Automated generation of Manic Miner speedrun/walkthrough

[IRF]

13 minutes ago, crem said:

Actually, I only planned the entire exercise to potentially discover new strats for speedrunners, so I optimized for speed rather than score... But then it turned out that you have this high score challenge in this forum.

But ok, challenge accepted. I'll see what I can do to generate lvl19 highest score variant. 🙂

Can your algorithm hack into the cavern security system and turn off the solar beam?  That would help! 🤣

[crem]

Levels 18, 19 (fastest but not the highest score) and 20.

Other than Level 19 challenge, all done. 🙂

lvl19_20210315-0912.fixed.rzx lvl20_20210315-1450.fixed.rzx lvl18_20210313-1556.fixed.rzx

[IRF]

35 minutes ago, crem said:

Thanks for mentioning me in the high score table! I indeed prefer to write my nickname in all lowercase, so "crem's algorithm" is good. However, now the table says "creme" rather than "crem", that's not the spelling I usually use.

It is currently spelled as "crem" in the Download section, but as "creme" in the associated Discussion Topic.  🤔

[JianYang]

Great stuff @crem!

 

Could you check the level 17 rzx? When I play it back I only see Willy dying twice.

 

3 hours ago, crem said:

Among 20 caverns, 5 had improvements:

• 2 small (≤5 frames) micro-optimizations: Level 3 "Menagerie" (1 frame) and level 10 "Endorian Forest" (5 frames)
• 3 large (≥20 frames) route improvements: Level 9 "Wacky Amoebatrons", Level 11 "Telephones" (29 frames), Level 17 "Warehouse" (42 frames).

Five hints that @jetsetdanny is actually human? Or five hints that the jsd AI is so advanced to know that it'd better underperform a few times to prove its humanity? 🤔

[crem]

2 minutes ago, JianYang said:

Could you check the level 17 rzx? When I play it back I only see Willy dying twice.

Oops, wrong rzx attached, fixed it now, thanks!

(for some reason when I write rzx during the generation, the result is corrupted. But when I regenerate it from the list of moves in a separate tool which uses the same code -- it works. Not sure whether my bugs or libspectrum library, but either somewhere a variable is not initialized or deallocated memory is used).

4 minutes ago, JianYang said:

Five hints that @jetsetdanny is actually human? Or five hints that the jsd AI is so advanced to know that it'd better underperform a few times to prove its humanity? 🤔

I believe (actually, hope!) that @jetsetdanny uses some tool assistance like saving/restoring or slow speed runs.
If it's actually entire level run by hand, he should consider submitting a run to speedrun.com to move @RuffledBricks to the second place. 🙂

[Spider]

2 hours ago, IRF said:

It is currently spelled as "crem" in the Download section, but as "creme" in the associated Discussion Topic.  🤔

Topic will auto update after a few hours, as long as file description is right its all good. 🙂 Bit annoying I know!

I noted some gaps now since Danny updated the HighScore Challenge, so I'm going to attach them in the topic there for now and update the ranks. The gaps are simply an opening for 3rd place for Eugene's Lair / The Bank / Amoebatron's Revenge / The Final Barrier

[crem]

I've noticed in the table "crem's algorithm" is added to all caverns that my script ran (and it happened to run all caverns).
I think it makes sense to keep them only for caverns where the new high score was achieved.

For a script, discovering something new is kind of an achievement (maybe), but repeating what's already done – not so much, it's kind of expected.

[jetsetdanny]

Hello again,

Re: crem/creme

Sorry, when I updated the HighScore table, I initially spelled it "creme" (probably because of Norman Sword's earlier mention of "creme de la creme" 😉). I spotted this mistake almost straight away, but it must have taken a while for the download discussion topic to refresh, or perhaps Andy (Spider) forced a refresh. Sorry about the initial mistake! I can see everything is good now 🙂 .

I would suggest that "crem's algorithm" is kept - if you don't mind - at all caverns, for a very important reason: it shows at a glance that you have "processed" the cavern in question. Then it's a confirmation that one can't go any higher, and it sets a "crossbar" for humans to reach (if they haven't already).

Since there is no limit as to the entries in the HighScore table at the moment, I believe that in the near future the situation will look like this: there will be both "crem's algorithm" and the nicknames of some human players in the first places everywhere. If "crem's algorithm" comes first, it will mean you were the first to achieve that score. If a human nickname comes first, it will mean that your algorithm has only confirmed the highest score previously achieved by humans.

Solar Power is the only cavern now where there is no "crem's algorithm", as your current score is below the three best human scores, so I don't think it's worth adding at the moment. I am looking forward to what your amended algorithm will do, though! 🙂 

[jetsetdanny]

Thanks for checking my highest scores in "Solar Power Generator" on the three occasions mentioned before, Ian! 👍 I am glad and a little relieved to know I was actually consistent 🙂 .

If you saw the hundreds of times (literally!) I use Rollback, guys, you would have no doubt whatsoever that I'm human 😀. I wonder about RuffledBricks, though. He looks and sounds human enough in his videos, but I couldn't get even close to what he is doing... So you never know 🤪. 

[JianYang]

My theory on RB. He is some Rick Sanchez level genius, who at some point in his life thought: "What am I going to do with my super human abilities? I could solve cancer, but that sounds boring. I guess I'll solve Jet Set Willy."