Recent posts

#51

Competition 2025 / Re: Cars and rules for 2026

Last post by Duplode - August 31, 2025, 06:18:20 PM

Is a fixed -100% coefficient sufficient to keep all the "cheat cars" at bay? I haven't tested them much so I am unsure how fast they really are.

Excellent question. The balanced bonus for PG Indy is somewhere near -30%, so let's round the coefficient to a nice 4/3. A -100% bonus amounts to a multiplier of 2, so the ratio between the driven lap times would be 2/3 for balance. The free/RH Default record with the Indy is around 30 s, while the time of a comparable lap with the Lada Niva Comeback is around 20 s. So yes, the fastest cheat cars might actually be competitive even with a -100% bonus!

(That said, if we were actually going to implement this, we might as well use -150%, or even have two tiers to distinguish cheat cars from the rest.)

#52

Competition 2025 / Re: Cars and rules for 2026

Last post by Duplode - August 31, 2025, 06:06:17 PM

@Matei Do consider posting replays at ZakStunts just for fun; you might actually like it. You don't have to care about scoreboard position or the car bonuses; just pick your favourite car out of the 16 and enjoy the ride. One of the goals of the multi-car system was making this kind of playing possible; Stan286XT did it for a long while in the recent past, and Stingray86 is doing it right now.

#53

Competition and Website / Re: Savestates

Last post by Matei - August 31, 2025, 03:23:42 PM

https://www.emu-france.com/emulateurs/10-ordinateurs/173-sinclair-zx-spectrum/1232-spectrum/

Une nouvelle version d'un des plus vieille émulateur Sinclair Spectrum disponible, crée par Pedro Gimeno. Il ne supporte que le Spectrum 48.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/bars3d/

This is my program and I included the emulator in the archive. From file REAME.txt, line 119:

Besides tape images, this emulator can also load and save snapshot images, but they are in a different format compared to the one used by most emulators and mentioned above, so I made 2 programs for converting these files, i.e. sna2sp.c and sp2sna.c, which are in zxbars/tools. More information is in README.txt, also there. A snapshot can be saved from the emulator by pressing F2. No confirmation will be shown, but the file will appear in the directory as SNAP****.SP. To load a snapshot, start the emulator by typing:

spec386 /sp=SNAP0001.SP

#54

Competition and Website / Re: Savestates

Last post by Duplode - August 31, 2025, 12:44:44 PM

I lean against it, precisely for the sake of software parity with those on real hardware or emulators lacking that feature. That's specially considering that vanilla DOSBox (the one most people know and use) doesn't have save states, and DOSBox Staging (which we should make the recommended default IMO) doesn't either. (That said, I won't be horrified if the consensus turns out to disagree with me.)

P.S.: The worst part of the conventional RH workflow for me is accidentally choosing "Re-start driving" instead of "Continue driving". Aaaaargh!!

P.P.S.: Sharing tips and advice about the RH workflow could make for an interesting conversation. (Mine are: pick a systematic replay naming scheme that works for you, and save lots of partial replays!)

#55

Competition and Website / Savestates

Last post by HerrNove - August 31, 2025, 11:53:23 AM

What's the community opinion about using savestates, like those provided by Dosbox-X, instead of the integrated rewind function?

I have never tried them since I play on vanilla DOSBox, but I would like to try as it seems to me that 50% of my playtime is spent pushing the rewind button. With savestates I would be able to focus on the interesting parts: driving, taking notes, studying the map, etc.

But, I think this should be first explicitly approved, at least informally, as it would give an advantage to those willing to use a specific emulator, wrt those playing on real hardware or other platforms.

Thoughts?

#56

Replay Beauty Contest 2006 / Re: Rules

Last post by Duplode - August 30, 2025, 06:09:52 PM

How strange: posts in the sub-sub-sub forums here do not show up as the "latest post" in the front page interface.

While this SMF bug remains, I have finally gotten around to removing the extra level of nesting of the Wacky and Beauty subforums 

[is]

#57

Live Races / Re: September Live race (Onlin...

Last post by Matei - August 30, 2025, 01:10:30 PM

It's not working properly on my end. It's working in slow motion.

It is working properly.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool-assisted_speedrun#Method

To make this more precise, the game is slowed down. Initially, it was common to slow down to some low fraction of normal speed.

This is how tools for speedruns function. Where do I set the speed? Now it runs 6.66 times slower, I want it a little faster.

#58

Chat - Misc / Re: Association game

Last post by Mortimer Macmire - August 30, 2025, 11:32:50 AM

Locklear

#59

Chat - Misc / Re: Association game

Last post by Cas - August 30, 2025, 05:10:44 AM

Heather

#60

Stunts Modification Projects / Re: Stunts SuperSight (extende...

Last post by Cas - August 30, 2025, 05:03:59 AM

  It does look great from up there!