I decided to test out TASing VVVVVV 2.0 (1.2 wont work yet because it is made with flash), and managed to beat no death mode in 13:57. I made plenty of small mistakes though, and Hourglass's savestates crash the program far too often, so I wont be putting the effort into a well optimized TAS anytime soon.
Some small notes:
-I used hourglass r71
-Even though the the game video runs at 30fps, the music will clip horribly unless you run it at 60fps, so I recorded the TAS at 120fps because it seemed to make my savestates crash the program less often (might be placebo though).
-You need to have a quick save, and no death mode unlocked for this movie to sync properly.
-Disabling Multithreading causes VVVVVV to not load, same with disabling direct sound creation
-I didn't notice any difference between using "Allow" and "Wrap" on multithreading.
-I think all the other options are default.
Well anyway, you can download the wtf file here. Have fun and what-not.
-You need to have a quick save, and no death mode unlocked for this movie to sync properly.
I'd suggest if a proper full run was done, that you start out the movie by deleting existing data, unlocking the no death mode via the menu accessible cheats menu, starting a new game, and then suspend > new no death mode game. Sure, this would erase existing data, but as far as tas syncability goes, it'd work far better than requiring the mode to be unlocked etc.
-You need to have a quick save, and no death mode unlocked for this movie to sync properly.
I'd suggest if a proper full run was done, that you start out the movie by deleting existing data, unlocking the no death mode via the menu accessible cheats menu, starting a new game, and then suspend > new no death mode game. Sure, this would erase existing data, but as far as tas syncability goes, it'd work far better than requiring the mode to be unlocked etc.
so, i made a movie with "no save", like from "first start"...
Youtube.wtf
my config:
- Multithreading and Wait Sync: Allow
- Frames per Second: 120
- Mute
- System Time: 6000
Warning: Might glitch to creditsI will finish this ACE soon as possible
(or will I?)
so I checked this out on youtube. I have to point out that it's still slower than it could be, if only because you chose to wait at a point where you can delay things on the previous screen by a few frames to avoid said period. Check out my intro test video on the previous page to see what I mean.
you chose to wait at a point where you can delay things on the previous screen by a few frames to avoid said period
oh i see, but i wont redo/finish the TAS because everytime the game crash (like after every 5-10 rerecords) you have to delete the "Saves" folder and then fast forward through the whole tas, and that is very annoying after a time...
Warning: Might glitch to creditsI will finish this ACE soon as possible
(or will I?)
How much time was saved by using a no-death mode, by your estimation?
A simple estimate would be to add up all of the time spent in cutscenes, as that is the primary time saving feature of NDM. Cutscenes alone take at least a minute.
If you wanted to get a little bit more in detail, you would need to factor in time that can be saved from dieing (a good example is death abuse in the tower to make the camera scroll faster), along with time that can be saved using save abuse (one example is that the cutscene in the communications room with Violet can be skipped by going one pixel past the cutscene trigger, saving the game, and then resetting).
So a rough estimate would be ~1minute I would say, which is quite significant considering the total length of a speedrun.
Another thing that might eventually come into consideration for a TAS is the differences between the 1.x and 2.0 versions, primarily concerning the collision detection of enemy sprites. Let's take the room Security Sweep in Space Station 1 for example. It was pointed out that in order to get make the first cycle of the bouncing ball, you would need to pause a short amount on the previous screen in order to be in the right position entering the room. In 1.2, this is not the case, because in my realtime speedruns of this game I was able pass the sweep with zero hesitation on the previous screen using the same room strats.
Probably the most glaring example, however, is in Space Station 2, on the screen "Lighter Than Air". In 1.2, if you hugged the wall going from that screen to the next (Level Complete), you would just barely miss hitting the cloud on the next screen, while on 2.0 you will hit the cloud every time without fail.
Granted, these differences are very small, especially considering that 2.0 has a new time-saving glitch that allows you pass through the inversion planes on "Three's Company", and "Three's a Crowd" by merely spamming flip (seems to only work on inversion planes that are close to a flippable surface), which, I am fairly certain saves more time than having to merely hesitate a bit every now and then.
While chances are that these version differences will not be explored in depth until hourglass is capable of running flash games, it is something worth keeping in mind at least.
I've found a fun glitch that probably needs TAS tools to test out (and I don't use Windows, so can't run Hourglass). Try quicksaving and reloading inside the Gravitron; the timing I used was just after the countdown started, but other timings might work. As you reload, hold down right. You should escape the Gravitron out of the top with the timer still going. Weird things seem to happen as a result; the timer running out does strange and unpredictable things (in a way that reminds me of memory corruption, and it's caused double-frees on the Linux version of VVVVVV, and so is probably well worth examining with a debugger), and even with the timer going there's strange behaviour (Gravitron enemies spawning outside the Gravitron and mostly getting stuck on walls, and Viridian's hitbox seems to be a different shape too, allowing him to escape off the top of the map and end up out of bounds).
I'm gonna post this here because apparently this thread doesn't exist:
Link to video
(interesting stuff at 6:30)
This is a neat way of skipping both intermissions.
I'm currently working on a 100% no death mode TAS so the new any% has to wait a bit, but making a new one was planned either way because I found a few minor improvements.
Warning: Might glitch to creditsI will finish this ACE soon as possible
(or will I?)
Is that possible? Isn't there one of the shiny trinket you need to die to collect it? (unless you can go through the was or make something crazy there...)
PS: the chamber I'm referring too is "Prize for the reckless"
The route changed again already?? TAS beaten by RTA???
Link to video
New route with timestamps:
0:15: Suicide to skip opening stage
0:50: Entering space station 2
2:25: Vitellary rescued / exiting space station 2
3:45: Entering warp zone
4:55: Verdigris rescued / exiting warp zone
5:35: Entering the tower
7:10: Vermillion rescued / exiting the tower
7:25: Intermission 1 starts
8:35: Intermission 1 ends
8:45: Space station 1 'done' / suicide skip to politely exit Violet's company (I think this is the new tech)
9:10: Entering flip zone
10:30: Victoria rescued / exiting flip zone
11:35: TV activated
12:35: Game beaten
Hm... This is going to be complicated. I think this new route means the RTA route is going to differ from the TAS route.
This new route saves time over the previous (double intermission skip) route, but I don't think it saves more time than a TAS can using that route.
Using tool-assistance, you can avoid the "The Bernoulli Principle" checkpoint, making the one in "Square Root" the last unavoidable Laboratory checkpoint. This means that exiting the Laboratory is going to cost a lot less time in a TAS.
The new way to get to Violet (teleporting, rather than doing Space Station 2 again) doesn't seem to be exclusive to this route, so that time will also be saved over the previous (I think 12:33?) run.
EDIT: Silly me, of course you can't do this when skipping both intermissions, as it requires you to use a teleporter.
I think this means a TAS will be faster if it skips both intermissions, but then I again, I might be completely wrong.
Yeah I also figured out that you can avoid that one checkpoint which would save time.
The thing is that to skip both intermissions you have to get Victoria follow you and then rescue Violet. And that is where getting Violet is indeed exclusive to the other route, because you have to use a teleporter, but if Victoria is following you you can't use a teleporter or you will just save Victoria the "normal" way.
You figured it out yourself :D.
I will test both ways and use the faster one when I do the any%.
Or I'll just wait for someone to discover a glitch that allows to teleport while having someone follow you.
Warning: Might glitch to creditsI will finish this ACE soon as possible
(or will I?)
The route changed again already?? TAS beaten by RTA???
Link to video
New route with timestamps:
0:15: Suicide to skip opening stage
0:50: Entering space station 2
2:25: Vitellary rescued / exiting space station 2
3:45: Entering warp zone
4:55: Verdigris rescued / exiting warp zone
5:35: Entering the tower
7:10: Vermillion rescued / exiting the tower
7:25: Intermission 1 starts
8:35: Intermission 1 ends
8:45: Space station 1 'done' / suicide skip to politely exit Violet's company (I think this is the new tech)
9:10: Entering flip zone
10:30: Victoria rescued / exiting flip zone
11:35: TV activated
12:35: Game beaten
It was beaten again. Now it is 12:18.
Projects:
Interested in TASing N64 Mario Golf.
GBA Mario Tennis: Power Tour is on hold.
It's too bad that we'll never see a TAS with the double intermission skip because the reroute made single intermission skip faster again. (Or does Masterjun disagree?)
