Note that what I said is specific to Sonic games: they don't do anything tricky with the hardware, and are relatively easy to emulate well. The closest these games come to doing anything tricky is the waterline in some of S3&K's levels (e.g., AIZ1/2) to prevent CRAM dots from showing up on real hardware. This isn't an issue on Gens or GPGX, since neither emulate it.
Timing comes from timing of some instructions being slightly wrong,
Actually, now thati think of it, the source of timing differences vs real hardware is most likely ROM refresh, DRAM refresh, 68k<->z80 bus contention, and 68k stalls when the VDP FIFO is Full.
ROM refresh is ready to emulate (2 cycles delay of the 68k when it accesses ROM every 126/130 cycles alternating), but neither Gens nor GPGX emulate it.
DRAM refresh is complicated and less understood; it is also forced to occur in lockstep with VRAM refresh when a DMA os going on. Outside of DMA, It can add 0, 1, 2, or 3 cycles every 130 or so cycles depending on when it happens. Again, neither emulator does this.
The VDP FIFO full stalls depend on accurate emulation of the VDP and FIFO. GPGX emulates the FIFO (kind of) and stalls, Gens emulates neither.
68k<->z80 bus contention causes delays on 68k or z80, depending on relative timing. This is probably the hardest to emulate because it requires perfect emulation of 68k, z80, and VDP down to bus access timings, as well as emulating ROM and DRAM refresh.
Of all available emulators, only Blast'Em comes close to emulating all this correctly.
OK, so, I wanna collaborate on a TAS of this game.
You'll be much more likely to find someone willing to collaborate with you (on any game - let alone this one) if you first prove you are capable of making a publishable (or at minimum, a relatively optimized) TAS on your own.
Otherwise--and this is somewhat based on your posts in other threads of the forum--it comes across that you're just wanting to split the glory from someone else's hard work.
Essentially, show us you're worthy of collaborating with.
Many of us have numerous projects we're working on (within and without the TAS community); and we either don't have the time or simply don't want to hold someone else's hand through the TASing process if they aren't going to be a beneficial collaborator.
I do not intend for this post to come across as rude, more just to-the-point.
OK, so, I wanna collaborate on a TAS of this game.
You'll be much more likely to find someone willing to collaborate with you (on any game - let alone this one) if you first prove you are capable of making a publishable (or at minimum, a relatively optimized) TAS on your own.
Otherwise--and this is somewhat based on your posts in other threads of the forum--it comes across that you're just wanting to split the glory from someone else's hard work.
Essentially, show us you're worthy of collaborating with.
Many of us have numerous projects we're working on (within and without the TAS community); and we either don't have the time or simply don't want to hold someone else's hand through the TASing process if they aren't going to be a beneficial collaborator.
I do not intend for this post to come across as rude, more just to-the-point.
Oh. Oof. Would a run of Green Hill suffice? I would try to optimize it as much as I can.
OK, so, remember how I brought up maybe doing a demonstrational TAS of just Green Hill? Well, I thought I'd publish what I did in act 1 to User Files/WIPs so you can get an idea of how optimized I am planning on my full Green Hill run being.
http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/61570963348780624
Hello SonicFan53. I very much applaud you for putting yourself out there. It's always great to have new blood in the TASing community.
As for your game choices, (Mario and Sonic) you have decided to specialize in two of the most iconic game franchises out there. These games and their sequels have been TASed to the point of near perfection. Any attempt to surpass them requires an intensely deep and expansive understanding of the underlying game mechanics. This is in addition to being able to utilize multiple tools at once in an attempt to create a perfect run.
Simply put, it is not possible for a brand new runner at your level to challenge these records. Your demonstration of Green Hill Act 1 is 2 seconds slower than Aglar's current video.
I highly suggest finding a game that has no current publication on the site and making a TAS out of that. Make sure to take your time. If you get from beginning to end in a couple days or less, then it's guaranteed to be sub-optimal and almost guaranteed to be rejected. Keep going back over sections and trying again. It should take a couple weeks to make a worthy submission. When you become really good at fine-tuning and optimization it should be starting to take 1-3 months for more high quality submissions.
I mean he could do some practice tases on these games like he was intending to. It really helps with learning game mechanics and optimization techniques. I started with these games and I turned out just fine. I do agree that he shouldn’t try to improve the current publications though due to how tight the optimizations are. Especially in the any% runs.
As for the games themselves you really should use gens. There are tools specifically made for tasing the og sonic trilogy on gens which make it much easier to fully optimize these tases. Here’s a link to the forum thread made for these tools.
[url=]http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=8827[/url]
There is also an problem with bizhawk I should point out. Most of the experienced og Sonic tasers (including me) can’t actually use it due to various reasons. Meaning we can’t critique your tases because we can’t watch them.
Joined: 10/12/2011
Posts: 6439
Location: The land down under.
SonicFan53 wrote:
...no need to point out every flaw with my TAS lol
Actually it's important. If you're a rookie (which you are) being provided with information about what improves can be made to your TAS is actually beneficial.
You're actually learning something. You should be appreciative of this information, not dismissive.
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
+fsvgm777 never censoring anything.
Disables Comments and Ratings for the YouTube account.Something better for yourself and also others.
(I was joking, that was implied by the "lol". But I think I might try Gens only cause u guys are all saying it's better.)
Not really, It's better for Sonic Games for the Sonic TAS Tools wich can help you to understand the Game Mechanics and get used to them.
So, if you go for Gens you might check this thread: http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=8827
Good Luck.
Be aware that gens's emulation of the Genesis is not as accurate as the Genesis core in BizHawk; this translates to gens runs seeming faster because there is less lag.
Be aware that gens's emulation of the Genesis is not as accurate as the Genesis core in BizHawk; this translates to gens runs seeming faster because there is less lag.
...I use Kega Fusion when I'm just playing games, but for TASing I use Gens. That's how I emulate Genesis.
I saw your userfile where your description indicated surprise that Gens was faster. Most of the time this is only because gens has less lag than Bizhawk, but the Bizhawk core emulates better, so the lag is SUPPOSED to be there.
I saw your userfile where your description indicated surprise that Gens was faster. Most of the time this is only because gens has less lag than Bizhawk, but the Bizhawk core emulates better, so the lag is SUPPOSED to be there.
Okay look we are well aware Bizhawk is more accurate. However all the tools we use for tasing this trilogy are on Gens. On top of that the only difference (from what I've heard) is lag which objectively speaking is not that bad. So either try to port the tools over to Bizhawk or shut up.
Also Sonicfan53 I would not suggest unnecessarily mentioning the differences between Gens and Bizhawk at all if possible. It could potentially start a flame war like I may have unintentionally done with this post.
Oh. Sorry. (I feel like I'm becoming hugely hated on these forums D:)
Nah you’re not being hated. You may have annoyed others sure but you aren’t being hated.
My comment to you was simply a bit of advice on why you don’t wanna compare bizhawk and gens when you don’t have to. I Also Spikestuff is known for being less than pleasurable as times.
It could potentially start a flame war like I may have unintentionally done with this post.
Yeah, to be honest I feel like this post in particular contained more unnecessary things than whatever SonicFan53 has been doing. The fact that you recognized it yourself did not make it any less rude. In particular:
kaan55 wrote:
So either try to port the tools over to Bizhawk or shut up.
This sort of attitude won't do at all. Boct1584 did nothing to deserve your lashing out at him.
kaan55 wrote:
Also Sonicfan53 I would not suggest unnecessarily mentioning the differences between Gens and Bizhawk at all if possible.
He's free to mention that. Documenting objective emulation differences is potentially valuable. If a flamewar occurs because somebody isn't pleased with the differences, it's a separate problem and it will be dealt with accordingly. Better leave that to the forum staff to concern themselves with than gatekeep it.
A sidenote to SonicFan53: the only reason why some people aren't quite happy with your posts or how you go about posting is that you don't exercise restraint expected of a public forum user. It's actually quite simple. Think over your post content before you press "submit", edit posts instead of following them up with extra details, use existing topics for relevant questions whenever possible, and don't automatically assume that whatever you're doing is important enough to announce before any consequential results are produced. Maybe consider going on IRC or Discord first if you need immediate feedback. A public forum such as TASVideos is not a chat but a document of discussion, collaboration, and research; treat it as such, and everyone will be happy.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
A sidenote to SonicFan53: the only reason why some people aren't quite happy with your posts or how you go about posting is that you don't exercise restraint expected of a public forum user. It's actually quite simple. Think over your post content before you press "submit", edit posts instead of following them up with extra details, use existing topics for relevant questions whenever possible, and don't automatically assume that whatever you're doing is important enough to announce before any consequential results are produced. Maybe consider going on IRC or Discord first if you need immediate feedback. A public forum such as TASVideos is not a chat but a document of discussion, collaboration, and research; treat it as such, and everyone will be happy.
I suppose I was a little too harsh yesterday. Sorry about that boct1584. Tbh part of the reason I did that is because I was afraid you'd end up confusing SonicFan somehow.
If it were up to me I'd allow him to mention the differences, but I didn't want him to accidentally spawn more of like these.
You don't. You only need to understand that a forum isn't a social media where you can do micropost everywhere, you need to be polite, read our tips to get better and understand our forum enviroment, make messages apporting something useful to the topic in question too.
About the topic which is Sonic the Hedgehog, me and kaan can help you to understand the game mechanic if you really want to do it.
Edit: if you really want to talk in realtime with the community we have a discord channel: http://tasvideos.org/DiscordServer.html
