http://www.wikiupload.com/1hKzr5un
So I did the first level, and trademark skidmark wants to do this. I created this topic so me and him can has frame wars.
lol
YoungJ1997lol wrote:
Normally i would say Yes, but thennI thought "its not the same hack" so ill stick with meh.
Heh, I was thinking about creating this sooner or later. I was going to pm you about it, but then I found this.
If anyone else wants to jump in, let me know!
Let the frame warz begin!1!1!1!!!!1!!!!!11!!1!!
:)
Games to TAS:
1. Rampart (NES)
2. Pokemon Yellow (GB)
3. Aladdin (SNES)
4. Shadowrun (SNES)
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<sonicsonic3> and please tell me...WHAT IS THE BACK LONG JUMP CODE!? [on SM64's BLJ]
You know, level two isn't that complex.
Anyways, I start my work when Nitro gets to the level two boss. Then I take care of him/her/it, do level 3, boss. Nitro takes over for two levels (but not the level 5 boss), and I tackle the last two levels. I might do a small TAS of something if NitroGenesis doesn't hurry up!
*sig*
*shot*
Games to TAS:
1. Rampart (NES)
2. Pokemon Yellow (GB)
3. Aladdin (SNES)
4. Shadowrun (SNES)
-----
<sonicsonic3> and please tell me...WHAT IS THE BACK LONG JUMP CODE!? [on SM64's BLJ]
That's good to hear that you're gonna start this up again (if that's what you meant by now it's back). I've been messing with speedrunning this game lately and wanted to get a sneak peek of how this TAS is coming along. Could you post that wip of stage 1 again so I could see what you've got so far? The link in the first post is broken.
Yeah, I going to maybe try this again. But I cleaned out all my emulator and roms, so I'd have to start from the one below.
This is my last wip of level 1. Comes from last August.
http://www.mediafire.com/?ilgz1odt0jw
Could be improved.
YoungJ1997lol wrote:
Normally i would say Yes, but thennI thought "its not the same hack" so ill stick with meh.
Nice job so far. I wanted to ask if that sliding glitch that's in the sequel works in this one. If not, then could I ask a favor?
When/if you get to Stage 4, could you pinpoint exactly how this happens?
Another glitch that I've seen on youtube that might be handy on taking out that chair for the stage 2 boss.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIQiw4-GzJ0#t=7m17s
Haven't been able to do this one in real time at all though.
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2821
Location: Northern California
Link to videoUser movie #17263986223054304
I whipped this together over the past couple days mostly because I wanted to see a run done, and this is a particularly simple game to TAS. I won't be submitting this, and I'm not sure if I'll work on an optimized version so I'll share everything I found out. Most of this is probably already known, but since there's no info or working WIPs in this thread (anymore) I feel validated in sharing it.
The fastest Rick can normally move is sliding: He'll move 1.875 pixels per frame, or 15 pixels every 8 frames to put it more simply. This speed can be kept by jumping on the last frame of a slide. When coming out of a slide, Rick will be in the crouching pose for a single frame, and then stand up. If you jump on the frame before that one, without holding any directional buttons, you can keep the 1.875 PPF for the entire duration of a jump. Jumping is 1.5 PPF, and walking normally is 1.375 PPF, so in most cases where sliding isn't an option you'll want to be jumping. The fastest way to start a stage is by walking for at least 5 frames, then jumping for a single frame into a slide as early as possible.
You can't cancel any action you make, meaning if you need to kick an enemy out of your way so you can slide, you need to kick as soon as possible to give yourself enough time to recover and be able to slide afterward. Kicking will stop your vertical momentum during a jump as if you let go of the jump button entirely, so enemy control is probably the hardest part of optimizing the run. Then again, there's pretty much no RNG at all in the entire game: Enemies and obstacles are preset and mostly only respond to your actions, and are otherwise fairly predictable.
Ladders, such as the one at the end of Stage 1, always fade out at the same time after reaching them. There's no advantage to being higher up or lower down, it's all about reaching them as fast as possible. Same goes for the end of any screen: Sliding off the edge of a screen whenever possible will save a couple frames, as will jumping into holes.
Speaking of things on set timers: The boreworms (the stage 1 boss) are also on a set timer, meaning you can kill them all or avoid them all, and as long as you kill the last surprise worm ASAP you'll finish at the right time. I avoid them all here mostly because it felt more entertaining to me.
You can pick up weapons while sliding, as long as you're close enough when you hit down you'll pick up a weapon at the end of a slide. Barring that, you can pick up a weapon in midair by crouching during a jump while you're over the weapon, and close enough to the ground for it to register.
Sometimes I feel like calling this game Scrollerhouse. Anyone who may want to optimize and run this game should be forewarned that you're going to have to make a lot of scroller sections entertaining to watch.
The poltergeist (stage 2 boss) fight is probably one of my favorite parts of the run, because it's just 4 quick-kill strategies in a row: The chair glitch (mentioned in the last post in this thread, even if it was three and a half years ago) is used, which saved a little over half a second compared to my previous fastest chair kill. What I think happens is that when you're up against the right wall, the chair keeps trying to "follow" you to the right. Normally when you hit the chair, it flies away from you, but for some reason even if you're up against the right wall and facing right, you'll still hit the chair from the left, sending it into the wall for a split second and causing it to bounce upward and continue on to the right (since it's "following" you). It flies over the wall and despawns, continuing to the knife phase. I do need to get hit there so I can be in the chair's hitbox to knock it over the wall. Any earlier and I'd run out of invincibility frames, any later and I wouldn't be able to get in position.
The second knife phase involves interrupting a jumping kick with a punch to send both knives into the same corner. Somewhat tricky to pull off, but very flashy. The hardest part is actually turning around and sliding into the painting to finish off the fight.
The Biggy Man (stage 3 boss) fight is probably the only notable thing about Stage 3. I do the RTA strategy in reverse, firing first and sliding afterward, which is slightly faster because of not having to take damage. The three-hit slide has pretty tight timing and requires a good position.
Just like Stage 3, the only noticeable thing about Stage 4 is the boss fight. You may notice I'm not preserving sliding speed: That's because of the quick kill (posted a few posts (and years) ago in this thread). The boss moves in that set up and down pattern while you're chasing it. Once you reach the end of the scrolling, the boss will continue its pattern until it reaches a certain point near the mid-bottom of the screen. Once it reaches that point, it'll start its arcing pattern over you. The quick kill works by waiting until the boss is past that point while travelling upward, giving you just enough time to get into position. Hitting the boss causes it to jump down further into its pattern, skipping over the trigger to send it into the next phase. The quick kill is pretty precise, requiring two hits to get the boss past the trigger point twice and two extra frame-perfect hits afterward to cut down on time.
I don't preserve my sliding momentum because it isn't fast enough to save a cycle for the boss quick kill, so I'd have to actually wait around for a second or so if I preserved sliding speed the entire way. Better to make it slower-looking and smoother, I say.
The second screen of Stage 5 is probably my favorite in the run. The downward slopes actually allow Rick to move at 2 PPF, slightly faster than his normal max speed. Unfortunately, it's hard to keep this speed up throughout the entire stage due to enemy placement, but I do my best to control that as much as possible. Three auto-scrollers later and I'm at the boss. This boss is notable because you need to follow a specific attack pattern to kill it quickly: Certain attacks at certain times can trigger an extremely long sequence where you can't hurt the boss. It's kind of a sloppy quick kill, but it's one of the only ways to do it without the lengthy transformation sequence happening again.
The rest of the run is pretty standard: Some form of entertainment during the Stage 6 autoscroller, taking damage to save time on Stage 7, and quick kills on both the bosses.
There might be a way to kill the final boss slightly faster, but I think it'd require being able to take a hit: The first time it pops out of the ground, you can hit it three times with a slide and punch/kick 3 times afterward (a total of 9 damage). Hitting it with precision prevents you from getting hit, which is how I survive the entire time with just one heart. Now, a slide kick will do 2 damage every time it connects, while normal punches and kicks do 1: This is why all the quick kills are done with slides. I believe the boss retreats into the ground after taking a certain amount of damage, so... Since the boss takes an odd amount of damage on the first round (3 hits with the slide and 3 punches/kicks), it may be possible to jump, take the hit, and slide again, causing 10 points of damage instead of 9 for that round. He'll take 8 damage (3 slide hits and 2 punches/kicks) for the next three rounds, then on the last round you can end input as soon as you start the final slide instead of waiting for the extra hit at the end.
Apologies if any of that's disjointed. I'll clarify if necessary.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2821
Location: Northern California
Link to video
Guess I'm committed to doing this now.
Stage 1 improved by 28 frames with a better jump/slide route that allowed me to keep sliding speed more often. No change on the boss fight since it's timed.
Stage 2 improved by 2 frames with a slightly changed jump/slide route and not sliding into the hole at the end, which for some reason saves a frame. I think I mentioned that jumping on the same frame as the crouch after a slide will preserve all sliding momentum. If I did, I was wrong: You lose .125 PPF off sliding speed. Still faster than normal jumping or walking, but I gained a frame from avoiding it. As far as I've tried, there's no way to jump into that hole because of the hanging corpse and the jumping mechanics. The scroller section is lifted from the test run, though the end is changed slightly. No time gained, but it looks a little neater. 9 frames were saved on the boss fight with a more optimized double knife phase. The chair skip is actually oddly frame precise: You can knock it over the wall on a number of frames, but most of the time it'll be just as fast as a normal kill. The one specific frame I hit it on both movies is the only frame that'll let you save the extra half-second or so.
Overall, 39 frames faster than my test run so far. I'm aiming for 12:15 for a submission. The test run is decent, but there's still room for improvements. Stage 4 needs better entertainment and I still want to save a cycle on the boss fight if possible. Stage 5 has a lot of potential for optimization, specifically with the tech-heavy second screen and the boss fight. Stage 6, I'll probably just lift the input from the test run. I didn't spend that much time on Stage 7 in the test run so I feel like I might be able to save a couple seconds there alone.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Hey Samsara! It's really cool to see someone picking this up for a TAS! I'm really glad to see some of the stuff I posed in this thread years ago actually being put to use!
I recently tried to improve my old TG16 run and ended up finding another oddity in the Stage 2 boss fight. Basically, I punched a knife once and it fell through the floor and de-spawned itself. I wouldn't be surprised if this ended up being possible on all 3 knives if it were looked into. I'll link both a youtube video and a video at 60fps in case you want to analyze it by the frame.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1R2yltXNPQhttps://www.mediafire.com/?8tf25149s78envt
As for ideas on things, I've been kicking around a few things since I watched this TAS. I have a feeling you might be able to avoid getting tagged by the final boss if you try jump kicks into slides after your first slide. I remember when funkdoc was trying to figure out the stage 5 boss on stream, he was going about it by taking hits, but if you do a jump kick into a slide, you never have to take any hits. The window is probably super tight though, since for whatever reason it's less forgiving to chain slides into regular attacks than the arcade version.
So my thoughts are that cycle one for stage 7 boss could be one of these:
1) slide hit, slide hit, slide hit, jump kick, slide hit = 9 damage
2) jump kick, slide hit, slide hit, slide hit, jump kick, slide hit = 10 damage
If the final boss works like the stage 5 boss in terms of how it handles the final hit being a slide kick, you should be able to carry that extra hit into the next cycle with method #2, which should save 1 hit in any subsequent cycle. I don't know how feasible this is, but I think it's worth looking into.
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2821
Location: Northern California
zallard wrote:
Hey Samsara! It's really cool to see someone picking this up for a TAS! I'm really glad to see some of the stuff I posed in this thread years ago actually being put to use!
They're excellent finds, and the run probably wouldn't look too different from an RTA without them. I'm glad I was able to figure them out relatively quickly and put them to good use.
I recently tried to improve my old TG16 run and ended up finding another oddity in the Stage 2 boss fight. Basically, I punched a knife once and it fell through the floor and de-spawned itself. I wouldn't be surprised if this ended up being possible on all 3 knives if it were looked into. I'll link both a youtube video and a video at 60fps in case you want to analyze it by the frame.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1R2yltXNPQhttps://www.mediafire.com/?8tf25149s78envt
This is interesting... I'm not sure if it'll save any time in the TAS since the setup looks like it'd be longer than the normal quick kill. Looking at it on Youtube, it initially looked like the same sort of thing as the chair glitch where the knife is punched into the wall but going through the 60fps video frame-by-frame both knives are in the same position. I feel like it could still be the same sort of thing, though.
As for ideas on things, I've been kicking around a few things since I watched this TAS. I have a feeling you might be able to avoid getting tagged by the final boss if you try jump kicks into slides after your first slide. I remember when funkdoc was trying to figure out the stage 5 boss on stream, he was going about it by taking hits, but if you do a jump kick into a slide, you never have to take any hits. The window is probably super tight though, since for whatever reason it's less forgiving to chain slides into regular attacks than the arcade version.
So my thoughts are that cycle one for stage 7 boss could be one of these:
1) slide hit, slide hit, slide hit, jump kick, slide hit = 9 damage
2) jump kick, slide hit, slide hit, slide hit, jump kick, slide hit = 10 damage
If the final boss works like the stage 5 boss in terms of how it handles the final hit being a slide kick, you should be able to carry that extra hit into the next cycle with method #2, which should save 1 hit in any subsequent cycle. I don't know how feasible this is, but I think it's worth looking into.
That's a possibility... The shortest timeframe between a jump and a slide is 32 frames, and I need to lose less than 40 frames with that 10 damage cycle to save time with the early input end. I need to test to make sure a jump kick into a slide won't get me hit, which I'll probably do once I make it to Stage 7 proper. It should definitely save time if it's possible, though.
Actually, now that I think about it, I just thought of something. I'm gonna leave it here to remind myself later: Leading with a jump kick each cycle might save frames, since I can hit with the kick on the last frame possible and go into a slide within a few frames of that.
In the meantime, here's an updated Stage 3:
Link to video
38 frames faster than the testrun for the same reasons as the last two stages: Better jump/slide route and a slightly faster boss kill due to better positioning at the start of the fight and a slightly delayed slide delivering the final blow a couple frames faster. Stage 4 won't have much time improvement unless I can get an early cycle on the boss.
---
Wait. Shit. There's Hard difficulty. I'm playing through it right now to document the changes. So far, the only really noticeable changes are in enemy/boss health. I think some of the enemies move faster, but I don't think it'd be noticeable in the TAS since most of the enemies don't move before they die. If anything I'd just be jumping and sliding in slightly different places to account for the enemies that do move. Boss fights would take longer: The knife quick kills don't work, for example, though the chair despawn and painting quick kill do work. Biggy Man has double health, the Evil Smile takes 2 more hits with the cleaver, and I'm assuming the rest of the bosses (Jennifer, Mother and Hell Chaos) have extra or double health.
Overall, I don't think restarting for Hard difficulty is worth it. The only interesting thing would be using that knife despawn glitch, which I'd have to properly figure out. The new Biggy Man strategy required for the double health would probably just be bringing the shotgun from the beginning of the level, using both shotguns to full capacity, getting the three hit slide afterward and hitting him twice quickly with jump kicks. Not a very interesting strategy, and it'd be ~5 seconds slower, not counting the time it may take to bring both shotguns into the fight.
The Evil Smile pattern lock still works, and it accounts for the two extra hits needed, so that's no big deal. The last three bosses would just be longer versions of the same patterns. Jennifer, though reasonably entertaining as a fight, would just need a longer version of the same general pattern. Mother would just be the same "slide, walk left for a couple frames, jump kick, repeat" pattern for a longer period of time. Hell Chaos, with its long downtime between cycles, would become far less interesting since more cycles would be needed for a kill.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2821
Location: Northern California
Well, I made it through Stage 5 and just hit a major roadblock in Stage 6.
The enemy pattern is, as far as I can tell, randomly predetermined: It's set at some point (most likely when entering the stage) and cannot be changed. This means that a fast boss fight may be impossible due to the enemy spawn pattern being awful. And, naturally, I get a really good pattern in my test run and a nightmare for the optimized one. This is (for my ever-dwindling patience, at least) a huge problem.
Stage 6 is a minute long auto-scroller that needs to be run over and over again every time I want to try a new pattern, and this is assuming the spawn pattern changes based on the frame you enter. I haven't tested it yet. The entire boss fight needs to be done every time to make sure I have an optimal spawn pattern for the full fight, and even after that there might be other, faster spawn patterns that exist. So that's all well and good, except for how terribly inconvenient it is to spend 15+ minutes testing one spawn pattern.
The problem lies in the new Stage 5 boss kill. It's about 40 frames faster than the test run, but it's extremely precise, meaning I'd have to find an equally fast strategy that I can actually afford some frame loss on, which means I'd have to redo that fight, and I might have to redo the fight every time I test a new spawn pattern in Stage 6 due to how awful optimizing that fight is.
How awful is optimizing killing your horribly mutated girlfriend? Multiple reasons. Jennifer jumps back on every hit, and when pushed into a corner she'll jump the opposite way. Every multiple of 6 damage, she transforms back into her normal self, which is an extremely long sequence where she can't be hurt. This has to be avoided by jumping over every multiple of 6: That is, dealing 5 damage in some way and then using a slide to deal 2 damage, jumping over 6 and skipping the transformation. The jumping back and the transformation skips aren't that bad until you remember that Rick automatically walks to the right when going to the next level, so Jennifer needs to be killed on the right side of the screen to save the most time. However, the new strategy I use ends up with Jennifer on the left side of the screen, meaning I have to hit her out of the right-hand corner, get myself into position with little time to spare, and hit her from the left so she moves back into the right-hand corner for the kill.
In short:
*You're usually barely out of reach even when you do time everything well.
*Your pattern needs to avoid multiples of 6 to get a quick kill.
*Every attack needs to be positioned and timed well to avoid losing time.
*You may have to pull off some serious acrobatics to kill her on the right side.
*And then you find out that Stage 6 has a bad spawn pattern anyway.
I'm not thrilled about this. The mere thought of having to continuously re-do the most frustrating parts of the run isn't exactly doing wonders for my motivation. I wouldn't say I'm giving up, but I do think I need an extended break. I'll probably post my current BK2 after a couple weeks in case someone with more patience than me wants to take a stab at it.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Joined: 4/8/2005
Posts: 1573
Location: Gone for a year, just for varietyyyyyyyyy!!
This boss fight sounds challenging indeed. It seems that the optimal solution is in some sense vague due to the situation having many different aspects that need to be considered simultaneously. Nobody will blame you, if you decide to give up. Also, it is okay to not optimize it fully. You can leave that part for the next taser and just keep progressing with your run. In my opinion, it is totally okay to leave some laborious parts unoptimized, as long as the author acknowledges these potential improvements publicly. It is like having a benign enlarged prostate. The doctor just says: It is all well, because now we know the situation and can monitor it in the future. The same thing applies here: We know there is a potential improvement in the run, so it is okay to leave the run unoptimized. We can always fix it in the future as long as we know it exists.
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2821
Location: Northern California
The spawn pattern I'm getting for Stage 6 would negate pretty much all the time I've saved so far, so I'd still have to check for a better pattern. It shouldn't be that bad to test a new pattern... Wait.
I think I could just walk away from Jennifer slightly after the Stage 5 fight and spend an extra frame or two walking back. I don't think I need to re-fight her every time.
Okay, that's a lot better. I shouldn't attempt to think or post when I'm tired. Bad things happen. I'm still not thrilled at running through Stage 6 multiple times, though I can do them in real time to test the spawn pattern and go back through to make it entertaining once I find a nice one. I just really hope the pattern changes every frame, but I'll leave that for when I get back to testing.
Since it might be a bit before the next update, here's a video...
Link to video
...and a fun fact: Jumping just before the post-Jennifer cutscene makes it look like Rick is just giving her a huge knee-drop before picking her up. That's nothing new: zallard does it in his record run and I rip it off paid homage to it in my test run, but what is new is that it actually saves 2 frames when timed correctly, which is lovely because I don't think Treasure Master had any time-savers I couldn't explain and I need to keep up that trend in my TASes.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Wow! Nice stage 5 room 2! Also it's awesome to hear that the knee drop pose after Jen is defeated saves frames, haha.
If you could, could you post your fastest Jennifer fight? I'd like to take a look at it.
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2821
Location: Northern California
https://www.mediafire.com/?kr33ocme337i5to
60 FPS download. It's a precise strategy and only saves 40ish frames over my test run. I might give it another go later but for now this is the fastest I've gotten.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2821
Location: Northern California
User movie #17951974419192999
Haven't been much in the TASing mood so here's my current progress. I have yet to attempt any of the Stage 6 spawn pattern manipulation in this movie. If anyone wants to take a crack at it then go right ahead, you'll get full co-author credit if you get it done. Admittedly I'd like to tackle Stage 7 myself, but I'll be caught up in RTA stuff for the next couple weeks so it'll be a while even if someone else comes in.
This is going to be finished no matter what, though.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
