Nakamaru
Smash Master
I recently talked to the Youtube user mugg1991 getting some help on how to get started with TAS using Dolphin. With his permission i am putting his information here so that others that might want to TAS on their own might have a little easier time getting started.
Dolphin TAS Setup
-To start off you will need Dolphin. Since it is against the TOS to link anything just Google Dolphin and look for r7719. Later builds have issues and earlier ones can be buggy.
-Now you will need the SSBM NTSC ISO. This should be easy to obtain with the abundance of hacking happening these days. If you can't seem to find it there is a good one on Demonoid that i use.
Get it and place it in the same folder Dolphin is in. (Makes searching for it easier)
-Set up your setting to look like this:
http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=266039#266039
You may or may not see the dialog box for "Emulator Display Settings" under the Display tab. Display also may be called Interface. It is the same thing, just match the settings.
-Download these files:
http://www.mediafire.com/?xqwq7a3yvv1y5ew
Un-Zip them and place them in "Dolphin/User/GC"
Please PM me if these files go down again. Just so the thread isn't cluttered with broken link posts.
These files are necessary for emulation.
-Set up your hotkeys in the config menu, and your GC input.
-Start up SSBM in Dolphin and it should ask you to create a memory card. Once made this memory card file will appear in "Dolphin/User/GC"
-Download a complete save file from gamefaqs (Must be a .gci file) and import it using Dolphin's Memory Card Manager.
Dolphin TAS Playing the Game
-"Start recording" will start emulation. Each savestate you make contains your button presses. So you can play around, make a state, close dolphin without saving a dtm (file that contains your button input), re-open dolphin and load the state to continue.
WARNING: Always disable read-only mode in the "Emulation" dropdown menu, since it's broken and if you load a state that contains button input while read-only is active, your movie will stop being recorded!
-"Config" -> "Interface Tab" -> "Hotkeys Button", you can set your hotkeys here.
Most important hotkeys are Pause/play, Frame Advance, and the savestate-related keys.
"Frame advance" can be ON or OFF.
When ON, pressing Pause/play will advance 1 frame.
When OFF, pressing Pause/play will only switch between paused mode and nonpaused mode.
-When you're done, save your dtm. Playing it back should always yield the same result. The movie will use the ingame settings that are saved in the memory card, i.e. if you made your movie in english mode with items set to OFF, make sure your memory card uses those settings else it might desync.
-You can use any of 3 possible controls for your inputs. They are keyboard, TAS input dialog box, or Controller. I use both keyboard and TAS input dialog box. Keyboard for button inputs and TAS input panel for fine tuned joystick control.
CAUTION:Even if the settings are the same, there's a slight chance it desyncs anyway. Sometimes trying to play back sufficient amount of times works. For people are having trouble syncing their movies even when using the recommended settings (though my guess is they weren't using the recommended settings).
Dolphin TAS Uploading to Youtube
-Prior to playing it back, go to graphic settings advanced tab, enable DUMP FRAMES.
In audio settings enable DUMP AUDIO. In */user/dump/audio or frames, it should save the avi and wav.
The AVI will be recorded in the resolution the window used at the time of recording the avi. So you should render to seperate window instead of main window, to make sure it uses 640x480.
-Merge Avi and WAV by using an edit program like sony vegas or movie maker (though movie maker sucks for obvious reasons), or by using avisynth (what I'm doing). Avisynth is a scripting language, you write avs files and load them in virtualdub and save the AVI.
-Sometimes there are frames that take longer than 0.016s (1/60th of a second). NTSC games use 60 FPS (frames per second), when the game loads a level or the next screen etc.
Audio still keeps playing during those frames but the recorded avi only plays 0.016s. So as a result, the audio desyncs and you need to put in extra frames manually to prevent the audio desyncs.
Dolphin TAS Extra
-If you press pause while advancing a frame, you can immediately see the pause screen. But sometimes you see it the next frame, due to dolphin behaving weird (I think wak once said it depends on how much time passed since power-on)
This can cause hiccups during any of your runs. So just be mindful that if something doesn't seem right when placing inputs that this may be the reason. In my experience it doesn't happen often but it is hard to notice when it does.
Dolphin TAS Setup
-To start off you will need Dolphin. Since it is against the TOS to link anything just Google Dolphin and look for r7719. Later builds have issues and earlier ones can be buggy.
-Now you will need the SSBM NTSC ISO. This should be easy to obtain with the abundance of hacking happening these days. If you can't seem to find it there is a good one on Demonoid that i use.
Get it and place it in the same folder Dolphin is in. (Makes searching for it easier)
-Set up your setting to look like this:
http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=266039#266039
You may or may not see the dialog box for "Emulator Display Settings" under the Display tab. Display also may be called Interface. It is the same thing, just match the settings.
-Download these files:
http://www.mediafire.com/?xqwq7a3yvv1y5ew
Un-Zip them and place them in "Dolphin/User/GC"
Please PM me if these files go down again. Just so the thread isn't cluttered with broken link posts.
These files are necessary for emulation.
-Set up your hotkeys in the config menu, and your GC input.
-Start up SSBM in Dolphin and it should ask you to create a memory card. Once made this memory card file will appear in "Dolphin/User/GC"
-Download a complete save file from gamefaqs (Must be a .gci file) and import it using Dolphin's Memory Card Manager.
Dolphin TAS Playing the Game
-"Start recording" will start emulation. Each savestate you make contains your button presses. So you can play around, make a state, close dolphin without saving a dtm (file that contains your button input), re-open dolphin and load the state to continue.
WARNING: Always disable read-only mode in the "Emulation" dropdown menu, since it's broken and if you load a state that contains button input while read-only is active, your movie will stop being recorded!
-"Config" -> "Interface Tab" -> "Hotkeys Button", you can set your hotkeys here.
Most important hotkeys are Pause/play, Frame Advance, and the savestate-related keys.
"Frame advance" can be ON or OFF.
When ON, pressing Pause/play will advance 1 frame.
When OFF, pressing Pause/play will only switch between paused mode and nonpaused mode.
-When you're done, save your dtm. Playing it back should always yield the same result. The movie will use the ingame settings that are saved in the memory card, i.e. if you made your movie in english mode with items set to OFF, make sure your memory card uses those settings else it might desync.
-You can use any of 3 possible controls for your inputs. They are keyboard, TAS input dialog box, or Controller. I use both keyboard and TAS input dialog box. Keyboard for button inputs and TAS input panel for fine tuned joystick control.
CAUTION:Even if the settings are the same, there's a slight chance it desyncs anyway. Sometimes trying to play back sufficient amount of times works. For people are having trouble syncing their movies even when using the recommended settings (though my guess is they weren't using the recommended settings).
Dolphin TAS Uploading to Youtube
-Prior to playing it back, go to graphic settings advanced tab, enable DUMP FRAMES.
In audio settings enable DUMP AUDIO. In */user/dump/audio or frames, it should save the avi and wav.
The AVI will be recorded in the resolution the window used at the time of recording the avi. So you should render to seperate window instead of main window, to make sure it uses 640x480.
-Merge Avi and WAV by using an edit program like sony vegas or movie maker (though movie maker sucks for obvious reasons), or by using avisynth (what I'm doing). Avisynth is a scripting language, you write avs files and load them in virtualdub and save the AVI.
-Sometimes there are frames that take longer than 0.016s (1/60th of a second). NTSC games use 60 FPS (frames per second), when the game loads a level or the next screen etc.
Audio still keeps playing during those frames but the recorded avi only plays 0.016s. So as a result, the audio desyncs and you need to put in extra frames manually to prevent the audio desyncs.
Dolphin TAS Extra
-If you press pause while advancing a frame, you can immediately see the pause screen. But sometimes you see it the next frame, due to dolphin behaving weird (I think wak once said it depends on how much time passed since power-on)
This can cause hiccups during any of your runs. So just be mindful that if something doesn't seem right when placing inputs that this may be the reason. In my experience it doesn't happen often but it is hard to notice when it does.
