Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Mechuyael wrote:
Too bad you couldn't waste those frames in a less notice-able fashion though.
Unfortunately, I think the frames need to be wasted in between the time the screen transitions to the hippogriff area and before I head-butt the fella.
Anyway, WIP up through Ovnunu, using the new path. It's still faster to use Firebrand on the mini eyeballs (there's lots of weird jumping and positioning if you try to kill them with Earth Crest), but Ovnunu falls stylishly in about 5 seconds, thanks to the Earth Crest.
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/695797732/Demon%27s%20Crest%20%28US%29.smv
Okay, some comments then:
1. Maybe you could walk over to the Hippo-statue and headbutt it instead of doing the jump headbutt for a more "elegant" frame wasting? Or would that waste too many frames?
2. When Ovnunu starts rising, maybe destroying the jar and taking whatever's there ASAP will reduce some of the lag there?
3. Perhaps you could beat Ovnunu faster if you attacked him using Ground's land attack instead of the air attack as he erupted from the slime, or did you not manage to do this?
Except for those 3 points, and perhaps a part where your dash jump may have clipped one of those fire-breathing statues which might have slowed you down a bit, I don't really know what you could improve since I know nothing about how to do a TAS.
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
So I just got around to watching what you have. For starters, I love love love your Hippogriff fight. Arma1 as well. You have a great knack for manipulating these boss fights, and I'm impressed. The midair dash jump is something I didn't know about, so I'm glad you found that. Your strategy for Ovnunu's eyes is awesome, and I can't believe I never thought to just sit in the slime and duke it out. Excellent. I'm very glad that you are working on this, because you seem well suited to it.
I don't really have a whole lot to question or complain about, since everything seems really good so far. Your hits in Hippogriff1 aren't optimised, so am I to assume that this is part of the manipulation? Is it possible for you to extend any of the after-dash hops in 2-1 so that you don't have to walk off screen at the end? Also, is it too much to ask that you do a flight wobble as Firebrand? It makes him look like a 4-winged demon, which is rad.
Mechuyael wrote:
2. When Ovnunu starts rising, maybe destroying the jar and taking whatever's there ASAP will reduce some of the lag there?
3. Perhaps you could beat Ovnunu faster if you attacked him using Ground's land attack instead of the air attack as he erupted from the slime, or did you not manage to do this?
Destroying the jar creates 5 moving sprites, rather than one static sprite. That being said, it causes a lot more lag to break the jar. Also, it's just a large life item in there. Also, Ovnunu always starts at that height, and waiting for him to get low/close enough to use ground shots wastes the time it took ElectroSpecter to land those air shots. Since 2 airs = 1 ground, it was better to just take the pot shots ahead of time.
What if he lands on the slime just in time to shoot the ground-shot and jump away before beginning to get swallowed? Would he then have time to position himself for air-shots?
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
Mechuyael wrote:
What if he lands on the slime just in time to shoot the ground-shot and jump away before beginning to get swallowed? Would he then have time to position himself for air-shots?
Doubtful. In the time it would take to drop the shot, then get free of the slime and attain the platform, Ovnunu would already be past the position that we want him in. I can't say this for sure, but that would seem to be the case.
Well, I tried myself, and at 49% I did get pretty close to managing something of the sort.
Okay, I checked, and I'm pretty sure that I noticed a decrease in lag after breaking the jar and taking the life bonus.
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Mechuyael wrote:
1. Maybe you could walk over to the Hippo-statue and headbutt it instead of doing the jump headbutt for a more "elegant" frame wasting? Or would that waste too many frames?
The wasted frames are more complicated than that, unfortunately. In fact, they aren't really so much wasted as they are there to change the outcome of the fight. The fact that I turn left and right instead of jumping or standing still makes all the difference in the manipulation. The only thing I could change about these extra frames is when they happen (I did them close to the jump/headbutt to make them less noticable, but if they are an eyesore, I can shove them even closer to the jump).
Mechuyael wrote:
2. When Ovnunu starts rising, maybe destroying the jar and taking whatever's there ASAP will reduce some of the lag there?
I haven't even thought of this. Honestly, I hope that it has no effect on lag, because it will most likely desynch my fight. Though this fight follows more "rules" than the previous two, and is much easier to get back into synch. I will look more into this.
Mechuyael wrote:
3. Perhaps you could beat Ovnunu faster if you attacked him using Ground's land attack instead of the air attack as he erupted from the slime, or did you not manage to do this?
This also didn't cross my mind, but now that you mention it, it may be faster. Though in this case, I would most likely kill him when he's much farther to the left, and even if this did save frames, I may end up with a net loss since it takes him so long to move to the center before burning up.
Zurreco wrote:
...I'm very glad that you are working on this, because you seem well suited to it.
Thank you! I'm glad for the words of encouragement, especially since this game doesn't have many other people working on it (though I am extremely grateful for the 100% route plan of yours).
Zurreco wrote:
Your hits in Hippogriff1 aren't optimised, so am I to assume that this is part of the manipulation? Is it possible for you to extend any of the after-dash hops in 2-1 so that you don't have to walk off screen at the end? Also, is it too much to ask that you do a flight wobble as Firebrand? It makes him look like a 4-winged demon, which is rad.
Are you talking about hits 6, 7, and 8? Those are the earliest times I can hit him during this period. He flies just a tad too high to hit for a bunch of frames, and this part of the fight, at least, isn't manipulatable. In 2-1, extending the jumps complicates things in terms of getting caught on different platforms and having to avoid the pots or the fountain or the Arremer (?) guy. And I'll definitely add in the flight wobble. In fact, it'll be darn simple with a hex editor, which I've become all too familiar with in the past 3 days.
I know that the "wasted" frames are actually there to change the outcome of the fight, I'm guessing that you made sure to lose as few frames as possible so that the fight will go as you wanted it to. It's probably only really an eyesore to me.
I also think that you seem to do very well with the TAS. I'm wondering what you'll manage to do with that fire boss in the forest. :)
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
Mechuyael wrote:
I also think that you seem to do very well with the TAS. I'm wondering what you'll manage to do with that fire boss in the forest. :)
The first form is killed before it even moves. At the worst, ElectroSpecter will just have to position himself so that both burning leaf attacks miss and the pair of homing birds run in to his grounded Earth Crest shots. It's fairly easy to set this up even without tool-assistance.
The second form can be tricked in to the sine wave attack every time, which basically allows for a shot, turn, shot, jump, shot pattern every time. 5 damage per turn, 20 HP total. Hell, you could even queue a direct dash attack on the fourth turn, assuming that you can deliver that last ground shot before he touches you.
13 shots for form 1, 4 patterns from form 2. One of the easier fights for a speedrun.
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Mechuyael wrote:
Okay, some comments then:
2. When Ovnunu starts rising, maybe destroying the jar and taking whatever's there ASAP will reduce some of the lag there?
Wow, doing this saves about 170 frames, probably more if I optimize my jumps. It completely destroys my fight though, so I need to record an entire new one. The good part is that Ovnunu only comes out when his pulsing goop reaches a certain point in the "pulse cycle." If you'll look on my old video, the cycle only completes 4 times from the time he reaches the top of the corridor to the time he emerges. This is largely due to the five or six mini eyes that come out halfway through. A couple of casual re-recordings of this part has shown me that I did something special the first time to get the mini eyes to come out so fast, and I've only been able to get re-recordings with 5 "pulse cycles". Sorry if this is confusing, but it's a good thing, because I have a HUGE margin of frames that I can aim for having the mini eyes destroyed (anywhere in between the beginning and end of the fourth cycle).
Of course, this makes me wonder whether it's possible to kill him within three cycles. But first I will have to figure out how exactly I lured those mini eyes out and make sure I won't go insane trying too hard to attain something that may be impossible. :p
Also, I was clipping one of those statues in the beginning of 2-2. This is now fixed and I've actually saved 26 frames between 2-2, 2-3, and 2-4. You'll see 'em when I post the new WIP later.
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
New WIP is finished, with 279 frames saved (about 4.5 seconds!) mostly thanks to destroying the pot in the upward passage. I'm getting good feelings about this run (though I'm ever aware there's a chance it won't be published, I still really want to finish it; the game definitely holds its own in uniqueness and isn't too repetitive, and the boss fights are what I expect to bring the yes votes). Expect Level 4 in a few days!
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/524685223/Demon%27s%20Crest%20%28US%29.smv
Also, Mechuyael, I tried out the standing shot in the slime for Ov's first hit. I wasn't able to save frames this way, but I may be doing it differently than you. Is there any way you can post a video of your Ovnunu strategy, so I can see what I was doing wrong?
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Hey guys, I have the basic layout for level 4 down. Is there any room for improvement that anyone can see? (The hippogriff 2 fight isn't optimized, I just kinda killed him semi-well to show the next parts of the level, so I guess ignore that fight for now).
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/773522769/Demon%27s%20Crest%20%28US%29.smv
Also, is there any way to upload only sections of video so that I don't have to keep uploading the entire WIP?
EDIT: I just noticed there's some parts in the horizontal wind area where I walk when I could be flying.
Also, is there any way to upload only sections of video so that I don't have to keep uploading the entire WIP?
This is capable of doing what you've asked: http://dehacked.2y.net/savestateify.php albeit, I've never really tried it since I haven't TASed any SNES games, where I would release WIPs, in a while.
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
Two small things that I think will shave off some time:
Firstly, in the part of stage 4 with the armored ghouls, I think you can save a few frames by firing off two Buster shots when you're jumping in to your flight. This way, you don't have to stop in midair to kill one of them.
Secondly, I think that if you switch to the Earth Crest after the first ascension part after Hippogriff2, you can fall faster outside and dash to the statue with the Crown relic in it. I might be wrong, but it's worth checking out.
Otherwise, excellent work. Hippogriff2 was great, and I'm glad to see that you were able to figure out the fast ascension of the latter part of the level.
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Zurreco wrote:
Firstly, in the part of stage 4 with the armored ghouls, I think you can save a few frames by firing off two Buster shots when you're jumping in to your flight. This way, you don't have to stop in midair to kill one of them.
Secondly, I think that if you switch to the Earth Crest after the first ascension part after Hippogriff2, you can fall faster outside and dash to the statue with the Crown relic in it. I might be wrong, but it's worth checking out.
Otherwise, excellent work. Hippogriff2 was great, and I'm glad to see that you were able to figure out the fast ascension of the latter part of the level.
I fixed the mistake I made with the armored ghoul part using your advice and saved 15 frames! Also, I will try using the Earth Crest to descend to the Crown. I didn't realize I would fall faster, but it makes sense, since that form has no wings :p
For the Hippogriff2 fight, I'm going to keep it mostly the same, but I'm going to change to Ground near the end and see if I can finish him off quicker that way (since he stays on the ground for quite a bit doing nothing, this will hopefully save frames due to him taking less hits and dying closer to the ground).
Also, during the fast ascent for Vellum 2, Firebrand looks like he's spinning ;) I really like how that came out.
I'm hoping Arma will be a good fight too. The fact that he does the tornado attack makes me think I'll be able to finish him off while he's on the ground fairly easily.
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
VANDAL wrote:
This is capable of doing what you've asked:
Ah, I didn't get around to thanking you before VANDAL. Yeah, it worked out fine, and I was able to just get a "recording" of the 4th level.
And speaking of which, here it is, and it should be fully optimized. Remember to uncheck the volume envelope box and check the left/right movement box so the movie doesn't desync.
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1101738896/Demon%27s%20Crest%20%28US%29.smv
The Hippogriff2 fight is a tad better with the help of the Earth Crest (I think it was like 160 frames faster?). Unfortunately, using the Earth Crest later to drop and dash to the Crown relic takes up frames rather than saves any. And finally, watch Arma get completely owned.
"Can it be!? My 'whirlwind' move has been defeated!"
(Arma, after not using it once during the battle)
I should be able to beat Flier fairly quickly too, though it will probably have to wait until Monday, as I'm going away for the weekend.
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
Excellent Arma2 fight. Seeing you catch him in a loop made me very happy. Too bad Earth Crest didn't save any more time than it did.
One thing sticks out that I should have mentioned earlier. It's probably nothing, but I think that in the first ascent after Hippogriff 2, you can reach a higher moving platform in the second set by hopping off of the urn on the ledge, thereby negating any waiting there. I'm not sure if this works or not, but I remember being able to save time this way. I also can't seem to make savestates in snes9x for some reason, so I can't test this on my own.
No promises, but maybe it's something? Sorry to point these all out after the fact :/
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
I think the platform in question shows up at the same time either way, and either way I still have to wait for it, so what I do in the meantime (jumping from the urn vs. the way I already did it) doesn't matter.
Well, haven't watched the wip yet, but one correction I'd make is to remove that [/url] in the link. =P
Edit: Fight seemed good to me, though of course my opinion means little. By the way, is there something I can fix so that there'll be audio in these part-wips?
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
There's no audio? I'm not really too sure. Has there been audio in the full WIPs that I send? And your opinion definitely means more than a little, seeing as you and Zurreco are the only two I have to rely on to spot my mistakes / bolster my confidence. Plus, you've saved me a couple hundred frames already. Heh.
Also, Zurreco, I'm on the Flame Lord (part 2). Is there any way to manipulate him so that he does the sine pattern and nothing else? Or do I have to wait through a barrage of him dropping flames before he starts doing the pattern?
The reason my opinion means little here is that I've never really done work with frame advance, and so couldn't tell if the fight was done very very well, or done frame-perfect.
And yes, the full wips had audio. The part wips are more convenient though, so I think that even if there's no way to have audio they're still generally better.
