Posted: 7/17/2008 2:40 AM
Post subject: Atari 2600.
Cheezwizz
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Why? There are a few games that seem to never stop getting harder as you play... Example? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXK54HS5bQQ
Posted: 7/23/2008 1:37 PM
nesrocks
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I've tried to talk people into adding re-recording to an atari 2600 emulator, but no programmer is interested, and there also doesn't seem to be interest to support atari 2600 runs in this website. Shame!
aka Nesrocks http://www.youtube.com/user/UoBtExFODA https://nesrocks.com https://twitter.com/bitinkstudios
Posted: 7/23/2008 2:14 PM
Warp
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Honestly, are there any *good* atari 2600 games? And I mean from the point of view of *watching* someone playing it. The graphics are quite crappy, so there must be something else that would make a TAS entertaining. From all the (few) atari 2600 games which have some kind of ending, I suppose just a small fraction are barely enjoyable to watch. Is it worth making a rerecording emulator for just a few games?
Posted: 7/23/2008 3:55 PM
alden
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Warp wrote:
Is it worth making a rerecording emulator for just a few games?
Yes, yes it is. And it would probably be more than a few. Are there any 2600 emulators that support savestates even?
I make a comic with no image files and you should read it. While there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free. -Eugene Debs
Posted: 7/23/2008 5:21 PM
nesrocks
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how isn't NES crappy?
aka Nesrocks http://www.youtube.com/user/UoBtExFODA https://nesrocks.com https://twitter.com/bitinkstudios
Posted: 7/23/2008 8:53 PM
moozooh
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NES could at least do some physics simulation. FODA, I believe you're completely missing the point that [at least some] Atari games have been interesting to play, or at least watch done manually; but in a TAS, their ugly repetition (because you could pack only this much data in a 2600 cart) comes forth and makes it look as boring as ever to pretty much anyone who's not a complete 2600 junkie.
Posted: 7/23/2008 10:30 PM
nesrocks
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I don't think NES videos are interesting for people that aren't NES junkies.
aka Nesrocks http://www.youtube.com/user/UoBtExFODA https://nesrocks.com https://twitter.com/bitinkstudios
Posted: 7/23/2008 11:42 PM
RT-55J
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NES games typically have more variety than 2600 games.
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Posted: 7/24/2008 12:59 AM
upthorn
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FODA wrote:
I don't think NES videos are interesting for people that aren't NES junkies.
I've never been a big fan of NES, but I have enjoyed watching several TASes of it, even of games that I'd never heard of before watching the TAS. I really cannot imagine this being the case with any Atari 2600 game that I know of.
How fleeting are all human passions compared with the massive continuity of ducks.
Posted: 7/24/2008 1:29 AM
4matsy
Joined: 4/25/2004
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upthorn wrote:
I've never been a big fan of NES, but I have enjoyed watching several TASes of it, even of games that I'd never heard of before watching the TAS. I really cannot imagine this being the case with any Atari 2600 game that I know of.
Adventure? Donkey Kong (Jr.)? E.T.? Frogger? Kung Fu Master? Pitfall (2)? Raiders of the Lost Ark? Space Invaders on ridiculously hard settings? SwordQuest (insert element here)world? ...Custer's Rev--*brick'd*
Posted: 7/24/2008 1:36 AM
Bisqwit
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FODA wrote:
I've tried to talk people into adding re-recording to an atari 2600 emulator, but no programmer is interested, and there also doesn't seem to be interest to support atari 2600 runs in this website. Shame!
I'm not sure if you recall, but my viewpoint has been all the time (for example, at http://tasvideos.org/EmulatorResources/Requirements.html#2 ) that I desperately want someone to prove me wrong in my opinion that no Atari 2600 game TAS could look very interesting to watch, considering that they are usually looping games.
Posted: 7/24/2008 1:01 PM
ZeXr0
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Does your opinion actually matters ? :P Just a joke :P
Posted: 7/24/2008 2:00 PM
Warp
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FODA wrote:
how isn't NES crappy?
Hmm, let's see... Atari 2600: NES: Need I say more?
Posted: 7/24/2008 2:15 PM
(Edited: 1/23/2022 10:25 PM)
Bisqwit
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Warp wrote:
Need I say more?
If that's all your opinion, then let me show you another "fair" comparison. Super Nintendo: Nintendo 64: I think interestingness of gameplay should be at question here, not the graphics. In my opinion, a game such as Frogger (mentioned above) is hardly very interesting to watch especially if you just zoom through. However, for classic game documentation value it might be good. But that brings to another hard question: Game ending. Those games rarely had actual endings.
Posted: 7/24/2008 4:19 PM
alden
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Well we have Elevator Action, Donkey Kong and Circus Charlie...
I make a comic with no image files and you should read it. While there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free. -Eugene Debs
Posted: 7/24/2008 8:22 PM
Warp
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Bisqwit wrote:
I think interestingness of gameplay should be at question here, not the graphics.
From a viewer's point of view graphics have a big impact on entertainment. The Atari 2600 just falls into the really ugly graphics side of old consoles.
Posted: 7/24/2008 8:31 PM
Bisqwit
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For the most part, I actually like Atari 2600 graphics. (Well, at least for the more popular games...)
Posted: 7/25/2008 12:15 AM
nesrocks
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I think 99,999% of the human beings on this planet think n64 games and below are incredibly bad graphics, so graphics really don't matter. To tell you the truth, I only enjoy TASes in two cases: 1 - a TAS of a game I enjoy 2 - a TAS that exploits an unexpected glitch, even for a game I'm not very fond of. For atari games, I think the second cathegory is hard to happen, with very few exceptions. But on the first one, I am very interested to see how far does Seaquest go, for example, in terms of insane difficulty. You can progress through the difficulty levels very quickly. In River Raid you can go farther than anyone has ever gone, by avoiding getting points. This would make an extremely long video, but it would be interesting for enthusiastics. I think it all comes down to this, how many enthusiastics are there. We know for a fact that NES has more fans than atari 2600, so that may be what's holding back interest in working on this system...
aka Nesrocks http://www.youtube.com/user/UoBtExFODA https://nesrocks.com https://twitter.com/bitinkstudios
Posted: 7/28/2008 12:03 AM
Bisqwit
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I would add TASing support to Stella, but I cannot make heads or tails about its architecture... It is way too modular for my tastes. Such an elaborate structure requires equally elaborate documentation, which is unfortunately nowhere to be found. (For maintaining, sure, modular programming is a great thing, but when you are not yet in to the system's secrets, you'll have not 4 big puzzles, but 200 small puzzles. And because there is nothing that shows how those puzzles connect to each others (they're modular after all), you're lost. I can't find a single main loop or something that would actually do something instead of providing potential services for something else. And yes, I'm sure it'll be a piece of cake once you find the end of the ball of yarn (considering that Stella seems to have rather robust savestates, RAM initialization randomness not counting), but until that, there's nothing much I can do. And my patience and time is limited, unlike how it was 10 years ago...)
Posted: 7/28/2008 1:36 PM
Warp
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Modularity is a great (and IMO essential) programming technique, but it's not a silver bullet. Modular design can go wrong, and if the overall structure of the program is not easy to figure out, the design has failed. It is also possible to overmodularize: Split the program into a humongous amount of very small modules. The amount of modules becomes so large that the entire program becomes basically a modular version of spaghetti code. Basically it's just modularity for the sake of modularity, without a good design. Not a good thing.
Posted: 7/28/2008 5:32 PM
Dwedit
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So do people want to see the "run" of Adventure that beats the game while inside a dragon? The thing about Adventure is that aside from generating game 3, the game is completely deterministic. The only interactions that can happen without the player at the screen is the bat stuff. So make the bat come by, and drop the Chalice at the location of the open yellow castle, then all you have to do is get to the yellow castle screen to win the game before the chalice gets pushed out of the way by bat or magnet. So that means you can just fly by dead inside a dragon to the yellow castle, and win the game inside a dragon.
Posted: 7/28/2008 5:47 PM
DarkKobold
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Bisqwit wrote:
.... And my patience and time is limited, unlike how it was 10 years ago...)
This is the real problem. We've got great coders working on this site - however, the majority of them are working on perfecting the TAS abilities of current tasable emulators. The question isn't whether or not to add TASability, its "who has any friggin time these days?"
Sage advice from a friend of Jim: So put your tinfoil hat back in the closet, open your eyes to the truth, and realize that the government is in fact causing austismal cancer with it's 9/11 fluoride vaccinations of your water supply.
Posted: 8/4/2008 2:10 AM
Cheezwizz
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There is one game with a definite "end" also, by the name of Solaris. The game itself is comprised of a bunch of maps connected in a mazelike way, where every object takes you to a fight or otherwise a warp jump. The object is to get to the blinking star in one of those sectors... It can take quite a while to finish that game (probably moreso to do EVERYTHING in the game, as everything happens in real time, whether you're there for it or not. some systems' bases will be under attack before you even get to them... Managing your time would be a big challenge.)
Posted: 5/5/2010 12:59 AM
CrazyTerabyte
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Just a note: Atari 2600 games work on scanline basis. Actually, the games are responsible for sending the sync signals to the Stella graphics chip. Thus... I'm not sure if a frame-based movie file would be the best format. Maybe a movie file with more fine-grained input (like scanline-based or even clock-based). Of course I haven't tested, but I wonder what types of glitches could be done by changing the input state mid-frame. Well, maybe none? Or maybe it depends on the game?