![[TAS] Venture arcade 9 levels in 7:23 (333180) @Prog61](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/iHunQMt3dgY/maxresdefault.jpg)
Uploaded November 2019 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Tool-assisted speed-run (TAS) for Venture arcade, 9 levels.
From the "insert coin" to the display of all the treasures, it took 7:23 min for a score of 333180.
NOTE:
-Since the monsters try to avoid the arrow, I sometimes fire one so that they get out of my way.
-Changing of direction of the character in a chamber take 5 frames, so I try to change direction as less as possible.
-On level 8 I miss the x9 by 1 or 2 seconds, I will have to work on that.
See tasvideos.org for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs.
Tool-assisted speed-run (TAS) for Venture arcade, 9 levels.
From the "insert coin" to the display of all the treasures, it took 7:23 min for a score of 333180.
NOTE:
-Since the monsters try to avoid the arrow, I sometimes fire one so that they get out of my way.
-Changing of direction of the character in a chamber take 5 frames, so I try to change direction as less as possible.
-On level 8 I miss the x9 by 1 or 2 seconds, I will have to work on that.
See tasvideos.org for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs.
![[TAS] Venture arcade 9 levels in 7:23 (333180)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/iHunQMt3dgY/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Venture arcade 9 levels in 7:23 (333180)
Tool-assisted speed-run (TAS) for Venture arcade, 9 levels.
From the insert coin to the display of all the treasures, it took 7:23 min for a score of 333180.
NOTE:
-Since the monsters try to avoid the arrow, I sometimes fire one so that they get out of my way.
-Changing of direction of the character in a chamber take 5 frames, so I try to change direction as less as possible.
-On level 8 I miss the x9 by 1 or 2 seconds, I will have to work on that.
See tasvideos.org for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs.")
![[TAS] Dharma Doujou Arcade in 21:49 (382,460 points)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/iXweyxgV4Ek/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Dharma Doujou Arcade in 21:49 (382,460 points)
Tool-assisted speedrun (TAS) of Dharma Doujou Arcade in 21:49 (382,460 points)
Time starts when you select 1P Only (0:26), and ends on fadeout of the final stage. (22:15)
Thanks to SQR Y3 for pointing out that I was missing points.
You normally get 100 points times the number of matched blocks but if you match chests (wooden blocks with a kanji on them) you get 1000 points times the number of matched blocks unless that match is at the end of the stage.
I had 4 stages I was matching the chests at the end of the stage, so I fixed that and got over 20,000 more points.
Thanks again SQR Y3.
Dharma Doujou is one of the best puzzle games Ive ever played. It really is a fun brain teaser.
You have the choice to play with a boy or a girl.
If you start the game by pressing the Player 1 button, you play with the boy, if you press the Player 2 button you play with the girl (but you have to play with the player 2 controls).
After each stage you get a Time and a Miss bonus.
The Time bonus starts at 12800 and decreases proportionally to the height of the critter that is on the left of the screen.
But you can slow it down by making matches. Depending on the symbol you are matching, some matches are more effective than others.
The Miss bonus starts at 3000 points and you lose 100 points for each Miss.
When you make a match, you get 100 points multiplied by the number of matching blocks.
Unless you match chests (wooden blocks with a kanji on them) you can get 1000 points times the number of blocks unless you match this at the end of the stage.
The layout of the blocks for a level is not random. There is a fixed number of layouts available for each stage. (from 3 to 8 layouts for each stage)
I took a screenshot of every layout I found, you can see them here: https://vgmaps.com/Atlas/Arcade/index.htm#DharmaDoujou
I found 87 different layouts. I may be missing one (or two) layouts because my method of listing them depends on the rng. If you find a layout that is not in my list, please tell me.
The layout presented to the player is randomized from the available layouts for the stage.
In the TAS I manipulated the rng to get the layout for which I had the best pattern to beat it with as few Miss as possible. To do this, I simply inserted empty frames before the last move of the previous stage until I got what I wanted. The delay is most noticeable at the end of stage 3. (2:32)
To do a stage , I had to figure out what the best moves are to complete the stage as quickly as possible.
To help me with this task, I developed a small Windows application that allows me to play any layout of any stage much faster than I could in game.
With this, I was able to try many strategies and optimize moves to minimize misses and minimize character movement.
Then I modified my application so that it can play randomly alone except when a match can be made.
It worked well until about stage 12, when my simulator was wasting most of its time doing Game over games due to lack of space to move blocks around. So I modified it so that it cant lose by always playing all the blocks in the top row.
This application simulates a few million games per minute. Eventually it produced some interesting patterns that I manually optimized. You can see the result of this in the TAS. But Im sure it could be optimized more but I think the result is not too bad.
Thanks to Lizstar for showing this game on her Twitch channel and playing Flame Fatales 2022 on GDQ https://youtu.be/NGj7X-C2jDA
If you watch her video, you might find that I couldnt find a better start than her for level 16. The first 6 lines are identical in my TAS.
I have to improve my gameplay if I want to approach Lizstar :) Right now Im not fast enough to play in real time past stage 7 :).
What is a TAS? https://www.youtube.com/c/Prog61/about
For a good introduction to TASing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ietk1-Wb7oY
For more information visit https://tasvideos.org.")
![[TAS] Return of the Jedi Arcade, No Death (1,663,830) (8 Levels)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/jMoOhUFynY8/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Return of the Jedi Arcade, No Death (1,663,830) (8 Levels)
Tool-assisted superplay (TAS) of Return of the Jedi Arcade, No Death (1,663,830) (8 Levels)
Goal of this TAS:
-Reach the highest score possible without using the death trick
-In my next video I will use the death trick that consist to die at the end of wave 8 to redo the complete wave 8 many times. With that method I think I will reach around 3,800,000.
Notes:
-I bump enemies to make them crash to have 1000 points instead of 500 when you fire on them.
-In the last section, in the death star, it is possible to pass between the left wall and the obstacles, but not on every position. In level 7 I demonstrate some position that work.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool-assisted_speedrun for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs
or http://tasvideos.org for more video.")
![[TAS] TX-1 Arcade (Japan) (3/8)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/jjT0Nin4N9k/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] TX-1 Arcade (Japan) (3/8)
Tool-assisted speed-run (TAS) for TX-1 Arcade Japan (270330 points)
Passed cars 182, remaining time 35, for a total score of 270330.
See tasvideos.org for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs.")
![[TAS] Frogger Arcade (10 Levels)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/k3nKtOh41fE/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Frogger Arcade (10 Levels)
Tool-assisted speed-run (TAS) of the first 10 levels of Frogger.
See tasvideos.org for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs.")
![[TAS] Point Blank 3 Arcade INSANE (264,329)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/khQTDKeJkos/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Point Blank 3 Arcade INSANE (264,329)
Insane Flash Warning
Tool-assisted superplay (TAS) of Point blank 3 Arcade Insane (264,329)
-The TAS can mostly shoot at 20 shots per second (every 3 frames) except about once per second where I had to insert a 4th frame.
Because of that, in the stage at 7:50 where I have to shoot as quickly as possible, I was only able to shoot 193 times instead of almost 200 (10 sec at 20 shots per second = 200)
-I could have made a few additional points:
-at 1:02 this stage is not perfectly optimized, I could have shot Dan and Don a few more times.
-at 6:54, I could have shot Dan (or Don?) to slow him down and shoot more enemies in the last 5 seconds.
-at 8:24 I could control Don more by shooting him to put more cans in the tray. (I did it a bit at 8:34)
-In the Ducks on the River stage (5:52) I couldnt shoot the ducks at the very top of the river because moving the target affected the rng, so if I moved the target too early, the duck I wanted shoot would appear in another location and I would only see it when I replayed the TAS. So, to be safe, I decided to shoot the ducks after the first fall.
-Its funny how the 9:01 stage can be almost over before the balls have finished falling.
What is a TAS? https://www.youtube.com/c/Prog61/about
For a good introduction to TASing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ietk1-Wb7oY
For more information visit https://tasvideos.org.
0:00 Stage 1 - 4
2:46 Stage 5 - 8
5:14 Bonus Stage
5:39 Stage 9 - 12
8:11 Stage 13 - 16
10:11 Final Stage
11:50 Attract animation")
![[TAS] Paperboy Arcade 203,866 (Easy Street) (Obsolete)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/kkrCcu-Syi0/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Paperboy Arcade 203,866 (Easy Street) (Obsolete)
Tool-assisted superplay (TAS) of Paperboy Easy Street 203,866
This video has been obsoleted by : https://youtu.be/2POizWwxAe4
The goal of this TAS:
-Get the highest score possible
Notes:
-Difficulty: Medium Hard (factory setting)
-I try to shoot things in that order:
-The flowers give the most points, there is a house (103) that give 1725 breakage points. But you have to run over them.
-Next are things that go ZAP! (250 points) (mostly humans)
-Windows, lamps, tombstone award progressive points if they are from the same house. (100, 125, 150, 175, 200, 225, 250 points)
-Jump (200 points)
-Others: trash can, doghouse (100 points)
-I know I can do a bit better, I may eventually optimized this TAS
-There is a limitation for how much newspaper can be in the air at the same time.
-This number is 9
-But, this number decrease by one each time you shoot a mailbox
-At the beginning of a day and for the training course, the number is reset to 9
-if you shoot 9 mailboxes, you cannot shoot anymore
-So, It is impossible to shoot the 10 mailboxes.
-I am not sure if it is a feature or a bug.
-So, you have to think of how many newspapers you want to be able to shoot at the same time.
-I think 4 or 5 is a good number be able to shoot consecutive windows
-So, the maximum mailbox you want to shoot is 4 or 5
-In the training course, you have to take a jump to replenish your stock of newspapers
-In the training course you can shoot targets that are far left, even if you cannot see the awarded score
-I found that late, my next TAS will shoot much more targets.
-Middle Rd. and Hard way are coming soon
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool-assisted_speedrun for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs
or http://tasvideos.org for more video.")
![[AI] Tempest played by an AI](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/kou9DEAkjgg/mqdefault.jpg "[AI] Tempest played by an AI
[AI] Tempest AI reaching black levels with 3 credits.
This is a video of an AI playing Tempest in real time.
This setup was created by David W. Plummer — you should check out his YouTube channel at: https://www.youtube.com/@DavesGarage
Dave has already posted a video of Tempest on his second channel https://www.youtube.com/@davepl, but I wanted to record a video played at normal speed to better appreciate the AIs moves.
If you are interested in this project, Dave has posted 3 videos on his channel covering it:
-Starting the project and explanation of all the steps: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tM3j_qjTPXg
-Working on the expert system: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3l2mbKLqeZw
-Improving the project: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdbpoDjIvPk&t=1s
All the code is available on Daves GitHub: https://github.com/davepl/tempest_ai
Settings:
Lives: 5
Bonus Life at: 10,000
Difficulty: Medium 1
I set the bonus life at 10,000 to give the AI a small advantage, though it doesnt have a big impact — once you reach 5 lives, you wont earn any more.
I know Dave has reached higher levels on his setup, but I couldnt get a better score than this after about 10 tries.
I will post a new video if the AI manages to reach a higher score.
By the way, Dave is now working on Robotron — Im really looking forward to seeing that in action!
The basic idea is to feed the AI information about the state of the game — such as the position of the enemies every frame — rather than feeding it the raw game screen, then wait for the AIs response to determine how to move the knob or press a button.
-A Lua script runs inside MAME
-The script sends game info to a server via TCP every frame
-The server feeds that info to the AI
-The AI generates a response that is sent back to MAME
In the end, it works much better than I expected. The AI is definitely better at the game than I am!
I hope you enjoy watching this video as much as I did. I look forward to your comments.
0:00 Start
0:08 Blue
3:11 Red
9:55 Yellow
16:21 Cyan")
![[TAS] Moon Patrol (3 courses)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ksECfMsFNQw/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Moon Patrol (3 courses)
Tool-assisted superplay (TAS) of Moon Patrol (3 courses)
I played this game often in the 80s, and it was one of my favorite games back then. My hi-score was over 400,000 points if I remember correctly.
I wasnt sure if I would learn anything new about this game by doing this TAS since its a simple game, so I was very surprised to see that it is possible to play this game at full speed, only slowing down once per course. I was sure that was not possible. (Note that this would be very difficult for a human to do)
Throughout the video, I only let go of the joystick in neutral position 2 frames per course. (6 frames in total for the whole video) (3:15 10:19 17:34)
-The rng can be changed by shooting or jumping. So when you see the TAS shoot nothing, its to change the rng. A few times I change the timing of a shot by a frame or two so I dont get killed by an enemy bullet, which is why I never had to slow down when the saucers were raining bullets on me.
-You can shoot 4 upward shots at the same time at 30fps but you have to wait for a shot to complete its run before shooting again.
-You only fire one bullet forward at a time, you have to wait for the explosion animation to end before firing again, which takes between 17 and 25 frames depending on whether the bullet hit something close to the buggy or not (2.4 to 3.5 fps).
-The 58 seconds instead of 59 trick:
-If you jump on the first possible frame at the beginning of a section, you will end the section with one second less. In Section A, you can time your jump to the end of the intro music. For other sections it is more difficult to time the jump but the trick works for all sections as you can see in the video.
-Did you know that there is a mine without collision? Point Q of the champion course (19:03).
-You can score a 100 point bonus by shooting the rock past the end of the T point on the champion course (12:15)
-As far as I know, the Rocket Car score is random (500,800,1000) and the pits score (Pit Plants?) is also random (300,500,800). I tested shooting at different delays and for each delay I got a different value and no noticeable pattern.
-I was sure this game had a 60hz refresh rate but its 57. Thats why the scrolling isnt as smooth as I would have liked. Im not sure I can do anything to fix this. Sorry.
Bonus: I found a small bug: At the end of the video I show that it is possible to have the animation of dying twice for the same death (21:36)
What is a TAS? https://www.youtube.com/c/Prog61/about
For a good introduction to TASing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ietk1-Wb7oY
For more information visit http://tasvideos.org.
0:00 Title screen
0:11 Round 1-A
1:32 Round 1-E
2:50 Round 1-J
4:12 Round 1-O
5:32 Round 1-T
7:04 Round 2-A
8:30 Round 2-E
9:51 Round 2-J
11:17 Round 2-O
12:42 Round 2-T
14:19 Round 3-A
15:44 Round 3-E
17:05 Round 3-J
18:31 Round 3-O
19:57 Round 3-T
21:36 Bonus")
![[TAS] Space Invaders arcade: Trail bug demonstration and invader out of bound at the end](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/lEfFT0Roww8/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Space Invaders arcade: Trail bug demonstration and invader out of bound at the end
Tool-assisted superplay (TAS) of Space Invaders: Trail bug demonstration
Goal of the TAS:
-Demonstrate the trail bug
-Keep one of the lower 2 rows invaders at the end and you will see the invader leaving a trail.
-But it is the first time that I see the invader leaving the play field at the end and locking the game. You can see also that if the player fire a bullet the bullet will not move. I wonder if anyone has ever seen this problem on a real machine. Let me know.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool-assisted_speedrun for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs
or http://tasvideos.org for more video.")
![[TAS] Video Hustler Arcade (10 Pattern) (158,340)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/lx-GpVYqyQk/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Video Hustler Arcade (10 Pattern) (158,340)
Tool-assisted superplay (TAS) of Video Hustler Arcade (10 Pattern) (158,340)
Notes:
-Sometimes you cannot do the move you want because of the limitation of the angle you can select. Its a bit frustrating.
-I would have like to reach 1000000 but I stopped before that because I was bored. I may continue it eventually.
-See my video of Billiard Academy Real Break for a better and more fun Billiard game.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool-assisted_speedrun for more information on Tool-Assisted Speed-runs/Superplay
or http://tasvideos.org for more video.")
![[TAS] Numan Athletics Arcade (1 player)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/lz6hQbj27Hw/mqdefault.jpg "[TAS] Numan Athletics Arcade (1 player)
Tool-assisted superplay (TAS) of Numan Athletics Arcade
What is a TAS? https://www.youtube.com/c/Prog61/about
This is a game that I did not know. I think its a fun take on the Olympic game genre.
If you know of any trick that can be done to improve this TAS, let me know in the comments. Thanks.
Notes:
Turbo Dash
-It seem that the best speed is reached only if you do not tap faster than 3 frames by button. (20 bps)
-The pattern I use is: 111333111333... anything faster or slower result in a slower time.
Interceptor
-It is probably possible to get 2-3 more shots.
Missile Toss
-Contrary to Turbo Dash, maximum speed is reached by tapping 1 and 3 as fast as possible.
-The optimal angle is reached by holding button 2 for 19 frames
Vs. Express
-The game seem to not let you get over 99.60m
-To get the maximum, you have to continue tapping even if the power meter is at the maximum.
Tower Topper
-The TAS show the difference between jumping at the first or the last possible frame.
-The 1st try show jumping on the first possible frame
-The 2nd try show jumping on the last possible frame
Nonstop Rock Chop
-The power meter do not have to reach the maximum to break the rock
Niagara Jumps
-You cannot run faster than 250 km/h
-The first jump is in the water, but not too far because you lose your speed, as shown on the 1st try
-The 3rd try show the optimal jump I could do.
For a good introduction to TASing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ietk1-Wb7oY
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool-assisted_speedrun for more information or http://tasvideos.org for more video.
0:00 Start and Intro
0:34 Turbo Dash
1:21 Interceptor
2:25 Missile Toss
3:25 Numan Sniper
4:27 Vs. Express
5:27 Tower Topper
6:53 Nonstop Rock Chop
7:53 Niagara Jumps
8:59 END
9:34 Scores")
