Tool-Assisted Speedrun (TAS) Definition and Purpose
A TAS is a rendered "emulator movie" made using emulator tools like slow motion and rewind. The purpose a TAS is usually to beat a game as flawlessly and as quickly as possible. To do this, you simply enable slow motion during intense scenes or do rewinds any time you die or take too long to do something. An emulator movie doesn't capture slow motion so when you're playing in slow motion, it'll appear as normal motion in the emulator movie. An emulator movie also doesn't capture rewinds, it'll appear as if those mistakes never happened in the emulator movie. Once the emulator movie has been made, it then needs to be exported into a video file since only emulators can play emulator movies.



How to Create a TAS
1. Play the game with the Mednafen emulator
Whichever game you choose to do the TAS with, be sure to play it with the Mednafen emulator.

2. Enable state rewinding with CTRL + BACKSPACE
As soon as the game starts up, the first thing you'll want to do is press CTRL + BACKSPACE to enable the state rewinding. This will allow you to rewind your game at any time by pressing BACKSPACE.

3. Start Emulator Movie when Ready with SHIFT + F3
Once you're ready to begin recording, press SHIFT + F3 to start it (and you'll press SHIFT + F3 again later to stop it).

4. Play through the game and use the TAS features when necessary
Play through the game and use the TAS features for things that may interfere with a perfect speed run. If you die or encounter something that slows you down, press BACKSPACE to undo it. If you encounter a situation that requires faster reflexes than what you're capable of, enable slow motion by holding ALT + SPACEBAR. These things are hard to pull off when playing with a controller so it's best to assign each of these commands to a button that isn't being used on your controller with XPadder.

5. End Emulator Movie when Finished with SHIFT + F3
Once you're finished with your recording, press SHIFT + F3 to end it.

6. Watch the Emulator Movie with CTRL + F3 and Record it
You'll now need to export the video of the TAS by watching the Emulator Movie and recording it. You can watch your emulator movie by pressing CTRL + F3. Keep in mind that you can only store 1 emulator

As soon as you start watching the emulator movie, be sure to start recording it right away. You can use either an external recording program or the RGR Plugin's built in recording. It is recommended that you use the RGR Plugin's built in recording capabilities by pressing F8 (or clicking the 'Start' button) to start the recording and F8 again (or 'Stop' button) to end the recording.

A few things to know regarding the RGR Plugin's built in recording.
1. While it does render the video at the highest possible quality, the video also takes up a lot of space
2. Can slow down your computer so it requires a decent computer
3. When watching the videos, usually you'll only hear audio due to not having proper codec (but they'll upload to YouTube just fine).
4. To fix issue 1 and 3, it is recommended that you use Freemake Video Converter to watch and/or compress the video.

7. You're all done!
That's it! Feel free to upload your video to the Vizzed YouTube Account from the game's page if you need a place to show it off.



Resources

Emulator Command Reference
F1 = Shows all emulator commands
CTRL+BACKSPACE = Enable Rewinding (press again to disable)
BACKSPACE = Rewind (you have to hold it)
ALT+SPACEBAR = Slow motion (you have to hold it)
SHIFT+F3 = Start Emulator Movie (press again to stop)
CTRL+F3 = Watch Emulator Movie (press again to stop)

Download Links
XPadder - Assign Emulator Commands to Controller Buttons
Freemake Video Converter - Watch and/or Compress Video exported by RGR Plugin
RGR Plugin - Download the latest version to play games with TAS features



RGR Plugin Systems that support TAS
Currently only the Mednafen emulated systems support Tool-Assisted Speedruns so be sure to play the game using Mednafen (for some systems, you'll find the link at the top left of the play game window). Here's a list of all the systems that currently support TAS on vizzed:
-Atari Lynx
-GameBoy
-GameBoy Color
-GameBoy Advance
-Neo Geo Pocket
-Neo Geo Pocket Color
-Nintendo NES
-Turbo Grafx
-Turbo Grafx CD
-PC-FX
-Sega Game Gear
-Sega Genesis
-Sega Master System
-Sony PlayStation
-Super Nintendo
-SuperGrafx
-Virtual Boy
-WonderSwan
-WonderSwan Color



If you'd liked this guide and would like for me to make more guides like this in the future, please let me know by replying or simply by liking my post

I don't use the RGR much anymore, but when I did, I would have loved a guide like this.  That's largely why I liked your post.  It was very helpful and simple to understand.  Thanks, David!

This is a really helpful guide you made here. 

I know a lot about the RGR and things to get to work with it, but this is something I never knew you could even have compatible with the RGR. 

There are a lot of nice systems that support this TAS, and I'll probably use it lol 

You should really make more of these guides, they're really helpful, and they come from you who knows about the RGR plugin and what users can do with it best. 

Barathemos : These features were added to the RGR Plugin 2.11 so this is all pretty new to the site. Hopefully with this guide and the TAS competition, users will start using these features more.

supernerd117 : Thanks.

Davideo7 : in all games from this systems works TAS? Or not all?

crush_overider : All of the games for the listed systems support TAS assuming the game works with the Mednafen emulator.

Davideo7 : How come I always get a State Rewind error? It prevents me from fixing my own mistakes as I should be able to do in a speedrun! This is so annoying!

Davideo7 : Happened some as Foodperson, here are the screenshoots


http://prntscr.com/7ognjq

http://prntscr.com/7ognx4


I cant rewind if I fail... any fix?

I try to disable and enable again, but 5 secs after I re-enable, the error message is here xD

crush_overider : Some games may not support it.

Foodperson : Do you get the error every time? Are you making sure to enable state rewind?

Davideo7 : I only get this error when playing on the PlayStation emulator. It seems to work fine on SNES, so I'll just play those games, instead, for the competition this month. Is there anything I can do to at least limit this error on this PlayStation emulator, or do I have to get a better computer. The way I understand it, this is a RAM issue.

Foodperson : Can you give me some examples of PlayStation games you had this issue with so that I can test it out for myself and determine whether PlayStation games are just not TAS supported or if it's just a CPU/RAM issue.

Davideo7 : Yes, the only game I tested is Crash Bandicoot. You may not have this issue when enabling Rewind States, but I would very much appreciate it if you do! Thanks!

Sorry for bumping this but what exactly are tool assisted speedruns? Aren't they external programs you download (Similar to what people may download and use for games like Farmville) or are these built into the emulator?