Pause buffer on three horizontal flames in Energy Zone / Flame cycle
5 years ago
Łódzkie, Poland

I just watched the TAS video that Angrylanks uploaded and noticed that it does a pause buffer when dealing with the three horizontal flames in Energy Zone:

Is this a viable non-TAS strat or does it depend too much on the current cycle of the flames?

On a related note, is it difficult to determine the current cycle of the flames? Is there some magic behind it? Would it be enough to know how long the cycle takes and match it to the time one starts the stage? This probably requires some maths as I don't think the cycle takes a nice number of, say 10 seconds ;) but there is enough time from the start of the stage to the flames to know which part of the cycle one will bump into.

SchmidttyGames likes this
Florida, USA

The first pause buffer on the long flame really isn't predicable as of yet. There is no good "tell" that I can really give you yet, as I'm still studying the level. When I find any way to tell I will certainly spread the word. But I can tell you that each one is frame perfect. I have seen runners use a single pause buffer in runs, so it is humanly possible. But for the sake of your sanity, lets just say that four of them probably isn't.

I am re-working the TAS to theorycraft Waterfall, so hopefully in future versions, the pause buffers will disappear.

pawelpredki likes this
Łódzkie, Poland

Can you share some of the insights as to why it's not predictable? Does this mean it's not a 'simple' global timer? Or is it unknown when the timer starts? Or something more complicated than that? :)

Looking forward to what you figure out. This part is often one of the most stressful of the run so it would be nice to have some control over it ;)

Florida, USA

It just means that, so far, I haven't found any reliable indicators that could be helpful for human speedruns. It is on the simple global timer, but nothing before it in the level is on that timer. There is an extensive rework of the TAS in progress, mostly to theorycraft waterfall and to study Energy Zone and Hangars timers. I will certainly share anything I learn with the community. :)

Florida, USA

Upon further study of the pause buffering effect, it turns out that the game only needs to be paused for the duration of the global timer in order for the pause buffer to work, so it can actually be quite easy to pull off. You will lose frames every time you use it, but it can be used to shut down a lot of the hazards in Energy Zone and Hangar, so it might be worth adding to your bag of tricks for the game. However, it can only be used if you can anticipate needing to use it, so it does very little to appease the stress of that first horizontal pillar.

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