Post subject: An idea to speed up most N64 games
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I don't know if this is widely used already, but here's an idea: Using L+R (the triggers)+start and the analog stick in a certain direction, the analog stick defaults to that. So it might be possible for a TAS that involves walking towards a certain point to use that thing. So basically, the run would use that trick to set the character running in one direction. Even if the run itself is a little longer because the character is not guided as well, the last input could be sooner.
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Can you record the fact that you start the game like this, if not, you won't be able to replay the movie unless you make this trick, and that would be useless. Also, you can't go over the maximum limit. which you can obtain by pressing the joystick to the maximum, so I don't think it would be faster.
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I don't think that button code works in the emulator anyway. Does anyone know what piece of hardware actually handles that? It's probably just remapping the coordinates the stick sends on some low level. In any case, this sounds like the equivalent of someone leaving their controller overturned on the floor and saying, "Ha ha, my speedrun is over already, technically, because I don't have to touch the controller anymore!"
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Resetting the analog stick in the wrong position so that the character automatically walks froward is no faster than actually holding forward, as far as I know.
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And it would only be applicable in a game where the last few seconds involves moving in the same direction without any sort of other action. How many games actually could use this?
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I only know of one http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/n64/code/197141.html Super Duper Speed You can exploit the N64 controller's "Neutral position reset"; feature easily in this game. What you do is hold down on the control stick, then simultaneously press L+R+Start. What this does is set the "down" position on the joystick to neutral. So what happens when you press up? You go REALLY FAST! Problem with this is that the neutral position is now "Down." To fix it, just let the joystick go neutral, then press the button combination again. This works GREAT in the first hidden level, "Outpost Omega" when trying to do the switch puzzle to get the artifact.
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I also know of some Goldeneye/Perfect Dark players using it to help with their lookdown. So besides an actual change in the gameplay, like the one laughing_gas pointed to, this technique is only helpful in normal play to help realtime runners hold the analog forward for them. In a TAS it has no use whatsoever.
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comicalflop wrote:
I also know of some Goldeneye/Perfect Dark players using it to help with their lookdown. So besides an actual change in the gameplay, like the one laughing_gas pointed to, this technique is only helpful in normal play to help realtime runners hold the analog forward for them. In a TAS it has no use whatsoever.
So it's a controller-side rather than game-side function? In that case, you can hex-edit in the super-forward value, or modify the TAS input plugin to double its effective range. An issue is that this may allow one to edit in values much higher than can be obtained even using L-R-Start. Should this be allowed? If so, it could make Doom 64 speedruns really, really fast. (As in, warp anywhere in a few frames)
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Extending the range in the controller or input plugin is impossible. The full range is already used, and it has to fit inside the 8-bit integer sent by the controller for each coordinate. The console could add an offset to the input after it gets it from the controller, but I've never seen or heard of any emulator doing that or otherwise supporting stick recentering.