Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
(EDIT 2: Sailor Mars HARD MODE Perfect Recoding here! - 30min 22sec from first to last in-game input) Features: No damage taken, every enemy defeated, every item collected, all 'A' ranks, most bosses defeated in one combo, hitting up to five enemies at one time, abusal of the tornado invincibility period, and the true final boss (only in hard mode) (EDIT: Download HERE! (now outdated, nowhere near as cool as the hard mode run :P) Okay, sure, it's hardly considered the best game in the world, but I'm playing it as a personal goal more than anything else. I like it, at least. :P I'm playing it with the character (drumroll) Sailor Moon. ( I figured it would be blasphemous to use anybody else :P ...plus, I'm not sure of the other characters moves, or if their damage rates are any better/worse.. I'll find that out later, though ^^; ) I'm up to Level 3 so far, around half way through the game. I had to repeat the second level many, many times due to de-syncing, but I've been retrying it so many times, I've finally got a run through to the end of level 3 that all works perfectly. Random features so far: 'A' ranks on all levels, all items (that I know of) obtained, no damage taken, some bosses killed in one straight combo. I have no doubt that my final movie will be beatable, but hey, I'm satisfied with my current run in any case. ^_^
Joined: 3/11/2004
Posts: 191
as a fan of the series, when i was like 13, it was 1 of the first animes i ever saw. Dragon Ball Z being the first when i was about 11 from a friends place (he was japanese) but anyways, i never played any of the sailor moon games myself but i would like to see a run through at least 1 of them. nearly any speed run is interesting to watch to at least some people. hell the shadowgate run bored the HELL out of me when i watched it (no offence caitsith2) but it was interesting as i never finished that game. so if you wanna make/post it i'd love to see it. hope it turns out cool
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
Okay, I'm a little annoyed, I had about FIVE backups.. all of them desynced. I got up to the end of level 5 (there's only 6 levels IIRC), played it back, and bam- the entire movie was out of time. Even the title screen. I don't know -what- it did. So I load a movie from the end of level 4-- BAM, that goes out of sync too. Another end of level 4-- same thing. I kept trying to resume from each of my backup movie recording files, and now they've all ended up dead. Oh well. Maybe I'll start again when there's a new version that isn't quite so terribly annoying.
Joined: 4/26/2004
Posts: 213
Location: Montréal, Québec
With what version were you trying ?
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
Version 7. It was going pretty well for the first level.. by level 2 though, I had to re-play it three times due to desyncing, but I could always play the movie back and 'resume recording' when I needed to, to fix it. That worked okay. Levels 3+4 went fine, but.. after level 5, I had the same desync problems.. except this time, it didn't want to resume my recording at all.. instead, it just seemed to corrupt them whenever I tried to record.
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
Okay guys, after my wave of irritance passed, I decided to give it another shot.. this time, as Sailor Mars. Not for any speed reasons, just because I think she's cooler, and playing the game with Moon over and over was getting tedious. ^^; Also, I found a special move with Mars.. but not until half way through the game. I probably could've used it more in earlier levels, but I don't think it would've mattered much anyway- the move is slow knocks the enemy back, which I don't usually want for beating easy enemies. However, it's great for final hits on bosses.. As far as I can see, there's no difference in characters between sprites/text. Moon has an extra turning frame but I don't think that slows her down or anything, it's just a prettier animation. Anyway, I'm back to Level 4 now, so should get this over and done with tonight. I'm breezing through it this time around. ^_^
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
Okay, I'm now convinced that Level 5 is evil. It always managed to mess up my recording every single time. Luckily this time I have safe backups that run to the end of level 4, and are in perfect working order ^_^ Until I can actually pass Level 5, it's going on pause.. again.. for the second time today. :P
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
Okay people, it is DONE! Here's a link to the recording: Clickhereclickieclick! I've noticed things that can be improved while I was playing, so I'll be doing a second run when I've get some motivation sometime. ^_^
Joined: 3/11/2004
Posts: 191
just a question. what emulater/rom are you using?
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
Jyzero's movie-recording version of Gens, v.8. The rom being 'Sailor Moon'.. I can't really go into any more detail than that.. there's only one Sailor Moon game on the Megadrive/Genesis, and it's in Japanese. That's the one I'm using. ^_^
Joined: 3/11/2004
Posts: 191
do you have a link to this emulator? as i cant find it anywhere
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
In the 'Other Games' category of these forums, there's a big thread on it, make sure you get the latest version though. ^_^
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
Okay, starting a second run-through now. Since watching the last recording back, I've seen lots of places to improve, mainly involving jump-starting some combos, and using Mars' fire tornado thingie in the earlier levels. Alssooo, thanks to SprintGod who actually helped me work out the three choices on the menu (I cannot read a word of Japanese myself.), I've now 'discovered' the hard mode difficulty. So, I'm now working on running Hard Mode with Sailor Mars. This'll make my old run inferior in every way. :p
Former player
Joined: 6/3/2004
Posts: 71
Well, my final recording is now done, in hard mode. I can't see any significant way to speed things up now. ^_^ I've linked to the recording file at the top-post.
zwataketa
He/Him
Joined: 9/1/2012
Posts: 309
There's only one TAS of a Sailor Moon game so far, and this game is a really fun and creative final fight-style game. Plus, I may just have the patience to TAS it! :D No WIP's yet, because I'm at school, Exam week, yada yada yada. But the preferred character would likely be Venus, due to her Earth Direct Throw, which pretty tears through enemies' health. Also, not related to the fact of speedrunning, this is the first game that I've actually created a cheat code on by myself (reading memory addresses, etc)! Meaning that now, I know how to read memory addresses! Meaning that should help with TASing, given I am patient enough! YAY! For those curious, the code is FFFEAA:00##, and effects the number of continues you have. Pointless in a speedrun for obvious reasons, I know, it's just a big deal for me because it means I'm learning a skill that will help me as a game designer! ^v^
I quit TASing.
Experienced player (674)
Joined: 2/5/2012
Posts: 1777
Location: Brasil
congratulations,i'll be expecting content
TAS i'm interested: Megaman series, specially the RPGs! Where is the mmbn1 all chips TAS we deserve? Where is the Command Mission TAS? i'm slowly moving away from TASing fighting games for speed, maybe it's time to start finding some entertainment value in TASing.
GoddessMaria
She/Her
Reviewer, Experienced player (862)
Joined: 5/29/2009
Posts: 517
Location: Hell...
I remember seeing the TAS that you are referring to. If memory serves, it was rejected due to heavy repetition and very low entertainment value. In my opinion, I feel that the Super Famicom version would be far better despite not being as graphically nice as the Mega Drive version. One reason is due to having 2 Players and you can take out enemies akin to the Streets of Rage games when attacking together as opposed to the MD version which has only 1 player and can take longer to defeat an enemy.
Current projects: failing at life
zwataketa
He/Him
Joined: 9/1/2012
Posts: 309
I have a feeling what you're referring to is a different game. Yes, this game had an snes version, but the mega drive version was overall better from what I know. Then the 2 player game was made later, only for SNES. It takes away most of the abilities that could be used for speed, like the dash jump each character has in this one. I might try that one later on tho, but for now, I'll try this. ... Now, meaning when I get home. And if I have time after working on my Kirby's Adventure Perfect Runs for my youtube channel. Edit: ok, I got through the title screen as quickly as I could (frame-wise), but I had to study for my physics exam, so that's all I could do tonight. Hopefully tomorrow I can get enough done to post a WIP, but I do have my kirby's adventure perfect runs to focus on as well ... Oh, and I'll be playing on Hard mode, which let's you fight the true final boss after queen beryl.
I quit TASing.
zwataketa
He/Him
Joined: 9/1/2012
Posts: 309
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/192849259/Bishoujo%20Senshi%20Sailor%20Moon%20%28Japan%29%20Venus%20TAS.gmv Been working on it a bit. I know it's not much, but eh, being slow is usually the nature of the beast, now, isn't it?
I quit TASing.
ALAKTORN
He/Him
Former player
Joined: 10/19/2009
Posts: 2527
Location: Italy
The title should be “bishoujo”, can someone fix it?
zwataketa
He/Him
Joined: 9/1/2012
Posts: 309
ALAKTORN wrote:
The title should be “bishoujo”, can someone fix it?
Thanks for catching that. I always make that mistake. Now, quick update: GoddessMaria15 is going to be helping me on this project. Here's the WIP we have so far, going up a bit into stage 2. http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/18337844/Bishoujo%20Senshi%20Sailor%20Moon%20%28Japan%29%20Venus%20TAS.gmv Also, something hilarious that happened while I was using frame advance.
I quit TASing.
GoddessMaria
She/Her
Reviewer, Experienced player (862)
Joined: 5/29/2009
Posts: 517
Location: Hell...
Alright, update time! Stage 2 is finished. I managed to figure out that there is a certain amount of frames that the enemies have invincibility before they are allowed to be attacked again. http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/262915952/Bishoujo%20Senshi%20Sailor%20Moon%20%28J%29%20%5B%21%5D.gmv Link to video
Current projects: failing at life
Editor, Experienced player (569)
Joined: 11/8/2010
Posts: 4034
Looks good so far! She has a pretty wide range of moves, and it helps keep things consistently entertaining.
GoddessMaria
She/Her
Reviewer, Experienced player (862)
Joined: 5/29/2009
Posts: 517
Location: Hell...
Thank you! That is what we are hoping for. Considering CherryMay's Mars submission was rejected because of lack of entertainment, but also the sheer repetitiveness and poor optimizations of the run. This TAS plans to make something happen with what we have while keeping the game pace consistent, which is hard considering how Beat 'em Ups tend to be lacking entertainment.
Current projects: failing at life
zwataketa
He/Him
Joined: 9/1/2012
Posts: 309
I'm working on Stage 3 now. I'll update when I'm done, though I think GoddessMaria15 will have to handle the encodes. ^^' Also I just checked something. The rerecord count for the entire product of CherryMay's TAS? 966, unoptimized. And ours currently? 1963. And that's for only a bit of the way into Stage 3. OPTIMIZATION, AH! On a completely unrelated note, I just now realized I never uploaded my profile pic! XP Welp, better fix that!
I quit TASing.