I doubt it will be something quick. This makes it practically impossible to get red rupees from most of the enemies that theoretically could have dropped it. I'm no expert at this so it would be nice if someone could double check this for me. It still might be faster to get rupees elsewhere so dungeon 2 can be done 2nd as planned but its probably not going to be as fast as I thought. Oh wells since no recording can be done now I will just have to wait and hope these desynch problems can be worked out.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Joined: 3/8/2004
Posts: 706
I'm still waiting for rerecording to appear in ZSNES; I can't stand Snes9x, it's the 16-bit Famtasia to me. Anyway, I tried to experiment with randomness myself. The only thing I could affect was to either make the enemy drop an item or to make him drop nothing at all. I could not find an efficient way to actually change the item the enemy was set to drop. This doesn't work to our favor, but we'll find a way around it; we always do.
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
Here is some more information about randomness, although it shouldn't be called random any more! Most random drops are predetermined by a table. For the sewer rats drop like this 5,1,5,20,5,1,5,5 and repeat. Each monster has its own cycle which is independent of the other, meaning there is no way to influence what sewer rat will drop except by killing other sewer rats first (and having them drop something, if they don't drop it won't advance the table). Leaving an area and coming back later also does not seem to affect the table. I have not tested this with all types of monsters but I would guess that each monster has a table of size 8 and acts the same way. I think in a time attack we just won't be able to take a big advantage of this. There are still things we can do though. Like always get a drop instead of nothing, and figure out ahead of time if it is going to be worth it to kill certain monsters to get to the good drop.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
I mentioned earlier that sewer rats had an item drop sequence, here are some other sequences and an example of a few monsters that have them, but not all of the monsters. Also note save-quit reset all these sequences to the beginning. When you get an item from a table it affects all monsters that use that same table. key: # = # of rupees, not 8 a = 5 arrows A = 10 arrows h = heart m = small magic M = full magic b = 1 bomb B = 4 bombs 8 = 8 bombs f = fairy sewer rat, red shooters, tangela, jumpy plants: 5,1,5,20,5,1,5,5 skeleton: m,1,h,a,m,b,1,h jumpy statues: ahaAahaA one eyed bombers:bbbBbb8b dogs with pitch fork, skull heads, guards: hhhh1h1h venus fly trap: hfM,20,8h,20,A green dildos, hammer on ice: Mmm5Mmhm Sorry for the non official names of monsters but I don't know them and these will probably be more descriptive than the official names anyways. If you find any sequences that I didn't list please post them. This information could probably be extracted off of the rom more easily if you know where to look which I don't. Right now I am going through and attempting to get all money from quick kills to see how much money will naturally come by the time we can consider flippers. Also a bug I found which might make grabbing some rupees quicker: you can throw your boomerang without stopping if your sword is being held out. So you could extend your sword throw boomerang backwards and walk forwards into enemy then proceed and the boomerang will clean up for you. Holding the sword out works with other items too, an example of something that might be useful is holding your sword out and shooting a bow, now you can sidestep without changing facing direction. There are other non obvious things you can do with your sword out involving dash. Edit: Not all monsters of the same type have the same sequence, but most do. The only exception I know of so far is the dark world bats, normally they can't drop anything, but in crystal 4 they have the sequence that can drop a fairy. But this might just be because the probability is coded to be 0 when infact they have the same sequence. I know probabilities doesn't matter usually since we are time attacking, but they very, look at the guys that throw bombs, they have 100% drop rate. Ok I made it to after the 1st crystal dungeon getting every drop that wouldn't take much extra time in a time attack. I ended up with about 400 rupees total. This is not enough, so I went and retimed how long it takes rupee collection at the other places. I found that going to the gambling game will take 16 seconds (8 for each additional) more than going directly to the master sword. The trick was using save quit and starting at sanctuary for this route too. This is very good it could even be used twice but thats probably a little excessive.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Joined: 2/16/2005
Posts: 462
Wow that's some fine research there flagitious. The zelda runs have always been difficult to figure out an optimal path but I am very interested in seeing the fruits of your work.
This signature is much better than its previous version.
Joined: 4/16/2004
Posts: 1276
Location: Uppsala, Sweden
Your works already looks awesome! Keep it up man!
/Walker Boh
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
Thanks, I guess its not that bad snes9x desynchs on this game its forcing me to do good research while I wait. About glitches, oringally I said it would be good to ban death mountain decent, exploration glitches, and levitation glitch. The first two are basically teleportation glitches, allowing you to skip entire dungeons. The levitation glitch can be used to do an exploration glitch but it can also be used to pass over any pit. It might be a good idea to allow it but I'm not sure. Many pits I use the bomb trick to pass over but many are too long. This would allow major time savings in crystal dungeon 5, where you could hit a swith earlier it would allow you to skip getting the big key and going straight for the boss. Minor time savings might occur in pendant 3, crystal 3, 6, 7, and ganon's tower. The glitch works by pressing 'a' to dash very rapidly. You could not really do it on the real console unless you had a special turbo controler. Also I found out a variant of this method that alows you to be pretty godly. Check out this boss fight I recorded with zsnes. Basically you hold your sword out and then do the levitation glitch. This makes it so your sword hits for full damage instead of half and also will stay out. Normally you can't change the direction you are facing but in this fight I could for some reason, I think it had to do with getting hit from the slime. Allowing this glitch would allow for a faster time, but it could lead to a less interesting video because it will simplify many situations that would normally be complicated. Note using it to do exploration glitch would be banned. Also tell me what you think about that video its pretty funny, it was made without rerecords so alot more could be done.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Joined: 4/16/2004
Posts: 1276
Location: Uppsala, Sweden
?I?M?O? ?(?a?l?s?o? ?I? ?h?a?v?e?n??t? ?c?h?e?c?k?e?d? ?y?o?u?r? ?d?e?m?o?n?s?t?r?a?t?i?o?n?)?,? ?a?l?l? ?g?l?i?t?c?h? ?s?h?o?u?l?d? ?b?e? ?u?s?e?d?.? ?I?t? ?w?o?u?l?d? ?l?o?o?k? ?c?o?o?l? ?a?n?d? ?d?e?m?o?n?s?t?r?a?t?e? ?w?h?a?t? ?t?h?e? ?g?a?m?e? ?i?s? ?c?a?p?a?b?l?e? ?o?f?.? ?A?l?s?o?,? ?I? ?h?a?v?e? ?p?l?a?y?e?d? ?t?h?i?s? ?g?a?m?e? ?s?e?v?e?r?a?l? ?t?i?m?e?s? ?b?u?t? ?I?'?v?e? ?n?e?v?e?r? ?h?e?a?r?d? ?o?f? ?t?h?e? ?"?l?e?v?i?t?a?t?i?o?n? ?g?l?i?t?c?h?"? ?s?o? ?i?t? ?s?h?o?u?l?d? ?b?e? ?r?e?a?l?l?y? ?c?o?o?l? ?t?o? ?s?e?e? ?i?t? ?i?n? ?a?c?t?i?o?n?,? ?a?n?d? ?a?l?s?o? ?u?s?e?d? ?w?h?e?r?e? ?i?t? ?s?h?o?u?l?d?.? ?B?u?t? ?t?h?a?t??s? ?m?y? ?o?p?i?n?i?o?n?.?
/Walker Boh
Joined: 3/24/2004
Posts: 248
Location: West 81st Street
I totally agree!!
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 1118
Location: Kansai, JAPAN
Glitches are awesome, use as many as possible that still make the game look interesting. I know of a glitch that allows to boil the whole game down into a matter of minutes, but that wouldn't be any fun. BTW, what version of ZNES is that movie for? I couldn't get it to play properly...Link died every time.
Do Not Talk About Feitclub http://www.feitclub.com
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
Ok I am glad you guys want these glitches I will try to keep it interesting. The version is the new wip, 7.17.04. I would have just recorded with snes9x but I needed autofire and didn't feel like slowing it down that much to do it manually.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Joined: 4/16/2004
Posts: 1276
Location: Uppsala, Sweden
What glitch is that? To make it in minutes I mean. Oh my, I thought I were pretty good at this ;P
/Walker Boh
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
That would be one of the exploration glitches, there is a good faq about it at gamefaqs. Basically you hold up and down at the same time as you go through a door and the screen scrolls wrong then you can walk around without boundaries right to the final boss and then walk past him into the victory room.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 1118
Location: Kansai, JAPAN
Thanks for the WIP and the demo. Looks pretty cool. Keep at it!
Do Not Talk About Feitclub http://www.feitclub.com
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
Doh, allowing levitation can potentially change the route after all that hard work. If you do crystal 2 right before you get the big bomb you combine trips to the dark world. This is the same reason it saves time doing it right before getting the flute, so its about equal in time. So this means you can get the flippers later (better money opportunities) and have the stronger sword. Note that getting the flippers right after c1 is most efficient routewise still but not money wise. I'll need to think about it more to be sure what is best now. Edit: New best route, I think. c1 (get some money) -> mirror -> save -> link's house -> flute -> c4 -> get money -> get sword tempered -> c3 -> save -> pyramid -> quake -> mirror -> flippers -> save -> mountain cave -> ether -> c5 -> c6 -> ice rod -> save -> link's house -> c2 -> silver arrows -> c7
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
Sorry it has been so long since posting. I have come to the realization that it could be a very long time before rerecording works well with this game (either desync fixed in snes9x or rerecording working in zsnes). So I have pushed off planning on it. I still do intend to do it when the time comes. And I will try to check in here and still see what is up every so often still. Also sorry this probably sounds like a complaint that it isn't working, but really it isn't, if anything you guys should be complaining that I am not helping the programming effort to get it done since it is me and people like me that want it done.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Joined: 3/8/2004
Posts: 1107
Also sorry this probably sounds like a complaint that it isn't working, but really it isn't, if anything you guys should be complaining that I am not helping the programming effort to get it done since it is me and people like me that want it done. Do you know a lot about programming? If so, would it be possible for you to make a patch for Snes9x that changes what the save, load, and pause keys are so they aren't in such inconvenient places, and maybe also a patch that adds an autofire option? Those are the major things that are stopping me from making save state runs in Snes9x, so if anyone could make patches to fix those things I would appreciate it.
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
i do know a fair amount about programming but it is mostly on the theory side, algorithms, efficiency, that kind of thing. i might be able to figure out how to rebind keys but i think the people that have been working with this code could do it far more easily. one suggestion though, a long time ago, i used snes9x in linux and the keys for everything were easily bindable. i don't know if this is still true but if its not then in linux there are probably programs that can rebind keys for you, (many people do this for caps lock acting like control). if you do not have linux well you should get it, microsoft is evil. sorry for the lack of certainty in this explaination.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Joined: 5/3/2004
Posts: 366
I haven't seen this mentioned anywhere (and I've done some skimming here and at gamefaqs and checked TSA's run), and it's not a route-changing observation, but... For the Turtle Rock Boss's second form, I found out that he can take damage before his middle section becomes vulnerable by attacking his head. At least, he does that in my version. I tried to make a ZSNES recording of it: http://www.kraftfam.org/~erk/ZELDA3.zmv So, I don't know if I have a weird version of Zelda 3 or what, but I figured I should mention this anyways.
TSA
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 186
Well - my video is technically 2 years old. But if you mean when Trinexx explodes, hit his head - actually quite a few people know about that. GameFAQs message boards delete posts over a certain date - I know I learned of this there about a year and a half ago. Also my friend from the old ZHQ e-mailed me about it when he saw my run.
Joined: 5/3/2004
Posts: 366
Well at least I'm not crazy. :D Anywho, I only skimmed to look for it so if it was even mentioned in the Gamefaqs board I would have missed it. Also, if Gamefaqs is deleting old posts, I guess it's good to at least get it mentioned here (since I didn't see it in the FAQS I checked) so that if somebody (such as myself) tried to time attack it they wouldn't miss such an obvious improvement...
Player (200)
Joined: 7/6/2004
Posts: 511
Cool, I didn't know about this. I knew virteous could be hit early but not this boss.
g,o,p,i=1e4,a[10001];main(x){for(;p?g=g/x*p+a[p]*i+2*!o: 53^(printf("%.4d",o+g/i),p=i,o=g%i);a[p--]=g%x)x=p*2-1;}
Joined: 9/14/2004
Posts: 12
Why are you only getting 300 rupees from the village in the Dark World, when there are two 300 rupee chests? Grab both and get 600. A dur. :P
Hoo ha.
Joined: 6/20/2004
Posts: 292
Location: United Kingdom
I'm guessing it saves time, 'cause if you don't need it, don't get it in this site unless your doing an absolute 100% run
TSA
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 186
Well - actually that would save time. Two 300 rupee chests, though? Refresh my memory about this. I know of the one right next to Thieve's Hideout, where is the other right there? You only need 710 rupees to beat the game.