NESBot - NES playing robot beating Super Mario Bros.

[0078265317]

This is so cool.

 

[raskar42]

a while ago i saw a robot beat world 1-1. I knew it was only a matter of time.

 

 

now do battle toads.

[jmetal88]

I don't know, it doesn't seem all that impressive to me.

 

Granted, it was probably time-consuming and tedious to get the machine programmed with the right moves and timing, but still.

[Rex Dart]

Program one to beat River City Ransom and I'll be impressed

[Wickeycolumbus]

That's pretty cool, though I definitely wouldn't consider that a robot.

[SRGilbert]

Now if they could make one play Gyromite along with ROB, that would be really cool!

[Punisher5.0]

That was a cool video but some of those moves didn't look right. Especially the one where Mario fell into a hole where he should have died but instead jumped his way out.

[Eltigro]

That was a cool video but some of those moves didn't look right. Especially the one where Mario fell into a hole where he should have died but instead jumped his way out.

 

Yeah, I caught a lot of those. Going through blocks, jumping out of holes, jumping in mid air...

[Koopa64]

The robot was exploiting well known flaws in the physics of Super Mario Bros. Wall jumping isn't well known but it's indeed possible. How it works is Mario has to approach the top of a block (stacked underneath other blocks) at just the right angle so his foot "catches" the very edge of the block. If you jump at that precise moment, you'll get an extra jump. I've managed to get the first part of the glitch to work numerous times, but I'm way too slow to jump when it happens.

[Tursi]

It's clever, but just a script playback. (Definately cool to see running on hardware though.)

 

Need to build a robot that can learn to win, though.

[bomberpunk]

would have been cooler if it was R.O.B. sitting there beating the game.

[Rex Dart]

Wait, where's the robot? This is just a chip feeding signals to the controller port.

[+wood_jl]

There must have been cheats enabled.

 

The Mario runs into the flower-chomper things many, many times, and is unaffected. Likewise, in the water stage, he runs into the white sea creatures. In the final stage, runs into the rotating fire lines.

 

Therefore, it's not impressive. Let's see it done in its entirely. There's something not right about that video.

[Lendorien]

When this is done with a REAL robot, complete with mechanical arms, THEN I'll be impressed.

[+thegoldenband]

There must have been cheats enabled.

Nope -- as Koopa64 said, this whole video is about exploiting known glitches in the collision detection, physics, etc. so that you can finish SMB in the shortest possible time. TASVideos has done tons of these "tool-assisted speedruns", and many of them exploit far more arcane and bizarre glitches. See the Rygar video, for example.

 

The cool thing here is that it can be reproduced on actual hardware using timed controller inputs, proving (apparently) that the game is deterministic and there aren't any hardware "edge cases" that break the run. I think a lot of the runs on TASVideos would never work on real hardware, particularly on systems like the SNES which depend on synchronizing multiple processors -- but this one does!

Edited August 29, 2011 by thegoldenband

[BrianC]

If you attempted to program one of these for Hoshi Wo Miru Hito, it would probably blow up.

[Rex Dart]

When this is done with a REAL robot, complete with mechanical arms, THEN I'll be impressed.

 

Mechanical ANYTHING; this thing isn't a robot.

[+wood_jl]

How is the "robot" device able to see the screen, and know exactly when to make those perfectly-timed controller inputs?

[Wickeycolumbus]

How is the "robot" device able to see the screen, and know exactly when to make those perfectly-timed controller inputs?

 

I obviously cant be sure about this, but I'd think it's just a microcontroller spitting out pre programmed control signals.

[+thegoldenband]

How is the "robot" device able to see the screen, and know exactly when to make those perfectly-timed controller inputs?

 

I obviously cant be sure about this, but I'd think it's just a microcontroller spitting out pre programmed control signals.

Yeah, I believe so. To answer the question differently, it doesn't need to see the screen. Once it hits the Start button, all the other events in the game are deterministic -- in other words, if you hit controller inputs at the exact right moments, you know exactly what will happen, and can write a "script" of inputs that will play the game without ever needing any feedback from the console.

 

If the game includes elements that depended on a true random number generator, this would be impossible, I believe. But otherwise almost every game ever made can be manipulated (often heavily manipulated) through timed controller inputs, simply by taking advantage of the console's state at a particular moment. You should see what they do with luck in RPGs! I'd be curious as to whether that can be duplicated on real hardware, as I believe a lot of it depends on sub-frame timing.

 

I'm always surprised that no one has tried this on the VCS, BTW. Of course it wouldn't be interesting on most arcade-style games like Kaboom, but I'd like to see the shortest possible game of Pitfall or Superman, or the fastest completion of Raiders of the Lost Ark (especially if there are unknown glitches that could be abused). Every time I've brought up the topic, though, it's been met with a resounding silence...

Edited August 30, 2011 by thegoldenband