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Classic Games (Games) NES (Games) Entertainment Games

'Perfect' Zelda NES Speed Record Beaten 103

Posted by simoniker from the wasn't-perfect-was-it? dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The last verified human Legend of Zelda (NES) speed record was 34 minutes. A few months ago, a re-recording emulator was used to make a 'perfect' video which was 31 and a half minutes. A team worked to optimize the path, and using an emulator created a new video which is 26:56, four and a half minutes faster. The video is 14% faster, and is the first Zelda run to be under a half hour. Furthermore, it achieved a sub-27 minute time, which was presumed impossible. Definitely worth checking out - you can grab the BitTorrent version of the AVI replay at Bisqwit's NES time-attack movie page." There's a thread on the NESvideos forum discussing the attempt, but can anyone succinctly explain the exact tricks the team used to speed up their time?
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'Perfect' Zelda NES Speed Record Beaten More

'Perfect' Zelda NES Speed Record Beaten

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  • Mmm. (Score:4, Funny)

    by bruthasj ( 175228 ) <bruthasj AT yahoo DOT com> on Sunday April 25, 2004 @07:40AM (#8964167) Homepage Journal
    Geek Olympics. Let the games begin!
  • can anyone succinctly explain the exact tricks the team used to speed up their time?

    Hum... Frame skipping?
    • Actually, wouldn't frame skipping speed it up, because the clock goes by how many frames have been rendered per second?
      • Nope, the fmv file prevents this, it only records the controller action so you simply download it and run it on your own computer and check the time.

        It would reduce the time shown in the avi, but not the time shown when you check fmv file.

    • Re:How they speeded up? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Vaevictis666 ( 680137 ) on Sunday April 25, 2004 @01:50PM (#8965917)
      They actually did some smart things to speed it up. I'm watching the older one (mfried) at the same time as the new one (sleepzteam) and the new one is doing quite a few things differently:

      1) Using (abusing) the Select-Continue to go back to the start of a dungeon (after grabbing an item, before fighting the boss) and to get back to the starting overworld area right quick.

      2) Going through the dungeons in a different order, which seems to keep the new guys almost a full dungeon ahead through most of it.

      3) Skipping out on some things - new one didn't get the master key from dungeon 8, and is using the new dungeon order to ensure they can get enough keys. They're also skipping out on the extra hearts from bosses for a few extra seconds - as it looks so far (half way in) it doesn't look like they're going for the level 3 sword, just level 2.

      4) Bombs. Lots of bombs. MFried used bombs only for blowing doors and some enemies. Sleepz is using them in regular combat to hit 4-6 enemies in one blow. Sometimes using multiple bombs for the silver knights and such.

      5) Flute abuse - sleepz is hitting the flute twice in a row, before the first whirlwind gets to them. Looks like this is still getting them to the same spot. Nice trick though :)

      All in all, I recommend people watch both at once :P It's entertaining to see them identical going after the sword, then one select-continuing, peeling left, and the other walk out, and go right. Neither have been in the same screen at the same time since :)

      • Flute abuse - sleepz is hitting the flute twice in a row, before the first whirlwind gets to them. Looks like this is still getting them to the same spot. Nice trick though :)
        I noticed him doing that, but thought it was a mistake. What does the double flute accomplish?

        • Re:How they speeded up? (Score:3, Informative)

          by Sancho ( 17056 )
          As I understand it, playing the flute increments or decrements a counter depending upon which direction Link is facing on the screen. Then that counter checks some value (like which dungeon you finished last or some such), adds to it, skipping over any dungeons you haven't finished already, and that's your destination. So playing the flute multiple times means you get to basically decide where you want to go (within the set of dungeons you've finished).

  • speed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tekunokurato ( 531385 ) <jackphelps@gmail.com> on Sunday April 25, 2004 @08:14AM (#8964275) Homepage
    I've beaten the game extremely quickly using emulation by cheating and saving state to gain rupees quickly at the gambling house, then getting the blue ring and other important artifacts right off the bat. Speeds things up like crazy.

    • Re:speed (Score:3, Informative)

      by Apreche ( 239272 )
      blue ring? wuss. First of all if you get the "it's a secret to everybody" guys you can get the blue ring before you get anything else in the game. Secondly don't you think you would beat the game a lot faster if you didn't get useless items like the blue ring? When going for a speed record you need to get only what is absolutely necessary to get to the end. Leave all other items behind.

    • Re:speed (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Sancho ( 17056 ) on Sunday April 25, 2004 @10:08AM (#8964651) Homepage
      It may make things easier, but if you can play a more or less perfect game, it doesn't actually speed things up. See, you don't NEED the blue ring to finish the game. Just never get hit. Other items can be gained easily on the way to the various dungeons, so there's no need to buy them. Even keys can be gained in an "optimal" way so that you rarely ever have to go out of your way to get one. Nothing you purchase in shops is necessary except maybe for the monster bait, and that's far enough along in the game that you don't need to gamble early to get it.
      • You also have to buy a bow and arrows to shoot the spider crab thing in the eye. The video has the guy playing the rupee game twice for 50 rupees each time, as well as getting an "it's a secret to everybody."
  • Optimizing is not that hard if you can do it with software. atleast not if you do ACM challenges.

  • Time Attacks Secondary Function (Score:4, Insightful)

    by neostorm ( 462848 ) on Sunday April 25, 2004 @09:41AM (#8964519)
    I have a huge game collection of oldschool titles I grew up with. Once in a while I pick them up to play through old favorites, but I am so busy nowadays that I rarely have 10 minutes to spare.

    Often times I just make a mental list of games that I'll play through again someday when I have the time. Well these Time attacks are a blessing in disguise, because I can relive all my old memories of childhood faves, not to mention in usually under 30 minutes!

    YEAH! THANK YOU GUYS!!

  • A few years ago Slashdot ran a story about a product that was used to cut a single frame per second out of television broadcasts in order to fit in an extra commercial. Maybe they used a similar trick :]

    • Re:"Trickery and Deceit in Speed-record Community" (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      You should read [link=http://bisqwit.iki.fi/jutut/nesvideos/whyhow .html#why]this page[/link] where they openly explain that they use tricks in emulators to ensure a 100% smooth play.

      I especially like that they are honest about this, and the part where they comment on stupid, loud-mouth people in forums that think they're being cheated before reading the FAQ...

      Don't worry, you don't apply to that group...

  • Emulation Speed? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anm ( 18575 )
    Can anyone comment on the accuracy of the speed of these emulators? Considering the dead time in just walking across the screen and loading a new screen, I don't think 14% increase there would very noticable. But details like that make a big difference. Personally, I'd have trouble trusting a recond time not played on an original NES.

    Anm

    • Re:Emulation Speed? (Score:2, Informative)

      by illuvata ( 677144 )
      you can download the fmv file, which basicly saves only what keys were pressed when. then, you can run the game on your own computer, and check the time. j just make sure you have the same rom they used

  • What is wrong with you people? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 25, 2004 @11:13AM (#8964970)
    Before anyone else posts something about how they "faked" the god damned movie, please refer to this page on thier website: http://bisqwit.iki.fi/jutut/nesvideos/whyhow .html#why

    They are very open about using various tricks of the emulators to achieve a quick run of the game. Even if you consider it "cheating" that is very much beside the point, because they clearly state that it is not so much a competition as much as for entertainment.

    They also comment on the idiots on various forums around the web that bitch and moan about their assumptions that these videos are faked, who also don't read the FAQ. I would hereby like to welcome you all (who have bitched and moaned about just that) to that group. Thank you for your contribution to stupidity.
    • I think you're the one whose failing to understand what's going on. The article explaining that these are faked is like the 4th link out of 5 and isn't made out to be an important link in the article. I doubt more than 1% of slashdot readers actually click every single link in any article with that many links. They'll click the ones that appear most important.

      Further, if most people knew how these were made, they would reject them out-of-hand because anyone can sit there and hit save/load state 100 times u
      • It's not only about not getting hit. Like you said, anyone can do that.
        But not anyone can (without lots of practice, thinking and planning) make new records.
        The previous timeattack movie at Zelda was about 31 minutes. It was done the same way as this one. It featured nearperfect fighting, like this does too. So why is this movie shorter than that?
        Find out.
        The answer is out there. [bisqwit.iki.fi]
  • Don't forget about my site. But what's a shame is that the existance of this cheated emulator site causes people to not want to bother doing speed runs for NES games anymore because then they'll just be compared against these and told they suck. I've been trying to convince TSA to do a LoZ run for me, he says he can get less than 29 minutes, but that'd still be almost 2 minutes slower than their "perfection" that I have no interest in watching.

  • Perhaps I'm a touch anal but... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by shaitand ( 626655 ) * on Sunday April 25, 2004 @01:57PM (#8965964) Journal
    Doesn't beating Zelda mean beating the ENTIRE game, not just half of it?

    The second quest is generally more difficult than the first. Saying you've set a speed record for beating the game but not even counting the second quest is pretty lame if you ask me.

    With that said, the gameplay was pretty impressive, it's definately the fastest I've ever seen the first half of the game accomplished.
  • I'm not an expert in this field, but for time run competitions and such, arn't you supposed to use a real nes with a real cart? I vaguely remember reading rules that said emulators are not allowed, or maybe that was just for a specific competition?
  • upon reviewing the video, and comparing it to my nes emulator (rock nes) running zelda, the video game speed seems increased, or at least link's run speed. I compared different scenes throughout the video two different ways, with myself doing the same actions in real time to the video, and the "stopwatch" way. I tested various scenes that ranged from running straight across from 1 screen to the next, to ones where more controlled movement was involved, and in all of them the video was signifigantly faster
    • If they had auto-framerate off, frameskip set to zero, and vsync or triple buffering enabled, as many emulator users do to get the smoothest gameplay, it would have run at whatever is their current refresh rate, maybe 75hz, as opposed to 60hz, unless they took the time to change the default. So they could play a faster game without having intended to do so. Another possible speedup would be using a pal rom instead of an ntsc rom, though their site says that they only allow ntsc.

      I doubt they a have desire t
    • I downloaded the emulator file and watched it thru there. Im kinda assuming the movie itself is 14% faster just because the video is mainly there to watch it, and making it faster means you can watch what he did and not have it take up too much time. I myself haven't hit that level of boredom yet but you might want to try running the emulator movie vs you playing on rocknes.
  • to everyone who left their bittorrent running. Got an awesome download rate this time.
  • Way back when i had this golden cartridge in my mittens, it took me 3 months to complete it. The time i've waisted... But those were good times =P Best timewaste ever!!

  • A few clarifications (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Whoops. I put this in the wrong place. These videos were NOT sped up. They should run at the exact same speed. No frames were removed, no frames were edited, this is actual gameplay that you could get if you pressed the buttons at the exact same time. The only reason that this is 14% faster is because a better route was thought of. The only "cheating" that was used was slowing down the gameplay(the actual movie runs at normal speed though), and rerecording.
  • Using an emulator and save states to redo every single move over and over again and compiling them into a single movie, imo, isn't talent. ANYONE can get a fast time with emulators, because you can continuously correct your mistakes as you make them, essentially erasing your errors. All that's needed is time. True speed runs are runs that are done WITHOUT emulation, WITHOUT taking out mistakes, doing everything as quickly as you can do without being able to bail yourself out by r
    • Using an emulator to compile moves into a "perfect" run can be amusing, but, by no means, should it be praised, or considered talent, nor should it be recognized or publicly released, because it downplays the mastery of the true speed runs.

      *sigh*

      Look, if you don't like the concept of emulator-assisted time attack videos, fine, don't download 'em. But who are you to say that such videos shouldn't be "publicly released"? Your opinion is like your asshole.

      Personally, I enjoy the hell out of the videos, b
      • Except pro wrestlers do require a great amount of physical strength, speed, and endurance. These so called "time attacks" don't require anything except for an emulator and patience. Seriously, anyone can do trial and error against a certain enemy in zelda until you get things right as quickly as possible. To simply re-record over and over again to achieve "perfection," imo, just doesn't require talent, imo.
  • I however never really go for speed when I (re)play a game. I generaly like to look around a lot and do EVERYTHING in a game. It still takes me a few hours to beat Zelda because I do silly things like get the white sword, blue ring, and anything else I can possibly get before even entering level 1. My favorite trick though has always been getting the white sword w/o getting the basic one.

    Just my 1.5

  • I ran for about 1 minute. If I liked the time, I recorded it. If it wasn't up to par, I stopped my stopwatch, turned it back to the end of my last segment, and tried again once I caught my breath. When I combined the times and distances, it was marathon length... but in less than an hour and a half! Call Guiness!!

    *yawn*
    Seriously, wake me when somebody does this in a single run without restarts on original hardware. Otherwise it is missing the point, not me (as the FAQ would want me to believe).

    • Re:I JUST RAN A MARATHON IN 1hour 30minutes (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      So do you not watch movies and television shows or listen to music, since they are made with essentially the same process as this video?

      Get over yourself, these things are made for entertainment. The people who record them don't pretend that they're god's gift to video games. The point of these speed runs is just to show what is possible under the best of circumstances. Sure someone who does it without savestates is more impressive, but that doesn't make movies like this any less interesting to watch.

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