LASERFIGHT: ACA Gradius Slowdown Accuracy

[BIL]

(all credit @ TZW_Guile)

Several years back, someone over in the ACA thread claimed Gotch (they of Rutubo)'s Gradius had more slowdown than the PCB, with comparison videos provided. (an unfortunately ill-tempered proffering, but the record is what it is)

I suspected they were in fact witnessing the heavy CPU load of 5x Laser fire, something easily noticed on the PCB. (and indeed on Salamander, Gradius II, and Gradius III's PCBs) When 5x Lasers are crossing the screen, Gradius will slow down significantly. If you hold the fire button, you will notice a distinctive ebb/flow pattern to the game speed.

Old videos I made back then, from the runs provided:

Spoiler

> Stage 3. Stays in almost perfect sync until the closing enemy rush, where the ACA player's aggressive Lasering drops him behind, while the PCB player safespots up top.

EDIT: The BigCore fight is interesting. PCB player's total onscreen time is ~17sec, with them leaning on 5x Laser throughout. ACA player's is significantly faster, ~13sec, with them not firing until the core is exposed. However, going strictly from core exposure to explosion, their times are closely comparable; around ~7sec. Both players are leaning on 5x Laser during this time.

> Stage 4. PCB player pulls way ahead early on, making landfall ~5sec in front, before gradually losing ground at the Inverted Volcano, eventually falling behind. At that point, the ACA player switches to Double and quickly gains a ~5sec lead. Tragically cut short when PCB player dies at the enemy rush. 3; Given both players lean equally hard on their Lasers, I'm guessing the swapping of place is down to the visibly differing firing patterns.

Recently, another video comparison has been made, providing a particularly good illustration of 5x Lasers' effect on game speed. (credit to Game Center Mikado and ReFKey_STG for PCB and ACA footage, respectively)

> Vertical Arrangement. ACA player above, PCB player below. Audio PCB-only, a handy marker of the player's staggered firing pattern. And who doesn't love Mikado commentary?

> Merged Footage. ACA player colour, PCB player monochrome; audio again PCB.

Please enable subtitles/captions for some inlined notes. Alternatively, please see below:

Spoiler

> Both replays (29.97fps) begin on the first frame the screen resumes scrolling, after the penultimate boss.

> ACA player arrives at the base slightly ahead, due to not enabling Laser until late in the Air Battle.

> Once at the base, with both players 5x Lasering, the gap stabilises for several seconds, both videos demonstrating the usual 5x Laser ebb/flow...

> ...until the pivotal moment, at 0m45s. Half of the PCB player's lasers strike the ground, terminating prematurely. This causes him to start firing in a staggered 2-on/3-off pattern for the next 45 seconds, massively reducing slowdown.

> Note the ACA player's scenery falling behind to the rhythm of his 5x lasers; plunging back while they're onscreen, stabilising when they're not.

> After the PCB player lets off the fire button, resetting his laser array to 5x, the gap stabilises, much as it did at the base arrival. After ~45sec of staggered Laser fire, the PCB player reaches the midboss ~8sec ahead.

TLDW/R: Gradius slows down heavily with five lasers onscreen. If you are crushing the CPU with gloriously sheeting 5x death, while your buddy is staggering fire to ~50/50, It seems you will lose that speedrun no matter which version you are playing.

However, it's always good to talk. Usually! What do you chaps think?

[PerishedFraud ឵឵]

It's called lazer because it makes the game lazy

[BIL]

[samspot]

What’s everyone’s fav version of Gradius 1? Last night I sampled NES, PCE, and the Saturn collection and kinda liked NES best. Probably due to nostalgia.

[Air Master Burst]

The Saturn Gradius and Salamander ports have fucked aspect ratios, I'd actually go with the PS1 collections instead.

ETA: I don't remember if that's also the case with Parodius.

[Bassa-Bassa]

It's the case of SAT Da! as it's still originally below SAT's smallest resolution mode, though it's not as noticeable as the first Gradius (and not an underscan you can't hide with the CRT's geometry controls, anyway). It even gives you the option to expand the viewport to fill the whole visible area, though that won't solve the aspect ratio difference, if that's a concern (and will make the game easier, for obvious reasons, though it was already easier for other reasons).

[BIL]

Sharpened up the Stage 3 BigCore description a bit. It's a more illustrative example than I'd recalled! The PCB player slows the game down by Lasering it from start to finish, dropping him ~5sec behind the ACA player, who only begins shooting once the core is exposed. Total time from first appearance to core exploding is ~17sec for PCB, vs ~13sec for ACA.

However, going from the core opening to exploding, it's about the same duration: ~7sec.

So, we see the PCB lagging behind ACA when only the former is firing 5x Laser, then synchronising with ACA once both are firing.

Ha, it's been a while. I wrote all this down in the ACA thread, now I look back.

What’s everyone’s fav version of Gradius 1? Last night I sampled NES, PCE, and the Saturn collection and kinda liked NES best. Probably due to nostalgia.

I wish the PCE ver didn't slow down so much; I love the warmer OST. While Gradius's soundtrack is tunefully iconic, I don't think it's as triumphantly strong as Salamander, II, III, Thunder Cross... Flak Attack, A-JAX, hell, basically any 80s Konami STG after. I'd even put Twinbee over it, haha. But I love the PCE tone; it really smooths out the slightly tinny arcade sound, playing to the OST's bubbly strengths.

Otherwise, I regard the arcade original as a perfect self-contained 1ALL, with short loops and steep difficulty ramp that makes endurance play intriguing too, even though that's not my usual bag. Game itself is at a perfect apex of early 80s simplicity and later 80s set design and firepower.

And the FC cart is a heroic capturing that, while not as cutting-edge cool as Umechan Team's Salamander and Gradius II, has a more consistent pace, and a lack of their sometimes mean memoriser gimmicks. One of my favourite FC STGs to unwind with.

Basically, can't go wrong with either AC/FC in their respective fields; while PCE is worth at least 1ALLing for its nice music, even if it chugs more than it should. The almighty PCE Salamander redeems it.

[MJR]

It's called lazer because it makes the game lazy

I am going to carve this on linoleum, laminate it, and put it above my fireplace, next to the severed moose head.

[Sengoku Strider]

What’s everyone’s fav version of Gradius 1? Last night I sampled NES, PCE, and the Saturn collection and kinda liked NES best. Probably due to nostalgia.

PCE has an extra stage and a PCE soundtrack. Slam dunk winner.

I can see why NES Gradius would be a special memory for some though. I was in that first wave of 3rd party NES games, and alongside Super Mario was by far the most impressive thing on NES for holiday 1986.

[MJR]

What’s everyone’s fav version of Gradius 1? Last night I sampled NES, PCE, and the Saturn collection and kinda liked NES best. Probably due to nostalgia.

I've mostly played Gradius on Gradius Deluxe Pack on PS1, and I think that balancing wise it is one of the very best shmups of all time. Extremely few games have such a feel and spot on level and enemy pattern design, such balance.

PC Engine version I also have, and it's superb. The original PCB may be out of my reach now, unless I keep getting more freelance work in the future.

[ratikal]

I could use more clarification. Does this mean the ACA version is overall slower than the PCB? If not, then is the slowdown explained by the 5 lasers overlapping?

[Ice Beam]

I remember that thread.

I've wondered what caused the hate-on for Hamster's version of Gradius. I assumed it's that video Miharasan made claiming input lag:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kar0yRFAo8c

Input lag no one else has been able to copy, from my understanding. Or, in the words of BIL:

Or maybe Mihara heard a white guy was spotted at Hamster's building and went full kamikaze?

I could use more clarification. Does this mean the ACA version is overall slower than the PCB? If not, then is the slowdown explained by the 5 lasers overlapping?

1. No
2. Probably

[Jeneki]

Easy enough to fix, just take Double.

(runs)

[BareKnuckleRoo]

I've wonder what caused the hate-on for Hamster's version of Gradius. I assumed it's that video Miharasan made claiming input lag:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kar0yRFAo8c

Input lag no one else has been able to copy, from my understanding.

Interesting thread, always love to see detective work like this! Reminds me of Guardian Force how there was an unusual run that ended up being from a channel that obviously was using tool-assistance. There was a spot where the player, using the yellow laser weapon as P1, bombs many times in a row and ends up with invulnerability after the bombs that lasts a ridiculously long time. Turns out each bomb you use extends the timer rather than resetting the invulnerability timer.

That video showcasing the input lag, do they show other controllers or other displays? I haven't delved too deeply into this, but the Miharasan video could be unfortunately caused very easily by something that was hardware related (be it the stick, the TV settings, etc) rather than the game itself having input lag. I know in recent years we've found weird stuff like running XB360 in forced 640 x 480 mode rather than 1920 x 1080 reduces input lag for some shmups? But yeah, unless you've ruled out those and tested other games on the same setup, I wouldn't rush to conclude the ACA version has input lag. Or maybe they patched ACA Gradius since that video and we missed there was a patch. Who knows?

While Gradius's soundtrack is tunefully iconic, I don't think it's as triumphantly strong as Salamander, II

Now that I think about this, I agree, most of the memorable tunes when I think Gradius for me are actually from Salamander I and II. Fire Tripper in particular is crazy good for what ended up being an unused track: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOWWhYIHfKM

[BIL]

I could use more clarification. Does this mean the ACA version is overall slower than the PCB?

No. From everything I've seen, the ACA version is very close in speed to the PCB. You can see them remaining in almost perfect synchronicity throughout Stage 3, in the first video of my post. You can also see the PCB fall behind ACA in Stage 4, in the second video.

In both examples, the major variable appears to be 5x Laser, which causes a drop in speed on both platforms. I would assume the CPU has a lot more collision-checking to do while 5x are onscreen; you can see the speed recover when even one hits an enemy, or terrain, or otherwise leaves the screen.

NB that firing 2x Laser or 3x Laser does not create the same delay. It is firing all five simultaneously that causes the speed drop. This is illustrated in the third video. The PCB player is behind at first, with the gap stabilised. He pulls way ahead immediately after terrain interaction switches his Lasers to a 2-on/3-off pattern. After he regains 5x, the gap between PCB and ACA stabilises once again.

In summary, Gotch appear to have emulated the Gradius PCB's behaviour very closely.

This behaviour also happens in Salamander, Gradius II, and Gradius III's PCBs. A good place to see it is Salamander's second stage, where you can slow the game down on command with 5x Laser. Salamander and Gradius II's ACA releases were also handled by Gotch, incidentally.

If not, then is the slowdown explained by the 5 lasers overlapping?

Not overlapping, per se - just being onscreen and active. It doesn't matter how they are spaced out, as long as they are active.

But yes, 5x Laser appears to be the variable here. It seems there is a threshold for slowdown to kick in, and 5x Laser will reliably push the CPU over it.

That, combined with at least a few onscreen objects. NB that the Stage 3 video doesn't lose sync at the start, when the screen is empty, despite the PCB player 5x Lasering while the ACA player isn't shooting at all.

I am away from home currently, but I'm sure I could savestate together ACA runs at "Fast" and "Slow" speeds, just by deliberately staggering my Lasers. It's easily done during the normal course of play. As mentioned, you can see it happen in the Mikado PCB replay up top. Just hit terrain or a big enemy with a couple Lasers, causing them to terminate prematurely, then keep the button held. Now, you will be firing 2-on/3-off, causing far less slowdown. (if you're wanting more slowdown for tactical purposes, it's a good idea to release the fire button when this happens; this'll reset you to 5x, again as happens in the Mikado PCB footage)

I hope I've not further complicated things. TLDR: 5x Lasers onscreen = game speed down.

Or maybe they patched ACA Gradius since that video and we missed there was a patch. Who knows?

Definitely at least a couple patches since. It may be The Just Blade Mihara noticed something early on, fixed since. While ACA remains avowedly low-frills, Hamster have refined their work a great deal over the past decade. Plus, Gotch did a lot for the releases they developed, Gradius included. All received major updates around their Switch re-releases, with the constants of optional input latency reduction, and sharp/smooth scanline toggle. (Akumajou Dracula even added its Haunted Castle revision, not that anybody should play that particular rev >_>)

Or perhaps, as you say, his setup was the issue, way back then. Hamster remain alive and unscathed after working with him on ACA TGM1+2, so it seems the great man is at least begrudgingly cool with them nowadays.

Now that I think about this, I agree, most of the memorable tunes when I think Gradius for me are actually from Salamander I and II. Fire Tripper in particular is crazy good for what ended up being an unused track: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOWWhYIHfKM

Salamander II's OST is amazing. Sensation, Speed, and Dear Blue are all Konami mixtape worthy; soaring indomitable sound. And All Is Vanity is bravura techno bodyhorror to do IREM proud. And indeed, Fire Tripper! What a track to leave unused, WTF?! I actually first heard it in a Gradius V superplay DVD trailer - either The Perfect or The Breakdown - and was immediately in love with it. I'll go see if I can track it down... probably gone by now, but I'd love to save it.

AHHH FUCK YEAAA Found it! ROAD TO VIC VIPER ~ Collaboration Guide Of Gradius V. YT-DLPd with the quickness. You couldn't ask for better BGM to a showcase of indomitable devotion and skill.

Easy enough to fix, just take Double.

(runs)

Unfortunately sir Double is tournament illegal for this here rootin' tootin' INTRASTELLER DAYTONA (｀w´メ)

---

EDIT: Hm, this is kinda interesting. From the ACA manual. Maybe not strictly relevant here, but it's the attention to detail I'd expect from Gotch. (and Hamster, these days)

Spoiler

[BrianC]

I think it was the hidden bubble version of Gradius in ACA that had extra lag. IIRC, it was fixed.

[Steven]

This is possibly the first time in video game history that European humans actually got a good deal instead of getting screwed, forgotten about/ignored, or treated like an afterthought. The second was probably the Dreamcast allowing 60Hz for some, but not all, games in PAL-land.

[Arino]

This is possibly the first time in video game history that European humans actually got a good deal instead of getting screwed, forgotten about/ignored, or treated like an afterthought. The second was probably the Dreamcast allowing 60Hz for some, but not all, games in PAL-land.

I'd be jealous too if my CRT TVs couldn't do RGB by default

[Fingolfin]

I'd be jealous too if my CRT TVs couldn't do RGB by default

Lack of true RGB capability was a significant shortcoming but perhaps an even bigger issue for PAL vs NTSC was that PAL was limited to 50 fields/25 frames per second/refresh rate @50Hz

The upside to PAL was its 20% superior resolution over NTSC tvs/monitors!

Several years ago I was tracking down old Atari and Apple 6502 based games and found that the original PAL version of Rogue* by Epyx for Atari 8 bit — the version programmed and sold for PAL machines — wouldn’t work on NTSC machines: collision detection wouldn’t work due to resolution differences (and specifically PAL being higher res).
[FWIW some of those old 8 bit PAL versions of games do in fact work on 8 bit NTSC hardware but at the time the only dump of Atari 8 bit Rogue was the PAL version and PAL Rogue did/does not work on NTSC machines]


Thanks much BIL for this deep dive into the emulation accuracy of ACA Gradius vs PCB and puttin’ the concerns of Mihara — and by extension/repeat…or rather trollpeat…of Jarpig Slayer — to rest!


* the ridiculously overused title and overdone subgenre “rogue lites” gets it name from this very same Rogue. “The more you know….”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_(video_game)

[Arino]

I'd be jealous too if my CRT TVs couldn't do RGB by default

Lack of true RGB capability was a significant shortcoming but perhaps an even bigger issue for PAL vs NTSC was that PAL was limited to 50 fields/25 frames per second/refresh rate @50Hz

The upside to PAL was its 20% superior resolution over NTSC tvs/monitors!

Several years ago I was tracking down old Atari and Apple 6502 based games and found that the original PAL version of Rogue* by Epyx for Atari 8 bit — the version programmed and sold for PAL machines — wouldn’t work on NTSC machines: collision detection wouldn’t work due to resolution differences (and specifically PAL being higher res).
[FWIW some of those old 8 bit PAL versions of games do in fact work on 8 bit NTSC hardware but at the time the only dump of Atari 8 bit Rogue was the PAL version and PAL Rogue did/does not work on NTSC machines]


Thanks much BIL for this deep dive into the emulation accuracy of ACA Gradius vs PCB and puttin’ the concerns of Mihara — and by extension/repeat…or rather trollpeat…of Jarpig Slayer — to rest!


* the ridiculously overused title and overdone subgenre “rogue lites” gets it name from this very same Rogue. “The more you know….”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_(video_game)

Last time I played something in 50 Hz was in the 80s when I was a child as soon as I learned more I made sure I'd only play NTSC or PAL 60 ...on my PAL-land RGB CRTs
=> my life was better than yours

[Fingolfin]

Last time I played something in 50 Hz was in the 80s when I was a child as soon as I learned more I made sure I'd only play NTSC or PAL 60 ...on my PAL-land RGB CRTs
=> my life was better than yours

Dude — Arino, how the fuck old are you?

Have generally appreciated the spirit of enthusiasm of your posts but not sure what to think about this completely asinine and childish reply — and I say that as an admittedly very immature 55 year old.

Not sure how my post elicited this response — no clue, no clue at all.

Didja somehow take it that I was in any way shape or form insulting or belittling you in some way?!?

Yes, I saw the multiple uses of so I know some kind of humor was intended but…wtf?

If taken at face, your statement here sounds like essentially at age 10 or so you made your parents purchase you NTSC PAL 60 crt/tv/gear.

Also hafta doubt you’re a second over 35 so when you state the last time “you played something in 50 Hz was in the 80s when I was a child” sounds a bit specious and sus.

Guessing with all your sundry material advantages, you also musta grown up in The House in the Middle

https://youtu.be/pGJcwaUWNZg?si=STFtU6XKqC2clY3i


Apologies for the off topic interruptions…
Nothing to see here; now back to our regular shmups programming.

Again, to restate…
Thanks much BIL for this deep dive into the emulation accuracy of ACA Gradius vs PCB and puttin’ the concerns of Mihara — and by extension/repeat…or rather trollpeat…of Jarpig Slayer — to rest!

[samspot]

I decided to check out the aspect ratio of a few ports myself:

Spoiler

Not only is Saturn ratio apparently wrong, but it's missing some background details!

Here's some NES & PCE for comparison, and a bonus GBA Galaxies screenshot

Spoiler

Link to imgur with it all in case that's convenient https://imgur.com/a/8nXeG00

These are all taken on MiSTer except the Mame shot which is from Nemesis. I'm surprised MiSTer doesn't have Gradius Arcade.

[Arino]

Not only is Saturn ratio apparently wrong, but it's missing some background details!

Are you referring to the stars (small dots) missing in the SS version? That must be caused by MiSTer: https://youtu.be/TqG0F97FVfw?si=nNYBtdHUJFSRk8aF

Spoiler

[...]

It's not my fault, Steven started it!

[Bassa-Bassa]

I decided to check out the aspect ratio of a few ports myself:

Spoiler

Not only is Saturn ratio apparently wrong, but it's missing some background details!

Here's some NES & PCE for comparison, and a bonus GBA Galaxies screenshot

Spoiler

I don't quite get what those screenshots are supposed to show nor how are you getting that conclusion about aspect ratio out of them?

[Arino]

I decided to check out the aspect ratio of a few ports myself:

Spoiler

Not only is Saturn ratio apparently wrong, but it's missing some background details!

Here's some NES & PCE for comparison, and a bonus GBA Galaxies screenshot

Spoiler

I don't quite get what those screenshots are supposed to show nor how are you getting that conclusion about aspect ratio out of them?

Maybe this is the explanation:

"according to MAME:
Gradius is 256x224
Gradius 2 is 320x224

Saturn's lowest resolution is 320x224, hence the unused display area on the sides for Gradius

I think the Playstation can do 256x224 so I would expect that it doesn't have the same issue (not sure since I don't own one)"

Source: viewtopic.php?t=16262&start=30 (Post by ED-057)

This means the aspect ratio is correct on the SS if I understand correctly. It even matches the arcade version 100%.

[Bassa-Bassa]

Which aspect ratio? Pixel aspect ratio can't be the same between SAT and PCB precisely because the former isn't able of the latter's resolution at full screen. But obviously this only makes sense on CRTs, that's why I don't get the purpose of the collage above where you can't check the screens' native resolution, unless it' just to show that there're black bars on the ports. There's a possibility on the other hand that, despite the Playstation being able of 256x224, the Gradius port just doesn't use it. Is it verified that Mister's Playstation emulation picks the original mode from the console for every instance?

[samspot]

To my eyes the PSX and Mame version are the same width with Saturn slight slimmer. I fully admit I don’t know the tech specs well. I wanted to do my own comparison since another poster asseted the saturn was wrong.

[Bassa-Bassa]

Slimmer when comparing those screenshots? Mister's ouput on a modern display? On a CRT?

The truth is both, SAT and Playstation use the same assets as the PCB. It'd be a total waste of effort redrawing everything when your target system can display 1:1 the original graphics with the only issue of having an excess of horizontal resolution to get them full screen, so they just leave black bars (or make more graphics visible in those full-screen modes, though that changes the game). That has the effect of making the graphics look "slimmer", as the same resolution is displayed within a narrower physical area. Again, this only applies on CRTs.