I decided to take another shot at it, here's my 5th run, 23 time units faster than fourth run, and 11 time units faster than the latest run. I have it here: Kung Fu by Deviance Version 5
Times for each floor:
Level 1: 1544
Level 2: 1556
Level 3: 1544
Level 4: 1544
Level 5: 1549
Hey Lezard, can I make that into a wmv and put it on my site?
This is slightly off-topic, but I wonder why WMV is such a popular format among some people.
I personally have difficulties in watching WMV files because my Win98 gets very unstable when I try to (it tends to crash, and most often than not after watching a WMV DirectDraw doesn't work anymore and I have to reboot). I know this is an individual problem (my Win98 has got so rotten by all the hardware and driver updates that it's quite unstable on many things, WMV playing being one of them), but it's still a bother.
Besides, WMV is a proprietary closed format with only a few codecs/players available, and it's a quite old MPEG4 implementation, definitely not the one with the highest quality. Using some more open and modern MPEG4 implementation such as Xvid or DivX (packed inside an AVI) is in my opinion a better idea.
Just an opinion. Please don't take this as a flame.
Besides, WMV is a proprietary closed format with only a few codecs/players available, and it's a quite old MPEG4 implementation, definitely not the one with the highest quality. Using some more open and modern MPEG4 implementation such as Xvid or DivX (packed inside an AVI) is in my opinion a better idea.
Surprisingly, WMV is a container format like AVI, not limited to a single codec.
Arc's Marble Maddess movie for example is encoded using "MSS2" codec which I have no means of decoding, while the cup stacking movie at the same page has the video encoding in MsMPEG4v3 codec (MP43) aka "DivX ;-)".
However the format itself is covered by patents and the MsMPEG4v3 is indeed old so I'm not trying to deny what you said.
Surprisingly, WMV is a container format like AVI, not limited to a single codec.
I probably confused it with ASF (or whatever the acronym was), which was Microsoft's implementation of MPEG4. WMV is probably more advanced than AVI (eg. it probably doesn't have the 2 gigabytes limit), but it still is a closed proprietary format, and I still have trouble playing it, no matter what they have inside...
If I didn't have any problem playing WMVs I suppose I wouldn't have so many problems with them... :)
I don't like WMV's, ASF's or any of those Microsoft's video/sound formats.. I prefer DivX and Xvid over those anytime
Actually AVI, and seemingly WMV, are just container file formats which don't in themselves define what multimedia formats they contain. You can think of it as an empty box which just provides some handles and holes to access what is inside. When you have an AVI file that only tells you that it's a multimedia file, it doesn't tell you what is the format the multimedia data is packed with.
Xvid and DivX are, however, concrete video and audio formats (implementing parts of the MPEG4 standard). You can put a Xvid stream inside an AVI file (and probably inside a WMV file as well, if I'm not mistaken). The audio can be stored inside the AVI file in a completely different format, eg. mp3 or ogg.
The problem with WMV is that it's a closed proprietary format. I don't know too much about AVI, but it seems to be much more open and supported. Putting your video in a WMV is like putting it in a closed box which you can't open yourself but you need a specialized tool to do so. And at least in the past Microsoft actively pursued people making their own tools (I don't know how phanatic they are nowadays about that). For example the great video handling program VirtualDub does not support WMV because Microsoft explicitly demanded its author to stop supporting it. AVI is completely ok, though.
So the problem with WMV is that not many programs support it, and those which do (probably without asking permission from Microsoft) may not always do it very well (eg. I have big problems playing WMVs with Winamp5 even though it plays everything else without a flaw). An my personal problem with it is that, as I said earlier, my Win98 gets extremely unstable when I try to play one.
As for which codec to use to encode the video, I suggest Xvid or DivX. Using Microsoft's own codec is not a good idea because it's old, not of very high quality, and probably full of proprietary enforcements. (Another format which I strongly oppose is QuickTime MOV, which has even more problems than WMV. And let's not start talking about RealMedia... Urgh!)
As I know there's no way U can use Divx or Xvid codec in WMV format.It uses is own format which is pretty nice for a Microsoft product but not as good as Xvid.So AVI rulz.If there's a way tell me how .
I give up with this game, i realized that it depends too much on luck the randomness of enemies, and sometimes you have to slow down here to speed up there, it doesn't follow a logic pattern.
I give up with this game, i realized that it depends too much on luck the randomness of enemies, and sometimes you have to slow down here to speed up there, it doesn't follow a logic pattern.
Do you have to slow down to affect the randomness, or does it work also by press arbitrary buttons during walking?
i don't believe it has to do with the speed, i play at 20 fps, 40 fps, and at full speed and I get the same results. It all depends on timing of commands meaning that every action (not button presses that don't affect thomas) changes how the rest of the level will play out. Theres a lot of experimentation involved.
Through level 2 when i reached the boss, there were 2 enemies behind me that i had to kick and fall right in the boomerang of the boss in a way i wasn't able evade costing me some time units. I analized Deviance 5th run and i realized that he was slowed a bit so that when he reaches the boss the boomerang wouldn't affect his time. I didn't mean the speed of the emulator, i was talking about your speed through the levels.
I've watched your new run, it's the same time as mine even if the movie info says it's slower. But Here are my thoughts on the levels of this game for future runs:
Level 1: I'm really trying to find a way to make the first level quicker since it hasn't been improved in the past 5 attempts at this game. This is by far the hardest one to do faster.
Level 2: this one seems to be the most dynamic. It gets improved almost every video, i'm sure it can be done quicker than 1556.
Level 3: Maybe a couple more time units here and there, nothing too significant if it is played around the same way. (unless you do something weird and it happens to improve the time). Many different ways of killing the boss.
Level 4: anyone who's done this game knows this is the most annoying one to do :P. I go 1545 in this level (in my third broken run) but have never been able to duplicate it. It could have been an error since i never got a chance to produce the movie. It all comes down to timing the low punches correctly.
Level 5: I thought this was perfect till I saw Lezard's second run. We can get it to 1550 or above.
I won't be able to try another run again till this weekend. Any comments on the above?
Here's my opinion:
Level 1: Agreed.
Level 2: Tried it a thousand times but couldn't make it to 1556, must the time where the two guys are kicked.
Level 3: Killing the boss the way i did seems to improve the time units a little, if you can improve the speed through the level, and use that technique with the boss (or another better), can be done in 1549 or so.
Level 4: I too, got 1545 one time, never managed to make it again, my level 2 of this movie was very imperfect and tried to improve it a little bit, i did improve it, but couldn't obtain 1545 on level 4 again, have tried it a lot and what i obtained is "hate" for this level.
Level 5 : If you can time exactly the 2nd kick to the boss, it is able to obtain 1550 and if through the level you try to avoid jumping all you can by kicking two guys in one jump, can get to 1553 or so.
Any comments???
Decided to try it again one more time before heading to sleep. I was finally able to improve the first level, and get the third to 1550. Its hosted on my site: Kung Fu by Deviance Version 6
Time Attack Details:
Level 1: 1545
Level 2: 1557
Level 3: 1550
Level 4: 1544
Level 5: 1549
Me and Genisto [have worked very hard to beat you guys ;) ] 1st version (probably the final one cause I dont think it can be beaten so easily) with FAMTASIA :p.
level 1 :1147
level 2 :1557
level 3 :1151
level 4 :1545
level 5 :1549
So enjoy it and good luck to beat this :D.
