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Posted: 12/3/2012 8:54 PM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
Very nice, I'm excited to see what you can pull off :D I've worked the instant rolling into my real-time route, but I have to do it a little differently for it to be consistent, starting with back, rolling through down to forward and then back to down. It works pretty well, although I'm still only about 70% consistent with it. I managed to get a 22:11 in real-time recently with a few missed tricks. I'm really interested to see what you pull off in your new WIP! One thing that I'm still really curious about is the hitboxes for several of the enemies and the bosses. They are really huge and disjointed at times, particularly for the final boss and the pirate boss. I don't have any experience looking for them, however :-/ I will investigate the seeds for the boss patterns though. So far it seems like they use a combination of your position, their current health, and something else that remains somewhat static during battle. At the very least, waiting around outside the boss door did not affect the pattern but going off and killing some enemies did. I will report back what I find, but I will need to switch off of BizHawk since I need the Trace Logger.
Posted: 12/3/2012 9:55 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
The only boss that is giving me a hard time is the Ninja, he likes to teleport from time to time, and he's totally invincible during this animation :(
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
Posted: 12/3/2012 10:07 PM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
The Ninja has only 3 patterns, and he varies them between which side he appears on. He appears much more random than that, but I spent some time just watching him to confirm his movements. The patterns are: -Shuriken -Boomerang -Bone Sword Each cycle completes in a set order each time, ie he always fires 4 shurikens in a row, and always 4 boomerangs. Shuriken pattern is the most desireable since he spends a long period of time vulnerable and nothing special is required to dodge the attacks. Bone Sword is the worst since he's only vulnerable for a short time and then teleports again. He seems to like doing Bone Sword between every Shuriken or Boomerang pattern. To manipulate him I would suggest altering your position (ie left/right of him) and seeing if that changes his next pattern. If not, it may give a better frame result by not hitting him once even when you can and seeing if that changes it to another pattern. EDIT: It looks like some bosses' patterns are seeded from a frame counter at 7E00AB. The ninja is definitely based on this value, at least. If you can't get a good pattern, consider waiting a frame or two before delivering the last hit before an invulnerability period. This should be enough to change his next pattern.
Posted: 12/4/2012 7:39 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
The Ninja is definitely our nemesis... I'll test your memory addresses and see if I can improve my last fight. I already tested your "surfing the Fuzzyneck" trick, and it is 30 frames faster than my fastest attempt. edit: The Ninja can’t scare me anymore; I gave him a Banzai, a Sashimi and an Okinawa he won’t forget! Anyways, he teleports after the first two hits regardless. What I noticed is that if he teleports to one of the lower corners he will just jump until he reaches the opposite lower corner, giving me time to finish the fight before his next teleport. Here's the new wip, 648 frames ahead; http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/3032292580423161
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
Posted: 12/6/2012 3:17 PM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
Yes, that's what I meant by set patterns. Teleporting to lower right or left will start him on a 4-pattern shuriken cycle where he does the small jumps and fires a shuriken until he gets to the opposite corner. If he appears in the upper sides, he will always fire off 3 boomerangs before disappearing and going into another pattern. Bone sword is the only pattern where he will appear somewhere else on the screen. This is what I was trying to say before; sorry if it wasn't clear. I just watched the WIP, it looks great! I'm glad you found all sorts of new ways to (ab)use the roll, and also some new clipping tricks! Keep it up :D EDIT: As you get to some of the other parts of the run, some things to remember: -Dracula Guy has only 2 initial patterns: one where he spawns in the center and another where he spawns in the upper-right. I don't know which of the two is faster (probably center) but an important thing is to take out all the bats with as few hits as possible. Ideally you can take out all 8 of the bats with a single swing (which is definitely possible). This is because hitting the bats freezes them momentarily and delays the spawn, so you want to minimize the overall time. Entering his loading zone at different frames is enough to change the pattern. -Pirate Guy is fixed, so no problems there. Tech Guy always enters from the same spot and has different patterns, but for a TAS it should not be difficult to finish any of the patterns as fast as possible. -The last boss is still a huge pain. Again, probably not as much of an issue for TAS, but his hurtbox prevents a lot of hits that should otherwise work fine, especially when he's at the middle height. His patterns are definitely based on the frames he starts them on, and some can be more advantageous than others. I always look for the low fire-wheel pattern to get in a massive number of safe hits. Again, not sure it will apply for you.
Posted: 12/6/2012 7:59 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
I was just trying to make a joke, but looks like I failed... Your tips helped me immensely with the Ninja guy, but all the other bosses can be hit on the first possible frame without worrying too much with manipulation. Avoiding get hit in the process is another story though, as you mentioned, the hitboxes are weird in this game and even far away from some of the bosses it's still possible to touch them.
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
Posted: 12/8/2012 1:29 AM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
I was able to improve your stage 1-2 by 30 frames. Instead of jumping up the cliffs in the midway point, you can keep rolling and jump on top of the rocks at the end. There's a hidden passage there that you can (briefly) roll in. On the other side, use a high jump at the opening to land on a platform, then normal jump to the solid ground. Finally, do another high jump and complete the level as normal. I think what I did can be optimized slightly more, but I saw the first start animation at frame 3423 whereas it appears at 3453 in your movie. I can make a movie if you'd like, but hopefully the description is enough.
Posted: 12/8/2012 1:49 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
The restart never ends... no, I'm not complaining, I'm thankful, but you always find something new when I'm about to submit the run, ha ha ha. Well, I'll stop working on the completion of the run until we can not find any other improvement. edit; better yet, I'm working on an improvement of Oddworld in the meantime.
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
Posted: 12/8/2012 3:43 PM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
I'm sorry if the improvements can't be re-synced :-/ I think that's nearly everything as far as improvements go, however. I've gone through each of the stages looking for new shortcuts or ways to force rolls, but I think it's coming to a close. I did a 21:21 in real-time last night; I think it can come down another 15 seconds with better boss luck, but otherwise I'm nearing the limit. That said, if you have a WIP from the one you were about to submit, I'm happy to take a look :)
Posted: 12/8/2012 6:49 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
The new trick found on Oddworld can be hex edited with a little effort, so I'll resume working on Congo's Caper real soon. About the wip, I don't have it here with me, I'm still on my job, but don't tell my boss I'm killing work... Only the Final World was missing, 799 frames ahead of my other almost submitted WIP, I was even writing the submission text... But, yeah, some parts can be reused, even some boss battles, so there's nothing to be sorry about :)
Omnigamer wrote:
I did a 21:21 in real-time last night
Really good time! I think the TAS can be around 20:00, never really beat the final boss though...
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
Posted: 12/13/2012 5:26 AM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
Just a quick heads up, I asked Pasky to look into hitboxes for us so there might be a script for it sometime soon. Major thanks to him for working on it between his current fighting game projects.
Posted: 12/13/2012 3:44 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
Thank you for the heads up! My any% improved run of Oddword is done, I may do a new 100% as well, but for this I would rather start from scratch, so it will be a future project. Talking about start from scratch... I tried, but my skills with TAS Studio are close to zero, so I'm restarting Congo's Caper too. I'm more familiar with TAS Movie Editor, since I'm using it for about two years, that means I may do the new run on Snes9x 1.51.
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
Posted: 12/13/2012 4:40 PM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
I think the main thing is that TAS Studio only has some very basic features implemented right now and it can't be used for a number of tasks. I'm still waiting on a trace logger as well... Good luck when you start a new run! I enjoyed the last WIP a lot, especially with the new zips and things you put in. I will be continuing my real-time attempts as well, but I don't feel like there are too many more areas for improvement besides luck.
Posted: 12/15/2012 2:15 AM
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Pasky13
Former player
Joined: 5/4/2005
Posts: 502
Location: Onett, Eagleland
http://pastebin.com/qgRjr5N5
I think.....therefore I am not Barry Burton
Posted: 12/15/2012 4:39 AM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
Wow, great work Pasky! This helped to find a safe(r) spot for Pirate rd 2 and the last boss. The massive hitbox on the club certainly helps plan out other things too.
Posted: 12/15/2012 3:43 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
Really nice, indeed! (the Lua Script on the previous page) by the by, Snes9x almost tricked me; I can start the game 5 frames faster in Snes9x, but I can skip cutscenes 1 frame faster in BizHawk. There are lots of cutscenes to skip through the game, so, a run made on BizHawk would kick Snes9x sorry ass pretty easily. So, I'm working on BizHawk 1.30. I'm about to fight the mid-boss, Dino, 38 frames ahead thanks to your shortcut on 1-2.
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
Posted: 12/15/2012 7:24 PM
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Pasky13
Former player
Joined: 5/4/2005
Posts: 502
Location: Onett, Eagleland
I got rid of the extra code I was using to debug with and added the boxes that show where you can jump on enemies and platforms, I couldn't find congo's collision for that box, I think it's just his y - 1. http://pastebin.com/dBzPccbi Probably the last of what I'll work on this.
I think.....therefore I am not Barry Burton
Posted: 12/20/2012 2:51 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
The Ninja Warriors Again... No, I'm not working on another game, it's that Ninja again giving me trouble. I had to sacrifice some of the saved frames to manipulate him. But changing where I took damage brought back some of the lost frames, at least. I'm at the end of the Water Stages, fighting the Pirate, my favourite foe by the way, 47 frames ahead of my fastest wip. Well, only a new trick can save time from here on, so I think this game is maxed out. See you in a few days with the submission.
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
Posted: 12/20/2012 3:04 PM
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Omnigamer
Player (37)
Joined: 2/16/2012
Posts: 282
Yeah, I've done as much optimization as I could and I don't think we have any more opportunities for tricks unless a new way to zip comes along. I'm getting closer to submittable runs on my end, so I don't think I'll have anything else to add. New strats on the pirate and final boss thanks to the hitbox viewer, so that helps. Good luck on the final version! I'm excited to see it :)
Posted: 12/20/2012 3:14 PM
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Dooty
Expert player (2467)
Joined: 6/2/2009
Posts: 1182
Location: Teresópolis - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
Sega TASer of 2013 SNES TASer of 2012 SNES TASer of 2010
Thank you, Omnigamer! I'm trying to include things I missed in other wips, like winning more lives on the Slot Machine and collecting more items, a way to keep things "fresh" for the final run, I guess.
I am old enough to know better, but not enough to do it.
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