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Quibus wrote:
Nach wrote:
Quibus wrote:
The whole point of MSX is that all software runs on all MSX models (with the proper specs like having enough RAM).
What is the proof for this determination?
It's the whole idea of the MSX standard. Write software for the standard, and it will run on any other computer that also adheres to the standard, no matter the brand. The standard contains information about regions and such, but there is no standard per region.
Please refer to http://map.grauw.nl/resources/system/msxtech.pdf This is the MSX Technical Databook, (part of) the official spec of the original MSX standard.
Thanks for this.
It is important to note though, that even if there is broad compatibility, it doesn't mean something intended for one area and created for what was popular in one area was intended in anyway for another area, especially if crucial differences are then involved.
For example, we should expect games made for MS-DOS 3.3 to also work for MS-DOS 5, as future compatibility was intended. But a game a made for MS-DOS was certainly not intended for DR-DOS.
Quibus wrote:
Nach wrote:
Doesn't this other point outright debunk it?
Quibus wrote:
First of all, there is no region protection at all, except for one single game (Metal Gear JP contains explicit code to check for a JP MSX model).
It's one single game. A very clear exception. For some reason they didn't want Metal Gear JP to be run on non-JP machines. (Don't ask me why.) But this is not applicable to any other game as far as I know. Even the Metal Gear release with English texts works fine on Japanese machines. It doesn't contain that check at all.
Yes, but it does indicate that not necessarily every game was intended for everywhere. It could be they added the check because previous games they made lacked it, and they didn't like seeing Japanese designed edition being sold elsewhere by third parties. And if such a concern existed with one company, it could apply to others as well, even if they didn't do anything about it.
Quibus wrote:
Remember, the game wasn't written by Microcabin. They just released it on cartridge in Japan for the Japanese market. Same game, different release.
The fact that they created a different release for Japan shows that they didn't intend their original release to be used in Japan.
Quibus wrote:
"Intended" is hard to determine with this game. All I can say is that the original developers (being from the UK) probably developed it on a PAL machine. And as such it makes it the most obvious to run it on a PAL machine, as was done by Zupapa.
This I think we can agree on. It's further bolstered by the fact that they made something specific for Japan, which may mean that the version in question was not primarily intended for NTSC (even though it does not preclude it).
Quibus wrote:
Nach wrote:
Quibus wrote:
Some games do behave different on different region machines. A couple of Konami games show Japanese texts and title graphics on Japanese machines and English ones on non-Japanese machines. But it doesn't affect the actual game play.
At least this indicates that those games were intended for those distinct MSX machines.
Following this reasoning, it indicates that these games were intended for "Japanese machines" and "non-Japanese machines".... right? :)
Correct.
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
Joined: 3/9/2004
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Quibus wrote:
The whole point of MSX is that all software runs on all MSX models (with the proper specs like having enough RAM).
What is the proof for this determination?
Doesn't this other point outright debunk it?
Quibus wrote:
First of all, there is no region protection at all, except for one single game (Metal Gear JP contains explicit code to check for a JP MSX model).
Quibus wrote:
And for MSX2 games and up, the video chip has a register in which you can set it to output PAL or NTSC (this means switch between 50 and 60Hz interrupt in practice). Some games write it to force a certain interrupt frequency.
I've heard that some arcade systems/games are like that as well.
Quibus wrote:
In the case of Zupapa's Blagger it's even more interesting. The game was written in the UK, where we have PAL machines. So most likely, the game was developed on a PAL machine. However, the game runs fine on machines of other regions, like a Japanese MSX machine.
But was it actually intended to be ran on a Japanese MSX machine?
Quibus wrote:
Originally, Blagger was released on cassette tape. Microcabin made a release in Japan of the game on ROM cartridge. Same game, same game code (they did alter a few texts here and there and so, but there is no technical reason they had to change the game code), different medium. The advantage of this ROM is of course that it loads instantly. A lot nicer to watch than the full cassette getting loaded (which may take quite a while).
Perhaps this indicates that the cassette was never intended for Japan?
Quibus wrote:
However, that rule says: play region X games on hardware of region X. I understand this is to prevent abuse of glitches due to region differences. On MSX, this abuse is very unlikely. At least I have never seen or heard of bugs that appear due to different regions (other than wrong characters being displayed on screen for instance).
It's not just about abuse of glitches. It's about possibly running the game in a way it was not necessarily intended to run. We want our TASs ran in the most legitimate way possible. That means excluding running games on platforms they were not intended for.
Quibus wrote:
Some games do behave different on different region machines. A couple of Konami games show Japanese texts and title graphics on Japanese machines and English ones on non-Japanese machines. But it doesn't affect the actual game play.
At least this indicates that those games were intended for those distinct MSX machines.
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MrWint wrote:
I wasn't aware that by the current guidelines any branch is basically fixed in which game version it uses once the first run is accepted (not counting "compatible" games like in the Pokémon Gen I case).
I wouldn't characterize it as "fixed". We do allow changes if it's generally the same game, and deemed an improvement once you factor out version differences. We also allow changes if the previous publication was deemed a mistake or poor for some reason, and in these cases, we even do massive cross platform obsoletions, and even obsoletions using different games in a series.
However, if there is a quality publication, then anything else which is viewed as being substantially different will need to be considered a completely different game or a completely different TAS objective in order to be published.
MrWint wrote:
I'd suggest to call this fact out in the movie rules explicitly, because afaics it is not at the moment. Something like "You can only obsolete a movie using the same game version" (with some caveates for compatible games, maybe with an example), or "Submissions using a different version of the game than the currently published movies need to contain significant differences that warrant a separate category, they can not obsolete existing publications".
I'm not really sure that obsoletions are a rules thing for players. Obsoletions vs. categories is a decision made by our judges.
MrWint wrote:
You have mentioned multiple times now that your preferences and the site's rules diverge in some points. Is that because your opinion is in the minority among other people who have a say in this, or because your opinion as the Site Manager and your personal opinion diverge?
I've mentioned on some previous occasions that if nearly all the site members want something, even though they're wrong, it's best to try to accommodate them. The site rules are based upon review of the opinions of our active members, with further discussions by the active staff, weighing them and asserting their practicality. With this process, I personally do not end up agreeing with every decision, but unless I find it to be utterly impractical, unmanageable, or without logical foundation, then I go along with it.
For some of these cases, indeed my personal opinion would seem to be in the minority of our active members. In other cases, we have rules that I generally agree with, but do have some gray areas. For these gray areas, I go with precedent and the spirit of the rule, even though in some cases I'm displeased with the outcome. So for the former, I would say that I am the minority, for the latter I would say that my actions as Site Manager and other capacities aim for what's good for the site, even though I'm personally uncomfortable about it.
MrWint wrote:
I'd argue that TASVideos is also seen by many as a place of record-keeping, and the existence of the Vault tier reflects that.
Personally, I am against the Vault tier, and dislike notions of video publications for record keeping. I watch our players' content for entertainment, not because it's some record. If I want to know about some record, then I'd prefer a table of data over a video. I think the Vault ends up containing a bunch of entertaining stuff that doesn't belong there. Also, Warp correctly argues that any speed record is a speed record, and then if Vault is supposed to represent speed records, why are entertaining speed records not in it? When you think about it, speed records should really be getting some kind of badge or trophy or something appearing on the movie publication (which I have no objection to). The tier system has a lot of weird rough edges to it.
MrWint wrote:
Adding a sentence stating that obsoletion requires the same game version as mentioned above.
Rephrasing the "PAL versions of ROMs are generally not allowed" part, even back to "PAL versions of ROMs are generally not preferred" would probably be good enough.
Refer to what I wrote earlier in this post regarding obsoletion.
For the PAL versions, I would accept any where there's a good chance the PAL is the original and other versions seem inferior.
Take Battletoads for instance, some argue the E version is the original, because the Stamper brothers lived in Britain when they created the game. Further, in Battletoads U, stage 11 doesn't support two players, which is the kind of thing you'd think you'd notice during development testing. However E has no bugs there. That lends some support to the idea that the game was only fully tested while creating E, and U made some changes and broke parts of it, because it was not fully tested like the original. Also people noticed vast differences in enemies for the intermediate levels between them, which if true, would probably make a full run of them seem very different than our existing publications. All in all, if someone made a great BT E 2 player run, I'd probably accept it as another branch.
For the phrasing itself, I prefer "not allowed" over "not preferred" because it makes things simpler. Don't bother with a PAL game unless you know it's the only or it's substantially different. A weaker wording like "not preferred" will just lead to a lot more submissions that will be rejected, and players will feel they had no warning.
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MrWint wrote:
I don't want to define preference at a game level, I don't think that's possible.
The rules currently as they stand in most cases define preferences at the game level.
I also find preferences at the game level the easiest to deal with. If you know how a game is handled, then you know how a game is handled. If you start doing it on a run by run basis, on all sorts of run-specific criteria, I think it becomes a lot more confusing on what might be accepted, and sometimes you might not even be able to know prior going into it.
MrWint wrote:
The preference may change over time with new submissions. If an impressive new strategy or glitch is found that only works in some versions, it may change the preference towards that previously inferior version, without necessarily requiring a new branch.
If it's really impressive enough, it will just become another branch. Look at our Super Metroid submissions as to how we have a whole bunch for all kinds of glitches or strategy criteria.
MrWint wrote:
So the three factors so far are:
audience preference
audiovisual quality
speed (this too may be seen only as a proxy for audience preference, depending on how you want to look at it)
and only audiovisual quality is mostly inherent to the version, not the submission. Audience preference may be bound to the version as well, but individual submissions may sway people.
For judging audience preferences for current stuff as is, I try to read their opinions in terms of the game itself, not the submission. The judging guidelines we currently have mention that we have to anticipate future runs for the game, and cannot just look at a single submission in isolation in terms of how to view dealing with new stuff.
Also a key point which I and a lot of others share (but seems not to be shared by various disgruntled players) is that speed changes due to version are meaningless. We don't care about so called improvements derived from a new version, there's no skill or mastery, or divine-like play in that. We love TASs because we enjoy seeing players do something crazy with what they're given and pushing it to its potential. Switching to B does not show how you pushed A to its potential. For version switches where there were significantly shorter cut scenes, and some players raved about their so called improvement, to me and others like me, I just yawned in response. When watching a TAS, I fast forward through the cut scenes as is, and we've even had some encoders step forward and make encodes for some runs with the cut scenes cut out. The viewer isn't even going to notice the so called improvement. Getting a new fast record in XYZ E does not mean you got a new record in XYZ J, it doesn't work that way.
MrWint wrote:
I'm sorry to go on about this, but the SMB PAL submission is the best example I have of this right now. I have read the judge's notes and especially the decision tree again, and I think part of the problem is that it was a two-step process. You considered obsoletion first, brushed it aside as lunacy, and then considered opening up a new branch for it. The result was that it doesn't deserve one (which is understandable), and hence was rejected.
I'm looking at it in opposite order: you first decide that it is too similar to the NTSC version first so they compete with another and you need to pick a favourite out of the two
The opposite order would go like this:
They're too similar, so it doesn't warrant a new branch.
Let's compare it then to the existing to see if it obsoletes, oh wait, that doesn't work well.
Now what? Precedent says whenever we cannot see how to publish, we reject.
Same result, just sounds a whole lot more confusing.
In terms of what actually happened, the idea I considered soonest and rejected outright was the obsoletion option, because that's what people were pushing for early in the thread, and the opposing opinion was playing more defense than offense.
MrWint wrote:
you have successfully avoided my attempts to get them out of you so far by saying they were not comparable and just different games
My official position on the matter is that they're not comparable. I don't know why you're trying to get anything else out of it. I would even go as far to suggest that trying to aim for something else here defies what TASing is all about in the first place.
MrWint wrote:
My initial suspicions when reading the judgment hence were that some of these factors played a role in it as well which I'd describe as questionable:
Prefer the currently published run (this is not totally unreasonable actually if the goal is to conserve publishing resources)
Prefer the run done in the original version (as mentioned e.g. here)
I did not even consider for a moment publishing resources. Nor do I typically care what is published unless what is published is considered a mistake, or if the new run does something questionable, and we have to ask whether it's any more questionable than the previous run. Since the existing was not a mistake, nor was the new one (or the existing) questionable, it's not a factor.
Regarding the original version, I did consider it for preference, in terms of should we switch all SMB runs from NTSC to PAL? Based on all the submissions I've seen, good players have TAS'd both NTSC and PAL versions, and seem to prefer NTSC, and further, most PAL submissions (discounting those that are junk submissions) were generally nowhere near as good as NTSC submissions. Further, in my study of both games and how they work a bit differently, it appeared that NTSC would seem more enjoyable for worlds 2 and 7 (differences in water potential and entertaining cheap cheap movement), while the other worlds were more or less equal between the two with various tradeoffs. Further, PAL fixed a few bugs that perhaps a clever TAS may want to exploit. Also, adelikat remarked to me that some of the changes for PAL make it an easier game, which is never a good thing. (I estimate the largest difficulty changes due to running/jumping are noticed in worlds 3, 4, 6, and 8.) In the end, I concluded that our players seem to prefer NTSC, especially the better more exacting ones, and my guess would be that NTSC would be more enjoyable for the audience as a whole. So I find that the original, being the more authentic version, is the preferred version, and arguable the better version as well. It also means I get to stick it to you British once again! Down with your tea and your stamp taxes! ;)
In terms of just switching that one branch to PAL, that is not a thought I ever entertained. Nor will I.
MrWint wrote:
I'd be happy to hear that these weren't factors, and which factors were used instead, as an example of how rulings like these are made currently. The fact that the notes didn't spend any time discussing these led to some of the outcry and my bold claim (which I'm still sorry for) that maybe it wasn't actually considered well enough when the decision was made.
I only mentioned in my notes that I know the games well and studied them. In terms of my opinion for this run, I find switching lunacy (both the thread and judges in conversation to me used the words "absurd" instead of "lunancy", with all our long-term judges strongly disliking obsoletion, although few explained to me their specific reasons for why). I did not elaborate further in my notes, because I don't find anything specific that requires elaboration. Any comparison is lunacy. I didn't write any lengthy remarks about the game tradeoffs throughout or submission history with players because I don't think that's relatable to the average viewer and more of a game-obsession-insight and TASVideos-judge-instinct than anything else. I only focused on a small summary that I know the game well, and a small list of the non-playable segments to highlight that even there there are differences, and comparisons cross-version are not as straight forward as the initial thread discussion would have you believe.
I hope this helps give you the insight you were looking for.
MrWint wrote:
My current best suggestion for cases where it's just too difficult to determine the preferred submission based on defensible criteria is to reconsider putting them into different branches. Given that these cases should be exceedingly rare, it shouldn't create too much bloat in the branches.
My personal opinion is to have it as a different publication. However my judgment was not based on my own preferences. I rejected a run that I really liked.
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The problem with the criteria that you pointed out is that you don't want to use them consistently.
You mentioned stuff like:
Sales
Popularity
Audiovisual
Speed
The first three are clearly about the game. The fourth could be about the game, but you want to make it about the branch. I don't find that to be a consistent set of cohesive rules.
The criteria I want to see laid out are clear cut in what is the same, what is different, and how we define preference at a game level.
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MrWint wrote:
You're not really doing any better in terms of clarity though, regarding comparability, what does it mean?
See what I wrote to Warp earlier.
MrWint wrote:
Comparing time? Audience response? Version quality?
Comparing input. Without a large degree of input compatibility, it's a different game.
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It seems there was some confusion with SRAM vs. Save States and the Master mode. I sent a message to the author saying we allow Master mode if there is a video showing how to create the SRAM to unlock it, and that is the SRAM used (with no other surprises in it).
Hopefully we'll see Master mode in the future.
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MrWint wrote:
Nach wrote:
I'd also point out towards your earlier point, that if speed of games are being considered for audience preference without getting into the particulars of any given run, you need to factor in all branches (such as stuff like walkathon and warpless in your example case). Which increases the amount of technically different factors to consider in determining which is faster, which can make different branches have different outcomes, sometimes non-intuitively.
It sounds like you're implying that the preferred version of a game should be determined independently of the branches.
I'm implying that's an option based on the discussion so far. In discussions about rule changes, unless you consider exactly what it is that you're trying to define, you end up with these questions.
MrWint wrote:
I think you hit on the main issue I see with the current rules here. For games which have technical differences but have a very similar look and feel, PAL doesn't need any "immensely significant altering things" in order to be favored, it just needs to be preferred considering all the aspects we discussed already.
Preferred in what context? You must be clear about this.
For acceptance? For obsoletion?
For the game as a whole? For individual branches?
MrWint wrote:
In the judge's notes of the SMB PAL TAS, I expected to find such a comparison of the games for this game and this branch specifically, but they completely skipped that and only discussed a separate category as an option, giving the impression (reinforced by the infamous "lunacy" quote) that there was no debate and NTSC is just the default version. I didn't expect the PAL version to win, but I expected it to be considered.
You're confusing two things here. PAL was considered for acceptance. It was not seriously considered for obsoletion because the majority of judges involved didn't see any sane way the two are comparable, hence, it's pure lunacy.
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MrWint wrote:
Nach wrote:
I think most of the time we should strive for both. If they're too similar and absolutely cannot do both, I'd personally prioritize:
snip
I wouldn't consider any of them because fastest time for some run in some branch, most sales, first to publish, and first to market have 0 affect on the game's quality or its overall TAS potential.
However, I want to challenge your statement that fastest time is not a factor at all. When considering the Pokémon Gen1 SRAM movie, which used Red to obsolete Yellow, I'd argue that time was a major factor. The run features no major new tricks, and is admittedly a downgrade visually from GBC to GB, so you could argue it used an inferior version of the game. Of course this run is almost exclusively based on technical details and the entertainment value is limited anyway. The audience response was pretty positive, but that is only because it was faster.
I can see the argument that the fastest time is only a means that as no impact by itself and the audience response is what actually matters (like game sales don't mean anything by themselves but usually drive audience preferences which do matter). On the other hand you promote time as a factor heavily on TASVideos, when I visit the home page of TASVideos, the information I'm presented with for all the listed runs is the name of the game, the category, and the time, so in a way you are promoting time as a driver for audience response.
As you pointed out, time can be a factor in how an audience feels, but it is not the main concern. Regarding how TASVideos presents data there, it's not my personal preference.
MrWint wrote:
How time is factored into the judgement is actually besides the point I'm trying to make, so I'll stop rambling about it. I'm interested in how you reconcile your statement that which version was released first to market has no impact with your statements on the originality of NTSC SMB as a reason to prefer it over the PAL version (e.g. here), as well as the Movie Rules which state that PAL ROMs are generally not allowed unless there are significant merits.
My personal preferences are not in alignment with the movie rules.
I'd also point out towards your earlier point, that if speed of games are being considered for audience preference without getting into the particulars of any given run, you need to factor in all branches (such as stuff like walkathon and warpless in your example case). Which increases the amount of technically different factors to consider in determining which is faster, which can make different branches have different outcomes, sometimes non-intuitively.
MrWint wrote:
Reading the rules in context of our discussions so far, I actually don't think it's unreasonable to state a general preference for NTSC ROMs, but this is only on the basis that they are likely to have a better audience response (because of their popularity), and that PAL ROMs tend to be broken because of the compensation for different clock speeds. Disallowing them in general unless special conditions are met is a step too far in my opinion. I think this could be fixed just by rephrasing the section, explaining that PAL ROMs are in fact allowed, but all the caveats apply so the NTSC version is the better choice in most cases. The current wording sends the wrong signals, and it causes rulings based on rules that should be guidelines.
I think a key point people are missing is that with the way the rules are structured currently, games which have technical differences but have a very similar look and feel will basically always prefer NTSC unless there is something immensely significant altering things in favor of PAL.
However, if our sole aim is looking to reword things for greater clarity of what the existing rules are without actually changing them, I can take care of that.
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Warp wrote:
If the exact same optimal TAS input works for both (or at least in the actual playable parts of both), they would be considered the same game, but if an optimal TAS input for one would never sync with the other (even with possible delays added or removed from the input), then they could be technically considered different games.
We do have the possible interesting case where best the TAS for game revision B syncs on game revision A, but the best for game revision A does not sync on game revision B because some bug was fixed.
Warp wrote:
1) If the site were redesigned to be more like speedrun.com, as I suggested earlier, with each game having its own page, with all the TASes of said game being neatly and clearly listed or tabulated there, would you agree that this would perhaps allow loosening the principle of keeping the number of branches/categories for a single game minimal (since perceived clutter wouldn't be a problem anymore)?
I have no familiarity with this other site.
Even if TASs are organized by game, if you see 30 TASs on a page for a single game, and what differentiates them isn't clear could be difficult for viewers.
feos wrote:
We don't obsolete games between different consoles unless:
- the consoles are very close to each other (like GG and SMS), the games are close to each other, and the audience agrees with obsoletion
- game versions are intentionally made (almost) identical, like it uses to happen with modern game versions for consoles of the same generation
We've had a few exceptions to this where a poor version was obsoleted by a better one (as was originally done for your Battletoads and Double Dragon). We've also used the technique to get rid of really old TASs that in retrospect we don't think should have been published in the first place.
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What our audience prefers for TASs is not necessarily related to what is the most popular version.
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Warp wrote:
Is the Famicom the "same" console as the NES? If not, where do you draw the line?
Is the NTSC version of Super Mario Bros the "same" game as the PAL version? If I understand correctly, the two versions are not bit-by-bit identical, as there are changes in the executable binary. If you consider the the "same" game, on what basis do you assert this, and where do you draw the line?
Is the Sega 32X version of Doom the "same" game as the PC version? How about Doom64?
I share your pain in this regard. I often question why we don't have TASs for the different revisions of Donkey Kong Country. When there's different bugs in each revision, a TAS for one shows the fastest possible with some glitch, while the TAS for another has no access to some glitches, and instead plays the game more as it was meant to. I think each have their tradeoffs and unique entertainment opportunities, and I'd really like to see both represented.
I think I'd look at it as to how compatible the different versions of a game are with each other. If the average run of a game plays back exactly the same on another version, I think we can consider them the same despite not being bit for bit identical. We have some TASs that playback on a Rockman game and its Megaman exactly the same, because nothing changed in the game aside from the imagery in the title screen some letters on menus and the end credits.
Once you reach the point that input for the two are not compatible, we enter different levels of incompatibility. Some games may had a new version which has some secret side level added, but otherwise is identical. For such a game, playback will work unless entering the side level was attempted, at that point the two games necessarily diverge. We have other games where any input for a given area in the game will play back identically, but the menus between those areas diverge. These I would consider our gray areas.
Beyond that we have different versions of games where input will never sync between the two, not even in limited (but complete) segments. For those, I don't see any parity between the games anymore, despite a similar look and feel, and it being common knowledge that the two are supposedly the same.
As a side example, let's look at two variants of Checkers. The rules are the same across both, except the following
Variant A) A player must jump if they have a piece they can jump. Kings gain the ability to move in both directions.
Variant B) A player can choose to jump if there is a piece they can jump. Kings not only gain the ability to move in both directions, but when jumping can skip as many spaces as wanted.
The board is the same, the pieces are the same, nearly all the rules are the same, but are they the same game? Are masters of one also a master of the other? Would a record game in one make sense as a record in the other? Games are defined as their rules, and when the rules change the game changes. TASing is all about the rules as they are, not as they appear. So even if two games look the same, if they are true video games, we must understand they're not the same. I go into this in more detail in Wiki: Nach/HistoryOfGamesAndRelevanceHere.
MrWint wrote:
I don't think it matters how large their differences technically are. It may be a 1.0 vs. 1.1 version of the otherwise same title, or it may be a port for a completely different system altogether, with a different underlying engine and everything. The important point is that they have the same goals, use similar means to achieve them, and provide a similar viewing experience
I think how large the differences technically are is the primary crucial point, and is in fact a foundation of TASing philosophy. Please see my above response to Warp and link.
MrWint wrote:
So assuming we have two runs that conflict with each other in this way, which one should be published?
In my opinion, this consideration should include (in rough order of importance):
- Fastest time (modulo trivial version differences)
- Audience response/Entertainment value (weight depends on publishing tier)
- Audiovisual quality of the version
- Relative version popularity/sales
It specifically should not include:
- Which version was published first on tasvideos.org
- Which version was released first to market (aka the "original")
Two runs for a single game or two similar games each with their own run? I assume you mean the latter, as the former makes little sense in the context.
This gets into a number of issues regarding quality of the game, TAS itself, popularity, audience response. I think most of the time we should strive for both. If they're too similar and absolutely cannot do both, I'd personally prioritize:
Highest quality game version (most potential for TASability and good audience feedback)
Version preferred by majority of audience
Audiovisual quality of the version
I define TASability as including ability to complete the games in multiple ways, many tradeoffs which require study and planning, much depth that has a near infinite supply of finding new things, ways to perform entertaining action often.
The following suggested criteria I would not consider at all not even one iota:
Fastest time
Version popularity/sales
Which version was published first on TASVideos
Which version was released first to market
I wouldn't consider any of them because fastest time for some run in some branch, most sales, first to publish, and first to market have 0 affect on the game's quality or its overall TAS potential.
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
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Okay then!
Looks like we each posted numbers with different kinds of rounding errors.
Thanks for the info.
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
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MrWint wrote:
Nach wrote:
Nobody paid attention in the discussion, because nobody posted any hard numbers, just kept on going on and on about faster real time, which is never how we compare changes across versions.
I don't think it's fair of you to expect this to just naturally come up in the discussion. I had no idea it was relevant, and nobody even questioned the timing in that direction. If this is a relevant part of how the run will be judged, I think it's also partly on you as the judge to bring this up before the final verdict hits people with this unexpectedly.
You're correct about this. Normally, I would also raise various lines of thought I'm considering prior to judging. However with all the madness going on in the thread prior to my judgment, I really didn't want to convolute things further before I had to judge it. At least at this point now people will focus on how this was judged as opposed to all the directions people were looking at before this.
MrWint wrote:
Speaking of trusting my numbers, the table I posted is a straight export of a spreadsheet with only formatting adjustments. The times are rounded to the nearest millisecond. The frequencies used are 60.0988138974405 for NTSC and 50.0069789081886 for PAL. Can you point to one of the inconsistencies you saw?
Sure, for first part of 1-1 NTSC, you have FPS as 60.10125755348685285, for the next part it's 60.09745533297238766, meanwhile 8-2 is 60.09963040334243934. So either I'm not doing my math right, my calculator is broken, or there's some fishy rounding or other issues with the numbers you posted.
Your NTSC numbers are within a second of what I got, so it looks sort of right to me, but I had a difficult time reconciling some of the fractional difference here (not that it matters all that much at this point).
MrWint wrote:
I know it's a stretch, and I'm not claiming that this is exactly what actually happened. It could have happened for any single part of the game though, or for other games, my point is that the current guideline of always preferring the original is presumptious.
Well, the various rules we have allow for some leeway in different cases, I don't see a clear demand for always having the original, especially when the original version isn't clear. But for cases where there is a clear original, and it's a well designed original, it makes sense to me to prefer it.
MrWint wrote:
Regarding SMB2j, that's a trick question, it's because SMB2j came out in 1986, the PAL version only in 1987. Maybe they realized their mistakes only after SMB2j's release ;)
Well possibly. Although I believe most of the bug fixes you found in the PAL version are actually found in SMB2j first. I have a hard time believing the music tempo though was a mistake.
MrWint wrote:
Overall, while this submission didn't go as I expected in more than one way, I'm happy with the result. Thanks Nach for putting up with me, and again sorry for overstepping in my initial reaction
It's quite alright sir! Keep up the excellent work you're doing.
MrWint wrote:
(although from reading from your last correspondence in this thread you also seem to enjoy this kind of thing a little).
I actually prefer it when things go smoothly. However when they don't, I'm up for it. I spent a decade on one of the most combative forums around, and learned quite a few techniques in the process. Sometimes these sorts of discussions bring back fond memories. If you want some laughs check out Wiki: Nach/Arguing (and some people here who I won't name even tried using some of those techniques in this thread).
Alyosha wrote:
It seems myself and MrWint measured time slightly differently
I think we all did, and rounding errors abound.
Alyosha wrote:
but there is no disagreement that the time saved in 8-2 is 112 frames.
It's possible you're correct, although checking through some of my SMB notes, I found this:
<klmz> doing the new flagpole glitch in 8-2 wastes at least 120 frames but makes it up later
Which would be much closer to 2 seconds. Also one of the movies I measured had it a bit over 2 seconds, which is where my number came from (possibly with rounding errors). I'll go back and look through my video archive and recompute when I get a chance.
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
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Thank you, I appreciate your vote of confidence.
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
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Habreno wrote:
Before we even get into this, let's get things straight. You, Nach, an administrator for the site, are seriously attacking people for disagreeing with you, and yet expect to still be considered a fair judge? There is absolutely no need for that (especially considering I, despite my disagreements, was very civil and objective in debating the judgement and not anything related to you as a person. Thanks for showing the same respect back jerk) and honestly, if you hadn't been so damn determined to insult me, I wouldn't be coming after this judgement as much as I am. This post probably would not have been created. But you insist on being right, and you leave me no choice.
Let's see, you are constantly trying to deny the quality in my judgment and characterizing it in a way intended to make me look bad, even when your characterization is not upheld by anything I wrote and you further try to misrepresent what I wrote.
Then you're claiming I'm attacking you for responding to these attacks on me, often purposely reusing similar words that you used, okay.
As for insulting you, no, that's not my aim. I'd say I was mocking what you wrote, which I will continue to do so with this response here, because you either seem to put so little effort into your writing in understanding what I wrote, or are intentionally trying to misrepresent it.
Habreno wrote:
Despite region differences, the NES is the NES, and while regions may be differentiated in the rules of TASVideos.org, nowhere does it mention that consoles are as well.
Yet the rules mention taking into account difference across games when comparing them, which clearly applies when the NES is not the same NES.
Habreno wrote:
"When we look at PAL <em>ports</em>, we must understand that these games are adaptions or variants of the original."
You once again insist on calling it a port despite still being for the NES.
I see you still insist on trying to claim it's not a port despite it not being for the same kind of NES, which cannot even properly run games made for another kind of NES.
Habreno wrote:
Aside from once again calling PAL a port (I'll stop pointing this out from now on, but this error is basically all throughout the judgement)
I like how you keeping making this error that it's not a port. Habreno wrote:
and the differences in the engine, made with that goal in mind, are extremely difficult to notice
I don't know, the music speed and Mario's walking speed during the cut scenes are incredibly obvious to me to notice. The former is something I also saw mentioned several times in the thread, so people are noticing some differences quite simply. Once you realize these differences, even a casual observation starts to reveal several others. Also try playing 2-3 and 7-3, to me at least, they felt very different.
Habreno wrote:
However the kicker here is actually in the first sentence. "If a PAL port offered the exact same engine/quality as the original, it could make sense to have it obsolete the original [...]" (emphasis added). Nintendo, as a game company, has always aimed to offer the exact same quality across all regions of the game it releases. I would argue they succeed, and your sentiments (based on the second paragraph here) seem to mirror mine. In regards to "engine/quality" the / is indicative of "or", thus the sentence reads "engine or quality" and while the engine may not be the same, the quality is (by your own sentiments), thus qualifying this run to obsolete NTSC based on the judgement text given
The slash indicates for some PAL port runs that engine is of primary importance while for others quality is. Engine is of primary importance when dealing with speedruns, because how else do you compare speedruns when their engine works extremely differently? While for playarounds quality is more of a concern. Since this run is trying to obsolete based on speed, it totally fails on the exact same engine qualification. Further as to quality as a secondary concern this case, it is possible to argue the quality is not there either. See what I wrote above regarding adelikat's comments.
Habreno wrote:
Nach wrote:
The first thing I want to shoot down is the idea that SMB PAL is faster than SMB NTSC. There are quite a few parts of the game that are non-playable. These include score countdown, castle animations, pipe transitions, 1-2, 2-2, 4-2, and 7-2 initial cut screens, level banners, vine climbing, and Bowser drowning to our princess is in another castle. When comparing across versions we need to take all this into account and figure out actual game-play time. NES SMB processes the non-playable segments of the games in multiples of 21 frames and 18 frames for NTSC and PAL respectively. Nintendo altered the number from 21 to 18 because 21/60 and 18/50 is 0.35 and 0.36, which should provide a close gaming experience on the port. In actuality, using more precise numbers, NTSC has frames which are ~0.0166 seconds long, and PAL ~0.0199 seconds. This means the non-playable parts are processed in multiples of ~0.3494 seconds and ~0.3599 seconds. Since these non-playable segments run on boundaries that are multiples of these, it means that the NTSC version allows slightly more time to get in activity before the game will round upwards. Conversely, if you just went a bit over a multiple, the PAL version will proceed to the next multiple sooner.
We'll get to the actual comparisons next, but the initial statement is factually wrong. If you look at the submission times, the PAL TAS is, in fact, faster than the NTSC TAS.
...
Next, we have the comments about what non-playable parts are included, and included in this list is "Bowser drowning to our princess is in another castle" which is after the end of input and thus isn't included in TASVideos.org timing at all.
My paragraph which makes no mention of this submission and mentions a whole bunch of parts of the game not seen in this submission is clearly not talking about this submission! (Obvious, right? )
I like how you are then claiming it's wrong because it doesn't match the submission.
Oh lord of pedanticness, how do you reconcile your own claim that "our princess is in another castle" occurs "after the end of input"? If I was a normal human being commenting on this, I'd say I'd knew what you actually meant, but since you are so pedantic, how can I possibly let this go? (Note the "if I was" probably doesn't mean "I" here.)
Habreno wrote:
I would expect an administrator of the site, including one that has stated he is "quite familiar with" to realize when the timing of the TAS would end for a game. And yet this error was made. While errors like this one may not be deemed relevant by the judge to the decision ultimately rendered, they certainly show that the judgement is made by someone whose expertise is questionable at times (including this one, especially as this is not the only error in this judgement text), and for said judge to be an administrator of the site certainly does not paint things in a better light for Nach.
Oh lord pedantic supreme, I think you conclusively proved with this last one a total lack of reading comprehension or an extreme campaign to paint me in a bad light.
Habreno wrote:
As also discussed here, the alterations made for the game's transition to PAL framerates included modifying the frame rule. NTSC's frame rule is 21 frames and the game runs at 60 frames per second (roughly), or 0.35 second chunks (technically slightly less, but for some slight simplicity here we'll round to two decimal places), and the most you would wait is 20 frames (0.33 seconds) (assuming if you meet the frame rule exactly you move on "instantly"). PAL's frame rule is 18 frames and the game runs at 50 frames per second, or 0.36 second chunks, and the most you would wait is 17 frames (0.34 seconds). Therefore, to correct the final few sentences, PAL actually gets slightly more time per frame rule to sneak into the frame rule (0.36 seconds vs 0.35 seconds), while NTSC is actually faster to the next frame rule if you go barely over (0.33 seconds vs 0.34 seconds), and not the other way around, as is stated in the judgement text. Even if my presumption that you move on instantly if you meet the frame rule exactly is wrong, the second corrected statemet still holds true (0.35 seconds vs 0.36 seconds). Yet another error by Nach.
Since the game itself is on a cycle of frames, and we're talking about frame rules, the internal time is what matters, making what I said correct. Yet you looked at it multiplied by the real time difference which is not how the game works, and you thus reversed what actually occurs. Yet another error by the supremely pedantic lord Habreno!
On NTSC, anything completed on frames 1-21 (or 0-20 depending on how you look at it) doesn't require rounding, and PAL limits this to 1-18, therefore NTSC version allows slightly more time to get in activity before the game will round upwards. Conversely, if you just went a bit over a multiple, the PAL version will proceed to the next multiple sooner.
However, these margins are more significant for PAL than NTSC because the non-playable parts are processed in multiples of ~0.3494 seconds and ~0.3599 seconds for NTSC and PAL respectively. Although on the other hand, the sweet spot for PAL is pretty much anything 1-18 past its multiples, while the sweet spot for NTSC is 19-21 past its multiples.
Habreno wrote:
Let us compare this table vs the one by MrWint (albeit comparing MrWint's PAL TAS vs the NTSC TAS, but given that his TAS matches the submission by HappyLee in real time identically, the fact that the two are different and that his is potentially "faster" should end up being irrelevant).
I love how two different TASs which spend time in playable areas differently to a noticeable degree are not relevant when it comes to comparisons made across playable areas. Habreno wrote:
As I initially mentioned in my post on Page 9 of 12 (responded to by Nach on Page 10 of 12), the first paragraph here ignores the fact that PAL also contains gameplay/nongameplay tradeoffs to avoid the firework animations as well. Once again, another error, this time extremely significant and relevant, which was dismissed by Nach as "The time consideration only matters if it were to obsolete NTSC." - which only further questions why all these comparisons are part of the judgement text if they don't matter (as I stated near the beginning here)?
Yes, keep asking questions which was already answered multiple times.
Habreno wrote:
Not only do proper numbers make things closer, it actually keeps things favoring PAL, unlike in the incorrect information where NTSC pulls ahead here.
I like how a comparison done with a different run is used to shoot down my comments on a completely different comparison. Further you keep doing it for a point which A) Is not relevant for the judgment, B) misses the point of the comparison made altogether (which is to highlight differences between the engines and the difficulty in comparing the two).
Habreno wrote:
And once again, these numbers can easily be accurately obtained as posted by MrWint yet Nach did not ask in this thread how to do so. Nor was it asked how to in the SMB thread on the forums, either (at least not since April, which is much before this TAS was submitted, and likely not at any point in 2017). So once again, a lack of effort in parts that Nach believed were not relevant.
Yes, because the only way to compare numbers for timing the length of a segment is to ask MrWint or in the SMB thread.
Conversely if I did ask someone else to provide such numbers for me, you'd then be arguing the lack of effort I myself put into it, and I'm delegating because I'm lazy. Habreno wrote:
Let me requote that first statement. "Armed with all the aforementioned information, how do we look at this?" This statement being made about information that was not relevant to the judgement that was made. If that alone does not scream contradiction, I have no clue how to show you any clearer.
Across all the information, indeed, not every last bit of it was relevant in the end, but it was all reviewed. In fact in terms of all the information that was provided, a comparison table was just a fraction of it. For some reason you like blowing this out of proportion. You also like to completely skip over the fact that in that section I was asking questions of how does one compare the two, what is and is not valid (not that I have any answers for you on that), and I didn't even touch upon many of the game changes. The questioning how to compare is the key point, not what the actual numbers are. The fact is, there is no fair way to make a comparison between the two.
Habreno wrote:
What are the counterpoints presented? This is never stated. If we assume that it was the above information
Gee, counterpoints must be something which somehow opposed the original point made right? That's the only safe assumption you can make given the context when nothing else is stated.
Habreno wrote:
not only do we now get to show that Nach is wrong, but that Nach has actively lied in regards to the judgement text made - you cannot claim something is not relevant if it is the counterpoints you yourself use in discussion with other judges to formulate a ruling on the judgement!
Yet nothing you claimed that I lied about actually relates to being a counterpoint for any of the initial points offered (except for one judge), so it cannot rationally be assumed to be part of the conversation, or in-order to be a counterpoint, you must assume the exact opposite of what you're trying to sell. Yet you like to keep on lying about this. So either we must again call into question your reading comprehension abilities or your self proclaimed designation as being the one true source of information regarding how to judge this run.
Habreno wrote:
If we assume that the above information was not the counterarguments presented, then we have the issue of secrecy.
Right, issues of secrecy, because we cannot possibly fathom from all the information provided what might be a counterpoint to what was labeled as the original positions of each judge. The most common position "before" was accept as another variant, and the most common position "after" was against this, and anything else against prior was still the same after. Hmm, I wonder what the counterpoint must have been?
Maybe this paragraph which presents counters to the "another variant" argument might be that counterpoint? Thinking about how this run actually differs from the NTSC when viewing, it's not by much. More than that, there's nothing that really necessitates a difference. Just because one run decided to randomly jump at some point does not make it different from a run which does not. It has to be different as a branch in a significant manner, not just how it was played back in a particular run or mere moments of it. The new glitch, while new, does not look so different going through the wall than going through the wall otherwise. Also, I'm not convinced every run of this PAL branch would require this glitch being abused.
Could that possibly be it? That it then follows with So looking at changes across the run, they seem minor, and 4/5 judges I spoke to are now in favor of rejecting. which matches the table of judges somehow indicate that this paragraph was related to those 4/5 judges? We're just going to have to think about that one... Habreno wrote:
Nach wrote:
When I initially saw this run, knowing the differences right off the bat between variants and our aims, it seemed clear to me that obsoletion was lunacy. However my knee-jerk reaction was that I love this run, the engine is a bit different, let's just accept this as another variant.
The first statement made here is also not language I would expect of an unbiased judge. Declaring a major, valid, consideration "lunacy" is utterly absurd.
Right, because judges cannot have an initial personal opinion on anything.
Being that most of the judges shared that same initial personal opinion must mean that all the TASVideos judges are biased. Making you even trying to argue anything here "utterly absurd".
The fact that the judgment actually differed from my original personal opinion and that I stated that I'm not personally pleased with the result which I created indicates how biased I am, right?
Showing in great detail my thoughts on practically every matter discussed in the thread, initial positions, conferring with other judges, decision tree, that only goes to enlighten how biased and secretive I am about this. Habreno wrote:
A proper comparison would be to include the differences caused by the gameplay in the cutscenes. You claim that the cutscenes differ in time, however, ignore the fact that this is due to differences in each game's gameplay time (which, as addressed above, even your comparisons on this are questionable at utter best) and the fact that SMB features a frame rule which causes such non-gameplay cutscenes to only progress at specific frame points. In short, since the gameplay time affects the cutscene time inversely (longer gameplay can cause shorter cutscenes) it is unfair to discount cutscene length when comparing versions as they are affected directly by the gameplay itself, and therefore should be included when comparing the gameplay.
Except those aren't the rules.
Further as I've stated many times, there are so many changes in gameplay itself, any comparison is unfair, unlike what is typically done when only some cut scenes or text change.
Habreno wrote:
Habreno wrote:
Secondly, the only rules about comparing playable and non playable content is with regards to NTSC-U and NTSC-J. None of it is in regards to PAL.
Nach wrote:
Rules don't exist in a vacuum. Extrapolating from similar cases to decide how to handle cases where there are no existing laws is common practice. I'm sorry, you're having a difficult time with this. If these rules apply to cases where only the language changes, all the more so in cases where the changes are much larger.
If you answered the first answer, then here's your treat. The rules might not exist in a vacuum, but your pedantic insistance on treating them in an authoritarian manner here goes against you, because the rules explicitly state that comparisons between NTSC-U and NTSC-J are subject to the comparisons of text and such, and that because none of the rule includes PAL, explicitly stating NTSC-U and NTSC-J it does not apply to PAL.
If you answered the latter, let me actually address your point. Title screen may be a very small difference if any exists at all. I haven't calculated, because it's possibly a hundreth of a second or so if it exists at all. Language change is zero. And cutscenes were addressed above. So all of the rules you want to apply are either changes of zero, very nearly zero, or inapplicable due to the interaction between gameplay and non-gameplay times- and even if you do include the gameplay only, it is stillquestionable at best if NTSC is ahead of PAL.
If the rules only compare NTSC-U and NTSC-J regarding taking into account the sole minor differences when doing comparison in order to make it fair, argument a fortiori, we definitely take into account major game change differences in order to make the comparison fair.
You pointing out any comparison being questionable is my entire point, which I have repeated multiple times. The comparison is far from fair.Habreno wrote:
I'm not the judge here. It's not my job to know the rules, it's yours (and given some of what's been said above, that knowledge you have is certainly not entirely correct). Show me where it says they need to be factored in.
Since all comparisons are meant to be fair, a lack of rules regarding comparison in cases where there is difficulty making it highlights they should not be made. I don't know why you keep missing this crucial point.Habreno wrote:
Nach wrote:
I think you're attempting to compare apples and limousines.
No, comparing regions and versions for OOT and comparing regions for SMB is not apples to limousines. It's a very relevant one.
Right, comparing a case where differences are minor and primarily affect non-gameplay is directly and fairly comparable to a case where the differences are major and seriously affect gameplay. Habreno wrote:
Firstly, it's nice to see numbers from someone who is able to create proper data.
Oh lord pedantic, you keep calling into question my numbers, but when someone else posts numbers with obvious errors in FPS, you fail to notice!Habreno wrote:
And yet you attack others all the time (no, I won't bother to quote every single one starting from your first response to me, you can look it up yourself) but cry foul when you get attacked.
I'm crying foul? I don't recall it. Rather I'm responding appropriately to how people are attacking me with unwarranted characterizations and twisting what I wrote.
For a lot of what you're writing, I think you need to stop projecting yourself on me.
Habreno wrote:
While I'm still not convinced this wasn't part of what you used with your counterarguments (and nothing you can say will ever change that, you have lost my trust as far as that goes)
You have lost any trust that I have in your abilities to apply common sense.Habreno wrote:
In short, the game does not need to be bit-by-bit identical for obsoletion on TASVideos.org. Precedent and site rules both prove this.
That's true, but we do strive for rather comparable gameplay except in the rare cases where we opt for a cross-platform obsoletion.
I would have responded to more of your other points but they fell into one of the following categories:
A) Something which has been discussed at length already and I won't go into over and over again.
B) Stuff which is not relevant to what's going on here (at least not that I could find, forgive me).
C) Stuff which I could not follow the logic of. I'll take responsibility for not understanding some of your arguments. However I am sorry, I cannot reply to what makes no sense to me on even how to parse the concern raised. I'm sure you'll proceed to attack me on this too, but there's nothing I can do about it.
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
Joined: 3/9/2004
Posts: 4588
Location: In his lab studying psychology to find new ways to torture TASers and forumers
MrWint wrote:
Sorry Nach, my intention was not to attack you personally, I may not have spent as much time as I should have formulating my points, so it ended up a rougher than I intended.
Apology accepted.
MrWint wrote:
When you write a long paragraph about debunking that PAL is faster then NTSC, and then present a "before" and "after" judge voting, the obvious conclusion is that you used the material you presented in previous paragraphs in your discussions.
I don't understand how people come to this "obvious" conclusion. The "before" is before I said anything to a judge except ask their opinion. If nearly every judge did not consider obsoletion before, and did not consider it after I made some undefined argument, I don't see why people would think that PAL vs. NTSC speed was even part of the discussion at all. Yes I used some of the material presented in previous paragraphs, but only the ones that applied to whatever the judge's opinion was "before". PAL vs. NTSC could only possibly apply to one of the judges, and even then I didn't end up using it as the case was. If I made any speed related argument with them trying to change their opinion, for the majority of the judges, it must have been about why PAL is way faster and it should obsolete NTSC! I don't know how to interpret the presented data on what happened any other way.
MrWint wrote:
You're also not innocent in this, though. I didn't gather this data yesterday, I have a spreadsheet with more detailed frame comparisons (also for the non-playable parts) which I created when investigating the feasibility of this run. Just because I didn't write about it doesn't mean nobody paid any attention. I just didn't think it was relevant to the conversation until you brought it up in the verdict, with numbers that didn't match mine. I still don't think it's a fair way to time the versions, but I think we're on the same page there.
Nobody paid attention in the discussion, because nobody posted any hard numbers, just kept on going on and on about faster real time, which is never how we compare changes across versions. There was also this mistaken impression in the thread that the speed difference primarily had to do with the glitch in 1-2, which is clearly not true when you realize the time disparity is greatest in 8-2 which is far greater than that in 1-2. The times I posted as a whole also serve to unmask any parity between the two, which was my aim.
On another point, the numbers I posted and that you posted are fairly close, and I also mentioned my timings could have rounding errors or be off by a frame (or more if you define start/end of non-playable differently than I did), so I don't have an issue with the numbers not precisely matching. But even if your numbers are more accurate than mine, I find them suspect too. Running your numbers shows me that frames / time is getting different FPS for different NTSC segments. So either my calculator is broken, or you're doing something with these numbers I'm not aware of.
MrWint wrote:
The difficulty argument is frankly debatable, you are assuming intention where none may exist. Just because you experienced the difficulty in NTSC a certain way, doesn't mean they specifically designed each jump to have a certain difficulty.
I agree it's debatable. The reason why I specifically wrote that it's adelikat's opinion is that I don't entirely share it, I can see either side. Although from the conversation we had, he is strongly attempting to argue based on a ratio between different engine numbers being relatively proportional to each other, with those same numbers being present in level design by area. That proportion according to him does not align correctly in the PAL version (I did not even attempt to verify any of this data myself).
MrWint wrote:
If I wanted to play devil's advocate here, I could claim that the PAL version is the true original, and they just didn't get it right the first time with the NTSC version, so they tweaked it intentionally for PAL.
It's hard to claim PAL is original when it came out about 3 years after the NTSC version. Nintendo wasn't even sure they were going to do Europe at all at first, and wanted to see if things caught on in the US prior.
Additionally, if you're correct that the PAL changes are intentional (bug fixes aside), why don't those changes appear in SMB2j?
MrWint wrote:
My point is not that this is unknowable (you could ask someone who worked on it), my point is it should be irrelevant, they are no more than differences, not making one version intriniscally better. You don't want to go out of your way tracking down what the actual developer intentions were for each section of each game to judge a submission for how true it is to the original intentions, and you can't assume just because it came out first that this must be the intention (if that were the case, no 1.1 versions would exist), so you can only see them as what they are, differences without any preference. If the differences are large enough, a new category might be warranted, and if they are not, obsoletion might be warranted. That is why I think the originality argument based on "indisputable authenticity" (source: Judge Guidelines) is flawed and not actually that indisputable.
For the games were the PAL port is exceptionally shoddy (which unfortunately many are), I think for those cases NTSC having indisputable authenticity is correct.
MrWint wrote:
I didn't disagree with the verdict, I disagreed with the way it was presented, which is what I think the main reason for the small outrage has been. I'm sure you thought about this thoroughly, but the judge's notes didn't reflect all of that properly.
It's definitely possible I could have presented some of it better than I did. It's also why I later added the decision tree because people had a hard time following what I wrote. But still I have a hard time believing people are coming to certain conclusions when those conclusions only adhere to a portion I wrote but are contradicted by another. For those cases I understand why people are asking for clarification, but I don't get why they're jumping to conclusions.
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MrWint wrote:
However, I'm afraid the information the ruling is based upon is wrong, and it may have had an adverse impact on the verdict.
Nothing you contented in the rest of your post was actually a crucial point in the judgment, so nothing it was based on is wrong.
Thank you however for your updated more accurate tables, it is useful for those that care about this.
MrWint wrote:
And the only reason it is even that close overall is because of the water section in 8-4, PAL is significantly slower while walking or swimming (they used a factor of 7/6 instead of 6/5). The ruling misrepresents the facts by how they display the data.
All the judge notes did was call attention to certain details that NO ONE seemed to pay any attention too during the lengthy one month discussion that went on prior to then.
MrWint wrote:
The reason it is relevant, the reason it was probably included in the ruling to begin with, is that it makes the decision much less defensible.
The primary reason it was included was to address many different topics that were discussed in this thread, and the level that they were or were not looked into, whether or not in the end the point was relevant or not. This is the same reason remarks regarding entertainment or rule changes were included. The secondary reason was to show there was a disparity between the two games and runs thereof that is beyond a new kind of glitch being possible or faster music. Your remarks regarding walking and swimming further bolster the evidence of this disparity.
MrWint wrote:
It demonstably convinced other judges into changing their opinion.
None of the other judges had seen any numbers I came up with prior to me posting the judgement. The numbers didn't have anything to do with how they were convinced either. Nor were numbers even relevant to any point any judge thought of except for one of them. This was also already mentioned in this thread.
MrWint wrote:
It is faster than the currently published run no matter how you slice it, and also well-liked. It has been rejected because it is apparently too different to allow obsoletion, but simultaneously too similar to warrant its own category (source: decision tree). This is a middle ground I don't think should exist, at least not for a high-profile game like SMB.
Source is also the judge notes.
The staff isn't entirely thrilled with this middle ground, which is exactly why there is a discussion regarding rule changes going on right now.
MrWint wrote:
And the decision relies heavily on the "original" vs. "non-original" distinction, which I don't understand at all. Whether or not something was on the market first has no relevance by itself. Actual possibly valid reasons are usually only results of this fact, like when the original was significantly more popular than later versions, or when later versions were poorly made compared to the original. It'd be great to get some elaboration on this point.
There were multiple elaborations on this point in this thread. I'm not going to repeat them over and over.
MrWint wrote:
The way it stands now it sounds like a handwavy way to justify a biased opinion about PAL games being intrinsically inferior due to being "not the original". The way Nach describes it as "Having a non-original game replace a perfectly valid original seemed lunacy to me, [...]" suggests that not much thought went into why that would be the case.
Instead of attacking me claiming not much thought went into the decision (which I spent over a month weighing and obtaining positions from the other judges), or my opinion of PAL which I laid out in the judge notes which is contrary to your conclusion regarding my opinion, why not consider that you yourself may be a bit biased because of the game or the effort you put into it. MrWint wrote:
Being the original doesn't make it better by itself.
adelikat provided an argument for why it does, see some of my earlier posts. Also, whether it's better or not isn't really grounds whether it should obsolete another. I think Super Mario All-Stars is better, should it obsolete everything?
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Alyosha wrote:
I don't know where Nach's original estimate of 2.37 for NTSC comes from, so if I'm missing something someone please fill me in.
I picked a spot before the staircase a bit prior to where HL slows down, as an easy to notice spot. I then went through a bunch of previous movies for the game, looking for the one which did the staircase to flag fastest. Once I found the fastest, I added the time from that point to the time I calculated for HL till that point, and then subtracted that from HL's overall time.
Alyosha wrote:
If anyone understands the vine glitch in 4-2 better and can improve the runs there that would probably be the biggest place to improve the accuracy of this comparison.
That's the thing, if you're aiming for fastest possible playable time don't do the glitch at all, as the glitch trades playable time for real time.
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Chanoyu wrote:
One important assumption is that the PAL SMB submission is, in every relevant way, faster than the NTSC published movie.
I don't agree with this assumption in the slightest.
Chanoyu wrote:
I think it is clear that the preferred version for SMB is now based on the popularity of the American version, which is perfectly valid.
Also originality. SMB Japan/USA version was the original version.
Chanoyu wrote:
One that may come close is The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time. In its publication history on this site, the version used has changed from JP 1.1 to USA 1.0 to JP 1.0. Surely this is because
of the glitch-potential (so superiority) instead of originality or popularity, even if it is a popular game.
I don't know enough about that game to say for sure, but from my understanding, there are no major differences between those two to the playable portions of the game aside from bug fixes.
Chanoyu wrote:
Therefore I think that the judge guidelines, as the OoT example shows, provide opportunity to at least soften the "lunacy" of obsoleting a "perfectly valid original".
I think you're attempting to compare apples and limousines.
Chanoyu wrote:
Furthermore, as MrWint explained, PAL SMB is not just a port, but also a sort of 1.1 patch applied at the same time as it was patched for 50Hz screens. The reason given to prefer originality is authenticity. I do not think it needs explaining that a later revision by the creator is no less authentic than the so called original: after all, the original only happens to be (coincidentally, as it were) published first.
Not quite. The game was carefully crafted around the original variables. It's unclear who did the bug fixes, that could have been done by the original development team even before Nintendo Europe got their hands on it. However it was Nintendo Europe who ported it to PAL. They are a subdivision of the parent company, but they still created a derivative work. SMB PAL's changes to momentum makes some of the tricky World 8 huge jumps easier. I don't think that was something intended by the original developers, and may have even been an oversight by the porting team. These changes to the actual game play make it non-original. It's just as non-original as the ports to SNES and CGB, even though the same company did those ports (and possibly even some of the same developers).
Chanoyu wrote:
In question form: what is more authentic, a modern game with or without its day one patch? Therefore I think the preference of originality (which American SMB has over PAL SMB) is problematic, as the whole idea of preferring the first-published is an arbitrary preference.
If it was only bug fix patches you'd be onto something. But a lot more was changed than just that. Changes to the engine variables have a ripple effect across the entire game. The challenges are no longer exactly the same as they were before.
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Warp, I totally agree. It's more about how do we view these engine changes in the bigger picture.
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feos, your feelings about this run closely match my own. My personal feeling is that it should also be published as another branch because:
A) It's a great run of a slightly different official game, it looks great, I want it!
B) Having a new variant offers up some new competition for our players to fight over that we're not getting with the existing branches.
I think many others in this thread feel that way too. However, I could not reconcile my personal feelings with the rules. When I spoke with judges B and D, they seemed to personally prefer acceptance as another branch, but they could not reconcile that with the rules either. Based on your lengthy remarks, I think you yourself deep down have a hard time reconciling the two as well.
On a side note, adelikat brought up an argument asking how would we view a hack which changed some the parameters to the game engine similar to how PAL does to NTSC here, and creates some new game-play opportunities. Would we consider that for publication as a new branch/variant that our players could compete to get the best score? If we accepted PAL should we accept that too? Once you start questioning things from the hack angle, my point B above is kind of demolished.
When we have only A to consider, I think we're all a bit biased here as BrunoVisnadi mentioned. If this was regarding Super Adventure Island or Lemmings, we probably wouldn't be having this conversation at all.
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Habreno wrote:
this is the hill I will die on.
Don't forget to take a shovel with you.
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Habreno wrote:
So it's rejected for being too similar to an already-existing category yet it was barely considered by any of the judges to have it obsolete the already existing category?
That was mentioned more times than I can count.
Habreno wrote:
Furthermore, the concept of "original version" and "non-original version" is not on TASVideos.org in any form until you mentioned it here.
You must be having a really hard time. "Original" appears 4 times on this TASVideos.org page: http://tasvideos.org/JudgeGuidelines.html which happens to be the Judging handbook.
I'm sure next you'll be arguing that the judging guidelines don't actually refer to how to judge these games.
Habreno wrote:
SMB PAL is an acceptable version (and if it's not, that's on you, the judge, to show why, against all of the reasons presented in the thread)
You mean the reasons presented in the thread against it on the first pages, which quoted the Movie Rules regarding NTSC vs PAL? Many in the thread didn't consider it acceptable at all till MrWint's analysis. Also I presented my own analysis in my judging comments. Based on your comment here, it appears you're not even aware of what I wrote.
Habreno wrote:
given it is on the original console (NES) it is effectively an "original version".
This fails common sense. It's not the original version and you know it.Habreno wrote:
The onus is on you to show that there are actual differences besides the framerate which makes PAL NES a different console entirely
Why should I attempt to prove a ridiculous claim that I never made that bears little relevance?
Habreno wrote:
A direct comparison is very easy - you compare from start of input to end of input, with each set of inputs at its proper framerate, and then time them. And in this comparison, PAL is ahead, because it finishes its inputs first in realtime. The framerate changes are not hard to deal with, there is zero reason this should have even been brought up.
I bring them up because the rules do:
Keep in mind that time gained solely through basic ROM differences will be discounted for the purpose of comparison. This includes:
differences in title screen, cutscenes, and menus (unless menus are the game's main control interface).
Being that these are our rules, it is rather obvious how some of them apply to this case. (Although as I mentioned both in judgment and again in my decision tree, some of it is not clear cut.)
Habreno wrote:
Where in the TASVideos.org rules does it state that when comparing versions from different regions you need to factor in framerate changes?
How about you tell me where the rules state that this should NOT be factored in? Since it's up in the air, I find any direct comparison to be flawed.
Habreno wrote:
Secondly, the only rules about comparing playable and non playable content is with regards to NTSC-U and NTSC-J. None of it is in regards to PAL.
Rules don't exist in a vacuum. Extrapolating from similar cases to decide how to handle cases where there are no existing laws is common practice. I'm sorry, you're having a difficult time with this. If these rules apply to cases where only the language changes, all the more so in cases where the changes are much larger.
Habreno wrote:
Moving on from that part, the next sentence, regarding momentum/jump distance/hitboxes/etc. is completely frivolous because those factors are entirely irrelevant by this point in the decision tree.
Yes of course, the point in the tree which asks the question whether something is faster and wants to know what should and shouldn't be included in that determination such as changes in how momentum works is completely frivolous. Habreno wrote:
Let me post a quote from the link above, regarding NTSC-U or NTSC-J vs PAL: "Console versions of PAL games run at a lower framerate than NTSC games, running at ~50Hz compared to NTSC's ~60Hz, and the games themselves are often not modified or poorly modified to accommodate to the change in timing." SMB PAL is actually an exception here in that Nintendo modified the game appropriately to create as close an experience as possible and as such this quote does not truly apply here.
Thank you for proving to me beyond the shadow of a doubt that you didn't actually read my judging comments.
Habreno wrote:
with you bending things as much as you possibly could in NTSC's favor
I like how you turned questioning what should and should not be relevant into bending.
Habreno wrote:
meaningless comparison
Thank you for affirming what I already wrote multiple times.
Habreno wrote:
And yet a TAS of identical time length would prove questionable in this comparison, which only further shows that comparing gameplay content and non-gameplay content as a whole is of questionable consideration when gameplay content can affect non-gameplay content
Exactly. Thank you for questioning any such comparisons made.
Habreno wrote:
"Conclusion: I don't have the slightest idea."
Then why are you even rendering a judgement if you don't know?
Why are you getting hung up on a point which didn't in the end have any bearing on the outcome?
Your whole argument here would only be valid if I accepted it as a new branch, then you could argue that it was supposed to obsolete it.
Habreno wrote:
A judge stating that they "don't have the slightest idea" certainly gives pause.
A judge stating that they "don't have the slightest idea" certainly shows there are some situations that if they do come up and become relevant need further rules fleshed out. Thankfully in this case it didn't need to come to that.
Habreno wrote:
Firstly, judges being asked are ambiguous. Based on the 4 of 5 for reject posted at the end I am going to assume that the two judges that said the differences were not large enough were both judges that had previously stated they felt it was, though this point is unclear.
Nothing is unclear. I you actually bothered to read my judgment notes you would see who thought what when was made quite clear. It's even in some nice neat tables.
Habreno wrote:
it could thus be argued that the issue of precedent clouds the view of the submission, which puts the submission under undue considerations sooner than it should have been.
How about considerations for how to apply rules consistently and not being biased by a single good run for a beloved game is what moved people from their positions?
Habreno wrote:
Finally, one can argue bias and viewpoint as it was previously stated that "having a non-original replace a perfectly valid original seemed lunacy to me" which is extremely indicative of a very biased viewpoint, and there is no way to verify with certainty that the questions posed to the other judges were phrased in a way to eliminate this bias.
I'm biased yay! So were at least 3 of the judges that were asked in this case before I said anything, yay! Oh and for the record, it was stated by certain people in the thread too, so maybe the judges were biased by some discussion in the discussion thread too (the thread certainly biased me, oh and so did the other judges who moved me off my original position). More yay!
Habreno wrote:
it cannot be ascertained that this section of the decision tree is valid.
Yet all those judges still stand by the decision made. So at best you can argue that I brainwashed them. Or maybe we just call that convincing. Or maybe they convinced me in the end, which you might know if you bothered to read the judgment.
You also forgot to argue that maybe the other judges don't exist at all, and I made them up.
But of course we should just in fact say the decision is invalid because you don't like it. Habreno wrote:
In regards to obsoletion, I believe the decision against doing so was reached extremely hastily without considering the rules of TASVideos.org as they stand now. The decision posted covers a fair bit of what is described as "extraneous content not related to the decision made" and this "extraneous content" is furthermore inaccurate and also does not conform to site rules. The decision against a new branch (assuming we are not considering obsoletion) is likely the soundest part of the judgement given yet even this has its flaws due to various factors, including partially the hasty decisions made prior.
You're welcome to make your own opinions and characterize others and their actions as you see fit. We're going to have to disagree.
Habreno wrote:
If we actually consider the rules of TASVideos.org the only true contention is if this is to obsolete NTSC or reject because of suboptimality
I like how none of what you just said seems to fit in with anything that is going on. It makes life fun and colorful.
Habreno wrote:
If it is somehow properly justified that this cannot obsolete NTSC under the site rules as they are now, then there is consideration for both a seperate publication and rejection for being too similar, and only if the argument against obsoletion is entirely sound could the decision of rejection truly be considered.
This already happened. You must've missed it because you don't like it.
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Since some people for some reason seemed to have a hard time following the logic I laid out (and seem to be ignoring the main section or not understanding sections which don't fit into their view), I put together a decision tree to help understand how the judgment was made.
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My paragraph which makes no mention of this submission and mentions a whole bunch of parts of the game not seen in this submission is clearly not talking about this submission! (Obvious, right? 
Oh lord pedantic supreme, I think you conclusively proved with this last one a total lack of reading comprehension or an extreme campaign to paint me in a bad light.
None of the other judges had seen any numbers I came up with prior to me posting the judgement. The numbers didn't have anything to do with how they were convinced either. Nor were numbers even relevant to any point any judge thought of except for one of them. This was also already mentioned in this thread.
