1. #1

    "Improved" physics when restarting level? [SOLVED]

    I've been playing "Ladder" a LOT recently trying to get the top rank. I dread to think how much time I've spent on this track.

    At first I was certain it was my imagination or luck but now I'm not so sure. Basically the more I press "r" to restart the harder the first section is to do especially hitting the tyre and landing on the down ramp. If I play the track through it FEELS like the physics somehow change very, very slightly (EDIT: For the better) on the next few goes.

    I really can't say for certain that it isn't my imagination but I am, maybe, 70% sure that there is something odd going on.

    Can you guys have a look and see if some variable isn't being reset when "r" is pressed?
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  2. #2
    sebastianaalton's Avatar Trials Developer
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    If the physics would go differently on separate runs, the game replay and ghost would become totally out of synch when others watch them. Our replay and ghost system is based entirely on player key presses (as we only record the key presses). We rely on the fact that the game physics and logic is 100% deterministic. This means when the world state is identical at level start and the identical keypresses are replayed, the game state will progress exactly the same way from the start to the end, and the state will be identical during the whole run. Even a slightest 0.0001 error in a single calculation would cause the whole system become out of synch, as the error would start to widen up rapidly, causing all replays and ghost be completely out of synch.

    During v1.05 beta testing we watched around 50 different replays (from current high score lists), and we didn't notice a single out of synch problem in them.

    I actually noticed a similar "problem" like you myself. The bike did act a bit different when I pressed backspace compared to R to restart the level. I noticed that the problem was that when I pressed backspace the level started immediately, and I moved my finger as fast as possible to the accelerate button, but there was still a less than 0.1 second delay, and the bike did accelerate slightly less than when I pressed R to restart the level. When I tried to first hold down the accelerate button and then press backspace (while keeping down the accelerate button all the time) everything was working exactly correctly.
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  3. #3
    Thanks for the response. I understand your point about the backspace vs "r" and have seen this myself. It isn't that. I always have a ghost selected (usually my own) when playing the "ladder" track and the ghost doesn't go out of sync so I suppose I will have to concede that it must be my imagination or luck or just me.

    However, I'm not TOTALLY convinced, if I do come up with some "proof" I'll let you know
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  4. #4
    sebastianaalton's Avatar Trials Developer
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    Originally Posted by Dragon
    Thanks for the response. I understand your point about the backspace vs "r" and have seen this myself. It isn't that. I always have a ghost selected (usually my own) when playing the "ladder" track and the ghost doesn't go out of sync so I suppose I will have to concede that it must be my imagination or luck or just me.

    However, I'm not TOTALLY convinced, if I do come up with some "proof" I'll let you know
    If you can, please try to drive a new record after you get to this "improved physics" mode. If the physics really is different (or the bike starts faster), the replay of your record score (in high score lists) would be out of synch when you or anyone else views it. It would be easiest to try to reproduce this in Tutorial-1 (and most likely would result you scoring at least 0.01 second quicker than others and getting to #1 spot).

    I will mark this bug as solved. But if you manage to make this "improved physics" happen and the replay gets out of synch, please save the replay (it's stored to My Documents folder), and send it to customer support e-mail so we can investigate.
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