mz
Emulator Coder, Player (79)
Joined: 10/26/2007
Posts: 693
Sir VG wrote:
Question. How does rerecording work with multi-disc games? Do you start a new file at the disc change with the check box unmarked? I'm curious because I've considered doing Parasite Eve, but it's a 2CD game.
Currently there are two options: 1. Most games give you the option to save to a memory card at disc change; so, save there and then start recording a new movie with that memory card on and Disc 2. Users would not need to download a separate memory card for this, for they can use the same one generated by the Disc 1 movie. 2. Start a new movie from a savestate on the disc change screen. This one may not be as safe as option 1, because you can cheat with a start from savestate movie. The input file doesn't record reset-press or disc changes. These things require more coding, which aren't a high priority right now. I'm still trying to get the basic stuff working as good as it can get...
You're just fucking stupid, everyone hates you, sorry to tell you the truth. no one likes you, you're someone pretentious and TASes only to be on speed game, but don't have any hope, you won't get there.
Joined: 3/18/2006
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Location: Great Britain
Derakon wrote:
antd: I believe that this is because frame advance auto-skips lag frames.
Yes, however the red lag number doesn't increase so I don't think it's that in my case. It seems some stages skip 2 frames and others 1.
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Joined: 12/27/2006
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mz wrote:
2. Start a new movie from a savestate on the disc change screen. This one may not be as safe as option 1, because you can cheat with a start from savestate movie.
Wouldn't that require the savestate in question to be provided? If so, there's no way you can cheat.
My published movies [03:45:05] <Naohiro19> Soulrivers: ... [03:45:19] <Soulrivers> ? [03:46:35] <Naohiro19> <Soulrivers> No! <Naohiro19> So? <Soulrivers> Yes! [03:46:48] <Naohiro19> joke
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antd wrote:
frames are being skiped blah blah
mz, at the start of this thread AND in instructions.txt, wrote:
-Possible workaround for desync issues. PCSX now works as FBA: each time you press "frame advance" it will advance until the next frame is drawn, which means you will see the frame counter jump two numbers or so after a single "frame advance" in most games (those games which run at ~30FPS, for example). Also, "Pause" and "Save State" functions will wait until the next frame is drawn too.
hmm... now I see what he meant with the "2 lines of text" thing. and also:
    000 4-byte signature: "PXM "
    004 1-byte flags:
       bit 0: reserved, set to 0
       bit 1:
           if "0", movie begins from an embedded savestate
           if "1", movie begins from power-on
       bit 2:
           if "0", NTSC timing
           if "1", PAL timing
       other: reserved, set to 0
    005 1-byte flags: reserved, set to 0
    006 1-byte unsigned char: joypad port 1 type
    007 1-byte unsigned char: joypad port 2 type
    008 4-byte unsigned long: number of frames
    00C 4-byte unsigned long: rerecord count
    010 4-byte unsigned long: offset to the savestate inside file
    014 4-byte unsigned long: offset to the controller data inside file
    018 4-byte unsigned long: author string lenght
    01C string: name of the author
now we know the header, it's time we meet the input values.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself. It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success." - Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
Drama, too long, didn't read, lol.
Joined: 3/18/2006
Posts: 971
Location: Great Britain
The reason why I was confused about that is because the game which I am currently playing runs in both 30fps and 60fps depending on the stage/scene. It's strange.
Former player
Joined: 9/1/2005
Posts: 803
This one's more of a request than anything else: is it possible to add the feature of starting a movie paused at frame 0, as opposed to it automatically playing and then having to manually pause it? when making small testing movies it's a tad annoying to have to either start it from a later frame for timing (comparison between movies wise), or pausing it as soon as you can, but still missing out on an input frame.
Joined: 3/7/2006
Posts: 720
Location: UK
I'm 31k frames into a Suikoden II TAS and no desync problems whatsoever, with sound enabled, even! Good job!
Voted NO for NO reason
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Yeah, LagDotCom... this latest version is desync-free for most games. I'm also playing SotN with sound on without issues (well, it's really annoying to frame advance with sound... and also the the volume goes high when you fast forward).
Atma wrote:
This one's more of a request than anything else: is it possible to add the feature of starting a movie paused at frame 0, as opposed to it automatically playing and then having to manually pause it? when making small testing movies it's a tad annoying to have to either start it from a later frame for timing (comparison between movies wise), or pausing it as soon as you can, but still missing out on an input frame.
Yeah, I guess that's not too dificult... just make (again) like Snes9x or VBA. If the emulator is in "pause mode", it will remain like that regardless of what happens, until we unpause it. In those emulators we do just that: Run the game normally and pause, then start recording a movie. The game will load normally, but PAUSE at the very first frame. Also, I'm waiting for the input format in the pxm files. And...
018 4-byte unsigned long: author string lenght 
You mean there's room for 4294967295 characters???
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself. It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success." - Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
Drama, too long, didn't read, lol.
Joined: 3/7/2006
Posts: 720
Location: UK
Hmm, actually, I got a desync last night before I went to bed. The problem was, it was in a bit of the movie I hadn't edited since I started recording. This might help track down the bug?
Voted NO for NO reason
mz
Emulator Coder, Player (79)
Joined: 10/26/2007
Posts: 693
Pause at frame 0 is not possible; PCSX seems to enter an infinite loop if you start emulation paused. Test my previous versions where you were allowed to do that... Anyway, with the new system, it pauses at the first drawn frame, so it never would pause at frame 0, and more like at frame 100 or 500, 600, etc. depending on the game.
pirate_sephiroth wrote:
Also, I'm waiting for the input format in the pxm files.
I have zero interest in doing that, sorry... You'll have to find this info for yourself or ask somebody else to do it for you.
pirate_sephiroth wrote:
You mean there's room for 4294967295 characters???
Heh, probably.
LagDotCom wrote:
Hmm, actually, I got a desync last night before I went to bed. The problem was, it was in a bit of the movie I hadn't edited since I started recording. This might help track down the bug?
Let me see if I understand this correctly: For example: You had a 1000 frames long movie which didn't desync at all. Then, you started recording at frame 1000 until frame 2000. Then, when you played the movie back, it desynced at frame 500? Is that correct? Did some random new input appear out of nowhere or is it something else?
You're just fucking stupid, everyone hates you, sorry to tell you the truth. no one likes you, you're someone pretentious and TASes only to be on speed game, but don't have any hope, you won't get there.
Joined: 3/7/2006
Posts: 720
Location: UK
That's right, mz. I think one frame disappeared? Also, I had a strrrrrange desync bug later on - the input suddenly decided it was on controller 2 instead of controller 1. I couldn't figure out how to fix it, so I just redid it. Grr... the only SPU plugins that sync with my current TAS are the ones that sound horrible. :)
Voted NO for NO reason
mz
Emulator Coder, Player (79)
Joined: 10/26/2007
Posts: 693
LagDotCom wrote:
That's right, mz. I think one frame disappeared? Also, I had a strrrrrange desync bug later on - the input suddenly decided it was on controller 2 instead of controller 1. I couldn't figure out how to fix it, so I just redid it.
I've seen that controller swap thing once... I can't reproduce it anymore, and I can't think of any way for it to happen. I've had protection against that all over the code since the first day...
LagDotCom wrote:
Grr... the only SPU plugins that sync with my current TAS are the ones that sound horrible. :)
Yeah, I'm working on that... Hopefully someday soon every plugin will sound good and will be desync-less at the same time. Thanks for the reports, I'll see if I can find a way to reproduce these bugs.
You're just fucking stupid, everyone hates you, sorry to tell you the truth. no one likes you, you're someone pretentious and TASes only to be on speed game, but don't have any hope, you won't get there.
Editor, Expert player (2071)
Joined: 6/15/2005
Posts: 3282
mz wrote:
LagDotCom wrote:
That's right, mz. I think one frame disappeared? Also, I had a strrrrrange desync bug later on - the input suddenly decided it was on controller 2 instead of controller 1. I couldn't figure out how to fix it, so I just redid it.
I've seen that controller swap thing once... I can't reproduce it anymore, and I can't think of any way for it to happen. I've had protection against that all over the code since the first day...
Are you sure it's not the digital/analog swap shortcut? It happens when you press "1", unless you disable it in N-Rage configuration.
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mz wrote:
Anyway, with the new system, it pauses at the first drawn frame,
Yeah, but it doesn't start paused. You have to start recording then press PAUSE or FRAME ADVANCE as the game is being loaded to get the first possible frame (but apart from the HD access led, you have nothing to warn you that the game is ready to run).
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself. It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success." - Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
Drama, too long, didn't read, lol.
Joined: 3/18/2006
Posts: 971
Location: Great Britain
Is it normal that I cannot fast-forward by holding TAB in the PCSX WIP version of .4? (I need to use the WIP version for Abe's Oddysee)
mz
Emulator Coder, Player (79)
Joined: 10/26/2007
Posts: 693
The GPU plugin is the responsible for speed control. So, if you're using any version not modified by me, you won't have turbo or slowdown.
You're just fucking stupid, everyone hates you, sorry to tell you the truth. no one likes you, you're someone pretentious and TASes only to be on speed game, but don't have any hope, you won't get there.
Joined: 3/18/2006
Posts: 971
Location: Great Britain
In my current movie it always desyncs with sound plugin enabled, but when it is off it is fine. Is there any solution for dealing with desyncs that occur only when the sound plugin is enabled, as I want to record audio and video? edit: also, I have found that if I save and load many times (making 9 saves/loads on 1 frame) it is more likely to desync. It may not be true with everyone, but I have seen that my movies desync (with sound plugin off) when I am at a tricky part and also where I have made 7-9 saves/loads in quick succession (around 3 frame apart at most). I played through 80% of my movie using only 2 save slots, and it didn't desync once. Then I used all 9 save slots for the next 20% and it desynced 3 times. Maybe not a coincidence...
mz
Emulator Coder, Player (79)
Joined: 10/26/2007
Posts: 693
antd wrote:
In my current movie it always desyncs with sound plugin enabled, but when it is off it is fine.
You could try this WIP version of spuPeopsDSound and see if it still desyncs. If it does, you'll need to upload your .pxm file somewhere so I can see why it goes out of sync with sound on.
antd wrote:
[...] I have found that if I save and load many times (making 9 saves/loads on 1 frame) it is more likely to desync [...]
Yeah, I've been thinking about these desyncs lately. It may be related to the stupid way I'm currently doing the file-writing stuff, so I'm going to rewrite all that code for the next version.
You're just fucking stupid, everyone hates you, sorry to tell you the truth. no one likes you, you're someone pretentious and TASes only to be on speed game, but don't have any hope, you won't get there.
Joined: 3/18/2006
Posts: 971
Location: Great Britain
mz wrote:
antd wrote:
In my current movie it always desyncs with sound plugin enabled, but when it is off it is fine.
You could try this WIP version of spuPeopsDSound and see if it still desyncs. If it does, you'll need to upload your .pxm file somewhere so I can see why it goes out of sync with sound on.
antd wrote:
[...] I have found that if I save and load many times (making 9 saves/loads on 1 frame) it is more likely to desync [...]
Yeah, I've been thinking about these desyncs lately. It may be related to the stupid way I'm currently doing the file-writing stuff, so I'm going to rewrite all that code for the next version.
mz, I've found after more testing that it is not the sound plugin causing my desyncs. It was because I was using the 0.0.4 wip version. I just put the sound plugin in version 0.0.3 and the movie didn't desync. And finally I tried 0.0.4 without sound plugin and it desnyced again. So it isn't the sound plugin^^ It was 0.0.4 version which you posted in my Abe's Oddysee topic. good luck with that, looking forward to the release.
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Hey, mz... try this It's a movie file for Castlevania SotN, with a savestate. This is the crash I was talking about. Play it in READ+WRITE mode and load the savestate (F4). It gives me an "unrecoverable something in recompiler thing". Well, it doesn't crash if I open it read only. It doesn't crash in interpreter mode either... but I don't know how good it is to use it for recording because you never mentioned it. And there's also this little thing... ESC doesn't work on interpreter mode! This bug happens every once a while, and even though it's not the greatest tragedy, it's annoying.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself. It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success." - Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
Drama, too long, didn't read, lol.
mz
Emulator Coder, Player (79)
Joined: 10/26/2007
Posts: 693
pirate_sephiroth wrote:
This is the crash I was talking about. Play it in READ+WRITE mode and load the savestate (F4). It gives me an "unrecoverable something in recompiler thing". Well, it doesn't crash if I open it read only. It doesn't crash in interpreter mode either... but I don't know how good it is to use it for recording because you never mentioned it. And there's also this little thing... ESC doesn't work on interpreter mode!
That savestate crashes for me in read-only mode, read+write mode and even loading it without being replaying/recording a movie; so I guess the savestate is damaged somehow. Also, it doesn't give me any message when it crashes (and... It's a bad idea to load/save on CD-loading screens). I know about the ESC thing on interpreter mode, but I don't know how to fix it, because I can't use the "#ifdef WIN32" things inside that block of code. By the way, how did you load that savestate on interpreter mode? As far as I know, save/load states also don't work with it. :P
You're just fucking stupid, everyone hates you, sorry to tell you the truth. no one likes you, you're someone pretentious and TASes only to be on speed game, but don't have any hope, you won't get there.
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It gave the error message only if it was played in real time and in read+write... And that's a special loading screen... I need to save states to play with the "Now Loading" image. About the interpreter mode... er... I dunno... I play this late night, so... anyway, just checking to see if you're paying attention! Good job, Soldier! :P
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself. It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success." - Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
Drama, too long, didn't read, lol.
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So I'm trying to record a Brave Fencer Musashi movie, and I had a question. Sorry in advance if this is confusing. To start, there's an FMV right in the beginning (after the Squaresoft logo). My problem arises when I try to optimize skipping the FMV. I save state before it loads the FMV, but when I reload from the save state, it will always take the same number of frames to reload the FMV. Meaning I can save state one frame before the FMV begins playing, but when I load the save state, it will take the 300 or so frames it normally takes to load the FMV, messing up the movie file in a major way. Is there any way around this problem? Does this even happen if you're using an ISO? (I tend to use the actual discs when using the emulator since I own many PSX games anyway, and searching for the ISOs seems to be risky business, in terms of bullsh*t spyware riddled sites)
mz
Emulator Coder, Player (79)
Joined: 10/26/2007
Posts: 693
FMVs don't get very well with the new frame-advance/pause/save-state/load-state system... Read the v0.0.3 changelog and try to understand how the emulator works now to prevent desyncs. Unfortunately, it's impossible to do one of those actions while there's a FMV playing, so, you can only save/load/pause/frame-advance after/before a FMV has played. The only way I can think you could do what you want, is hex-editing the file... Adding/removing 4 bytes each time, until you can't optimize it anymore.
You're just fucking stupid, everyone hates you, sorry to tell you the truth. no one likes you, you're someone pretentious and TASes only to be on speed game, but don't have any hope, you won't get there.
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Joined: 9/1/2005
Posts: 803
I've found that fmv's and such don't actually support frame advance as it were, so the only real way to get through them is to just find out what button presses will skip them, and then just hex them in as a turbo input or something. It's a dirty way of doing it, and it might not necessarily be the fastest, but it works. Most of the time.