Possible work-around for continuing in middle of tape playback issue

[BryanFRitt]

Possible work-around for continuing in middle of tape playback issue

{ I'm sure things could be stated better / more accurate, but hopefully this is close enough to get what I'm trying to say. Feel free to ask for more clarity. Also, don't know if it matter's or not, but I'm using a theme based on a 1920x1080 theme found in these forums. viewtopic.php?t=2221 }

It is possible to continue from the middle of tape playback via a tape playback.
[] STOP, |> PLAY, || PAUSE at point to start from, () RECORD, Continue from here.

However as of this post there's a bug in R'n'D with this. The movements at this spot aren't dealt with in a way that works for future tape playbacks. (and high score server) It's like the 'I'm now stopping here now' and now I'm starting 'a new movement', instead of 'where it used to say my keyboard key down/up end state was', isn't being handled right for future playbacks (including high score server)

A work around for this is to make sure the QUICK SAVE / QUICK RESTORE and the tape playback [] STOP |> PLAY, both end up at the same position/time and are the not moving, before continuing.

Example/More detail:
Create a QUICK SAVE that you want to start in the middle of.
[] STOP, |> PLAY, || PAUSE to the point in the middle where you want to start from.
press () RECORD to start from here.
This will mess up for future non-QUICK LOAD runs if player isn't stopped, and is pressing buttons.
(QUICK LOAD keys are set up from R'n'D MAIN MENU > SETUP > KEY SHORTCUTS > VARIOUS KEYS)

To work around this,
After pressing || PAUSE () RECORD while a [] STOP |> PLAY is going on (to set point to continue from)
A> Non-paused, let the character come to a stop by not pressing any keys
B> Do a QUICK SAVE / QUICK RESTORE
C> Then do a [] STOP |> PLAY restore to go back to this point,
D> Which should ideally go back to the same spot/time as the QUICK SAVE / QUICK RESTORE, with both not moving when non-paused, But if not, do a [] STOP |> PLAY and repeat steps A> B> C> D> again.
You can PLAY/QUICK SAVE/QUICK RESTORE/etc... as normal after this.

This workaround may add some more time/movement to tape, but it's better than having a tape that seems to go crazy at some point.

For fun, Attached an interesting messed up tape

EDIT: Added "PAUSE()" to line before "A>"

[filbo]

This is an issue that Holger has been slowly chasing for years.

I wonder if you would be able to perform your series of steps, saving tapes at multiple places along the way (and then moving / copying them out of the way so the next one doesn't overwrite it) -- then provide a set of those tapes + narrative of the exact steps.

Of course it is quite possible that just simply doing a tape-save will 'break' the logic of getting to the failure -- but that, too, would be a massive clue.

A> Non-paused, let the character come to a stop by not pressing any keys

then save tape 'A'

B> Do a QUICK SAVE

then save tape 'B1'

/ QUICK RESTORE

then save tape 'B2'
etc. You be the judge of exactly which steps should be saved separately. The saves from one step to the next may easily be identical for many of the steps; that's fine.

[BryanFRitt]

This is an issue that Holger has been slowly chasing for years.

I may have reported this bug from different aspects/perspectives before.
I hope my what seemed/seems to be a good work around helps at least someone.

I wonder if you would be able to perform your series of steps, saving tapes at multiple places along the way (and then moving / copying them out of the way so the next one doesn't overwrite it) -- then provide a set of those tapes + narrative of the exact steps.

Good idea. I've attached tapes of this to this post.

From "~/.rocksndiamonds/tapes/rnd_tutorial_niko_boehm/001.tape" aka "TUTORIALS > NIKO BOHM'S TUTORIAL > 001: EMERALDS & DIAMONDS"
These were saved with the QUICK SAVE method after them. Is there a LONG SAVE method?

• Tape 01 Record full tape
• Tape 02 []STOP|>PLAY||PAUSE to get tape split
• Tape 03 Let it unpause enough to get to stopping point
• Tape 04 []STOP|>PLAY that back, Note: It went though spots I didn't go though, like it was trying to continue the original path, didn't press any direction keys, etc... since finishing Tape 01

[filbo]

These were saved with the QUICK SAVE method after them. Is there a LONG SAVE method?

I think there are two different SAVE methods. I have my keyboard setup so that the keys 0-5 map to the tape buttons. According to setup > key shortcuts > tape buttons:

Code: Select all

0  Eject tape
1  Warp / single step
2  Stop tape
3  Pause / unpause tape
4  Record tape
5  Play tape

And I am playing EMC levels, which means I'm probably in a different engine from you, and that might make a difference.

Anyway, I did this simple test:

1. start playing a new level (i.e.: with no saved tape)
2. do almost nothing
3. ESC to quit
4. now back at main menu, hit '0' -- game responds 'TAPE SAVED!'; a corresponding %d.tape file is created
5. start the level again
6. do almost nothing
7. ESC to quit
8. click the 'SAVE' button
9. game responds 'NO GAME THAT COULD BE SAVED!'; tape file is not written (note: if you hit '0' at this point, it is still able to save in that method; i.e. game state was not disturbed by the failed 'SAVE' attempt)

So it seems to me these are different operations. (Also, that the tape button labeled 'Eject tape' in the kbd setup screen should perhaps be labeled 'Eject / save'?)

=====

Above research done with RnD 4.3.7.0, which was the most recent build I had in my source tree. Now I have pulled and build the current main branch (4.3.8.2, commit de223003), retested, and reproduced exactly the same behavior.

The EMC levels currently have this user interface on the main menu; or at least, the levelset I'm on right now (EMC Haunted Mine 4) -- but I don't think these levelsets replace the main UI, unlike more RnD-oriented / originated levelsets. Anyway: on the bottom row there are I believe 10 tape-oriented or -related buttons, but I don't really get what they're all about.

rnd-tape-buttons.png (7.56 KiB) Viewed 12721 times

Starting from the left we have:

'square' (?stop?)
'2 bars' (?pause?)
'>' (?play?)
... then 3 audio toggles ...
'SAVE' (?save?)
'LOAD' (?load?)
... then tape indicators (which, confusingly, also contain an image of 5 MORE greyed-out tape buttons)...
'^' (eject / save)
'square' (stop)
'2 bars' (pause)
'red dot' (record)
'>' (play)

I've tagged the first ones with '?' because I haven't experimented much with them and don't understand what they're about.

(Holger: any chance these [and all] buttons could have 'hover' texts?)

ANYWAY. In my steps above, in step 4 I hit '0'. Since then I have confirmed that this is the same as clicking the 1st button in '2nd set' in my image. In step 8 I clicked 'SAVE' as seen in '1st button set'. These two buttons have different effects. But I don't know if they save different file contents -- because each of them disturbs the current state, so it is impossible to perform one then the other, in either order.

(Holger, I know you've explained these two sets to me before; or to the forum readership in general. But they continue to hurt my head. It is especially confusing that several of them have the same icons but do not necessarily do the same thing; e.g. 'square' seems to have rather different and sometimes unexpected effects.)

Finally, anyway, what I meant in my earlier post by << save tape 'X' >> was to use the '0' / 1st button in 2nd set 'save' action. But I now realize that this can't be done in some of those steps (like after 'quick save'), because they leave the game in a reset state. So I'm not sure if it's possible to get a good useful data set.

OR -- the 4 files you've uploaded might explain it all to Holger. Hopefully! :)

[BryanFRitt]

8. click the 'SAVE' button

For me, this button isn't available outside of when playing a game. Tried with 'CLASSIC GRAPHICS', and then based on the forum's 'WIDESCREEN 1080P'. I had been using keyboard shortcuts to 'QUICK SAVE', 'QUICK LOAD', etc... .

'square' (?stop?)
'2 bars' (?pause?)
'>' (?play?)

For 1st button set, I've only got the ||, SAVE, and LOAD buttons. No [], or |> with the |> button, switching between |>PLAY and a ||PAUSE button. What ARTWORK settings are you using?
MAIN MENU > SETUP > CUSTOM ARTWORK > CUSTOM GRAPHICS > ...

Then, creating snapshots using "quick save" should only be possible while recording the game, not when playing without recording (which would always result in broken tapes).

An additional restraint could be that playing shouldn't be permitted while not recording, or can play only while recording.

Instead of []stop going into an awkward unsavable* game play mode, it could go into the start of tape []|>playback mode ||paused, with a message of how tape []|>playback works, until a do not show again is selected, and/or these instructions could be added to something like a MAIN MENU > INFO SCREEN > TAPE USE

Basically the way I normally play with [] and |> (Which is to view a playback of tape, or continue from middle of existing tape), there's no need for separate buttons, and having separate buttons definitely confused me when learning what they do. New []|> button could 1st press go to start of tape, start playing the while playing it could switch between pausing and unpausing playback. When record or direction keys(etc?) is pressed it goes back into game play/record mode (instead of tape play back mode). This would likely affect preexisting artwork themes.

(Holger: any chance these [and all] buttons could have 'hover' texts?)

This could help those that aren't familiar with the buttons learn what they do, as long as it doesn't get in the way of viewing the buttons.

[filbo]

I don't think I've ever configured a custom art (or music etc.) set. Just whatever the levelset comes with or refers to. But you're on RnD levels, I'm on EMC -- those have different base layouts.

[Holger]

Also, don't know if it matter's or not, but I'm using a theme based on a 1920x1080 theme found in these forums.

This should not make any difference in this context.

It is possible to continue from the middle of tape playback via a tape playback.
[] STOP, |> PLAY, || PAUSE at point to start from, () RECORD, Continue from here.

However as of this post there's a bug in R'n'D with this.

That's interesting. So far, I was sure that the method described above produces 100% rock solid tapes (meaning that they always behave exactly as they should when replayed, especially, always solving the level during playback if they solved the level during recording).

In contrast, using "quick save" and "quick load" when solving a level is known to potentially cause broken tapes due to a bug in the game that I am searching for since many years, but never was able to find, let alone fix it.

It's like the 'I'm now stopping here now' and now I'm starting 'a new movement', instead of 'where it used to say my keyboard key down/up end state was', isn't being handled right for future playbacks (including high score server)

A work around for this is to make sure the QUICK SAVE / QUICK RESTORE and the tape playback [] STOP |> PLAY, both end up at the same position/time and are the not moving, before continuing.

I must admit that I don't understand this, even after reading it several times and trying had to guess what you mean.

Especially, using "quick save" and "quick load" as a workaround for problems with the tape controls seems strange to me, assuming that "quick load/save" has problems/bugs and normal tape buttons do not.

Example/More detail:
Create a QUICK SAVE that you want to start in the middle of.
[] STOP, |> PLAY, || PAUSE to the point in the middle where you want to start from.
press () RECORD to start from here.
This will mess up for future non-QUICK LOAD runs if player isn't stopped, and is pressing buttons.
(QUICK LOAD keys are set up from R'n'D MAIN MENU > SETUP > KEY SHORTCUTS > VARIOUS KEYS)

I'm not sure if I understand the intention of the above actions, but I can only say: Whenever any use of "quick save" or "quick load" is involved in creating a tape, it is subject to being broken.

That's the reason these buttons (quick save/load) are disabled by default.

And when I think about it, I should remove them from the default button controls of the custom artwork of the Supaplex and EMC collection.

This workaround may add some more time/movement to tape, but it's better than having a tape that seems to go crazy at some point.

Nevertheless, it is quite interesting that you have found a way to prevent this bug from happening! Maybe thinking about this may help me in finding the root cause of this problem. :-/

[Holger]

filbo wrote:

Of course it is quite possible that just simply doing a tape-save will 'break' the logic of getting to the failure -- but that, too, would be a massive clue.

Yes, indeed.

BryanFRitt wrote:

I may have reported this bug from different aspects/perspectives before.

Most probably yes!

Switching over to a slightly different topic (but which makes quite some sense in this context):

filbo wrote:

Anyway, I did this simple test:

1. start playing a new level (i.e.: with no saved tape)
2. do almost nothing
3. ESC to quit
4. now back at main menu, hit '0' -- game responds 'TAPE SAVED!'; a corresponding %d.tape file is created
5. start the level again
6. do almost nothing
7. ESC to quit
8. click the 'SAVE' button
9. game responds 'NO GAME THAT COULD BE SAVED!'; tape file is not written (note: if you hit '0' at this point, it is still able to save in that method; i.e. game state was not disturbed by the failed 'SAVE' attempt)

So it seems to me these are different operations. (Also, that the tape button labeled 'Eject tape' in the kbd setup screen should perhaps be labeled 'Eject / save'?)

Yes, these are indeed different operations, but it's far away from being obvious or clear to the user, which is bad.

Referring to your screenshot:

Buttons from the "1st button set" are game buttons, while buttons from the "2nd set" are tape buttons. And yes, this is confusing, at least in the context of the custom artwork of the Supaplex and EMC level collection!

This may be more obvious in the classic artwork set: The game panel (to the right of the playfield, at the top) contains all the game buttons, while the tape panel (to the right of the playfield, at the bottom) contains all the tape buttons. And they have indeed different functionality.

In the artwork sets mentioned above, they are all in one place, which is confusing.

The three buttons on the left of the "1st button set" group control the game. You can stop, pause and play the game with them (with the second and the third button in fact being somewhat redundant). When you stop a game, the tape is also stopped.

The five buttons in the "2nd set" control the tape. You can stop the tape, but the game will continue to run.

The "save" and "load" buttons trigger the "quick save" and "quick load" functionality. This will save or load a snapshot of the currently running game -- including the complete tape state. As there is no game running when you are in the main menu, you will get the "no game that could be saved" message when pressing the "quick save" key or button (but you can indeed load a previously saved game state with the "quick load" key or button).

What makes things even more confusing is that "quick save" not only saves the game state (including tape state), but also saves the tape. This is done to persist the game state when switching levels between quick-saving and quick-loading a game, as the game state is not persisted to disk otherwise. (Consequently, quick-loading causes the tape to replay until the end in this case, while it just recovers the game state (including tape state) from memory if the level was not changed between quick-saving and quick-loading.)

This could be cleaned up (technically, not necessarily from a usability point of view) by separately storing and reloading a game state saved via "quick save" to disk. Unfortunately, this would create a huge file of several megabytes for each snapshot, which would never be deleted again. Therefore, just the (small) tape is saved and reloaded if "quick load" is requested and no snapshot for the current level is found in memory.

I really understand that this is all terribly confusing and a mess that should be cleaned up.

(Holger: any chance these [and all] buttons could have 'hover' texts?)

Hover texts would also be useful at other places (like the setup menu or the level editor), but unfortunately do not exist and would have to be programmed for R'n'D (as it does not use any library that just by chance already offers such functionality ready to be used).

An alternative could be a special key to be pressed, with the mouse pointer changing to a "pointer with question mark" over any item for which a help text would be available, then showing a potentially longer help text on the main playfield area, with a "back" button to go back to whatever screen that was active before. (This would make it possible to show more than the short line of extra text usually shown with tool tops when hovering over some GUI elements with the mouse pointer.)

In step 8 I clicked 'SAVE' as seen in '1st button set'. These two buttons have different effects. But I don't know if they save different file contents -- because each of them disturbs the current state, so it is impossible to perform one then the other, in either order.

They both replace the previous tape file with the current tape state. But the "save" button ("quick save") also saves the current game state to memory (which gets destroyed when the program is quit of even if a different level is selected).

(Holger, I know you've explained these two sets to me before; or to the forum readership in general. But they continue to hurt my head. It is especially confusing that several of them have the same icons but do not necessarily do the same thing; e.g. 'square' seems to have rather different and sometimes unexpected effects.)

When I think about this, it hurts my head, too.

At least using different icons here may help a bit (although having the negative side effect of then being different from the icons for the same functionality in the classic artwork set).

OR -- the 4 files you've uploaded might explain it all to Holger. Hopefully!

I haven't had a closer look to them so far, as, unfortunately, they are only tapes, and do not carry any information about how they were created. That is, I cannot gain any extra information regarding the problems that may have occurred during recording or that may happen during replaying them.

[Holger]

New []|> button could 1st press go to start of tape, start playing the while playing it could switch between pausing and unpausing playback. When record or direction keys(etc?) is pressed it goes back into game play/record mode (instead of tape play back mode).

Regarding the last part, this is indeed how it works in GDash (the game from which R'n'D will get its new BD engine in the next major release version). That is, during replaying a tape, you enter pause mode and press any "action key" (direction keys or snap button), and the game automatically switches from replay to record mode! I was never sure if this is a good idea (maybe it is!), or if explicitly pressing the "record" button to switch from "replay" to "record" would be better. :-/

(Holger: any chance these [and all] buttons could have 'hover' texts?)

This could help those that aren't familiar with the buttons learn what they do, as long as it doesn't get in the way of viewing the buttons.

That can indeed be a problem: Moving the mouse pointer to a button, doing nothing for a second, then having a large text blob covering half of the GUI that only goes away when moving the mouse pointer outside of that text blob.

[BryanFRitt]

It is possible to continue from the middle of tape playback via a tape playback.
[] STOP, |> PLAY, || PAUSE at point to start from, () RECORD, Continue from here.

However as of this post there's a bug in R'n'D with this.

That's interesting. So far, I was sure that the method described above produces 100% rock solid tapes (meaning that they always behave exactly as they should when replayed, especially, always solving the level during playback if they solved the level during recording).

After doing the

[] STOP, |> PLAY, || PAUSE at point to start from, () RECORD, Continue from here.

Future QUICK SAVE / QUICK LOAD for the same run of R'n'D will go to the right spot(s), but future tape playbacks of [] STOP |> PLAY, and high score server will mess up at the point where the previous cut(aka continue from middle of tape playback) took place. Giving the player extra movement there that shouldn't be there unless conditions in workaround are met. (Same game conditions, like same spot, same time, and no movement after unpause for both QUICK LOAD and tape playback []STOP|>PLAY end.)

[BryanFRitt]

For fun, Attached an interesting messed up tape

From post 1 of this thread
LEVELS > SUPAPLEX > SUPAPLEX LEVEL COLLECTION 95 > LEVEL 100: =========IQ! =========
~/.rocksndiamonds/tapes/sp_level_collection_95/100.tape
100-sp_level_collection_95-MessedUp-ButMakesItToEndExceptForEmeralds.tape
download/file.php?id=1519

Messes up ~5m00s, back to normal ~5m50s, QUICK LOAD goes to 7m03s - 423 TIME,
This tape gets obviously messed up at the point where a cut had taken place, but by chance, shows it continuing movement as expected after a certain later point. Normally it doesn't happen like this.

It seems that it's the cut point itself is where the playbacks are messed up, not points after it, but those are often misaligned because the playback at the cut point before them is messed up.

Often I see additional tape replays[]|> after creating cuts adding some additional movement to where the cut took place. Basically after a cut, future tape playbacks[]|> are messed at the point of the cut with extra movement that shouldn't be there. Note: This extra movement in tape playbacks []|> that shouldn't be there isn't included current QUICK SAVE / QUICK LOAD so that part is working. But would be included if QUICK SAVE / QUICK LOAD after another tape playback[]|> end. The work around is basically getting them in sync with no movement that's in one that's not in the other, etc... .

[BryanFRitt]

To work around this,
After pressing || PAUSE () RECORD while a [] STOP |> PLAY is going on (to set point to continue from)
A> Non-paused, let the character come to a stop by not pressing any keys
B> Do a QUICK SAVE / QUICK RESTORE
C> Then do a [] STOP |> PLAY restore to go back to this point,
D> Which should ideally go back to the same spot/time as the QUICK SAVE / QUICK RESTORE, with both not moving when non-paused, But if not, do a [] STOP |> PLAY and repeat steps A> B> C> D> again.
You can PLAY/QUICK SAVE/QUICK RESTORE/etc... as normal after this.

This workaround may add some more time/movement to tape, but it's better than having a tape that seems to go crazy at some point.

Not sure, but between C> and D> add a QUICK SAVE / QUICK RESTORE ?

[BryanFRitt]

It seems that the [] STOP |> PLAY restore has a tiny bit of extra time right after the cut stopping point that it shouldn't have, and that's why doing this making sure not moving at same point for cut point for both types of restores works around the issue.

Also that it seems this work around doesn't work for continuing from some older tapes. [made with a different version?].

Curiosity: Could this issue have something to with using shortcuts to play at different speeds? (feature only in debug version <-- neat feature that I think could/should be in non-debug too; possibly in a button to switch to style, instead of the current a button toggle between it and a default speed. Update: Now made in to separate bug report feature request viewtopic.php?t=3591)

[BryanFRitt]

Questions/Thoughts/Ponderings (before I forget)
Extra movement happens at points saved during future playbacks. Is it not terminating the run at the right time the right way? Status of keyboard at save spots, key down / key up? Does paused status at this point have any effect? Does changing frame speed while playing or paused have any effect? Is it getting the right time? Does boulder/wall/etc... movement/non-movement pushing speed affect this?

This workaround seems to help a good portion of the times. Remember to unpause after playing back to see if there is extra movement that shouldn't be there, if there is, get to a point where the character stops, quick save, and try [] |> followed by quick save again. Repeat if necessary.