VGS Thanksgiving Contest 2022 [ENDED]

[ZeldaFreak | 3,600]

jesus

[ZeldaFreak | 3,600]

...Anyway, only about 6 more hours left to submit scores, get 'em in while you can! Once again, once the clock rolls over to 12 AM on the 26th (EST) that'll mark the end of the contest!

29 minutes ago, darkchylde28 said:

There are ROMs for 4-5 light gun games that had the timing on the hit boxes tweaked so they could be detected on an LCD.  As long as you keep the lights in the room where you're playing lower, it'll pick up the hit boxes just like the real thing.

I didn't know about that, that's really cool.

[DefaultGen | 5,401]

2 hours ago, darkchylde28 said:

4,670,000 (Round 104)

  Hide contents

 

 

what

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,104]

17 hours ago, darkchylde28 said:

There are ROMs for 4-5 light gun games that had the timing on the hit boxes tweaked so they could be detected on an LCD.  As long as you keep the lights in the room where you're playing lower, it'll pick up the hit boxes just like the real thing.

104 rounds, I finally had to leave to go to our family's day after Thanksgiving dinner, lol.  My dad and I played a LOT of Duck Hunt (and Clay Shooting) when I was little.

Does that version fix the kill screen after Round 99? When the counter resets to Round 0 on a regular cartridge the ducks glitch all over the screen so you can't advance any further.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

8 minutes ago, Bearcat-Doug said:

Does that version fix the kill screen after Round 99? When the counter resets to Round 0 on a regular cartridge the ducks glitch all over the screen so you can't advance any further.

It does the exact same thing that my childhood copy did, it rolls over to "0" (round 100), then starts counting up 1, 2, 3, etc. again, with the scores and speeds for the ducks reset to what they were at those original levels, but keeps the requirement for having to shoot all ducks to proceed to the next level.  To run the patch for the hit box compatibility for LCDs, you have to find a specific version of the ROM, which was a specific revision of the Duck Hunt cartridge.  I'm not sure what differences there are between revisions of Duck Hunt, but apparently one crashing after level 99 and one not is one of them.  Were you playing on straight up Duck Hunt or the Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt combo cart as a kid?  That might be part of the difference.

[Jeevan | 8,910]

17 hours ago, ZeldaFreak said:

jesus

 

16 hours ago, DefaultGen said:

what

This is what it's like to be @ZeldaFreak'ed

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,104]

38 minutes ago, darkchylde28 said:

It does the exact same thing that my childhood copy did, it rolls over to "0" (round 100), then starts counting up 1, 2, 3, etc. again, with the scores and speeds for the ducks reset to what they were at those original levels, but keeps the requirement for having to shoot all ducks to proceed to the next level.  To run the patch for the hit box compatibility for LCDs, you have to find a specific version of the ROM, which was a specific revision of the Duck Hunt cartridge.  I'm not sure what differences there are between revisions of Duck Hunt, but apparently one crashing after level 99 and one not is one of them.  Were you playing on straight up Duck Hunt or the Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt combo cart as a kid?  That might be part of the difference.

Here's a video of the kill screen that I was referring to. It's possible that it only happens on Game A. Maybe @rdrunner can confirm?

 

[ZeldaFreak | 3,600]

Alrighty then! So, with scores of 4,670,000, 469,300, & 464,800 respectively, @darkchylde28 has won in 1st place, @RH has won in 2nd place, and @Bonanza125 has won in 3rd place. Congrats to you all, you all will be PMed shortly!

But as always, thank you all for participating!

@darkchylde28@RH@Bonanza125@nesmaster14@Bearcat-Doug@Dr. Morbis@PII@DefaultGen@TDIRunner@JVOSS

So, with that said, the 2022 VGS Thanksgiving Contest has now come to a close! Hope you all had fun with it, glad this was an excuse for some of you guys to dig out the ol' classic NES and give it a whirl

Hope to see you all again next event!

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

1 hour ago, Bearcat-Doug said:

Here's a video of the kill screen that I was referring to. It's possible that it only happens on Game A. Maybe @rdrunner can confirm?

 

Interesting!  I noticed on the guy's pan out that he was using the "triple" pack-in cart to play, SMB+DH+WCTM.  What cartridge were you using to play as a kid?  If it was the same as this, that could point quasi-directly at what's causing that glitchy "kill screen" at round 100.  It also could be just with 1 duck mode, as I never really played that as a kid.

[RH | 4,903]

Congrats @darkchylde28 on the win. Thanks @ZeldaFreak and VGS staff for a fun competition.  This one wa s loads of fun!

[Gloves | 11,776]

Grats to the winners, and thanks to all who participated! 

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,104]

1 hour ago, darkchylde28 said:

Interesting!  I noticed on the guy's pan out that he was using the "triple" pack-in cart to play, SMB+DH+WCTM.  What cartridge were you using to play as a kid?  If it was the same as this, that could point quasi-directly at what's causing that glitchy "kill screen" at round 100.  It also could be just with 1 duck mode, as I never really played that as a kid.

I was using the SMB/Duck Hunt cart, but I'm fairly sure that I've gotten to the kill screen on a regular Duck Hunt cart as well. It's possible that it only occurs on Game A, but if there is a patched ROM for LCD TVs, I wouldn't be surprised if they fixed the kill screen glitch too. Congrats on the win!

[rdrunner | 422]

Only Game A has a kill screen.  B and C allow the game to loop past Round 100 (somewhat) normally.

Fun contest idea.  Congrats to all the winners!

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,104]

1 hour ago, rdrunner said:

Only Game A has a kill screen.  B and C allow the game to loop past Round 100 (somewhat) normally.

Fun contest idea.  Congrats to all the winners!

Game A is really easy compared to Game B, so that makes sense. Thanks for clearing it up!

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

2 hours ago, rdrunner said:

Only Game A has a kill screen.

I'm really glad to hear this because, for completionists like me, it means the game technically has an ending, at least on the first Mode...

@the_wizard_666: time to scrub Duck Hunt from your Games Beaten list...

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

44 minutes ago, Dr. Morbis said:

I'm really glad to hear this because, for completionists like me, it means the game technically has an ending, at least on the first Mode...

@the_wizard_666: time to scrub Duck Hunt from your Games Beaten list...

I have never required reaching a kill screen, just the loop point.  With Duck Hunt that would be after Round 18 when you lose if you miss a duck. 

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

1 minute ago, the_wizard_666 said:

I have never required reaching a kill screen, just the loop point.  With Duck Hunt that would be after Round 18 when you lose if you miss a duck. 

...Assuming the ducks don't get any faster...   I'd say the loop point is when you have to hit every duck and the speed of the ducks has reached their max level, ie: the game isn't getting any harder from one round to the next...

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

2 minutes ago, Dr. Morbis said:

...Assuming the ducks don't get any faster...   I'd say the loop point is when you have to hit every duck and the speed of the ducks has reached their max level, ie: the game isn't getting any harder from one round to the next...

Having played on one duck almost to the point of rolling the score, I can say that I didn't notice the ducks get any faster.  In fact, the speed of the duck is related to the colour of the duck, not the stage number.

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

6 minutes ago, the_wizard_666 said:

Having played on one duck almost to the point of rolling the score, I can say that I didn't notice the ducks get any faster.  In fact, the speed of the duck is related to the colour of the duck, not the stage number.

Go back and play it again - it's 100% related to the Round number...

Round 1 ducks are slower than molasses!

Edited November 27, 2022 by Dr. Morbis

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

1 hour ago, Dr. Morbis said:

Go back and play it again - it's 100% related to the Round number...

Round 1 ducks are slower than molasses!

Did some digging, and it's both correct.  That is, the speed increases every 5 rounds (with the max being at level 21), and the duck's colour being a slight factor as well (different colours give different scores, and the higher scoring ones are slightly harder to hit). Regardless, I achieved all I need to for me to cross it off my list.  If you want to make it arbitrarily more difficult for yourself, have at 'er.

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

30 minutes ago, the_wizard_666 said:

Did some digging, and it's both correct.  That is, the speed increases every 5 rounds (with the max being at level 21), and the duck's colour being a slight factor as well (different colours give different scores, and the higher scoring ones are slightly harder to hit). Regardless, I achieved all I need to for me to cross it off my list.  If you want to make it arbitrarily more difficult for yourself, have at 'er.

Then it looks as though completing Round 21 would be the loop point.  Do you remember how far you made it when you "beat" the game?

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

2 hours ago, Dr. Morbis said:

Then it looks as though completing Round 21 would be the loop point.  Do you remember how far you made it when you "beat" the game?

I already said my criteria was getting past the stage where missing meant game over.  So beating 18 is good enough for me.  Regardless, I was over level 50 on one duck, clay shooting was definitely in the 20s, it's only 2 duck that I ever had issues with, so that was probably only 19 or 20, but regardless, I'm done with it.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

If anybody's interested in being able to play light gun games on their modern TVs (via a flash cart or, alternately, a self-burned ROM), go check out http://neslcdmod.com/.  The IPS patches necessary are in the downloads section, and when you tell it to download, it'll tell you the specific ROM revision that the creator tweaked the timing for so you know which one to use.

For me, Duck Hunt is the most solid out of the ones he's done so far, but Hogan's Alley is also really spot on.  The last I played it, Wild Gunman was a bit hit and miss.  As for Duck Hunt VS and Barker Bill's Trick Shooting, I have faith that they're well done, but can't speak to them personally as he only had the three working games (and noticed about Freedom Force not being possible) when I last visited the page and got patches.  I'm curious how these stack up against the Retron Duck Hunt bundle that's being sold, as the principle for each is the same, but Retron's is done "on the fly" via hardware.

If anybody giving this a shot has issues with their original Zapper, I've found that the Tomee "Zapp Gun" (or "Light Gun" per more current packaging, apparently) works every time for me, both on LCD as well as CRT.  Here's a link to it on Amazon, should anyone not be able to find it locally.  Should someone have bought and tried the Retron Duck Hunt bundle, please respond and let me (and others) know how well it works, as I saw it locally yesterday but the clerks knew nothing about it beyond what the box said and I'm not willing to spend $30 to satisfy that curiosity.

[PII | 1,885]

This was a really fun little competition.  We should have a yearly Thanksgiving Duckhunt tradition.  

Suggestion for next time:  Just like this time except Once you've shot your regular score you switch the light gun to your non-dominant hand and aim with your non-dominant eye and submit that score as well.

@darkchylde28 Nicely done.  That score is insane.  You must have been born with light guns for limbs or something...

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

15 minutes ago, PII said:

This was a really fun little competition.  We should have a yearly Thanksgiving Duckhunt tradition.  

Suggestion for next time:  Just like this time except Once you've shot your regular score you switch the light gun to your non-dominant hand and aim with your non-dominant eye and submit that score as well.

That sounds like fun, but why wait?  Isn't there a thread somewhere containing suggestions for "off season" contests/competitions?

16 minutes ago, PII said:

@darkchylde28 Nicely done.  That score is insane.  You must have been born with light guns for limbs or something...

 

lol, thanks!  I just didn't have a ton of games to start out with, so I played a lot of SMB/Duck Hunt after getting my system, then even more Duck Hunt/Clay Shooting once my dad took a bit of interest in that game.  I'd already beaten the other games I got for Christmas with my system on Christmas, so I ended up having more fun running up the score on the pack-in cart until I managed to start picking up more games the following year.