feos: I undeleted this page to use it as a historic reference.

Also known as the nightmare FAQ.

This site is a collection of tool-assisted speedrun movies of games that have been recorded using an emulator and other tools. This page answers questions regarding the authenticity of those movies. For more information, see Why and How.

Fake means something that is not what it is claimed to be. A glass jewel could be a fake diamond.

The makers of tool-assisted speedruns do not claim the movies to be recordings of real-time playing ― thus they are not fake.

Cheating has two meanings:

Arguably, we do cheat the games. The games have been programmed assuming that the player is a human who has humanly limits. We surpass those limits with tool-assistance.

For example, there are very few humans who can produce a 30 Hz autofire by rapidly bashing the B button, but in tool-assistance, it is trivial to do that. We also abuse many programming errors in the games.

But we do not cheat the audience. The makers of tool-assisted speedruns are very open at how they made the movies. There certainly is no deceiving taking part. It is the audience's responsibility to read and understand how these movies are made.

As for rules, tool-assisted speedruns fall under the rules of tool-assisted speedruns, not under the rules of non-assisted speedruns. The purpose of tool-assisted speedruns is different from regular speedruns and there is no competition between these two different kinds of runs, so the set of rules is not, and does not have to be, the same.

We try to keep the difference from the games themselves minimal. For example, our rules dictate that the movies we make must be of non-modified games. We do not crack and hack the games. Basically, the only thing we do is produce unexpected kind of input to the real games, as if a god were playing the game.

The rules of this site are found at the SiteRules page.

Hoax means an act intended to deceive or trick.

If someone presents tool-assisted speedruns as non-assisted speedruns, then yes, there is a hoax present. However, the members of the tool-assisted speedrun community are very open at how they made the movies. There is no hoax, because all information is openly available, and no deception (at least intentional) is taking place.

If you feel you have been deceived (and you have read all the relevant information), please instruct us how we can better inform the audience so that misconceptions do not occur.

Legitimate for what?

Tool-assisted speedruns are legitimate tool-assisted speedruns.
Tool-assisted speedruns are not legitimate non-assisted speedruns.

Submitting these movies to sites that collect records of real-time playing where human abilities are at stage, is wrong. These movies are not manifestations of real-time playing skills. See Why And How.

Tool-assisted speedruns are input edits, not video edits.

We edit the sequence of button presses the game receives, but we do not edit the actual video or sound produced by the game.

All of our AVI videos represent exactly how the game reacts to the given input (with a margin of the emulation and codec quality, which is out of our hands.)

Most of the input editing is done by playing the game, re-recording once in a while if the result is different than desired. Due to the usage of tools, it is arguable whether it can be called playing.