iMacmatician's videos

Hazard Loop (16.32) and 3 other levels

Overview:

To fill up much of the song, I put together two types of levels: two hazard levels in MBP and the Great Divide levels in MBG. I chose the hazard levels (specifically Marble Agility Course) because I was historically not too good at MAC (even though I have a Mac…lol), and I chose the Great Divide levels because it was about time I revisited them (my other video of those levels was outdated months before it was put up on YouTube).

Details:

Hazard Loop (16.32): The backwards path is from probably over a year ago when the cyclone part was quite hard for me. Thus, I decided to start with it rather than end with it so if I screwed up on the cyclone, I would only waste ~5 seconds rather than ~20 seconds. (Now it's not the hardest part.)
Possible improvement: 0.25 second

Marble Agility Course (19.79): I think this is GreeD's path, it seemed to be faster than the other path so that's what I used. TM catch was pretty decent, and I did the part after the TM about 0.5 faster than just about all of my other runs, so that was impressive.
Possible improvement: 0.75 second (I got a fluky mid-18 on the TM once)

Great Divide (21.81): I went diagonally at the trap so there would be more force to push the marble out further after the trap, making it less likely to hit the wall.
I don't remember what resolution I recorded the .rec it in, but this .rec screwed up while playing it at a resolution higher than 848x480 but worked fine in 848x480.
Possible improvement: 0.15 second (I missed a 21.6-21.7, the marble rolled on the midway platform)

Great Divide Revisited (14.42): Here I tried to not press right so the marble wouldn't have as much of a tendency to go up rather than across. After some time I got 15.03 and after a few more hours I got this 14.42.
While recording, I got some runs that rolled on the midway platform after the trap, those only got 14.9x because the marble went too slow.
Possible improvement: 0.50 second

Song: Ashley Tisdale - Be Good to Me

Good job on all the levels!

MMG: Icichole (15.63) and 3 other levels

This was actually done some time ago, I was just thinking whether I should try to redo them, but given how busy I am right now, if I planned on redoing them, this video wouldn't be released for a long while.

Details:

MMG: Icichole (15.63): I found that toggling right while pressing forward had a high success rate of propelling the marble into the hole. Ending was a bit off.
Possible improvement: 0.3 second

Lightning Ice (8.65): The noob start pad trick was easier for me than the jump-bounce-jump-bounce-jump-jump pattern that Sonic used in his video. While recording I realized that if I don't jump at the loop but on the ice after it, I can curve into the end loops faster and more effectively.
Possible improvement: 0.2 second

Swivel (16.14): One of those larger levels filled with small-scale objects. This type of level is one of the hardest and most annoying for me, but I've improved from the 25.xx or so that I got maybe half a year ago. I didn't go diagonal at the end because I seem to go to the side when doing so, especially when the computer was acting slow.
Possible improvement: 1 second (more and it gets really hard)

Quaked Path (8.73): The movement of the small green platform was very annoying because it would always rise up right before I got to that part, which means I have to wait several more seconds or try to get there earlier. On rare occasions, I was fast enough to get above that platform, but most of those runs failed at the gem.
Possible improvement: 0.5 second…if I get lucky…

Song: Transcenders featuring Tracey Amos - Spin the World



(Good…the song works…thanks to getting the Keynote export file and re-exporting it through MPEG Streamclip.)

Nice!

Two thumbs up!

Three thumbs up!

Great job!
I think you need a new taste in music though...

Jan 13, 2010, 4:50pm, mbgdemon wrote:I think you need a new taste in music though...I actually like many of the songs Matan (and others) put on their videos, but I tend to avoid repeating songs that have been used by someone else.

I just realized I hadn't subscribed to you!

*subscribes*

Stamina (28.93) and 4 other levels

All MBP expert levels done in personal record times.

Stamina (28.93): This is JRONI's path with an additional time modifier catch. The traplaunch went very high, I was surprised that it didn't go OOB (a few that went slightly higher did). That also mainly accounts for the high final time.
Possible improvement: 2 seconds

Tunnel Vision (18.48): The most annoying thing about this level is that it's so dark on the flip side that I couldn't see what was going on and many times missed the proper position to turn before the gem. This run was almost 0.5 second faster than what I was aiming for. I can finish before the TM restarts but it's quite hard for me, I didn't go as fast as I could have after the TMs to avoid screwing up the really good TM catch (best previous catch was 18.79).
Possible improvement: 0.1 second

Michael's Final Adventure (6.95): I got the path I used for my 14.86 and changed practically everything about the path. I got a lucky edge hit before the second-to-last diamond and that was good because it bounced me back to the second-to-last diamond instead of pushing me forward or OOB.
Possible improvement: 0.5 second

Trigonometry (53.34): This path is my No Gems path extended to fit the level with diamonds. While recording I found that I could jump off the 1st trigger to the 2nd diamond and rebound up to the platform. That saved me a few seconds.
Possible improvement: 2 seconds

Uphill Racing (32.26): I saved over 7 seconds from my last video (39.59) using the same path. All I did for this run was to keep improving my time by one second at a time while collecting all the Time Modifiers and gems.
Possible improvement: 1-2 seconds

Song: Black Tide - Warriors of Time

(So I found that uploading at 848x480 gives worse quality than at 1280x720, so I'll stick with upscaling the original video to HD.)

Awesome times!

Another great video!

Jan 13, 2010, 6:22pm, imacmatician wrote:
Jan 13, 2010, 4:50pm, mbgdemon wrote:I think you need a new taste in music though...I actually like many of the songs Matan (and others) put on their videos, but I tend to avoid repeating songs that have been used by someone else.

Ok. I was just judging by the music in your videos, which is pretty bad most of the time. But I understand not wanting to repeat

COMMENT ON NEW VIDEO:
Wow, impressive as always! I especially liked Trigonometry as you epically pwned every trick I fail at

EDIT: Argh, Ninja'd

Marble Blast fun stuff

Fun and interesting stuff in Marble Blast. The videos on the rainbow marble are from about a year ago.

Details:

Learning to Roll (3.79) [no edge hits]: 3rd time I've hit this time [PR]. I've always had a thing for doing this level without edge hitting.
Possible improvement: 0.02

A-Maze-ing (3.46) [surprise path]: I was trying to pull off a really hard tweak to my old PR path (that gets 3.7x-3.8x) which got me a 3.49 or so, but I couldn't get it on video. In this run, I jumped and accidentally hit the edge of the wall rather than the top of the wall as usual, and the next thing I knew I hit the finish after a second edge hit!
This run and others will be featured in a Best of Old Runs video coming sometime.

A-Maze-ing (4.82) [MBU Frictional Concerns path]: There are many ways to do this, some of them don't involve a start pad hit and some don't involve the Super Jump. This is one way that I recorded.

Learn the Random Force (3.79) [alternate path]: Pretty much Pascal's path from the MBP World Record Rampage.
Possible improvement: 0.05

Mini Mountain (5.82) [no time modifiers]: I actually got a faster time without TMs than I did with them.
Possible improvement: 0.1

Astroflight (22.71) [alternate path]: Path inspiration from my Astroflight No Gems pathway. I hit the scenery pole many times and it is possible to go to the left of it too.
Possible improvement: 1.0

Divergence (5.06) [no powerups]: I went OOB after the second TM because it's easy and doesn't waste much time (if any) compared to jumping back.
My best first TM catch is 4.36, which is enough to beat my PR of 4.40 (different path).
Possible improvement: 0.4

Divergence (6.36) [B3, roll only]: Full history behind this run will be explained in my Best of Old Runs video. The nice thing about Divergence is that the slopes are well suited for slope hits and edge hits, especially with the big marbles.
Possible improvement: 0.1 (best TM catch 6.28)

Super Portal (18.78): Self-explanatory. I can get 18.76 on my Mac, probably due to internal clock differences.

Wave Jumping (10.45): I can't seem to do the traplaunch now, which is weird because I did it all the time back then. This path requires quick and accurate moves to the trap position (which are less difficult now). There's also a specific time to jump in the trap that gives the best balance between an early launch and a fast launch to give the lowest final time.
Possible improvement: 0.3-0.4
Personal record: 10.2x

Song: Everlife - Find Yourself in You

Great!

Cool video!

Wow, great job! You were as good then as now

One of your best vids.

Read my YT comment but to summarize: truly awesome vid. Deserving to be your best.

Excellent video, def. one of your best if not the best.

Epic video as always. Better then expected by a longshot!

So I decided to try Gauntlet yesterday and after a few minutes I got this close miss! (Note the sparks on the side/edge of the platform.)

This edge hit was as much faster over Adustalarm's 8.63 as his 8.63 was over Pascal's 9.00.

I estimate that if the marble had gone up about 1.5-2 marble diameters higher, I could have finished with probably a 8.4.

Song: Linkin Park - In the End

So close! Better luck next time.

nice job!

So you tried so hard, and got so far, but in the end, it doesn't even matter...

But, you never cease to amaze me.

Wow, good try! So close.

Good try, I could never do that

Keep trying! That would be awesome if it worked.

It should, its not easy though

Ramp Matrix [Through the Times] (23.32, 22.37, 19.17, 18.35)

Overview: This video is the first of a number of Through the Times series of videos. They consist of multiple runs of a level over a long period of time, in this case, from November 2008 to February 2010, ending with the current WR path.

All these videos are PRs at the time of their recordings I think except for the 19.17 one (PR was 19.15).

23.32 (November 2008): According to my description on the .inf file, I made some lucky gem catches, which helped get that low time! Note the heavy use of forward-only movement and the high Super Jump launch. At that time (and in the next run) I could do this path faster than I could do the other path.

22.37 (December 2008): Improvement over the previous run, I used some diagonal movement at the start and after the 8th gem, parts that were previously forward-only.

There's a big gap between this and the next run, this will be reflected in other Through the Times videos that I will compile because it's a period of time when I didn't make many .rec's. A notable time I got during this time period was 20.39 (I think) on May 2009 (I think, gotta check my screenshots) using the current WR path (minus the wall-hit tweak and the tweak after the 8th gem).

19.17 (September 2009): I got sub-20 with the wall-hit tweak and then further improved my time by adding the tweak after the 8th gem and general skill improvements.
Personal record: 19.15

18.35 (February 2010): The position of the wall-hit on the trim in the last run is quite far to the right, and I found that hitting the trim further to the left saves time. Not long after getting the 19.17 I was able to get sub-19. At around the same time I found that not jumping at the end slope lets me curve into the goal better without slowing down too much or hitting the rightmost edge of the finish pad. I made further improvements and got a 18.35.
Right now I think this is the fastest published video for this level in MBG... at least until the MBG WRR2 extension is released...when is that coming out anyway?
However I still think the trim hit and the end movement weren't as good as they could have been, so I think I can do (a hard) 0.1 second better.

Song: Nickelback - How You Remind Me