(Link to video)

About the Game

The Adventures of Pinocchio (not to be confused with Disney’s Pinocchio) is an unreleased isometric puzzle game for the Gameboy, created by Bit Managers. At some point, a ROM of a prototype was leaked and made available to the public. Being a prototype, it has things you wouldn’t see on normal game releases, such as a level select (which was mistaken for a game end glitch), and effectively infinite lives (the lives counter doesn’t tick down if you die). This game actually was released in the form of another game: Otto's Ottifanten - Baby Bruno's Nightmare. Although only your ears would know, as the only thing held over was the music, nearly everything else was changed. Interesting tidbit about the “finished” game, it also has a level select, but it’s locked behind a password. More reason that the game end glitch movie was invalid.

Game objectives

Emulator used: Bizhawk 2.4.2

  • CGB in GBA mode is enabled for console verification.
  • Console verification of this TAS can be seen here:

Categories

  • Aims for fastest completion of the game
  • Some glitch abuse
  • Some luck manipulation

Comments

Goal

The goal is to get to the arrow. You have to do this for 100 rooms, then you beat the game. It’s a fairly simple goal; how you exactly get to the arrow is where the fun happens.

Movement

Movement is fairly simple, pressing a directional goes one unit one direction, while 2 adjacent directionals pressed (eg, Up/Left) will go both those directions for one unit for each direction. Which yes, this means that 1 Up press then 1 Left press is equal to 1 Up/Left press. For this reason, diagonal movement is heavily used throughout the run.

Jumping

Jumping is fairly simple, yet very broken. You’ll always jump the same height no matter what, and the game doesn’t have any concept of acceleration, so there isn’t any way to jump further. Yet, many puzzles can be solved in unintended ways with precise jumps. As a note, jumping will always cause 1 extra frame of lag, so it is best to minimize them. As another note, it is best to jump as soon as possible, as you’ll often want to land as quickly as possible.

Moving/Picking Up Blocks

Some rooms have blocks that can be pushed around, sometimes this is needed to get past obstacles. Some blocks can be picked up and placed on the ground, these blocks have a black dot above them. Sometimes blocks are used in unintended ways, like in room 44, where a block is placed in a way so I can just jump over spikes.

Corner Exiting

While making this movie, I’ve discovered a nice time-saving glitch. If you push against the corner of an exit, you will actually clear the room. This glitch is first apparent in room 13, where I effectively skip most of the room with this glitch. Unfortunately, you still need to be actually on the ground in order to clear a room, you can’t corner exit in the air, which does limit this glitch a bit.

Lag Reduction

The game runs at a pseudo-15 FPS most of the time, but sometimes it can drop to 12 or even 10 FPS. This is usually apparent on stages with a lot of moving sprites. Some of this lag can be reduced with some different movement, usually in the form of L/R or U/D alteration where it doesn’t matter to getting to the arrow.

Ghost RNG

Some rooms have ghost-like enemies, some have set patterns, but some have random movement. Delaying a stage start or jumping at certain spots (remember, jumping always has an extra frame of lag) can be used to manipulate these patterns, which is occasionally needed.

Other Comments

There isn’t really much else to explain, the movie pretty much explains the rest. As a minor note, the game doesn’t automatically switch music when going to the castle levels, I could pause/unpause the game to force it to use the new music, but I get an extra life after clearing the first castle room, which restarts the music, which gives the new music. This game is probably Vault anyways, so this is probably the better choice. As another note, the credits don’t exactly display correctly; this is an emulator bug, and is fixed in 2.5 (which the movie syncs fine on).

Samsara: File replaced with a fixed version that trims one frame of blank input. The rest of the run remains completely unchanged.
Prototype game versions are only accepted if there is no stable release version available.
Otto's Ottifanten: Baby Bruno's Nightmare was the officially released version of this game, with some things that can make the game easier patched away. Level layouts are the same, and there are more levels in Ottifanten.
There is a published movie of this version, but we also say in Movie Rules that past mistakes don't justify repeating them.
So by the current rules this movie would have to be rejected, but we've been discussing whether we need to tweak how we handle unofficial games, which includes prototypes, and we come to some conclusion.
The only way to allow prototypes is if they are so different from the release that most of it plays like a different game. We rely on the same cutoff we determine if a given in-game option introduces so much difference that it works like a different mode. In which case both modes can be published even in Vault, as two Fastestcompletion branches. Otherwise we only allow one fastest completion branch. And to tell for sure that majority of the game has changed from that option, we use the 50% cutoff, where 50% or more of gameplay becomes inherently different.
Independent game modes are treated as separate games, and are allowed for Vault as separate movies. Independent mode is defined as a one that inherently offers more than 50% of unique game-play (for example, more than a half of unique bosses or unique levels). This includes character choice and other in-game options.
Here's some background behind that limit. The word "offers" is possibly confusing, but 50% or more unique gameplay really has to be an unavoidable difference. Because if it remains optional, then it's not 2 different modes or games, but rather routing details within the same game, therefore only one can be fastest completion.
Defining the borderline in any different way would lead to lots of ambiguity, and under-developed game versions not meant for regular use would be competing with official releases that everyone played. This compromises legitimacy of our superplay, because the game can't be arbitrarily tweaked to be made easier or quicker to speedrun, and prototypes could have all sorts of arbitrary deviations from official versions.
Verifying legitimacy of prototypes themselves is also problematic, because you normally don't casually own a developer-intended version of a game, you own a release that you can then compare the TASed image to.
If less than 50% of gameplay is different, then it's not a majority, and then we can't obviously and clearly call it a different game or mode. That seems to be the most fair borderline with no subjectivity. Even if this game is considered to be "better" by people, that's still a subjective category, and we can't rely on subjectivity in Vault. Which game is better, and which game allows for a better TAS, is really a Moon concern, not Vault. In Moons we endorse subjectivity and rely on it, we in Moons we pick better games and movies. This game is too boring for Moons.
As explained in the thread, we don't have a pleasant solution for this submission that would also match any future-proof ruling. Either the rules are future-proof and they set equal and predictable competition conditions for everyone, or they are weak and we have to make exceptions, which means the rules aren't clear and predictable. We need clarity and predictability in Vault.
I don't know honestly if anyone will ever want to TAS Otto's Ottifanten, but if it happens, such a movie would obsolete the current publication of The Adventures of Pinocchio. But this movie has to be rejected, sorry.

Samsara: It's been a couple years and now we actually have an Ottifanten submission, but we've also had a pretty huge set of rule changes since then, so I think it's worth re-evaluating this run.
Samsara: Thankfully, re-evaluation is pretty easy here!
Things were a lot different when this run was first judged. We still had the Vault back then, which for those of you who don't know was the original name for our default publication class that people claim is called Standard when it actually doesn't have a name but everyone still calls it Standard despite all of my protesting. Vault was much more restrictive back then, there were a lot of weird arbitrary rules that had piled up over the 9-ish years it was in place and it wasn't getting any easier to deal with, so we overhauled it to be a lot more open back in August 2021.
One part of it, mentioned in the earlier judgement, was a strict "50% unique" rule that determined whether or not some runs were "worth" publishing, in that we had always aimed for quality over quantity and figured that the best way to enforce that was to turn away perfectly good runs for maybe being a little bit too similar for our liking. Keep in mind that this decision was reached by the same site that, at one point, had two separate low% TASes and three separate any% TASes for Super Metroid. Let's just say consistency really wasn't the site's strong suit in the past. Determinism is for TASes, not logic.
Vault was overhauled, and shortly afterward we moved into overhauling the MovieRules. Currently, for prototypes such as this, they do need to have significantly different gameplay to their release counterparts. As I stated in the TAS of the release counterpart, I feel these games really couldn't be more different despite the fact that they are essentially the exact same game. Obvious things like graphics aside, the two games play and feel so different that I wouldn't blame anyone for thinking they were both released games that just happened to reuse assets. Really, Bit Managers were just trailblazers for modern online marketplaces. If only there was a Game Boy equivalent of the Unity store.
I was never really comfortable with the original decision made on this run. Even back in the days where I was more receptive to how Vault worked, it just felt weird to me to reject an improvement just because we had decided the game itself wasn't publishable anymore. These days, on a much more receptive TASvideos, it's lovely to be able to say that we've changed our minds on everything.
fsvgm777: Processing.

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This topic is for the purpose of discussing #6858: CasualPokePlayer's GB The Adventures of Pinocchio in 06:51.50
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Oops, seems like my movie file had a blank input at the end somehow, here's an updated movie file that doesn't have this blank input: http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/65640752971850434
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If you're ever free, please post the ASM code for the level select. It would help the judges at least.
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I don't really think that's necessary. The actually released version of the game has a password that unlocks the exact same level select, which seems to be a running theme in games from Bit Managers. Otto's Ottofantotto: Baby Boomer Nightmare or whatever should probably be the preferred version to TAS from here on out. It's pretty much the exact same game, just with better graphics and slightly changed level layouts. Its existence shouldn't affect this run's publication, though... Because, I mean, let's be real, I seriously doubt anyone is ever actually going to TAS Ottifanten anyway. Holy hell, it's so much slower and worse to play. You can't even walk diagonally! They regressed in gameplay from the prototype! Who even does that?
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I really enjoyed this movie. I have to admit, that this was the first time watching a full playthrough of this game, since the other two submissions essentially featured no real gameplay haha. The movement always looked really tight, and the pace of the game overall seemed quite fast, due to the very fast transitions between screens/levels. Yes vote on entertainment from me :)
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Does anyone know how many level layouts are different between this version and the official release? We have this rule for prototypes:
Movie Rules wrote:
Prototype game versions are only accepted if there is no stable release version available.
But if more than 50% of levels are different, then those can count as different modes and both be vaultable.
Samsara wrote:
Because, I mean, let's be real, I seriously doubt anyone is ever actually going to TAS Ottifanten anyway. Holy hell, it's so much slower and worse to play. You can't even walk diagonally! They regressed in gameplay from the prototype! Who even does that?
This version is probably better, but I can't figure out how to sensibly incorporate such an exception into the above rule. If gameplay is radically different, it's feasible to compare and measure the differences, but if it's slightly different, any superiority would be mostly subjective, and hard to measure for everyone. I'd argue that whether gameplay is better or not shouldn't be a reason to prefer the prototype version in Vault, because Moons is the tier where gameplay is meant to shine and please people's tastes, and Vault is for clear cuts and measurable objective things that are true for everyone.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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I don't consider this game as a prototype, as the officially released game features a game engine that was mostly rewritten from scratch.
my personal page - my YouTube channel - my GitHub - my Discord: thunderaxe31 <Masterjun> if you look at the "NES" in a weird angle, it actually clearly says "GBA"
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ThunderAxe31 wrote:
I don't consider this game as a prototype, as the officially released game features a game engine that was mostly rewritten from scratch.
Having the same level layout on a different engine would result in mostly similar gameplay. But having different levels on the same engine would result in completely different gameplay. We care about gameplay when deciding on vaultable differences, not engines. Because engines are also hard to objectively measure and compare.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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feos wrote:
Does anyone know how many level layouts are different between this version and the official release? We have this rule for prototypes:
Movie Rules wrote:
Prototype game versions are only accepted if there is no stable release version available.
But if more than 50% of levels are different, then those can count as different modes and both be vaultable.
I believe Ollifanten has about 30 more levels added in to begin with, but from the batch I tested (1-50), most of the level layouts are identical, albeit with some minor changes here and there.
This version is probably better, but I can't figure out how to sensibly incorporate such an exception into the above rule. If gameplay is radically different, it's feasible to compare and measure the differences, but if it's slightly different, any superiority would be mostly subjective, and hard to measure for everyone. I'd argue that whether gameplay is better or not shouldn't be a reason to prefer the prototype version in Vault, because Moons is the tier where gameplay is meant to shine and please people's tastes, and Vault is for clear cuts and measurable objective things that are true for everyone.
From my testing, the gameplay is different enough that even with identical level layouts, the "solutions" will be completely different due to Ollifanten having no diagonal movement and slower movement speed. I could do a more in-depth TAS test if need be, but I'd estimate a run of that game being over twice as long as this one is, likely even upwards of 20 minutes. ...Yeah, I'll do that now, actually. Gimme a bit of time and I'll come back with an Ollifanten test for a much better comparison.
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Thanks! Yeah if layout is similar, inherently different solutions that come from gameplay differences are also a sign that it might be different enough. The 50% cutoff originated from when we discussed how a different character should alter gameplay to be considered a separate mode, and we allow separate modes for Vault. If 50% or more solutions will be different for Ollifanten, we can allow both versions in Vault. If it's less, we'll have to prefer one, most likely official.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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I would argue diagonal movement would be enough to satisfy "radical differences" in regards to gameplay. Besides the fact that diagonal movement inherently makes gameplay faster (e.g. Up+Right input goes the same distance as Up input then Right input), it also just allows me to solve puzzles in different ways than what was exactly "intended." Many solutions I used would just be straight up impossible if you can't go diagonally. Not to mention corner exiting cannot be done (since that relies on diagonal movement). EDIT: lol samsara sniped me
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Link to video 10 levels of Ottifanten. For the record, this submission completes 31 levels in the same amount of time. You can pseudo-move diagonally by alternating directions, but the slower speed and different level layouts mean the solutions still need to be adjusted. Also, I feel my soul dying every minute I spend with this game, so hopefully this is enough. EDIT: User movie #65990142120952176
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Reached level 18, I have no idea how to beat it. http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/66144640781107698 From what I'm seeing so far, the released game feels more like a hard mode, purely because there's no way to truly move diagonally. However that's most likely an oversight in the prototype version, because with it you can skip most of the puzzles. I think they just patched it away (as a bug), just like infinite lives and level select. The "completely different" solutions look like just the way it was designed to work originally, not like intentionally/inherently unique gameplay. Easier gameplay isn't what we look for most of the time, especially if the game is an interim draft, and the official release is harder.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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feos wrote:
Reached level 18, I have no idea how to beat it. http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/66144640781107698 From what I'm seeing so far, the released game feels more like a hard mode, purely because there's no way to truly move diagonally. However that's most likely an oversight in the prototype version, because with it you can skip most of the puzzles. I think they just patched it away (as a bug), just like infinite lives and level select. The "completely different" solutions look like just the way it was designed to work originally, not like intentionally/inherently unique gameplay. Easier gameplay isn't what we look for most of the time, especially if the game is an interim draft, and the official release is harder.
For level 18: https://streamable.com/yhvd2s From the perspective of TASing... I can see how it could be seen as "hard." But in the perspective of RTA... I think Pinocchio is harder. The diagonal movement does allow you to "skip" puzzles somewhat (although corner exiting is more the extreme in this aspect), but the execution is usually not easy for a human (somewhat due to how touchy the controls are and how fast Pinocchio moves). In some cases, it's just near impossible for a human. Doing the puzzles the "intended" way is often much easier and safer to do, although for Ottifanten the slow speed can sometimes be crippling to this (although you could argue the opposite). I do think there could be compromise though. I notice in Ottifanten there are these collectable baby bottles and these are tracked. I don't know what the hell happens if you collect them all, but I does mean Ottifanten should be able to actually have a full completion run. Pinocchio can simply be the go to version for fastest completion, with Ottifanten being able to be published in Vault too with a full completion run.
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It's interesting. My mind refers to the rule about different vaultable modes that says:
Independent game modes are treated as separate games, and are allowed for Vault as separate movies. Independent mode is defined as a one that inherently offers more than 50% of unique game-play (for example, more than a half of unique bosses or unique levels). This includes character choice and other in-game options.
If you forgo diagonal movement, your solutions in Pinocchio will be similar to those in Ottifanten. I can't call the difference between 2 games inherent. It's not like you're forced to go through 50% of unique levels. At the same time, the rule wording doesn't require that you're forced to stick to a different route, it just says that such a different route is inherently offered. Maybe I'm overcomplicating this, and the meaning is exactly that? My heart on the other hand feels that this movie has value as well, and outright rejecting it would be too harsh. You mention that this "easier mode" doesn't make it easier to stand out from unassisted play, quite the opposite. I also think that this kind of argument is more about Moons and superplay potential a given game has. But in Vault we also value clarity of a record. Being impossible even for a skilled human is a meaningful trait. If not the possible full completion criterion in Ottifanten, I'd require that this movie is accepted and then obsoleted by Ottifanten. Ottifanten having more levels (I haven't checked yet) is also a good thing for a full completion kinda run. Not sure if this solution is derived clearly from all the current rule wording (need help in terms of English language here).
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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feos wrote:
If not the possible full completion criterion in Ottifanten, I'd require that this movie is accepted and then obsoleted by Ottifanten. Ottifanten having more levels (I haven't checked yet) is also a good thing for a full completion kinda run.
I think that would be fair... especially considering nobody is actually going to TAS that game anyways lol. Also, yeah Ottifanten does have more levels (30 more for a total of 130 levels) For the rules, I don't really know. Perhaps it is just being overthought, but perhaps some issues just arise since "inherently" can be subjective? Then again, this rule wasn't specifically designed for this case, edge cases be edge cases...
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It was intentional, and it was designed as a clear cutoff, to fit all Vault cases. Initially Vault only allowed fastest completion and full completion, and it was believed that for any given game there can only be those 2 branches eligible for Vault. Then we discovered that there are separate episodes within some games, where you can play entirely different levels available from the start. Those count as separate games and we can have the any%/100% pair for each of them. Then we discovered that separate game modes can work the same in representing entirely different gameplay, like fighting and beat-em-up modes in some fighting games. So we wanted to find this cutoff, and I think we found something very clear and reliable. If you have 2 route options with just one character, Vault only allows one of them. Because otherwise it won't be limited to a single fastest branch per game. Therefore the unique difference a given mode provides should be inherent. I'm pretty sure it was meant to say unavoidable. Because once it's avoidable, it's a subject for Moons branches, which Vault games don't get to have. Bottomline: I think the logic behind that rule was indeed designed to require unavoidable gameplay differences, not just options that you may ignore to make it look different.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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We discussed it some more with adelikat and here's the result. We have to closely follow the movie rules especially when dealing with Vault content, because Vault is meant to be free from any subjectivity, and the speed records there are meant to be as legitimate and clear as possible. So any decision that we make about this movie should align with movie rules, and if we need to decide something that doesn't align with them, then we should check if the rules themselves have to be improved. Because it's impossible to write the rules that are 100% future proof and perfect, even though it still doesn't make sense to challenge the rules upon every submission that breaks them.
The current rule for prototype versions bans this game entirely, because there is an official release. Even though there is a published movie using prototype, it doesn't mean it's allowed for all the future ones. If we enforce the current rule, then this movie gets rejected, and the released version has to be TASed. If we completely allow all prototype versions even when there's an official release, then it turns into a complete mess, because movies done on under-developed versions would be obsoleting official releases, and that compromises the environment that all of us were running those games in: we used official releases, and that's the most legitimate version, so TASing with official releases is the best approach. Prototypes differ from official releases in having more bugs that were intentionally fixed, no prototype was meant for regular use. Some prototypes have debug functionality available right away without codes, and it's obvious that we shouldn't use that in regular TASing. If we partially allow prototyles, then it becomes impossible to draw a clear and reliable borderline that would also allow this movie to be published. We have the 50% gameplay cutoff rule, where if half of the levels (or something similar) is completely different between game versions, they can be considered different games and can have both versions in Vault. If the difference is optional (up to the player) and not inherent, then only the most optimal option is vaultable. If we allow prototype for any% and release for full completion, then I can't come up with a future proof rule wording that would allow that, because it would mean that in some cases prototype and release are equal and inter-changeable, which we don't want. If we make an exception for this submission, then how do we even make Vault rules predictable? "The movie must meet the rules unless we feel like making an exception, and no one can know in advance what we allow as an exception, so rely on pure luck!" If we invent some clause about the prototype being "better", then it also turns into a mess due to subjectivity of what people may count as "better". How do you check in advance exactly if the prototype you're TASing is better? And then, if it's better, a whole bunch of prototypes may end up replacing official releases, which reduces the overall legitimacy of our content, because playing a prototype is exceptional in itself! It's like playing a broken cart where you can do things no one else can do. It's probably possible to showcase in a Moons-only branch, but we can't afford that in Vault.
Conclusion: If we want Vault to represent equal competition for everyone, to have reliable and clear rules, we have to make them equally unpleasant in some cases. Unpleasant but fair. Like blind justice. No one wants this movie to be rejected, but I see no way to incorporate it into any future proof Vault policy, only into subjective exceptions. And that means it's not fair and predictable anymore.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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feos wrote:
If we invent some clause about the prototype being "better", then it also turns into a mess due to subjectivity of what people may count as "better". How do you check in advance exactly if the prototype you're TASing is better? And then, if it's better, a whole bunch of prototypes may end up replacing official releases, which reduces the overall legitimacy of our content, because playing a prototype is exceptional in itself! It's like playing a broken cart where you can do things no one else can do. It's probably possible to showcase in a Moons-only branch, but we can't afford that in Vault.
Is this problem exclusive to prototypes? I can imagine a situation where different official releases are in contention because one plays differently than the other. In fact, I know games where major bugs were patched between releases (Donkey Kong Country SNES comes to mind, though it's not a Vault game). However, I also think this may be a side-issue, since one response to this is that "prototypes are always treated as inferior, while different releases of a game can have more nuance".
feos wrote:
If you forgo diagonal movement, your solutions in Pinocchio will be similar to those in Ottifanten. I can't call the difference between 2 games inherent. It's not like you're forced to go through 50% of unique levels.
I'm still not entirely satisfied why both the prototype and the official can't coexist in this specific instance. It seems to me the gameplay differences are significant enough that the individual level strategies would require different navigation, even though the level layouts happen to be the same. It's not just "Pinocchio slowed down". Ignoring diagonal movement, character agility, and the relative level speeds seems to me a somewhat subjective choice. After all, the rules don't say level layout trumps everything, any other differences between games can be ignored. If "inherent" means level layouts, the rules should say that. I personally think you can have inherent differences while still having the same level layouts. A far more objective criteria in my mind would to compare how the relative tactics can be transposed from one game to the other. If it's just a matter of adding blank space between inputs, than the differences are trivial. If however, it actually requires different navigation, then considering them separate may be better. For instance: dodging enemies is clearly different, and I also think Pinocchio is able to jump farther and therefore navigate around the platforms in different arrangements. I would imagine there are very few levels if any where the movement could just be slowed down and exactly copied and be optimal for both games. If at the end of the day, there are too many things that are similar, that's what it is, I suppose. But I can imagine there being independently released games that are also similar and I'm curious if we would treat Pinocchio and Ottifanten as cross-obsoleting if they had been separately released.
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RetroEdit wrote:
Is this problem exclusive to prototypes? I can imagine a situation where different official releases are in contention because one plays differently than the other. In fact, I know games where major bugs were patched between releases (Donkey Kong Country SNES comes to mind, though it's not a Vault game). However, I also think this may be a side-issue, since one response to this is that "prototypes are always treated as inferior, while different releases of a game can have more nuance".
Yeah prototypes are unofficial games, and as I said they weren't meant to be played by regular gamers. Other unofficial games were released for regular gamers even though they were crappy, but they were equally crappy for everyone. When picking a released version, we have these guidelines: http://tasvideos.org/MovieRules.html#GeneralNotes
RetroEdit wrote:
I'm still not entirely satisfied why both the prototype and the official can't coexist in this specific instance. It seems to me the gameplay differences are significant enough that the individual level strategies would require different navigation, even though the level layouts happen to be the same. It's not just "Pinocchio slowed down".
You can't call them different games if you can switch between them depending on whether you're holding diagonals or not, and the only difference is speed. If it's the same game, then it can only have one fastest completion branch in Vault. Otherwise any arbitrary routing option could be called "different enough" within any given game, and argued that all of those should be separate Vault branches.
RetroEdit wrote:
Ignoring diagonal movement, character agility, and the relative level speeds seems to me a somewhat subjective choice. After all, the rules don't say level layout trumps everything, any other differences between games can be ignored. If "inherent" means level layouts, the rules should say that. I personally think you can have inherent differences while still having the same level layouts.
Inherent means it's not optional. If all you could do in the prototype is moving diagonally, and in the release it's anything but diagonal, that's inherent difference.
RetroEdit wrote:
A far more objective criteria in my mind would to compare how the relative tactics can be transposed from one game to the other. If it's just a matter of adding blank space between inputs, than the differences are trivial. If however, it actually requires different navigation, then considering them separate may be better. For instance: dodging enemies is clearly different, and I also think Pinocchio is able to jump farther and therefore navigate around the platforms in different arrangements. I would imagine there are very few levels if any where the movement could just be slowed down and exactly copied and be optimal for both games.
It's not objective by definition, because it depends on what the TASer may or may not discover and pull off. Right now they look like different routing is required, even though it's not by design, but rather by an oversight that has been patched. If tomorrow someone discovers a way to move diagonally in Otto at the same speed as in Pinocchio, then the TAS strats will be similar. If it can change over time depending on luck and skill, it's not objective.
RetroEdit wrote:
I'm curious if we would treat Pinocchio and Ottifanten as cross-obsoleting if they had been separately released.
Yes!
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
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feos wrote:
RetroEdit wrote:
A far more objective criteria in my mind would to compare how the relative tactics can be transposed from one game to the other. If it's just a matter of adding blank space between inputs, than the differences are trivial. If however, it actually requires different navigation, then considering them separate may be better. For instance: dodging enemies is clearly different, and I also think Pinocchio is able to jump farther and therefore navigate around the platforms in different arrangements. I would imagine there are very few levels if any where the movement could just be slowed down and exactly copied and be optimal for both games.
It's not objective by definition, because it depends on what the TASer may or may not discover and pull off. Right now they look like different routing is required, even though it's not by design, but rather by an oversight that has been patched. If tomorrow someone discovers a way to move diagonally in Otto at the same speed as in Pinocchio, then the TAS strats will be similar. If it can change over time depending on luck and skill, it's not objective.
Fundamentally, this particular line of argument seems unfair. It's saying because we could hypothetically discover a way to move diagonally in the future, then the current difference doesn't matter, therefore the current difference doesn't matter. This line of argument could be arbitrarily applied offhand to anything. A better standard would be to reevaluate at future time if such a difference was discovered; we can only operate on the information we know presently and shouldn't be bound to a completely theoretical circumstance. That is my understanding of how branch obsoletion sometimes works: we don't necessarily know all the details of whether two branches that originally appear to be distinct will eventually converge in all cases, so we operate on what we currently know. (To be clear, this standard is not one-sided for this situation: what we currently know could support either case). Also, I want to clarify I see the diagonal movement as one difference to be considered among others. The speed I've referred to is not simply a matter of Pinocchio being better because it's faster or something basic like that. It's more a matter of Pinocchio's agility having tangible impacts on how levels can be navigated and which jumps are possible to make, to my understanding.
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I'm not saying those differences are absolutely insignificant in their nature. They would be significant if we were talking about Moons branches, which is exactly the place for superhuman play to shine, where lots of things are meant to be subjective and entertain people. But for Vault, it has to be clear and absolute. If different routing in some levels is now considered a different game, then how many prototypes will need to be published as separate "games" because they happen to fit such a loose definition? Also where do we even draw the line and tell the users "okay yeah now this is actually too similar to be considered two different games"?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
RetroEdit
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feos wrote:
But for Vault, it has to be clear and absolute. If different routing in some levels is now considered a different game, then how many prototypes will need to be published as separate "games" because they happen to fit such a loose definition? Also where do we even draw the line and tell the users "okay yeah now this is actually too similar to be considered two different games"?
That seems like a fair point from an officiality perspective, as unfortunate as it may be. At the end of the day, I'm more personally concerned with the construction of the TAS than necessarily the "official recognition" of what is the real game. I think Pinocchio presents distinct challenges that would be interesting to TAS independently of Ottifanten regardless of all similarities. But as a philosophy for discerning what can be published, that can clash hard with filtering out games. Does a Mario hack where Mario runs a few subpixels faster and jumping has been replaced with Castlevania physics then count as a separate game? There are probably endless permutations that can be justified under that loose criteria of being unique enough to be an interesting TAS with different challenges.
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Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.