Electronic Super Joy

2014-03-27 01:37:01 pm

Hm, I guess the main question for 100% is if we're counting world 4 as part of it, as otherwise its basically just getting all the stars and then beating the game I'd say.

bowlercaptain

2014-03-28 07:16:56 pm

Okay, I propose the following set of categories, arranged in order of how long they are likely to take. We can modify this list as necessary:
Any%: Play the game in such a way that, from a clean save file, would have you enter the final portal in "Murder" and make the epilogue and credits appear ("In the years that followed..."). Timing begins upon selecting "Welcome" and ends on touching the end portal of "murder". For reference, the in-game timer will freeze when this happens.
Any% no pause&Quit: Play the game from the beginning and make the epilogue appear without quitting to the level select screen.
Four worlds: Play the game in such a way that, from a clean save file, would have you complete "Murder" and all five levels in world four. This requires collecting all of the stars. Timing ends when you enter the end portal in "Totally Necessary"
100%: Unlock the "100%" achievement, by getting all the stars and zero deaths and gold times on all levels.

slightly-less-serious runs:

Any% all stars: Play the game from the beginning and make the epilogue appear after collecting all 22 stars.
Super King: Unlock the "Electronic Super King" achievement, by completing the requirements for all other achievements.
World one: Enter the end portal in "Sudden Death" (This category was semi-regularly run by some SRL runners a while ago)

I phrased a few of the runs the way I did so we don't have to constantly clear our save files. Obviously we don't want people to just be able to pause&quit and just navigate to "murder" to win, but we don't want to lose all of our achievements and record times. Thus, if the motions you make in a run, if replicated exactly would accomplish the goal on a blank save file, it's legit.

As far as races go, we could make a concerted effort to populate #superjoy on Speed Runs Live (irc.speedrunslive.com) as much as possible so there's more often someone to race with than not. I still have yet to get to race anyone, which I would like to fix.

Thoughts on categories, anyone?

Okay, I propose the following set of categories, arranged in order of how long they are likely to take. We can modify this list as necessary:
Any%: Play the game in such a way that, from a clean save file, would have you enter the final portal in "Murder" and make the epilogue and credits appear ("In the years that followed..."). Timing begins upon selecting "Welcome" and ends on touching the end portal of "murder". For reference, the in-game timer will freeze when this happens.
Any% no pause&Quit: Play the game from the beginning and make the epilogue appear without quitting to the level select screen.
Four worlds: Play the game in such a way that, from a clean save file, would have you complete "Murder" and all five levels in world four. This requires collecting all of the stars. Timing ends when you enter the end portal in "Totally Necessary"
100%: Unlock the "100%" achievement, by getting all the stars and zero deaths and gold times on all levels.

slightly-less-serious runs:

Any% all stars: Play the game from the beginning and make the epilogue appear after collecting all 22 stars.
Super King: Unlock the "Electronic Super King" achievement, by completing the requirements for all other achievements. 
World one: Enter the end portal in "Sudden Death" (This category was semi-regularly run by some SRL runners a while ago)

I phrased a few of the runs the way I did so we don't have to constantly clear our save files. Obviously we don't want people to just be able to pause&quit and just navigate to "murder" to win, but we don't want to lose all of our achievements and record times. Thus, if the motions you make in a run, if replicated exactly would accomplish the goal on a blank save file, it's legit.

As far as races go, we could make a concerted effort to populate #superjoy on Speed Runs Live (irc.speedrunslive.com) as much as possible so there's more often someone to race with than not. I still have yet to get to race anyone, which I would like to fix.

Thoughts on categories, anyone?

Prismatoid

Edit history:

Prismatoid: 2014-03-29 12:40:04 am

2014-03-28 07:59:46 pm

I agree with all of those categories.

100% requirements for world 4 are tedious as hell, deathless is certainly not easy, but I'm going to be attempting to get some kind of baseline run done tonight. Do you think sub 40 is too optimistic of a goal?

I've been hanging around in #superjoy for the last few days and so far haven't seen a single other person, maybe this will change soon?

Edit: Default WR for 100% was 49:59.98 and improved to 42:38.xx. There is a lot of improvement to be done.

Freddeh

2014-03-29 05:56:43 am

The first two could just be shortened to RTA and SS respectively, as that's basically what the difference is.

ShadowDraft

2014-03-29 07:23:52 am

Get over here!

Quote from Freddeh:

The first two could just be shortened to RTA and SS respectively, as that's basically what the difference is.

I'd like to take this post to kick off timing discussion once again. I've been talking with a few people these past few days and we all agreed that RTA can't be viable because of actual slower load times between levels due to weaker hardware.

This has been confirmed via the world 4 boss level featuring Spike. Across 4 different people/computers there's been desync between a few frames and hole seconds.

This actually makes timing ESJ a nightmare (if you want to have fair competition that is) because there's no reliable way to count these invisible load times. We could try to reach out to the devs and ask if they could implement a standard load time not influenced by frame rate. That way we could just take that number and our RTA times and subtract it after the run.

Another thing is the build in frame limiter which I know is bad as it causes input lag.

What's everyone's thoughts about this problem?

[quote="Freddeh"]The first two could just be shortened to RTA and SS respectively, as that's basically what the difference is.[/quote]

I'd like to take this post to kick off timing discussion once again. I've been talking with a few people these past few days and we all agreed that RTA can't be viable because of actual slower load times between levels due to weaker hardware.

This has been confirmed via the world 4 boss level featuring Spike. Across 4 different people/computers there's been desync between a few frames and hole seconds.

This actually makes timing ESJ a nightmare (if you want to have fair competition that is) because there's no reliable way to count these invisible load times. We could try to reach out to the devs and ask if they could implement a standard load time not influenced by frame rate. That way we could just take that number and our RTA times and subtract it after the run.

Another thing is the build in frame limiter which I know is bad as it causes input lag.

What's everyone's thoughts about this problem?

Prismatoid

2014-03-30 03:22:44 pm

Quote from ShadowDraft:

I've been talking with a few people these past few days and we all agreed that RTA can't be viable because of actual slower load times between levels due to weaker hardware.

If RTA isn't viable because of "slow load times" then no category should be viable because every category has load times and some people are always going to have slower load times than others. This is the nature of PC gaming.

ShadowDraft

2014-03-30 03:32:57 pm

Get over here!

Quote from Prismatoid:

Quote from ShadowDraft:

I've been talking with a few people these past few days and we all agreed that RTA can't be viable because of actual slower load times between levels due to weaker hardware.

If RTA isn't viable because of "slow load times" then no category should be viable because every category has load times and some people are always going to have slower load times than others. This is the nature of PC gaming.

That's the reason why most PC speedrunning communities come up with timing settings. Amnesia restricts the viable times to gametime which excludes load and menu times. It's a lot harder with ESJ though because the load times aren't visible like in other games because the devs decided to give the game an uninterrupted experience. Or at least they tried to hide it very well.

Prismatoid

Edit history:

Prismatoid: 2014-04-14 01:40:35 am

Prismatoid: 2014-04-02 12:04:59 pm

Prismatoid: 2014-04-02 09:19:14 am

Prismatoid: 2014-04-01 11:32:05 pm

Prismatoid: 2014-04-01 11:59:59 am

Prismatoid: 2014-03-31 12:46:31 am

Prismatoid: 2014-03-31 12:46:15 am

2014-03-30 11:35:38 pm

VOD for sub 25 "any% single segment" if we shall call it that is on the way, stay tuned. Smiley

Edit:

Edit 2: Still working on getting a solid 100% run. I did improve the current run to 40:44, but there are still a lot of really sloppy mistakes that I would like to get rid of before posting.

Edit 3: Going to upload a 36:28 as the "default" WR because world 4 keeps killing my chances of doing any better (+5:00 world 4 while on pace for 33:xx got me a 38:04). Will probably upload tomorrow as it's late at night and I still have to render and my upload speed is junk.

Edit 4: Wowe such edit. There are instances in which stars you have already collected do not appear. In these cases I just pretended that they were there and tried to get them anyways. I don't think anybody would say that resetting a level until the stars actually appear is feasible.

Edit 5:

I wish more people played this game. ;-;

bowlercaptain

Edit history:

bowlercaptain: 2014-04-23 06:56:43 pm

bowlercaptain: 2014-04-23 06:22:08 pm

bowlercaptain: 2014-04-23 06:22:07 pm

2014-04-19 05:58:42 pm

So, for the aid of racing: Livesplit takes its run categories off of PBtracker: http://www.pbtracker.net/game/electronic-super-joy . It does not have standard split names, but it's possible to compare splits during a race if (and ony if, for now) the splits are named the same. So we should establish A. Some standard category names (which we basically have) and B. a naming convention for splits.

Because thus far people have been submitting to the category "any%", let's make that the any% RTA run. If people want to submit specifically SS runs, submit that under "Any% SS".
Prismatoid's been doing some 100% runs (submit as "100%"), and the not deaths requirement sucks. If you can pull off a star-collecting no-deaths run, you can get all gold times on all but 3-11, but resetting at the first flag after a star on 3-11 allows you to get all the stars and still have a gold time, and is a faster way to navigate the level. Because Gold Times are just a measure of speed, I suggest that we only worry about the things that can easily be verified for a 100% run - all stars acquired, all levels completed, and 0 deaths.
Because the deathless requirement sucks, I suggest people who want to do world 4 levels do "Four Worlds" runs (maybe "All Worlds"? Do the bonus levels count as a world? Certainly an "All levels" run would include the bonus levels. Would it include the stars? Probably. An "All Levels NG+" run would not.)

When the stars fail to appear, the game counts them as unlocked, so I say we don't require them to be collected. Until we figure out if or how to manipulate whatever makes that glitch happen, as a goodwill effort, we should try to pretend the star is there and fake-collect it to keep times consistent.

I'm not sure how to solve the timing problem. We should figure out the range and scale of the loading delay - if it's mostly negligible at the high-ish end, then the problem will cease to be as time passes and we all replace our computers when they die.

Also, #SUPERJOY #SUPERJOY EVERYBODY #SUPERJOY LET'S ALL BE IN #SUPERJOY AND RACE AND SUCH. irc.speedrunslive.com if you already have an irc client or http://speedrunslive.com/channel/ if you don't. If anyone wants some help figuring out how IRC works, contact me anywhere.

So, for the aid of racing: Livesplit takes its run categories off of PBtracker: http://www.pbtracker.net/game/electronic-super-joy . It does not have standard split names, but it's possible to compare splits during a race if (and ony if, for now) the splits are named the same. So we should establish A. Some standard category names (which we basically have) and B. a naming convention for splits.

Because thus far people have been submitting to the category "any%", let's make that the any% RTA run. If people want to submit specifically SS runs, submit that under "Any% SS".
Prismatoid's been doing some 100% runs (submit as "100%"), and the not deaths requirement [i]sucks[/i]. If you can pull off a star-collecting no-deaths run, you can get all gold times on all but 3-11, but resetting at the first flag after a star on 3-11 allows you to get all the stars and still have a gold time, and is a faster way to navigate the level. Because Gold Times are just a measure of speed, I suggest that we only worry about the things that can easily be verified for a 100% run - all stars acquired, all levels completed, and 0 deaths.
Because the deathless requirement sucks, I suggest people who want to do world 4 levels do "Four Worlds" runs (maybe "All Worlds"? Do the bonus levels count as a world? Certainly an "All levels" run would include the bonus levels. Would it include the stars? Probably. An "All Levels NG+" run would not.)

When the stars fail to appear, the game counts them as unlocked, so I say we don't require them to be collected. Until we figure out if or how to manipulate whatever makes that glitch happen, as a goodwill effort, we should try to pretend the star is there and fake-collect it to keep times consistent.

I'm not sure how to solve the timing problem. We should figure out the range and scale of the loading delay - if it's mostly negligible at the high-ish end, then the problem will cease to be as time passes and we all replace our computers when they die.

Also, #SUPERJOY #SUPERJOY EVERYBODY #SUPERJOY LET'S ALL BE IN #SUPERJOY AND RACE AND SUCH. irc.speedrunslive.com if you already have an irc client or http://speedrunslive.com/channel/ if you don't. If anyone wants some help figuring out how IRC works, contact me anywhere.

Prismatoid

Edit history:

Prismatoid: 2014-05-16 01:30:36 am

Prismatoid: 2014-04-29 12:28:52 am

Prismatoid: 2014-04-23 02:21:31 pm

Prismatoid: 2014-04-22 10:43:22 pm

Prismatoid: 2014-04-22 09:55:03 pm

Prismatoid: 2014-04-22 09:14:44 pm

2014-04-21 11:43:11 pm

World 4 in a nutshell: http://puu.sh/8iyWa.png

World 4 is really great: http://puu.sh/8jLri.png

What a rush: http://puu.sh/8jNQD.png

I am seriously considering never running 100% again: http://puu.sh/8jQiA.png

Improved to 34:10, not planning to upload it because it can be improved by over 2 minutes and because no one else is running it.

More edits: I would like to hear peoples opinions on either A) allowing world 4 to be done before world 1, 2, and 3 in a 100% run and B) a NG+ 100% run in which world 4 is done first should idea A not sit well (which I imagine won't). Both of these ideas are just for the sake of making 100% a friendlier, less reset intensive category.

100% improved to 33:58, might link it here eventually.

Prismatoid

2014-05-18 01:03:40 am

100% in 33:46.

This game is in desperate need of some discussion.

AmpliPH33R

2014-06-06 04:19:18 pm

I'm a Potato

I've found several runs of this on YT and Twitch. I'd like to start running this myself. My "pb" is like 30 or so, but seeing how I don't have a real or in-game timer, I'm not sure what to say about it. If anyone would be so kind as to link me to an accurate timer, I would love it. I'm new to the community and would love to get involved, and I think this game is my way in. I'd really like to see this game played at AGDQ or SGDQ 2015. This game deserves so much more recognition. I look forward to running and racing with you all in the future. Peace and potatoes for you all!

AmpliPH33R

2014-06-06 04:20:36 pm

I'm a Potato

Quote from Prismatoid:

100% in 33:46.

This game is in desperate need of some discussion.

I couldn't agree more.

Prismatoid

2014-06-06 05:58:39 pm

http://livesplit.org/ is the timer I personally use. Shocked

AmpliPH33R

2014-06-06 06:01:09 pm

I'm a Potato

Quote from Prismatoid:

http://livesplit.org/ is the timer I personally use. Shocked

Ah, thank you.

AmpliPH33R

2014-06-06 06:32:01 pm

I'm a Potato

What about cap software? I can't stream because my ISP is slower than our current rate of continental drift divided by the moving speed of a glacier. I've been using Action! for all of my YT vids for the past couple years.

Also, Livesplit isn't overlaying my ESJ screen. Is there something I need/can do to fix that?

Prismatoid

Edit history:

Prismatoid: 2014-06-06 06:35:18 pm

2014-06-06 06:33:39 pm

I capture with open broadcaster software which can be found here https://obsproject.com/ . To be able to see your splits you have to be playing in windowed mode.

AmpliPH33R

2014-06-06 06:34:28 pm

I'm a Potato

Ah, okay. I dl'd obs awhile back. Thanks a lot, dude. You're a legend.

Prismatoid

2014-06-06 06:35:03 pm

I just do what I can. c:

AmpliPH33R

2014-06-06 07:32:17 pm

I'm a Potato

In regards to "I Blame Your Mother," is there a specific position that you have to be in for the laser skip? I know it's somewhere near the center. I was doing a pretty decent (first-time) run earlier and I skipped the laser successfully on my first attempt and burned through the rest of the stage flawlessly... until I leapt OVER the end-stage portal and started all over again, and couldn't get it right on any attempts afterwards, so I quit.

What's the deal?

Prismatoid

2014-06-06 07:34:39 pm

Just mash stomp repeatedly and hope it works. I seem to get it 95% of the time.

AmpliPH33R

2014-06-06 07:47:03 pm

I'm a Potato

Ah, I see your point. I wasn't mashing, simply pressing at a quick pace. Now I'm getting it at about that rate as well.

Is running always this tedious? Like, I've only done one run so far and I didn't even complete the main story and I'm already exhausted and pooped. I know practice makes perfect (and from my death/fail count in this attempt, there's a LOT of practice ahead) but still. I guess that's just with being new to running is all... It certainly looks like it will be a good time if nothing else. I just can't see myself being skilled enough to even come CLOSE to your records or anyone else's. Just how crazy is this gig?

Prismatoid

2014-06-06 08:06:01 pm

Honestly, as long as you actually try to do each stage properly you will easily surpass the majority of the people running this game (the majority are above the 30 minute range I would say).

The one thing I always notice is that hardly anyone takes the time to learn the strats for most of the levels. As long as you put in an honest effort you should have no problem getting under 28 minutes. After that it's all about getting consistent and avoiding the small deaths that add up over time.

AmpliPH33R

Edit history:

AmpliPH33R: 2014-06-07 06:40:10 am

2014-06-07 06:17:26 am

I'm a Potato

So, with v1.08 has the RNG manipulation for Pride and Big Sexy Beast been modified? Or is it not possible to manipulate it in this version?

(EDIT: P.S. Oh my god I keep making the most simple mistakes in WORLD ONE of all things. My god this is frustrating...)

Prismatoid

Edit history:

Prismatoid: 2014-06-07 11:09:24 pm

Prismatoid: 2014-06-07 11:55:14 am

Prismatoid: 2014-06-07 11:35:27 am

2014-06-07 08:44:54 am

It is possible to manipulate the RNG in v1.08. Some people say that the method changes from person to person, but the people that I have helped with it have had the same patterns that I did.

Going to leave this video here:

Pretty sure this is currently the fastest run. Timing starts upon selecting the first level, timing ends when the screen flashes white after defeating the boss.

Edit: 9:55 Smiley