Looks good so far. Should we have more guidance on what makes a good game description? Copying a movie description would be pointless as it would appear twice on a game page then, but maybe something more focused on the game's story or history, like for Arcade Donkey Kong? Also, we should add a note to include the Japanese alphabet title in tags for relevant games, like CoolHandMike mentioned (example here). Otherwise I only see minor edits to be made, like punctuation. I like your assurance that Search key will be removed (as it no longer determines the page URL and is just a hassle to fill in now) and that replacing the screenshot is okay in some cases.
Memory wrote:
I did intentionally not mention what to do with duplicate, troll, etc. entries.
For the record, I think the games database is clear of such entries now. Any discussion would be toward avoiding future problematic entries being created, or dealing with them if they are (like if Pokémon Gen 1 is reduced to one game with Blue/Red/etc as GameVersions, leaving duplicates behind). So far we've established that nonexistent games don't get an entry. Discussion can still be made on things like video player cartridges, controller test programs, and other such things. I'm for excluding both of those.
For now, how about if a game has no publications, submissions, or userfiles, it shouldn't have an entry? This seems simple and avoids encouraging editors to do unnecessary extra work, like adding consoles' entire libraries to the database. Also, some Wii and Linux games aren't TASable due to compatibility issues, so they couldn't have TAS work yet anyway.
Memory wrote:
I want to move away from repurposing entries because frankly I find it obnoxious that it was asked of users. There is now a UI for deleting game entries that only appears if it has no publications, submissions, and userfiles linked to it
It's nice to have a second option for removing bad entries, but wouldn't deleting them leave number gaps, like what happens when a submission is deleted by staff? This isn't the only submission that appears as a 404 page for me and most other users. Which makes me wonder why we don't assign new submissions in those empty slots. And for the games database, a complete, uninterrupted set, why 404-error its empty entries when you can repurpose them to point to games with actual TAS work done, in only a few clicks?
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CoolHandMike wrote:
There are multiple different transliterations systems for languages, and some titles are not correct, incomplete due to human error.
Can you give an example, or as many examples as possible of incorrect titles? Or do you mean the English titles are correct, but we should include as many other translations in tags as we can?
CoolHandMike wrote:
Also, in some Japanese games in many cases transliteration must be an educated guess since there are no pronunciation guides when they are using kanji in non standard ways. Having the original name as an alternate name would bypass those issues completely.
That's a good point. I edited SNES DoReMi Fantasy's tags to add the kanji title and it saved successfully. This probably should be done for all Japanese games at the very least.
GMP wrote:
Is it ok to provide the links to IPS patch files in the description of game pages for ROMHacks?
I would say yes, as it helps ensure the input files and that game will continue to be playable, and is like how we link to homebrew ROMs on our current publications. IPS patches also don't contain any copyrighted data from the original ROM. However, if the hack adds graphics or music from other published works, it would be an issue if such a patch was stored on this site. So Archive.org seems a good place for preserving them.
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Korzic wrote:
If I can get my old PC to boot up
You could try replacing parts like the memory and GPU until you've found what's faulty. Alternatively, you can remove the hard drive and plug it in to your current PC with a hard drive enclosure, or the cord that comes with an external HDD if you have one.
Korzic wrote:
Anyway, the short version is that I likely won't see a TAS of this game through to completion, though I'd very much like to. There's probably too much grinding and too much RNG for me to feel comfortable dealing with in an optimized manner.
What if I could help you with the hard parts? I won't have time anytime soon, but maybe late summer or fall of this year?
Also have you seen the Genesis version TAS by The8bitbeast? I don't know Ys III or if there are comparable strategies to this version, though I did some planning for a full-game run of Ys I for SMS.
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Thanks for the insight, everyone.
A compromise for the name sorting situation could be sorting Games by their GoodTools Name, but continuing to show the Display Name in lists, as GT names already have ", The" at the end. However, changing the sort may still be difficult for ESL users as Masterjun described.
feos wrote:
Don't you think nonexistent and self-created games, at least, should be left out of our databases? The former is pointless to catalog as there's not even a ROM to play it back on, and the latter can be abused by indie devs submitting their own titles, with us promising that we'll "advertise" it for them alongside Cave Story and our other vetted (notable, popular, etc.) game choices.
Also, if (almost) all submissions have a Game, should Userfiles as well? Currently individual userfiles are hard to find once they drop off the Recent list, especially since many don't have a Game linked to them.
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Wiki: Games How To
This topic is for discussion of Wiki: Games, the Wiki: Games/List, and Game page content, as well as reporting issues that need fixing. Such a topic has been needed for a while, but now that there's an official call and news bulletin for editors to fill out Game pages, this seemed like a good time.
To start, I have some questions about Game groups and game-based organization:
1. Should pirate games, fangames and clones be included in Game groups? Long ago I put the Korean pirate Super Boy II in the Mario group, to make it easier to find for visitors who played it and thought it was a real Mario game. I also put the Castlevania clone 8 Eyes in the CV group, similarly to aid in its discovery by people who already like the gameplay of Castlevania. But I thought I should ask, are these kinds of games acceptable for "official" game groups, should only some of them be, or should they all be left out?
2. Should we really add every submission with no Game linked to a Game entry? (See the last part of the "official call" above.) Some are of controller test programs, uncategorizable ROMs, games run through automatic porting programs, and games that don't even exist. Do we want to "promote" these to the Game list, adding them to our search results and giving them our official approval? I thought this was why submissions stopped being automatically given Game entries circa 2012. Not every NoGame submission is this bad, but some do not fit the concept of Game-based organization and we should figure out something else to do with them, or leave them on NoGame.
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A lot of cool Flash games lately that are new to me. This one reminds me of the offline fangame Super Mario Forever.
Very fast, glitchy and well-executed! Yes vote!
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Welcome, despoa! Thanks for all your hard work already, encoding runs and filling in Game/ROM info to help the site. I'm sure you'll do even greater things in your new position!
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It was funny! And that loading screen bug made it even better and stranger, and quite hard to look at.
The manual arrived, Here it is on Google Drive, and also DocDroid (a free PDF viewer, will expire after 60 days of inactivity). You can use the Zoom buttons to zoom while keeping the text clear and readable.
There's no mention of any cheats, and I couldn't find the button combination in any articles from a cursory look online, just unlockables by collecting enough chocolate chips. It seems like RTA runner Storster really was the first to discover it. It's possible the code was left in by mistake like you said, especially since using it on the last level leads to glitched tracks. It's surprising how easy it is to activate though.
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Very cool! I think glitchy 3D platformers make for some of the best TASes.
I don't know the game, but I agree that more precise movement should save time. For example, at 12:29 in the video, see if it's possible to land next to the machine so you don't have to walk over to it. Maybe for the slide level at 15:10 you can find and watch RAM addresses to keep Charlie from slowing down, if that's possible. Otherwise, ceiling clips look good, and I liked your entertainment during waiting periods.
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The graphics are actually really nice. It's too bad you can't do anything about the heavy lag, unless you can scroll the camera to push some objects offscreen?
Also, the encode in the OP appears to be set to Private.
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I've been waiting for a TAS of this game, and I liked your run of the last level. But I'm worried that the button combination constitutes a cheat code, which may not be acceptable as it skips over gameplay and is accessed through the intended manner. See this rejected submission's judgment message and a discussion on this rule, and this one which was accepted because the debug menu used was only accessible through a glitch.
I haven't been able to find the M&M's Kart Racing manual online to confirm whether your button combo is an intended code or not; the closest I got was the DS version publisher's site with a broken link to its game manual. But I just bought a copy of this game from eBay (no fooling, it was cheap too), so in less than a week I can share a scan of the manual and we'll see if it's mentioned.
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Thank you for laying the groundwork with your pull request. There's definitely been a lot more information available about SGB since you and I pushed the issue on Discord, thanks to knowledgeable people like CasualPokePlayer and TiKevin83 coming forward. Discussion is exactly what I wanted when I made this topic, so I'm happy it's happening.
With that new info in mind, I would say Yes to 1 and No to 2. The current VBA runs were my initial concern, as like you said they are only SGB by its broadest definition. Due to the improvements in SGB emulation, I think the accessory has a lot to offer that hasn't been explored yet, so it should still be accepted here.
In my opinion, runs should only be marked SGB if they use features involving SNES hardware like multiplayer mode in Bomberman GB. But as you've said, where to draw the line is for the community to decide.
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Hey, that's okay. My response was really late too.
Do you mean when you load a savestate from a previous level, it crashes? I've heard of that with N64 games before; maybe Charlie also saves level data in a weird way. You might just have to finish TASing one level, then move on to the next and delete your savestates from previous levels so it won't crash again.
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I must be a fan of this game, because I rewatch the published run at least once a year. I considered improving it as well due to its age. But you did a better job than I probably would've, and saved me a few weeks of work. I appreciated all the little tricks to keep Jo's momentum, especially in Stage 3. I voted Yes, good job Samsara!
I wasn't sure about the difficulty change. At first, it felt a little cheap. But I recall that speed-oriented fighting game TASes sometimes reduce the number of rounds per match. And of course, many other games use the easiest difficulty too. For this game also, easy mode reduces repetition and makes the run more exciting (or "dashing", if you will), so I think it's acceptable, even to obsolete the existing run.
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Okay, we're ready. Please replace the file with this one, with subtitle commentary to enhance the viewing experience in BizHawk and on YouTube. I tailored it to a general audience, especially Pooh fans, but it should answer all the questions any viewer may have on watching the run.
I also replaced the temp encode in the submission with one of the improvement.
By the way, I never entered Read+Write mode while making the subtitles, yet the Mupen64Plus core still desynced at the end of level 2 once. Tigger stood around instead of going up to Owl. I fixed it by restarting BizHawk, but I've never seen that before. I guess that core is infamous for desyncs, but I wasn't even recording.
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That was really funny throughout! It looked like you pushed wall building to the limit, covering as much as possible and having plenty of time to play around. The foreknowledge of where ships and especially the Kraken would be led to surprising moments and combos. And yes, I could tell what you drew in level 12; I think every NES fan will appreciate it. Great playaround, on par with Genisto's SMB3! Yes vote!
I suggest a screenshot in level 13, around 21:41 in the encode, where a large amount of cannon fire is heading toward one little ship. And your main castle and cannons are in view, unlike similar moments in other levels.
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First Wii, then Windows, Linux, and now 3DS! I'm happy I've been here long enough to see the birth of the TASing scene for all these modern consoles.
Ben, that was a really informative and well-thought-out submission text. But it looks like Citra has already been approved for submission on this site!
Also, great run. I was only familiar with the N64 routes so this one kept me guessing, and the ending was satisfying. It's amazing how much Text Skip adds to the run, not having to sit through all those cutscenes. Yes vote!
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I saved 199 frames (3.317 seconds) from Stage 6 - Pooh Sticks. (Encode here.) It's always possible more frames could be saved by better manipulation and invisible lag reduction, but it's a trial-and-error affair. You not only have to get Pooh to throw earlier, but get both sticks to hit enough floating boosts to make it to the end as soon as possible, in each round. And each round affects the next. Sometimes if you throw a frame or a pixel off, it doesn't move as fast. Maybe invisible lag costs it a frame of movement.
Round 1: I used similar input as EZGames, though it's a little cleaner. 2 frames saved between when Tigger starts cheering and the start of the next round. Not sure why.
Round 2: Slightly different positioning of both sticks allows me to hold onto the frames I've saved. Still 2fr ahead.
Round 3: Very different strat. Pooh still takes a while to throw but this is the fastest I could get him to. 52fr ahead.
Round 4: Somehow those previous rounds led up to a very fast Round 4. I throw on the first frame without aiming, then Pooh takes only 9 additional frames to throw. The majority of the improvement is here, along with a pause and unpause that shuffles lag frames enough to save 2 more frames. I tried this on Rounds 1-3 too but it always changed Pooh's AI for the worse.
I also had a 5 frames faster Round 2 (with a pause/unpause) and a completely separate 7 frames faster Round 3, but I couldn't find throws in later rounds to hold on to those frame savings.
I also changed the core from Interpreter to Pure Interpreter in case it improved accuracy. It didn't appear to affect sync. But speaking of which...
EZGames69 wrote:
If anyone finds a faster RNG seed for this stage, I'll be willing to redo the run from here.
I'm going to take you up on this, because I was unable to resync any of Stage 7 due to lack of knowledge about how the rest of the game works. I mentioned before how much I like this run, so I hope it goes well for you and you're able to carry those frames to the end.
I also added myself as a coauthor, if you don't mind. If you do, you can remove it when you resync the rest of the stages.
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feos wrote:
It's meant to be a part of game based navigation. Why would it become unusable? We'd just link hacks of a game as separate game pages.
I thought we only created new Games on first publication of a game, at least since c. 2012 when every submission was given a Game (which is most of why we still have Games like this with no published runs). Do we want to elevate Playground area Games to the same status as published Games? Like you said, it would facilitate game-based navigation. But should we worry about a large number of ROMhacks for e.g. SMB clogging up the Game list (or at least the NES list)?
Actually, what is the current consensus on what to do with Game pages with only submissions, userfiles, or a Game Resources page but no publications?
