Posted: 6/25/2008 5:50 PM
(Edited: 4/7/2010 9:18 PM)
Post subject: Aquatic Games - Entertainment superplay
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
EDIT: Read this post for the new, entertainment oriented run. I don't know why, but I just can't help it to make one TAS at a time. My Pocahontas TAS isn't complete yet, but that didn't stop me from making this one. For all those who have played the game, understand a little better how it is, and how this TAS can be rated. The Aquatic Games Featuring James Pond and The Aquabats is an "Olympic events" style game. In each event, you need to show your skills as a gamer and do your best. In this TAS, I show how hard the game can be pulled in some events, but in others, you just have to hold on for a certain time limit. Here is a description of them all, as well as my comments on each:
  • 100 Meter Splash: Press A and B alternately as fast as you can to build up speed and win the Frog in a race. This one was easy. There was nothing I could have done to improve the entertainment.
  • Kipper Watching: Some beach balls randomly appear on-screen. Your job is to stop them from hitting your seal friends, by knocking the balls off. The longer you survive, the better. 2 minutes minimum. This one had no entertainment whatsoever. Just bump, bump, bump. The ones who watch this are recommended to fast-forward.
  • Hop, Skip and Jump: A, B alternately to build speed, press C at the mark to Hop and Skip, and press C again when the angle shows as closest to 45º as possible. I just had to figure out what was the lowest angle possible to qualify. The minimum distance is 800.
  • The Bouncy Castle: Jump on the mattress, press A to twist, C+Left to do a back somersault and C+Right for a forward somersault. Do 6 stunts as fast as possible. I could swear that I made it 2 seconds earlier on the real console. Which means: NEEDS IMPROVEMENT, badly.
  • Feeding Time: Fill up your basket with goods, and than give them to the fish below you to keep them from showing up, and being fished to death. This event is so boring! Even though I fed almost all of them before they even show up.
  • Shell Shooting: When a shell pops-up, jump on it to make it fly, and then collect it in your basket. Launch the shell you have and pop all the balloons. I got really impressed by this one. Maybe could have been faster: 2 shells went towards me at the same time, and I had to jump. Also, I should apply the "jump after collecting" technique from the beginning.
  • Tour de Grass: Up, Right, Down, Left to speed up, and then jump when you reach a crab to avoid losing speed. It was suppose to be simpler, but it ended out a bit complicated. And it turns out that you don't loose speed when going upwards, if you are at max speed.
  • Leap Frog: A, B alternately to build up speed, C to jump over (electric) fences and water. Ok, people. This is where the run gets "o.O". The second fence is IMPOSSIBLE to jump according to what I've tried/could have done. It IS possible to jump over it, but somehow that got corrupted in this run. Maybe, MAYBE, this won't happen in the next version, probably the final.
Get it here. (I don't know why I didn't do this with my first TAS...)
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 6/25/2008 10:29 PM
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paul_t
Emulator Coder, Former player
Joined: 8/12/2007
Posts: 102
The first event and Tour de Grass were the most entertaining to me. Not to be discouraging, but this seems likely to be rejected due to "poor game choice." Also, you might want to use Microstorage for your movie files.
Posted: 6/26/2008 2:16 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Thanks, paul_t. I'll use Microstorage next time. About the bad game choice, I think I have to disagree. People who have played this game before are wondering what would it be like to pass it with TAS. The only things that actually support this being a bad choice for a game, is actually some of the worst events, such as Feeding Time and Kipper Watching.
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 6/26/2008 10:52 PM
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mmbossman
Experienced player (828)
Joined: 11/18/2006
Posts: 2426
Location: Back where I belong
GBx TAS of 2008
Espyo wrote:
About the bad game choice, I think I have to disagree. People who have played this game before are wondering what would it be like to pass it with TAS.
I agree with paul_t. If you plan on making this to submit it, I can guarantee it will receive only negative feedback, because it's an incredibly bad game to TAS. Many of the maneuvers look like they could be performed in real time with a turbo controller. I also don't know how many people here could claim to have played this. I owned a Genesis, and had some random and rare games, and had never heard of this one. If you plan on continuing for your own enjoyment, then have a great time making it:) But if you do decide to submit, I'm sorry to say that it will be rejected.
Living Well Is The Best Revenge My Personal Page
Posted: 7/2/2008 6:20 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Well, if you guys say so... I'll just do it for my own entertainemnt and maybe post a video on YouTube. I might actually post it on TASvideos, even if possibly rejected, seeing that Tool Assisted Speedrun videos aren't limited to just the good games; that would be stupid! Even though it may not be as entertaining, other games deserve speedruns too, either there are many or little people to see it.
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 2/19/2010 5:43 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Espyo wrote:
About the bad game choice, I think I have to disagree.
Wait, did I actually say that? I agree that it's not the best choice out there. However, people who have played the game might actually demonstrate some interest in seeing James [Pond] running at ludicrous speed in the first event, as well as the rest of the events. This is one of those games in which the only replay value is retrying the games to perform better each time. Thus, seeing a TAS of it causes a different reaction (something along the lines of rage, because we see the TAS performing better than the player can). Anyway... I posted my WIP on YouTube, and now I'm in the mood to redo it. I've already redone the first event (redone, what? It's exactly the same thing), but as for the second event... In my WIP, I was actually quite boring. Now I need some hints on what to do. A million things cross my mind, such as juggling several balls (without causing lag), trying to keep the seals awake for the longest amount of time possible, etc. Do you guys have other ideas?
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 2/21/2010 1:32 AM
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Truncated
Editor, Reviewer, Experienced player (978)
Joined: 4/17/2004
Posts: 3109
Location: Sweden
Arcade TAS of 2023 Sega TASer of 2021 Sega TAS of 2021
I guess I am one of the few people who have actually played this game on a console... I agree with what people said above, this movie is not likely to get published. But since I guess you are doing it for your own amusement, here are my tips: On the first level, it is possible to jump to grab the bird, which flies you ahead at high speed. I'm not sure if this is faster since you are already going at max speed. Worth testing. For the long jump it would be more interesting to see how long you can jump, under optimal conditions. For the seal, it would be nice to see a million balls juggled. For the unicycle thing, jumping is slower than going along the ground. This is especially obvious when you jump down a ledge. If there's a way to avoid this, perhaps it could be faster. The other timed events are hard to make interesting.
Posted: 2/27/2010 3:23 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Hmmm... Actually, you had me thinking, Truncated. I was searching for ways to make a fast run (i.e. completing as fast as possible), but actually, I realized that, seeing as the movie probably won't be published in the first place, I might as well put the idea of speeding aside, and focus on making it entertaining. I have to admit, when you said that a million balls juggled would be cool, I sort of mouth watered. Ok, that being said, I guess I'll try to make a really awesome run, without focusing on speed. Besides, most of us (people who played Aquatic Games) don't even know what happens if you touch the sombrero guys at the third event.
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 3/27/2010 3:15 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Ok, so far I've completed event 4: Bouncy Castle. I like what's been done so far, but that's my opinion: I don't know if the viewers will find it as entertaining. Now, there's just one thing that bugs the crap outta me. In my old, speed-oriented TAS, I did Bouncy Castle in... insert time here... And it was far from optimized. When making the entertainment-oriented TAS, I decided to be faster, because there's nothing more entertaining than going fast in this event. Turns out that, with better optimization, I get a slower time. -_- I'll find out what the problem is shortly, but if I don't, it'll just be another life mystery.
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 4/7/2010 9:17 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Ok. Finished the entertainment run. It's pretty neat if I can say so myself. I uploaded it on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCYIUbebd5g I probably won't even consider submitting it to TASVideos because this is a Tool-Assisted Superplay, not a Tool-Assisted Speedrun.
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 4/7/2010 10:06 PM
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mmbossman
Experienced player (828)
Joined: 11/18/2006
Posts: 2426
Location: Back where I belong
GBx TAS of 2008
Even though many of our submissions do aim for speed, a good play-around certainly has the opportunity of being published. Viewer feedback is the biggest decider for those types of runs. I haven't watched the YT link yet, but if you feel like it's entertaining, submit it! I'm sure others would too.
Living Well Is The Best Revenge My Personal Page
Posted: 4/8/2010 4:16 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Well, the user feedback IS an important decider. But I guess I didn't quite consider submitting because of how underlooked this game is. I may be wrong about that, though. I may submit it if I get good feedback from the YT video. And maybe after I improve event #4...
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 4/14/2010 1:44 AM
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Sonikkustar
Skilled player (1325)
Joined: 9/7/2007
Posts: 1354
Location: U.S.
Sega TASer of 2021 Sega TAS of 2021 Sega TASer of 2011 Sega TAS of 2011
That was pretty awesome. There were a lot of "WTF" moments like how you were able to clear the "100 Meter Splash" in exactly 17 seconds & the fact that you can clear "Leap Frog" without jumping at all! Also, the falling through the floor in "Shell Shooting" was definitely unexpected. This looks like a good TAS to submit. It has succeded in entertaining me. :)
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Posted: 4/14/2010 6:26 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Well, I have to admit that I've been thinking... I saw both the rules and guidelines pages, and guess what? My movie follows all aspects. And as a bonus, the "play around" category has been added recently (feel free to correct me) to the site. So... I'm going to improve some things here and there, redo Bouncy Castle because the fact that it's slower than my WIP speed TAS is driving me nuts! Here's what I think can be improved in each event:
  1. Maybe press A or B lightly without moving from my spot, but make the bar move, before I finally go.
  2. Not much that can be done here, really.
  3. Make the second jump land exactly at 799. -(Bonus ev.) Nothing
  4. Make it as fast as possible, add more splats, and maybe even move around a lot more. -(Bonus ev.) Maybe keep juggling until time is up. That may be boring, but I'm not sure.
  5. Try to make it finish in 2:00:00... somehow...
  6. Nothing.
  7. Nothing.
  8. Jump occasionally. Maybe make some jumps that looks like I'll just barely hop over the obstacle, but still hit it.
EDIT: I figured I could upload the gmv file for the video version on YouTube, seeing as some might prefer watching it that way. Also, seeing as I'm going to start the final version, I'm afraid I could screw up really badly... I always keep several backups, but one more can't hurt. http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/251922269/Aquatic%20Games%2C%20The%20%28U%29%20%5B%21%5D.gmv
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen
Posted: 4/14/2010 9:33 PM
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Antoids
Joined: 8/27/2009
Posts: 159
Location: California
Encode (might have to come back in a few minutes if it's still processing where you are) No offense, but I couldn't find much entertainment. All the games are very simple and repetitive. I think you did the best you could with what you got; this game just doesn't look very fun to watch. Still, a game's a game, and they all gotta go some time, so hopefully more people will weigh in with positive reviews. Doing it for yourself is fine, of course. I'm just saying this game is not the best suited, in my opinion, for TASing.
Posted: 4/15/2010 2:19 PM
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Espyo
Joined: 6/7/2008
Posts: 124
Location: Portugal
Wow, thanks Antoids (not sarcastic). But you didn't need to go through the trouble of encoding a WIP. Yes, the game IS really boring. Unless you play it with a friend, this game isn't enough to get you hooked. However, for those who played it and know how it works, some of the stuff in the run are interesting. Well, better get started on the final version before I start getting bored again, and not feeling like doing anything.
I'm Espyo from the SRB2 Forums. Current project: A Pikmin fan engine, Pikifen