100% Route [locked]

2004-02-20 11:23:07 am

Alright, I need you people's help.

I want you all to watch my "new" run. Maybe having watched the old one will suffice.

This can be found at http://www.metroid2002.com/daveb as usual. The individual segements (100-01 to 100-14) are the new run, whilst the 1:06:59 is called MZM_DaveB_100_10659.

Well, anyway, as I said, I need help.

Whilst watching the run, I want you people to try and think of ANYTHING that could be done faster, or, if you feel like it, suggest a completely different route. Otherwise, I will have to "sess" this route to get sub 1 hour, which I dont particulaly feel like doing.

I will take into account anything you people suggest, as long as it isnt stupid, as I need to get this sub 1 hour.

There are only minor changes between the 1:06:59 and the 1:05:04, so dont bother dowloading the new one if you dont want.

Thanks in advance to those who help.

Thread title:

Light of Day

2004-02-20 11:42:07 am

I'll gladly watch your run for you, but what version of VBA was it recoreded in? Also, my speed running experiance is near zero and my computer desyncs every emulator movie it can, so my chances of actually being any help are slim to none, but I'll try.

elbryan42

2004-02-20 11:59:11 am

I must watch that when I get home.

Zero Mission is starting to become an art. :P

DaveB

2004-02-20 12:05:54 pm

I use vba 1.6a with frameskip 0, and automatic frameskip off.

Light of Day

2004-02-20 01:09:12 pm

I've watched about half the run now, and unsurprisingly its very, very good. I've found a little trick you can use, though. It'll only save a couple of seconds, but I'll mention it anyway. After defeating Ridley, a few rooms to the right there is a room you speed boost through. The next room is the one with the secret area under the floor and an energy tank. If you save your speed booster charge from the last room, after shooting a hole in the floor you can perform a morphed shinespark to the right, saving a few seconds. It's not much, but I hope it helps.

DaveB

2004-02-20 01:23:31 pm

Well, I did know about the above trick, but then thought about it.

If you add the time taken to get the charge, activate the spark, and then end the spark, there is actually next to no time saved.

Also, for some reason I space jump the last e-tank, not sure if its faster or not.

Red Scarlet

2004-02-20 03:01:10 pm

I('d) like to watch (some MP3 runs)

Quote from Dave:

I use vba 1.6a with frameskip 0, and automatic frameskip off.

......

Sarah

2004-02-20 03:44:13 pm

Killer slowdown :x

Pekod

2004-02-20 06:18:35 pm

I've watched it twice, and I've got nothing.

Using the space booster on the last etank earns my respect-it's harder but faster.

The main question is whether it's somehow possible to get that Norfair power bomb early. I know wall jumps don't do jack underwater, but getting that thing is a major detour, and having it early would bring the run way under an hour.

Incidentally, this run taught me a lot of details. To be fair, I only spent about a week on the game, but it was still very cool.

1. Early super missle (are there others?)
2. Drop to tube in mother ship
3. Going right through the ball boost area to super missles in brinstar. (You can also get all items on one boost, coming from the right)
4. No varia, splitting up the Ridley run, and returning to chozodia from Crateria were all really good run design.

Red Scarlet

2004-02-20 06:40:34 pm

I('d) like to watch (some MP3 runs)

I know of a couple things I think that could speed you up, but I'm not sure..1 main thing is because I go back into the ship after getting the other items a different way, etc.

Warlock

2004-02-20 10:21:06 pm

Quote from Pekod:

The main question is whether it's somehow possible to get that Norfair power bomb early. I know wall jumps don't do jack underwater, but getting that thing is a major detour, and having it early would bring the run way under an hour.

I don't think it is possible. You'd have to have a huge number of energy tanks to survive that long as it is. And then you'd have to figure out how to get up there without wall or bomb jumps since they don't work in lava. Only way I could see doing THAT would be with a speed boost (do they work in lava?) but I don't know how you'd maintain the shinespark that far.

Toozin

2004-02-20 10:23:34 pm

Not impossible

just highly unlikely

Quote from Dave:

I use vba 1.6a with frameskip 0, and automatic frameskip off.

Isn't that... kinda... CHEATING?

Pekod

2004-02-20 10:59:17 pm

It depends entirely on how fast your computer is. With a very nice machine, 0 frameskip would actually be faster than a GBA, so the emulator has to throttle it.

If he's getting near normal speeds at 0 frameskip, Id say his machine is 1 to 1.5 Ghz.

However, there's the fact that certain areas cripple the emulator for some reason, specifically any areas with many enemies, including any area that has the tiny little clinging parasites. This causes a huge slowdown at a set frameskip, and a lot of choppiness at automatic frameskip.

You can note these clearly in the movie by the fact that dave's space booster jumps start to become much more precise in areas with many enemies, due to the emulator running more slowly.

In all fairness, there are no difficult tricks in rooms with many enemies, so this is never a cheat.

Sarah

2004-02-20 11:12:47 pm

I get superkilleromegadiediemydarling slowdown in Zero Mission on 1.6a in most areas and I'm on a 2.4Ghz machine with a great videocard and 512MB of RAM. The ROM runs a lot better in 1.7 and only chugs in a few areas.

Id of Ith

2004-02-20 11:21:14 pm

Quote from Sarah:

I get superkilleromegadiediemydarling slowdown in Zero Mission on 1.6a in most areas and I'm on a 2.4Ghz machine with a great videocard and 512MB of RAM. The ROM runs a lot better in 1.7 and only chugs in a few areas.

That's weird, it doesn't on mine and my processor is about 1.5Ghz (the rest is similar). I do get nasty slowdown in a few places, but it's solid most of the time. The emulator does seem to have issues with Fusion, though; going through the ARC habitat can really slag the emulator. Those little bugs are generally the cause of emulator chokage in Zero Mission. I wonder why...

Anyway, I'd switch to 1.7 but the run videos sometimes give me the middle finger when I use it. 1.6a seems a lot more stable for those, and that's pretty much all I use the emulator for.

Sarah

2004-02-20 11:23:21 pm

They're more stable in 1.6a because that's what they were made with most likely. Apparently you have to watch videos with the version they were made in or they desync. Which I didn't learn till recently.

lpchaos

2004-02-20 11:31:13 pm

How do you run the videos???

Under VisualBoy 1.7.4 (which you said you could run them right Sarah??) How did you do this??? I have no option to open such a file...

Marcosm64

2004-02-20 11:41:06 pm

to open the video (I think) you have to click tools->play->start movie (or something like that). The thing is that everytime I try it shows an error message that says "Save game is using the bios file" and then it shows another error message that say that it couldnt open the file. How do I get it to work?

DominicanZero

2004-02-21 12:19:57 am

直死の魔眼使い

-_-
Why people don't read around before posting? -_- Oh well...

Exactly as it says, the video was made using the GBA BIOS file. If you want to see it, you WILL have to get the GBA.BIOS file, or else you're just screwed. Doesn't get any simpler than that.

Sarah

2004-02-21 12:42:11 am

Should also mention you can't get that here ;) Just to prevent further question.