Time Gate: Knight's Chase

Edit history:

arnaud33200: 2020-07-21 12:37:57 pm

2020-07-21 12:37:26 pm

I recorded a new run, it's a 2:04 minute improvement, there are some small mistakes but overall it's a good run.
I will submit this run to speedDemosArchive tonight.

I think I will take a break, I got some stuff to take care of, I don't have so much to time to focus on the run for the moment.

LotBlind

2020-07-23 11:49:11 am

Quote from arnaud33200:

I recorded a new run, it's a 2:04 minute improvement, there are some small mistakes but overall it's a good run.
I will submit this run to speedDemosArchive tonight.

I think I will take a break, I got some stuff to take care of, I don't have so much to time to focus on the run for the moment.

Okay, so long as you're not planning to improve this in let's say half a year, it might be worth publishing now. We'll try not to take longer than 1-2 months after it's entered verification.

Quote from tigrou:

EDIT : could you run this tool (press ignore if it ask to install direct play) and checks if you have DDSCAPS_OVERLAY
I suspect your video card does not have hardware support for it and so it runs overlay in software.

Looks like I DO have it.

arnaud33200

Edit history:

arnaud33200: 2020-07-23 07:09:52 pm

2020-07-23 07:09:12 pm

Quote:

as you're not planning to improve this in let's say half a year, it might be worth publishing now

No idea when I will be back on that game, maybe more than 6 months. I guess if someone beat my time I might be motivated to work on it again ahah.
I'm finishing / cleaning the documentation for anyone who would be interested, especially explaining future possible improvements and link some useful files

tigrou

2020-07-24 02:57:08 am

Quote from arnaud33200:

No idea when I will be back on that game, maybe more than 6 months. I guess if someone beat my time I might be motivated to work on it again ahah.

we will miss you Cry

arnaud33200

Edit history:

arnaud33200: 2020-07-24 07:30:43 pm

2020-07-24 10:30:45 am

don't worry I'm still around, I will look at the thread sometime ^^
Also thanks again both of you for your help, I've learned so much!!!

LotBlind

2020-11-13 09:47:41 am

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxS7tVqRKnBgTlhQX1JpclpWRms/view

Please download this CD-ROM image: it's for the English SVGA version that's not offered by either storefront. I'm not saying speedruns have to be done on that version, but... looks better. I'm not gonna test it myself but I can only imagine it'll be even slower.

Mobygames lists Windows releases for this game. Maybe those can be virtualized? Would that mean less lag?

arnaud33200

2020-12-29 10:28:19 am

sorry didn't see your message (I don't get any emails to notify me ...)
sweet I will try that!
Also I think I would says I would not be to strict about where the runner get the run, as long as it's a valid version.
Maybe we can exclude the FR version which has a different behaviour with the pause?
Let's keep the way it is until someone else is interested to run this game

LotBlind

2020-12-29 12:04:22 pm

Yeah, those notifications don't always work I think. Sad.

Normally you just run whichever version is fastest, including different language and patch versions. I just linked that file to preserve it on more hard drives. Seems rare.

arnaud33200

2021-01-22 03:09:23 pm

When I will run that again, I think I would run the FR version, the pause button is better.
it's available here as an abandonware: https://www.abandonware-france.org/ltf_abandon/ltf_jeu.php?id=722

But for now, I'm focusing more on Sega Master System games, a little bit of TAS too

arnaud33200

2021-05-31 07:47:40 pm

FYI I will be running for SGDQ 2011 this July 8th at 8:30AM (EST time)
I think LotBlink you told me you not interested in GDQ but I was thinking I could let you know ^^
I will do a shout out for both of you LotBlind & Tigrou, you guys helped me a lot

LotBlind

2021-06-01 03:24:25 pm

LotBlink... :| That's fair enough, I am known to blink a lot. That's why I miss so many ephemeral events.

Anyway, you can always post something like this in these threads. I'd honestly rather you shout out the site, not me.

arnaud33200

2021-06-14 09:50:00 pm

sorry I meant LotBlind ... ><
sounds good I will shoutout SDA

btw, while I was practising on my run and testing my stream, I got a nice PB! my time is now 19:46.
I didn't submiit to SDA because I spoke during the run, I feel like it won't be valid

LotBlind

Edit history:

LotBlind: 2021-06-19 09:04:44 am

2021-06-19 09:03:01 am

Maybe trying to apply more known tricks before another SDA submission would be a good idea as well.

Yeah, audio must be clean, but you can set OBS to record the game audio into a separate track. It's really easy. One tutorial.

Worn_Traveler

2021-07-08 06:44:15 am

Formerly known as Skullboy

Good job on the SGDQ run. That rafter fall was funny. I'm glad to see the run went well.

arnaud33200

2021-07-08 08:49:09 am

Quote from Worn_Traveler:

Good job on the SGDQ run. That rafter fall was funny. I'm glad to see the run went well.

Thanks! yeah those falls are always funny in the game

arnaud33200

2021-07-12 10:32:58 am

I've forgot to post here, I've found a nice route that would save around 6 min in the run:

During the follow the monk glitch (Scriptorium), we can access the tower part. From there there is another glicth with Berwal cutscene that change William hit box to have a negative height. We can then go through anything and go straight to the Abbey, the last part of the game.

Bad news is the cutscene doesn't load, so we cannot progress since the executioner is not loaded. We still have the ghost ability to go through walls, so we can go directly to the secret entrance and splash Juliette

But then we get block by the door that bring us upstair where we need to push the cross. For now I'm think there are 3 ways to pass that door:
- Glitch to unload the door by dropping and picking up items (Alone in the dark glitch), that might have been fixed for time gate. I've tried recently and doesn't seems to work
- Other way to OOB (Out Of Bounce)
- There might be a way to trigger the cutscene, kill the executioner and then open the door normally
- Maybe there is way to get a glitched william with some saving manip, or maybe we can get into a ghost state again

I've made a demo video using the RoomViewer to pass that blocking
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1045616234?t=00h07m35s

I've forgot to post here, I've found a nice route that would save around 6 min in the run:

During the follow the monk glitch (Scriptorium), we can access the tower part. From there there is another glicth with Berwal cutscene that change William hit box to have a negative height. We can then go through anything and go straight to the Abbey, the last part of the game.

Bad news is the cutscene doesn't load, so we cannot progress since the executioner is not loaded. We still have the ghost ability to go through walls, so we can go directly to the secret entrance and splash Juliette

But then we get block by the door that bring us upstair where we need to push the cross. For now I'm think there are 3 ways to pass that door:
- Glitch to unload the door by dropping and picking up items (Alone in the dark glitch), that might have been fixed for time gate. I've tried recently and doesn't seems to work
- Other way to OOB (Out Of Bounce)
- There might be a way to trigger the cutscene, kill the executioner and then open the door normally
- Maybe there is way to get a glitched william with some saving manip, or maybe we can get into a ghost state again

I've made a demo video using the RoomViewer to pass that blocking
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1045616234?t=00h07m35s

tigrou

Edit history:

tigrou: 2021-07-16 08:55:35 am

tigrou: 2021-07-14 12:58:38 pm

2021-07-14 12:58:07 pm

Quote:

There might be a way to trigger the cutscene, kill the executioner and then open the door normally

I could have suggested you to take a look at scripts (as it could give you an oversight of what can trigger a specific cutscene or a door), unfortunately we can't disassemble the scripts for that game yet.
LifeDISA support all previous games (eg: JITD/AITD2/AITD3 ) because FITD has partial support for them as well (it's not the case of Time Gate).

LotBlind

Edit history:

LotBlind: 2021-07-16 07:09:12 am

LotBlind: 2021-07-16 07:09:03 am

2021-07-16 07:08:47 am

Quote from arnaud33200:

But then we get block by the door that bring us upstair where we need to push the cross. For now I'm think there are 3 ways to pass that door:
- Glitch to unload the door by dropping and picking up items (Alone in the dark glitch), that might have been fixed for time gate. I've tried recently and doesn't seems to work
- Other way to OOB (Out Of Bounce)
- There might be a way to trigger the cutscene, kill the executioner and then open the door normally
- Maybe there is way to get a glitched william with some saving manip, or maybe we can get into a ghost state again

1) Is the actor limit still 50 in Time Gate? That's normally not even close to filling out in AitD at least. And I doubt in Time Gate either. So this method is difficult to control (especially if you can't move between rooms or at least views) and requires a ton of collected items.
2) Dunno what forms of OOB still work in Time Gate. Certainly seemed like some of the main ones have been patched out. You should try "collision clipping" but even that one requires luck/messing around to make the slot order be right.
3) If tigrou ever manages to make them readable, check the scripts to see what starts the cutscene. If you can't meet those criteria, you probably can't do it at all.
4) Same. It's usually not the engine that does things like change bboxes. Kinda just depends on if there's anything in the scripts that does that.

[quote="arnaud33200"]
But then we get block by the door that bring us upstair where we need to push the cross. For now I'm think there are 3 ways to pass that door:
- Glitch to unload the door by dropping and picking up items (Alone in the dark glitch), that might have been fixed for time gate. I've tried recently and doesn't seems to work
- Other way to OOB (Out Of Bounce)
- There might be a way to trigger the cutscene, kill the executioner and then open the door normally
- Maybe there is way to get a glitched william with some saving manip, or maybe we can get into a ghost state again
[/quote]

1) Is the actor limit still 50 in Time Gate? That's normally not even close to filling out in AitD at least. And I doubt in Time Gate either. So this method is difficult to control (especially if you can't move between rooms or at least views) and requires a ton of collected items.
2) Dunno what forms of OOB still work in Time Gate. Certainly seemed like some of the main ones have been patched out. You should try "collision clipping" but even that one requires luck/messing around to make the slot order be right.
3) If tigrou ever manages to make them readable, check the scripts to see what starts the cutscene. If you can't meet those criteria, you probably can't do it at all.
4) Same. It's usually not the engine that does things like change bboxes. Kinda just depends on if there's anything in the scripts that does that.

tigrou

Edit history:

tigrou: 2021-08-04 04:02:50 am

tigrou: 2021-08-02 03:00:16 pm

tigrou: 2021-08-02 02:59:39 pm

tigrou: 2021-08-02 08:59:37 am

tigrou: 2021-08-02 08:58:58 am

tigrou: 2021-07-16 09:20:08 am

tigrou: 2021-07-16 09:18:20 am

2021-07-16 09:17:37 am

I took a quick look at Time Gate executable disassembly : it contains a piece of code that convert life scripts to human readable text (probably used by devs at some point during development).
I am wondering if that code can be called directly when game is running (eg: from a secret debug menu hidden somewhere). AFAIK there is no such thing in AITD1/2/3 executables (maybe I missed it).
Using that code, adding support for Time Gate to LifeDISA shouldn't be too hard (because we know the name of functions and their parameters). I don't have time or energy to do that but if someone want to give it a try I can give some hints and explain where to start.

EDIT : it seems AITD1 has similar debug functions. They are called "TraceMacro" / "DumpParam". Unfortunately there is no references to them (so I don't think there is a way to call them).

arnaud33200

2021-07-21 07:12:18 pm

Also I don't know why I didn't try before but putting the game in hard difficulty is faster!
the enemies give more damage but looks like the player also give more damage so the fights are faster

arnaud33200

2021-07-25 09:57:45 pm

I've tried some run and so far in Hard mode I have 19:19, of course it should be a different category.
Also I did some reroute:
- Scriptorium: after entering the garden while following the monk, I do the glitch earlier by going straight.
- Hospital: I grab the "Knife" (forgot the name) first in order to do just one loop around and fight the 2 guards at the end
- Abbey: since William is stronger, I can do the executioner fight without the horn and the mace

As I said before I'm playing the french version because of the "P" key to quickly pause buffering

LotBlind

2021-07-27 08:36:58 am

Making YOU deal more damage on a harder setting is kind of outlandish.

arnaud33200

Edit history:

arnaud33200: 2021-10-12 10:44:47 am

arnaud33200: 2021-10-12 10:11:32 am

arnaud33200: 2021-10-11 08:53:53 pm

2021-10-11 08:53:41 pm

I'm going back in the game a bit with the goal of doing a sub 19 min (Any% - Hard)

I found 2 nice thing with the old blind man part:
- we can skip the cutscene, we can pause right after climbing the stairs by holding ENTER and then drop the sword, the cutscene doesn't play at all and we can move
- there is a way to shortcut to the garden / outside court by going behind the blind man and drop an item right after he calls the guard. the door is open so we can just go. I cannot use this yet since one gem is missing for the hospital gem. also going back to the fire place, the game crashes. here is a video to illustrate:

I've also found setting aspect=false in the dos config gives a better aspect ratio, on the menu options are more a circle now, so I'm gonna use that from now

arnaud33200

2021-10-12 12:30:20 pm

Quote from LotBlind:

Making YOU deal more damage on a harder setting is kind of outlandish.

ahah right? it would make sense to do more damage for the enemies and less damage for William

LotBlind

2021-10-12 12:34:32 pm

Yeah, on a CRT monitor, the monitor itself distorts the aspect ratio so all these old games have graphics that assume that will happen. That's why it's difficult to make it perfect on a modern display.

Good skips! Keep looking.