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We do not have consistent rules regarding having separate categories for any% movies that use glitches. However, I think the glitch exploited here is sufficient to warrant a new category, and I get the feeling that the general consensus is that this should not obsolete the 'traditional' any% movie.
I'm fine with this being a new category as long as we can have a clear line as to what constitutes this category vs the any%. The difference here is ram corruption from what the 'experts' have told me. This is probably going to be clear cut enough, though I suspect there will be at least one TAS that challenges this potential gray line. The downside to this category difference is that the difference will not be perceivable visually. Someone will have to verify that ram was or wasn't 'corrupted'. But that just means more work for the and community on future TASes.
As such, I will be accepting this movie as a 'ram corruption' category for this game. I'm open to suggestions for a better category name.
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Very nice improvements and an impressive TAS. Good job! Also very thorough submission notes, I appreciate that. That game resources link is a bit lacking though <_<
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The real solution here is for more people to rate more often. Questionable decisions by a single individual is much more meaningless in a large pool of votes.
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Firstly, I think many people here have made some really solid points. More importantly, I don't think anyone has definitely proved their point. Probably because with a 'low glitch' type goal choice, there is generally some unavoidable gray area.
In general, I prefer to respect the subjective choices by the author, whether it be entertainment choices or goal choices.
This is a well made movie, of high entertainment value, a goal choice that has a solid place on TASVideos, and has voter support. The only thing up for debate is the the author's decisions in regards to major level skips (particularly in SB2 and SB3) and/or the rational behind a no zips run. I think the author's choice is well thought out and sufficient. As such I will accept this run.
However, I think a future run COULD be done with slightly different goals (such as proposed by moozooh, and others) and still obsolete this one. To be absolutely clear, I'm not saying those are definitely better goal choices. I'm saying that they are possibly valid as well, and publication of this run does not necessarily restrict them. I don't want the publication of this movie to mean that a future improvement blindly follow these goals because "they have to". If a run was technically superior but was "respecting solidity" or "low glitch", I'm saying we could accept it as an improvement despite the completion time being LONGER (presumably).
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marzojr wrote:
Bobo the King wrote:
I checked the published run for the zips it used. Of the 18 levels, 12 used zips.
For what is worth, one of the reasons Aglar has decided to do a non-zip run is that there are several new zips which will be added to the normal run: the 3 Marble zone levels basically are all skipped due to new zips, there is a new zip/shortcut in Spring Yard 3 and Star Light 1 is basically skipped also due to a new zip.
That certainly pushes the percentage that Bobo calculated up to a more favorable number.
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As for a place to host your src, we already have a repository for console verification related code: http://code.google.com/p/console-tas/
I would happy to add you as member so you can check in your code, I would just need a google account email.
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Heidman wrote:
About getting the spread stream started, You use the enemies that pass left/right on the screen. What is the time frame available from hitting them to the other bullets hitting the wall in the back of the room? Is there a consistent way of doing this in real time as well?
Unfortunately the window is just a single frame. Bullets hit an enemy 1 frame sooner than a wall so you would have to be press b in that exact moment. Fortunately once you have a "3 stream" pattern it is easier to keep it going but it probably isn't practical to keep it going reliably.
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Warp wrote:
Finally finished watching it. Voted yes. I don't have a strong opinion on whether it should obsolete the warped run or not.
I'm probably not the first one to notice, but it's just hilariously ironic that the game end entices the player to push the B button.
LOL, I never noticed that either, even on the warped runs. That's awesome.
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Prior to the current publication we had the in-game time and real time any% runs published along side each other. I personally would be open to restoring that situation. Though I"m a bit sad that one movie couldn't accomplish both anymore. I thought that the double obsoletion was really impressive with Taco & Kriole's movie.
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This category itself is novel and a good example of the TAS community at its best. This should be an impossible category, but through collaboration a very creative and impressive strategy was worked out to beat 4-3. I think this is an impressive movie to publish on this site. This movie is filled with a lot of other awesome moments as well of course, and I found it very entertaining. Thank you.
As for categories, the 4-3 solution here is more novel than all the warped run combined. And like others have said, this movie offers everything the warped run does and more. Thus I vote in favor of it obsoleting the warped run.
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scrimpeh wrote:
Now let me dump my opinion here. Personally, I prefer to avoid confusion and just find the first frame the game needs no more input to self-comlpete. It works for every game, is a clear method for comparison and it results in the shortest movie overall.
Hence arukAdo and I decided not to include Phil's little Dance at the end in Super Castlevania 4, for example. Not that it really makes a difference if we're only talking about a few frames here, but, oh well.
What about this movie? It is an extreme example but still, he saves a few second of input but makes the movie about 5 minutes longer. One could easily argue this movie is a 10 minute tas not a 5 minute one. My point is that this is a subjective issue and that a rule isn't a good one just because it makes things easy by removing the subjectiveness.
Warp wrote:
I like this one the most:
* End input as soon as no further input can make the game ending happen faster.
I have always preferred this too and is almost always my choice in my TASes. That was the choice in this movie which is why I did not choose the this tactic. Keeping shredder further away costs a few frames even though it shortens the necessary number of input frames.
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moozooh wrote:
X2poet had the best intentions submitting this without realizing that adelikat had decided against ending input earlier on purpose.
I agree that this was with good intent.
P.S. Has anyone actually watched the differences here? Perhaps this should be judged on the one aesthetic difference that it has? Which ending do people prefer? Does anyone care?
If I were going for input time at the expense of real completion time there is already a well known trick that could probably be employed here with mike and the shuriken glitch documented on the Game Resources page. It would take a good bit of reworking of the route and it would cost a lot of time, but it allows ending of input way sooner, so it might save time overall.
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Interesting, I submitted a movie and didn't know it! ;)
No offense but there is no improvmeent here. Cool, you ended input earlier, but you didn't kill shredder any faster. In fact, this movie is 4 frames slower by that metric.
We have, by design, not had a definitive rule on when to end input despite our reported times being based purely on input length. Sacrificing completion time for the sake of input time is a debateable topic and thus I've left it up to the authors to decide this. However, the point is that doing one method over another is hardly an improvement. Nor is finding a trick to input sooner without increasing input time. It is certainly something nice to find I guess, but the end result is the same.
(Also, I was fully aware of this tactice of keeping shredder on the left but my tests resulted in a longer actual completion time)
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The site uses 60.0 fps for gameboy. The policy of the site has traditionally been to use whatever the emulator emulates at. Does VBA not emulate at 60fps?
Desmume emulates at 59.826 fps (more specifically it runs at 33513982.0/6/355/263 fps) and so the site reports that fps.
Personally I think we should calculate movies based on the console fps even if the emulator fails to run at said fps (for instance SNES is ~60.98 just like the NES but SNES9x runs at 60 fps).
As far as emulating the machine being "off", that kind of is outside the scope of what we can do. Hacking it to be blank frames is a hack but at least it approximates the results well. I'm not too concerned with that issue then. All options produce only an approximate result and all choices result is approximately the same reported time.
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Interesting situation with the spacebar. The button is part of the standard controls and is mentioned in the game. That seems similar to Legend of Zelda where it was deemed appropriate to use controller 2's Up+A.
I'd say it is legal, but maybe it might lose entertainment value to the audience? I say make a TAS that uses it and let's see what it looks like.
