Topic by Kuwaga

Posted: 2/22/2007 5:11 PM

Post subject: Saint Sword

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

Do you think this game might be worth running? It has some interesting glitches if you press left+right as birdman (they work as merman too, but you can't move without water). Left+right makes you go to the lower right corner of the screen, l+r+up makes you go to the upper left corner and l+r+down makes you go straight up. But this will only move your character, not the screen. You have to get to the center of the screen if you want the screen to move again. If you move to the center of the x-axis, the screen still won't move along the y-axis and vice versa. Walls eject you either downwards, to the left or not at all. Also, I realized that this game won't accept any input shorter than two frames. But stuff like left,left+b,b works. You have to kill a certain number of a certain enemy in every stage (at least in the first three afaik) to get a key. Then you have to find the boss door to get to the boss. I used the Japanese version for [URL=http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/4031/Saint_Sword_test.gmv]this[/URL] short test run because it has a faster start up screen.

Posted: 2/22/2007 9:28 PM

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Aqfaq

Editor, Expert player (2461)

Joined: 4/8/2005
Posts: 1573
Location: Gone for a year, just for varietyyyyyyyyy!!

Hi Kuwaga! Nice trick. The funniest combination is UP-DOWN. :) You seemed to handle it well. The full movie might be interesting, but usually it's best to choose the hardest difficulty setting. --- EDIT: I used the latest Gens to find the memory address for the boss health: 00FF0318. I don't know if this helps you at all, because the boss health-bar is visible anyway, but it gives the hit points in numbers.

Posted: 2/22/2007 11:26 PM

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

I just realized that l+r+d+u makes you go to the lower left and d+u+r is an alternate way to go to the lower right. I also managed to stay transformed after the timer displays 0 a few times, but I still don't know what causes it. I don't know what the differences in hard mode are, but I think it's just going to make the game more boring, but that's my general opinion about hard modes. xD Edit: Getting hit during one of two frames before the retransformation starts does the trick.

Posted: 5/11/2009 4:36 AM

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

I've decided to finish this run. I'm lingering around at this place for far too long without having finished a single TAS that it's almost a bit embarrasing. ;) So, I've finished the game for my first time now. There's bad news, you have to play through the whole thing twice to face the final boss. And for the second time through there are only minor changes. So essentially some levels would look exactly the same except for a different color pallette that is used. Now I'm wondering if it's ok to take slower routes the second time through as a speed/entertainment tradeoff, though I must say I only see the run getting rejected then. Another thing I could do is make the first time through a glitchless run and only use them the second time through. On another note, I've found the address for the killed enemy counter that only increments when I kill an enemy that can drop a key (00FF041B if you care). I have to kill 4 of those in stage one. I'm now positive that I can find the fastest routes through all levels with that knowledge. Now, I'd need some feedback on these two questions: What do you think I should do about the fact that I have to play through the game twice? And do you think I should play in hard mode? The only difference is that enemies have more health and I don't see how this contributes to the entertainment factor. Thanks

Posted: 5/11/2009 1:56 PM

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Aqfaq

Editor, Expert player (2461)

Joined: 4/8/2005
Posts: 1573
Location: Gone for a year, just for varietyyyyyyyyy!!

Kuwaga wrote:

What do you think I should do about the fact that I have to play through the game twice?

Well, one thing to consider is using a password to get to the final level, so you don't need to play the whole game twice. This approach was used in Ghouls 'n Ghosts.

Kuwaga wrote:

And do you think I should play in hard mode?

If the enemy HP is the only difference, then I would prefer the easier skill level.

Posted: 5/11/2009 6:18 PM

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

Ok, I've found four passwords that will make you start on your second trial without no starting advantages. Now it's time to figure out which takes the least time to put in, I guess. xD Also, about the hard mode. I can't seem to access it at all. x_x I've read my old post and from that I concluded it would raise enemies' HP. But now I can't seem to be able to make the changes I make in the option menu influence the game at all.. Anybody having more luck than me?

Posted: 5/11/2009 8:01 PM

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Aqfaq

Editor, Expert player (2461)

Joined: 4/8/2005
Posts: 1573
Location: Gone for a year, just for varietyyyyyyyyy!!

I tried it too and failed. It works fine with Kega Fusion, so Gens has a problem.

Posted: 5/11/2009 9:22 PM

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

Probably gens doesn't store stuff during a reset.. I'll check out hard mode using a different emulator. Hopefully it won't turn out to be more entertaining, or I think I'll have to stop working on this again. ;p Thanks for your testing! In any case, I've found what I think is the fastest way to input one of the level codes. It's done in 36 frames, the second fastest code would have been 40 frames long. (It was a bit complicated for this game since button presses get only counted if they're at least 2 frames long) ^^ Edit: Played through the game once in hard mode now. The passwords for normal and hard modes are unfortunately the same. Not much is different in hard mode, but there would be a very few more enemies (not even in every stage I guess and they're hardly noticable), which would make the run an itsy bit more entertaining. Meh. :/ Edit: I only wanted to tell that I stopped working on this only because my laptop crashed and I had been unable to boot it up for over a week. When it started working again, I had lots of work to do for my studies and I still have. I'll get back to it though.

Posted: 3/7/2010 10:18 PM
(Edited: 12/5/2010 2:20 PM)

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

Hey there. I somehow felt inspired to make a HUD for this game today (J version). Some things were kind of tricky to figure out, but I think I've been doing a pretty good job so far. (It's not done yet, but there's no telling if I'll ever feel like finishing the job, so...) It displays the level number, boss health, playerx, playery, camerax, cameray and clearly displays each level's mission(ary?) goals that this game otherwise likes to keep hidden from its players. (sometimes it prematurely rewards you of the key though, haven't figured out why yet) The HP of the minor enemies are displayed below them, in case you forget how often you've already hit a certain gremlin or whatever.. Next to their HP, I display in brackets the item that the respective enemy will drop after its defeat (except for keys). This only works correctly in the first level right now, as it's really kind of tricky to do. Also, should an enemy decide to disappear while off screen, its outrageous deed will be immediately reported by my high-tech radar tracking system. >_> I've also implemented an infinite health cheat that won't freeze out the score screen and provided our (yes, our) hero with an unlimited supply of magic transformation items. Yay... Edit: An updated version of the script can be found in a later post.

Posted: 3/9/2010 6:58 PM

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

In fact, the game's RNG determines how many enemies will have to be killed in level 2 until it rewards you the key. Most of the time, it will be after the 6th enemy. In the best case, it's already after the 1st! I have already found the RNG-current-number's location in memory and figured out how the RNG works. I'm able to predict the next number it'll generate 100% of the time. Except, there are things that cause the RNG not to advance to the next number. Now, I'll still have to figure out what exactly these things are. ^o^ The RNG doesn't advance to the next number while the game is paused or while transforming. The RNG lags behind on several occasions, but will then advance by 2 steps on the next frame. That means the RNG is almost fully determined by the current frame number. These lag frames could probably be abused to make the game take the random number of the previous frame though. ^^ Edit: Manipulating luck by abusing RNG lag frames is impossible, sadly. The only way to manipulate luck is by dropping frames. Edit: Rough route planning in progress... Level 1: Get 2 wings, use 1, get a score of 3000 Level 2: Get 1 wing, use 1 Level 3: Get 1/2 wings, use 1, get a score of 6000? (rather 1 wing) Level 4: Get 1/2 wings, use mirror, get a score of 6000 Level 5: Nothing used/got Level 6: Use wing Level 7: Use fish Level 8: Nothing used/got Level 9: Use wing Level 10: Use wing Level 11: Nothing used/got Edit: Finally figured out the algorithm for calculating the number of enemies that have to be killed in the next level until you get the key. Was a huge pain to do. >_>

Posted: 12/5/2010 2:29 PM
(Edited: 12/8/2010 8:43 PM)

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

Big update to my LUA script for this game. Polished the code (a bit) and enhanced it with game trainer functionality. The game trainier menu will appear if you move your mouse to the middle-upper left of the screen. I think it's pretty cute. I also added hotkeys for weird combinations of directional input (uses buttons of controller in port 2) because my laptop hates it if I try to hold down multiple buttons at once. Edit: Removed code. (not up-to-date anymore) Edit: Added map-making capabilities to my script. Produced this neat little map of stage one with it. Todo: Figure out a neat way how to get the spawning points of the enemies onto that map. Edit: [URL=http://www.abload.de/img/level_one_monsters5f58.png]ALMOST[/URL] ;)

Posted: 12/6/2010 11:28 AM
(Edited: 12/6/2010 6:09 PM)

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

Starting to look pretty decent now. :D This is surely going to help an awful lot with the route planning. *breaks the page* Edit:*fixes the page* [URL=http://www.abload.de/img/atlas7ue5.png]Map of stage 1[/URL]

Posted: 12/6/2010 2:24 PM

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NitroGenesis

He/Him

Editor, Experienced player (551)

Joined: 12/24/2009
Posts: 1873

maybe you should just post the url instead of the huge picture, i don't like it when my page is broken :P

YoungJ1997lol wrote:

Normally i would say Yes, but thennI thought "its not the same hack" so ill stick with meh.

Posted: 12/6/2010 6:18 PM

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

Yea, I intended to remove it at some point anyway. I'll see if I can still improve my code and then I hope to have every stage mapped out by this Wednesday. Then, looking at those giant maps, I'll hopefully finally be able to come up with a route. Yay.

Posted: 12/8/2010 8:55 PM

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Kuwaga

Joined: 10/20/2006
Posts: 1248

Kuwaga wrote:

I hope to have every stage mapped out by this Wednesday.