Jump to content
Jet Set Willy & Manic Miner Community

Automated generation of Manic Miner speedrun/walkthrough


crem

Recommended Posts

I believe that if the jump at 22 seconds was replaced by walking off the platform instead, then it might save one time-frame (equating to one more point)? Because jumping forwards, when you can walk continuously forwards instead, slightly slows you down.  (I'm not certain though, because that jump ends in a fall to a lower level which has to be executed anyway, even if you walk that bit.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 hours ago, IRF said:

For Eugene, you might need to adjust your algorithm so that it collects the nearest item to the portal last - even if that means passing close by to it without grabbing it straight away, but coming back for it once all other items have been bagged.

And also, if Eugene is too close to the portal at the point when Willy is about to finally collect that item, you might have to get him to wait around [which I know you've said the algorithm doesn't like to do!] until Eugene has ascended to a height that allows Willy to sneak into the portal once it starts flashing (whereupon Eugene becomes angry and starts descending again).

I don't want to give it too much hints, that way there is more hope that it finds something that humans didn't think about (extremely unlikely though, but that way the algorithm still feels more "pure").

Basically currently there are only two components in scoring:

  • Prefer new places on the screen to the places already visited (encourages exploration rather than staying in one place).
  • Slightly prefer more collected items to less collected items (to have some feel or progress).

I think I'll do the following two changes:

  • If Eugene sits on portal, that's loss.
  • Encourage more exploration not only by looking at Willy's location, but also at Eugene's location (when it's falling).

Only if that won't work, I'll also add penalty to scoring, preferring Eugene at higher positions.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, IRF said:

I believe that if the jump at 22 seconds was replaced by walking off the platform instead, then it might save one time-frame (equating to one more point)? Because jumping forwards, when you can walk continuously forwards instead, slightly slows you down.  (I'm not certain though, because that jump ends in a fall to a lower level which has to be executed anyway, even if you walk that bit.)

I've just checked that, and it doesn't help.

If I replace that jump with the same amount of frames walking right, it still works, but if it walks one frame fewer, the second jump is too early.

In general I expect that the tool should find such local optimizations fine; usually it's much harder to discover strategies where cause and effect are further in time.

If someone happens to have .rzx file for the 1854 score walkthrough (or a video, which is slightly worse but doable with frame-by-frame manual comparison), that would be really helpful to debug what's wrong there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 minutes ago, IRF said:

Attached is JetSetDanny's (Daniel Gromann's) RZX recording of Abandoned Uranium Workings, in which he achieved a score of 1854 points.

04 Abandoned Uranium Workings.rzx 20.82 kB · 1 download

Thanks, will take a look where the difference is.

Do you know which emulator can open it? Fuse complains at it for some reason.

Meanwhile, here is the level 6. This time it did achieve the highest known score of 1821.

lvl6_20210309-0450.rzx

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It will also work in Spectaculator.

Thanks for uploading it, Ian! 👍

The complete set of my RZX recordings showing my personal bests in each MM cavern be downloaded here.

Thanks for the automated walkthrough of "The Processing Plant", crem! It's good to know that the algorithm confirms that my highest score there cannot be improved 🙂.

I take it you are still working on "Eugene's Lair"?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 minutes ago, jetsetdanny said:

The complete set of my RZX recordings showing my personal bests in each MM cavern be downloaded here.

Danny, I was going to provide that link to the full set of recordings, but I decided against it as it will presumably soon need updating - once you have managed to match (or perhaps even beat?) the current record score for the Cold Room? 😉

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.