Hi
I'm very new to this forum/website. I love playing Doom, it has huge nostalgia value for me. I've speedran it a bit in the past, and I would love to give TAS a try
I've looked around a lot for tools for this but barely found any. I've found that some videos say "recorded with prboom+" (or glboom+), and I have that program (I had it already, I used it to play Doom normally) but I can't figure out how to use it to record or segment things together.
If it's possible and not too technical, I'd love to get some tools to read RAM as well (to get info on the player's location, orientation etc). I'm pretty sure they must be out there, judging by the amount of TAS videos available on youtube, but I just can't seem to find them.
Any help, any at all, is greatly appreciated.
Many thanks,
shoefight
PS: i have a decent understanding of how computers and software work, and with explanation I can easily learn
In principle we don't accept runs of modified games, which rules out games that have been modified for tool-assisted speedrunning. Also (unless this policy has been changed) we don't generally accept runs in the form of a game's own replay system (for various reasons, but often because those can be tampered with in a manner that breaks the other rules).
All the input must come "from the outside" so to speak, not from anything inside the game. This means, effectively, that we only accept runs of original unmodified games run in emulators (or, in a few cases, original games running on an actual console, with the key inputs being fed directly to the controller port).
Thus basically the only way of accepting a Doom TAS would be to run it on an emulator (which in practice means DOSBox). However, AFAIK there are some emulation difficulties in this (or at least there had been in the past; I haven't been following the DOSBox TASing status recently).
Anyway, if you are interested in making a Doom TAS, you ought to look in that direction, ie. see if you can use DOSBox for this.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
I'm in love with Doom too, but, like you, I can't find commands =)
The best rerecording emulator programme for Doom is PrBoom+ (using GlBoom+ for avaliable cheats like WallHack), but I got the problem with rerecording/continuing the runs.
As we know, it's possible to do a savestate, but impossible to load it while recording the movie. I was trying to contact with other Doom runners to discover which commands do they use to continue the recording if they do a mistake, but no-one explained. Someone was talking about the command "recordfromto", but it just continues the recording from the last frame in the movie.
Here is the... general topic about PrBoom+. Good luck!
P.S: here are my first tries of making Doom TASes. Each map was started like new game (pistol only) and done in single segment (I decided to TAS the one of my favourite WADS - Freedoom.wad)
Map 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQ_NURwhg-Q
Map 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsIKvtL7SsA
Map 3 (failed): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-c3JkWmyS5w
Map 3 (segmented, used Sony Vegas): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=af8FPEJYuKI
(continuing):
The playlist of all full TASes on different Doom megaWADs (encoded by Sp00kyFox).
TASing is like making a film: only the best takes are shown in the final movie.
Has anyone set DooM up in JPC-rr? That'd probably be better for TASing it as far as our community is concerned since that way you get the tools we generally look for.
We can't even TAS Wolfenstein 3D (dwangoAC TASed only 1st map and then stopped). JPC-rr is difficult in work with mouse. On the page of bad game choices (there) the reason of not TASing Doom 32X is "Inferior port. TAS movies already exist for the PC version."
Where is the publication of this PC version? Give me the link :-)
TASing is like making a film: only the best takes are shown in the final movie.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Probably not on this site; my understanding is that Doom TASing developed as it's own subcommunity to general Doom Speedrunning, much like how our community developed out of the general Speedrunning community after The Infamous Video.
Whoa thanks a lot for the (elaborate) replies guys!
I'll be reading into it :) got a lot of reading to do now
From first glance, it looks like there is no such thing as a nice and clean UI that shows frames, position/orientation variables, and allows you to redo segments at will. I was hoping to find that but oh well, we'll have to row with the peddles we've got, as we say in Dutch :)
Again many thanks
shoefight
Joined: 4/8/2005
Posts: 1573
Location: Gone for a year, just for varietyyyyyyyyy!!
Dimon12321 wrote:
Where is the publication of this PC version?
Oh, I meant the same runs that you linked to.
The DooMed Speed Demos Archive also has lots of TAS movies, but you need to navigate through the large database to find a specific run. The site is updated regularly (once a week), but only publishes the input files.
Btw, given that other DOS/Windows games have been TASed, what exactly was the problem with Doom being TASed via emulation? I don't remember anymore.
What about Windows: no mouse support. I'm sure it will be possible to TAS it when Hourglass-Resurrection will be released. Also, i don't know where to get the original game and does it work on Win7, Doom has lots of engines. So, you open any engine (PrBoom, GZDoom, Zandronum, Chocolate Doom etc.) with Hourglass, which automatically opens Doom.wad (or Doom2.wad). I don't know will it work without desyncs, not talking about work stability!
What about DOS: also difficult to emulate mouse! You have to read Wolfenstein 3D thread where dwangoAC was writing about the mouse emulation beside the walkthrough. I don't understand what are the details of the problem, but I'm sure it has smth to do with TASing mouse-required games. The problem seems to be difficult as he TASed only 1 map and suddenly stopped. In short, you have to find out.
TASing is like making a film: only the best takes are shown in the final movie.
If Doom is ever fully TASed inside a DOS emulator, it ought to definitely be the original Doom, not any of the newer wad-compatible engines. (In a sense those could be categorized as mods, not the original game.)
Did the original Doom even support the mouse? I can't remember. Even if it did, it was something that not many people even used back then. (Of course using the mouse would do wonders to a TAS because of almost infinite turn speed, while keyboard turning would feel extremely sluggish in comparison.)
If Doom is ever fully TASed inside a DOS emulator, it ought to definitely be the original Doom, not any of the newer wad-compatible engines. (In a sense those could be categorized as mods, not the original game.)
Did the original Doom even support the mouse? I can't remember. Even if it did, it was something that not many people even used back then. (Of course using the mouse would do wonders to a TAS because of almost infinite turn speed, while keyboard turning would feel extremely sluggish in comparison.)
I have found a thread (not TASVideos), where some people discussed the mouse support for Doom. According to them, the original Doom never had mouse support, but it's possible to play it with mouse if mouse drivers are installed. We need to check it.
DOS Doom link 1DOS Doom link 2
TASing is like making a film: only the best takes are shown in the final movie.
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Probably it should be given another try with jpc.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.