Speedruns

[TimeGentleman]

Just watched this interesting video about the history of SOMI speedrunning, and thought I may as well make a topic in case anyone else has any fun stuff to share.

 

 

The only other one I could think of off the top of my head is this one of Double Fine staff inviting a speedrunner to their studio to show them some strats:
 

 

[Huz]

I watched the top video yesterday. It's really good! Great to see it going into so much depth and being so well-produced - I assume the guy used the ultimate talkie edition to get the clips of the game with voiceover.

 

I learned a few surface level, simple things I didn't realise about MI1. Sometimes when you first visit the shop, the shopkeeper is already gone? Didn't know that! And you can learn one of the swordfighting insults from the troll? Didn't know that either! And some of the responses can be used on multiple insults? Hmm, I might have realised that in the past, but good to see it confirmed!

 

I liked the revelation that taking the "shortcut" doors through Melee town is actually a trap, because it's slower than taking the long way around - unless you use the Ctrl+R trick to snap the screen into place (and I didn't know you could do that either). It's always felt like using the doors doesn't save you much time, but I've always done it anyway because it's fun.

[Thrik]

I’ve never really thought about it before but I guess those doors are the first indication it’s all a theme park, where Guybrush rapidly jumps into the underground tunnels to reach the next door.

 

Only joking. But I do know that in the MI1 demo you can use the doors to get onto the parapet(s)…

 

 

Did they also have the shortcut behaviour, or did they just add that after deciding to bin the parapet? I never played this version of the demo.

[Huz]

What, you're too good to open ScummVM yourself now? Got to get your minions to do your dirty work? 😡

 

Well, luckily for you it's been a long time since I played Passport to Adventure, and I was intrigued! The other doors do work as shortcuts, apart from the one that gets you onto the town walls and the one housing the mysterious rubber chicken shoppe. Which is awesome, and a thing I'd totally forgotten happens! Super cool.

[Thrik]

Haha, yeah I guess I should give it a go once I get some time on the computer. I’m interested to see what other odd differences there might be, like the ‘dead chicken’ in that inventory!

[Scummbuddy]

"Use" "dead chicken" "with" "circus tent pulley".

[Jake]

That was a great video, with a great ending. I didn’t really know where the video would conclude, but the way it did was awesome. Love that they actually interviewed a bunch of runners. 

The game going slightly faster because you hit escape during the high frame rate sparkles on the logo was an amazing detail. 

 

It’s surprising that they use ScummVM instead of DOSBox given that ScummVM is surely different from the original interpreter in a bunch of subtle ways, but I guess it doesn’t really matter as long as everyone has an agreed upon baseline. I wonder if Aaron Giles’ upcoming DREAMM will be of interest to these guys, as it’ll have ScummVM-like ease of access but will be running off original code instead of a rewritten interpreter? 

[Marius]

57 minutes ago, Huz said:

And you can learn one of the swordfighting insults from the troll?

WHAT!

[Huz]

58 minutes ago, Jake said:

It’s surprising that they use ScummVM instead of DOSBox given that ScummVM is surely different from the original interpreter in a bunch of subtle ways, but I guess it doesn’t really matter as long as everyone has an agreed upon baseline. I wonder if Aaron Giles’ upcoming DREAMM will be of interest to these guys, as it’ll have ScummVM-like ease of access but will be running off original code instead of a rewritten interpreter? 

 

It would be interesting to know if some of the weirder glitches happen in the original interpreters as well as in ScummVM, like the one where the shopkeeper walks directly up to the safe instead of going up the staircase, and the one where you can "warp" to the beach if you click in the right place. In theory they should be the same if ScummVM is a perfect interpreter, but as you say I bet it's subtly different!

[Huz]

1 hour ago, Marius said:

WHAT!

 

It's true!

 

 

You can use the dog insult straight away in the swordfighting bit if you get him to say this.

 

This whole piece of conversation acts as a bit of a primer to the insult swordfighting concept, really. You can either "defeat" the troll with an insult he has no comeback for, "lose" with "Oh yeah?" (which ends the conversation) or end up with a middle result, where he gives you the insult above. It has no impact on how you get past him, of course!

[Huz]

I just did my own mini speedrun to get to the insult swordfighting part as quickly as possible, to confirm for the post above that the troll-insult really is available immediately. I was frustrated even doing that and it still took ages, so hats off to the real speedrunners who can get through the whole game in half an hour while streaming.

 

Of course, my run was slightly impeded by thinking "pot? I don't need that" while running through the SCUMM Bar kitchen, before remembering that money is useful for buying a sword and paying Captain Smirk. Waiting for the cook to emerge on the second attempt somehow took an incredibly long time.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Great video. Didn't mean to watch the whole thing but it sucked me right in!

 

Also surprised that ScummVM is what they use given how non-standard it can be. But as long as it runs the same across everyone's machines, then I don't suppose it matters. Fascinating watch.

Edited May 29, 2022 by ThunderPeel2001

[Glokidd]

4 hours ago, Huz said:

I just did my own mini speedrun to get to the insult swordfighting part as quickly as possible, to confirm for the post above that the troll-insult really is available immediately. I was frustrated even doing that and it still took ages, so hats off to the real speedrunners who can get through the whole game in half an hour while streaming.

 

Of course, my run was slightly impeded by thinking "pot? I don't need that" while running through the SCUMM Bar kitchen, before remembering that money is useful for buying a sword and paying Captain Smirk. Waiting for the cook to emerge on the second attempt somehow took an incredibly long time.

My strategy for the cook: open kitchen door, get yelled at. Look at fire: cozy. Wait 5-8 seconds and the cook will emerge every time

[Serge]

On 5/29/2022 at 7:21 PM, Jake said:

The game going slightly faster because you hit escape during the high frame rate sparkles on the logo was an amazing detail. 

 

Indeed. And of course I couldn't resist to take a look...

 

A lot goes on during those first frames, other than just showing the logo. The machine rating is measured, based on how long it takes to first draw the logo room - but that's not what causes the speed-up - but rather this (pseudo-SCUMM, as per usual):

 

override skip-intro
; some stuff to wait for the music here...
run-script sparkles
sleep-for 1 second

 

override skip-intro sets up where we'll go, if ESC is hit. "sparkles" is the script that does the sparkles ("run-script" means this script won't continue running until "sparkles" is done - or the override key is hit).

 

At the beginning of the "sparkles" script:

min-jiffies = 5

 

Yes, that's for "high frame rate". It sets the minimum jiffies (60ths of a second) for a frame to 5 - i.e. 12 frames per second. At the end of the script, when the sparkles are done, it's set back to 6 (10 frames per second - also the initial value for MI1). If you hit ESC in the meantime, the script will be stopped before it reaches the end, and "min-jiffies" will stay at 5. So you have to wait until the sparkles start - when it's set to 5 - and hit ESC before they end, when it's set back to 6.

Edited May 30, 2022 by Serge

[ThunderPeel2001]

That is insane... of course there's no sparkles on the Amiga version. So what happens there?

[Glokidd]

46 minutes ago, ThunderPeel2001 said:

That is insane... of course there's no sparkles on the Amiga version. So what happens there?

ooooh or the Sega CD version... on native hardware 😀 the entire run would consist of fighting loading times 😀 

[Glokidd]

Okay after hooking up my old sega cdx and firing up the sega cd version I just want to discourage anyone ever considering playing it that way for speed. the loading between transitions and even just wandering around is insane.

 

Additionally my LRG versions would not play which is likely an effect of how they made them. Most sega cd consoles don't really have copy protection so you can play backups unintentionally, later revisions like my CDX however added security which blocked burnt disc's etc. Not saying the LRG edition is a burnt copy but it may not be signed in whatever way sega used eventually to verify authenticity. my original release plays just fine

[CalisDraws]

I LOVED that video!!! (but then again, I'm a sucker for Speedrun history vids haha) Funnily enough, the world record was snatched 2 days ago without even using the credit early strategy so I feel like in a few months, this video will already be super out of date. 

 

It makes me wonder if other adventure games speedruns in the little community that they have are as well optimized as the Monkey Island runs but I unfortunately do not have the time to learn more about it at the moment.

[Trapezzoid]

I feel like SCUMM games are pretty bug-free for how complex they are. I want to see more exploits like that shopkeeper walk path bug.

[Scummbuddy]

Have you tried pressing Ctrl+W??

[OzzieMonkey]

One of the guys from that video did a speedrun marathon of all 5 games, and I gotta say, it's quite impressive. 

One part I found particularly interesting was that you don't have to take down any of Jojo Jr's hitpoints until you're down to one and then one hit will eliminate all of his except one where he draws and you beat him. What a crazy strat. 

[TimeGentleman]

As noted on the News page, the same channel that did the video I linked to in OP has done one for MI2:
 

 

EDIT:  ahh, this is the interview Ronzo was referring to when he dug out the LeChuck spawn code and posted it on his blog a while back (also reported on the News page at the time!): https://grumpygamer.com/speed_running_mi

Edited June 28, 2023 by TimeGentleman

[BaronGrackle]

I became fixated on Stan haggling last year. I think the current speedrun record went with: Walk away, reject 6 extras, offer 2000, offer 5000.

 

BUT he could have gone with: Walk away, reject 6 extras, offer 5000. Of course, skipping that one click for the 2000 offer probably doesn't save much time.

 

You could also: Reject 5 extras, offer 2000, offer 5000, offer 5000 again. That lets you avoid the "walking away" animation. I'm not sure if that would save time or not.

 

Disclaimer: rejecting or accepting the first extra (porthole defoggers) is irrelevant because of a bug, but I imagine it's easier/faster to just reject everything.

EDIT: The insult swordfighting stuff is fascinating. If you're playing Special Edition, Carla will never use "I've got a long, sharp lesson for you to learn today". So you'll never successfully use the "And I've got a little TIP for you, get the POINT" response against her. But these guys aren't on the Special Edition.
 

Edited June 29, 2023 by BaronGrackle