Most submissions are rather straightforward, and can be roughly divided into three categories: Those which are accepted almost without question, those which require more discussion and voting, and those which get rejected for being just subpar.
But then there are a few games which seem to almost always draw controversy to them, when a submission is made. Maybe too many TAS categories have been created for that specific game, maybe it's not clear what it should obsolete if anything, maybe the submission just isn't up to the expectations for that game... Whatever the reason, it seems that some (if not all) of the submissions for these games just generate lots and lots of discussion, often heated one. They tend to stay in the queue for a very long time while people fight over whether it's good or not, whether it should be published or not, whether and what it should obsolete, what would be its category...
I suppose LoZ:OoT is the king of this type of game. (How many months has the newest submission been sitting on the submission queue now, and how many posts have been made to its submission thread?) Super Metroid also seems to frequently draw heated controversy onto itself.
What is it with some games that seem to generate this kind of controversy?
I suppose LoZ:OoT is the king of this type of game. (How many months has the newest submission been sitting on the submission queue now, and how many posts have been made to its submission thread?) Super Metroid also seems to frequently draw heated controversy onto itself.
I think this is mostly because one of the most involved people with that game has an ego the size of a blimp.
As for the rest, I think people just look into it too much. Is it fun to watch? Is it played well? If yes, hit the fucking publish button already so the plebs can enjoy it too.
Well, I can only give my opinion, but I think there is something similar in both examples you mentioned:
1) It are very popular games
2) It is a non-regular category
- If the games (or TASes) weren't popular, the non-regular category would be rejected a lot faster.
- If it's a regular category, there is no problem, certainly not if it's a popular game.
--------------------------------
In these particular cases, the OoT run has been accepted for quite some time... the wait is only for someone to encode it. I think accepting it was a very good choice, since it's shows of lots and lots of stuff the any% run doesn't, and at the same time, a true 100% run would only add lots and lots of boring things. So there are still the regular 2 version: an any% and a full version (though not 100%) (I think the goals in this case were as good as they would get).
For Super Metroid, it's a popular game that's pretty suited for TASing. Therefore, every goal you set will produce an entertaining movie... and therefore it gets good votes, no matter how rediculous the goals become. There are 4 published runs now, and a fifth category in submission. If it were up to me, an any%, and a 100% run are enough (2 runs). The other runs are just more of the same, with minor tweaks, which aren't even noticed probably by most viewers. I am very much against adding yet another category for this game.
Joined: 11/11/2006
Posts: 1235
Location: United Kingdom
Warp wrote:
I suppose LoZ:OoT is the king of this type of game. (How many months has the newest submission been sitting on the submission queue now, and how many posts have been made to its submission thread?) Super Metroid also seems to frequently draw heated controversy onto itself.
OoT has been accepted. The problem is that it was made with a plugin/plugin settings that cause the framebuffer to be unemulated. When framebuffer emulation is used (which makes the game look its best) the movie desyncs whenever the framebuffer is written to (or read, or both). As such, none of the current publishers want to encode it because it'll look like crap, and we feel the run deserves more than that despite it's not-so-great settings.
bkDJ was working on an avi that splices all the good parts in from different plugins in order to acheive maximum quality, along with a chapter system that allows you to skip all of the cutscenes. Such a task is huge though and only a priliminary encode was made. After seeing it I feel publishing anything less than the quality that was in that mkv would be silly.
<adelikat> I am annoyed at my irc statements ending up in forums & sigs
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 3518
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Baxter wrote:
For Super Metroid, it's a popular game that's pretty suited for TASing. Therefore, every goal you set will produce an entertaining movie... and therefore it gets good votes, no matter how rediculous the goals become. There are 4 published runs now, and a fifth category in submission. If it were up to me, an any%, and a 100% run are enough (2 runs). The other runs are just more of the same, with minor tweaks, which aren't even noticed probably by most viewers. I am very much against adding yet another category for this game.
I completely agree with you my dear friend.
Nitrogenesis wrote:
Guys I come from the DidyKnogRacist communite, and you are all wrong, tihs is the run of the mileniun and everyone who says otherwise dosnt know any bater! I found this run vary ease to masturbate too!!!! Don't fuck with me, I know this game so that mean I'm always right!StupedfackincommunityTASVideoz!!!!!!
Arc wrote:
I enjoyed this movie in which hands firmly gripping a shaft lead to balls deep in multiple holes.
natt wrote:
I don't want to get involved in this discussion, but as a point of fact C# is literally the first goddamn thing on that fucking page you linked did you even fucking read it
Cooljay wrote:
Mayor Haggar and Cody are such nice people for the community. Metro City's hospitals reached an all time new record of incoming patients due to their great efforts :P
I could honestly not give any less of a shit if the game has 5,000 categories as long as other runs are still being produced. Seriously, what's the big fucking deal?
I could honestly not give any less of a shit if the game has 5,000 categories as long as other runs are still being produced. Seriously, what's the big fucking deal?
I am in agreement. I mean, you said it yourself: "Therefore, every goal you set will produce an entertaining movie"
bolding mine.
As long as their are different games being worked on, who cares if old ones gain new ideas.
Since Matroska is an open format, so anyone can get a player (like VLC) that plays mkvs, can't that be the video format used? The avi container is outdated and only used because it's the lowest common denominator that works nearly everywhere, and also it's a Microsoft format.
I really don't mind the number of categories for any particular game, as long as the goals are clearly defined and adhered to, and the goals themselves give way to entertaining results. At this point, I don't even care if they get published, because they're still submitted and I can still watch and enjoy them. People get too uptight over such meaningless bullshit, behaving as though the publishing of a run will take away their basic human freedoms and first born children. If you disapprove of new categories purely because they are not the bland and unoriginal fast as possible with no other goals, then don't watch, the movie's not for you.
So sick of the holy wars, good God.
If you disapprove of new categories purely because they are not the bland and unoriginal fast as possible with no other goals, then don't watch, the movie's not for you.
Well, if the other categories are named "faster ingame time" and "lowest percent" and none of them fit their own criteria, it's really difficult to defend them using only common sense.
The controversy/joke is people trying to keep them anyhow, and finding a way to empty the meaning of those categories to make them blurry and subjetive, and thus evading obsoletion.
I remember seeing other submissions having alternate files where a certain glitch isn't used, but these usually complement the same submission, not create a different category.
And I don't mind people having egos, as long as they use it for good purpose and don't hinder other people from doing the same.
Joined: 12/27/2006
Posts: 532
Location: Göteborg, Sweden
Xkeeper wrote:
I could honestly not give any less of a shit if the game has 5,000 categories as long as other runs are still being produced. Seriously, what's the big fucking deal?
The problem with too many categories is that after the 3rd one (I'm thinking any%, 100%, low%, for the games this is applicable), the goals tend to get very arbitrary.
My published movies
[03:45:05] <Naohiro19> Soulrivers: ...
[03:45:19] <Soulrivers> ?
[03:46:35] <Naohiro19> <Soulrivers> No! <Naohiro19> So? <Soulrivers> Yes!
[03:46:48] <Naohiro19> joke
I could honestly not give any less of a shit if the game has 5,000 categories as long as other runs are still being produced. Seriously, what's the big fucking deal?
I do give a shit if some new runs of original games get rejected because only 2/3 of the people enjoy it, while one would be 100% sure of publication if you just make another Super Metroid movie, no matter how similar it is to what's already there.
Darkdata wrote:
I am in agreement. I mean, you said it yourself: "Therefore, every goal you set will produce an entertaining movie"
Yeah, and a "saves the animals" run at the end will be just as entertaining as a Super Metroid run that doesn't. A 99% run would also be entertaining. The problem is that it's just more of the same, with only minor tweaks. Do you think the "Luigi"-SMB run was that less entertaining than the normal run (the run where 2 players are selected, mario runs into goomba, and the the game is completed as luigi). You can't argue that it's really less entertaining than the regular run... but the goals are just getting rediculous, and there isn't enough new stuff.
superjupi wrote:
I really don't mind the number of categories for any particular game, as long as the goals are clearly defined and adhered to, and the goals themselves give way to entertaining results.
Well, I don't mind the number of categories if all runs are significantly different.
superjupi wrote:
If you disapprove of new categories purely because they are not the bland and unoriginal fast as possible with no other goals, then don't watch, the movie's not for you.
There are 4 published runs now, and a fifth category in submission. If it were up to me, an any%, and a 100% run are enough (2 runs). The other runs are just more of the same, with minor tweaks, which aren't even noticed probably by most viewers. I am very much against adding yet another category for this game.
I think that the problem with Super Metroid in particular is that the fastest completion time (the 6% run) is quite boring, and the 100% run is quite long. Of the two, the latter is definitely less boring, but well over 1 hour is a bit too much for many.
I do agree, though, that most of the in-between categories could be dropped. I have always been of the opinion that minimizing the game's own timer (at the cost of real-time) is a ridiculous goal and doesn't add anything of value. I would not mind at all if that category was dropped.
I always thought the in-game time challenge was a bit silly to come up with, but in practice, I like that it (initially) showed a much different path than the realtime movies had. It was nice to see something new, even if the goal itself sounds silly.
I always thought the in-game time challenge was a bit silly to come up with, but in practice, I like that it (initially) showed a much different path than the realtime movies had. It was nice to see something new, even if the goal itself sounds silly.
I think that for sight-seeing purposes the 100% run is good enough.
I always thought the in-game time challenge was a bit silly to come up with, but in practice, I like that it (initially) showed a much different path than the realtime movies had. It was nice to see something new, even if the goal itself sounds silly.
Now I'm reminded of how Mega Man 9 encourages the player to switch weapons a lot in timeattacks because the weapon select screen pauses the timer, whereas when you include those slow menu openings in the time, you only see one or two weapon switches per level in a classic-style Mega Man speedrun. So sometimes going by an in-game timer improves the action of a game despite adding to its length with menu time.
put yourself in my rocketpack if that poochie is one outrageous dude
May I as well list things that are debatable? As follows: significancy, popularity, legitimacy, common sense, entertainment value, similarity, being proper, being suited.
It would be really interesting if people participating in such debates would use none of those to defend their arguments.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Popularity isn't debatable, if a certain fraction of the populace all know and like a game, that makes it popular. the exact number is a little bit fuzzy, but nobody's going to disagree (for instance) that chrono trigger, super metroid, ocarina of time, and super mario 64 are all popular games.
How fleeting are all human passions compared with the massive continuity of ducks.
It's not as much "debatable" per se, as it is simply relative. If there are 10-20 well-known and outspoken users who support a certain game's runs, it may as well be counted as popular. It won't matter if these 10-20 people will be the sole populace on the site who actually loves the game (I think games like Rygar and Aria of Sorrow somewhat fit the description here).
Besides, popularity in this case translates to amount of people being fond of the game, but it still doesn't mean anything for the movies themselves (I know for sure I don't like watching long Chrono Trigger or Final Fantasy VI runs despite being fond of the games). Using that to discuss runs might be a little misleading.
Also, if you notice, you took four of the few extreme examples of popular games. What if I ask you about NES Metroid, Tetris, Sonic 1, Super Castlevania IV, Castlevania: Bloodlines, Excitebike, Ninja Gaiden, Contra 3, and perhaps a couple dozen more games?
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Joined: 11/11/2006
Posts: 1235
Location: United Kingdom
arflech wrote:
Raiscan wrote:
that mkv
Since Matroska is an open format, so anyone can get a player (like VLC) that plays mkvs, can't that be the video format used? The avi container is outdated and only used because it's the lowest common denominator that works nearly everywhere, and also it's a Microsoft format.
I think you missed the point of my post. I wasn't condemning mkv by any means. I just mentioned it was an mkv. A few points:
VLC isn't exactly the greatest program in the world (at least in my opinion) and not everyone wants to use it.
Just because AVI is outdated doesn't mean it's a bad idea to use it. My understanding is that this site has always aimed for the best compatibility when it comes to making media files, and compression quality:size comes second. While mkv is great and all, you can't play it on alot of hardware media players yet, and even some software players commonly used need a splitter/demuxer before they can play it properly.
So you're saying that if it wasn't a Microsoft format, it would be okay to use it? That's the stupidest thing I've heard in a while.
I'm aware of AVI's other downsides, and you'll notice that when any of them are significant to affect the filesize of the finished encode significantly, I'll use mkv instead.
Sorry for going somewhat off-topic.
<adelikat> I am annoyed at my irc statements ending up in forums & sigs
The bad thing about the movie format that the site uses is that it can't be played out of the box. I need to remember what codec download to be able to play it.
I don't think there's no real solution to this. As mkv requires a custom players (VLC etc.) And the AVI format requires the use of codec.
The bad thing about the movie format that the site uses is that it can't be played out of the box. I need to remember what codec download to be able to play it.
Well, yeah. FinalFighter uses to solve that problem by always publishing his movies in MPEG1 (.mpg) format. Those are playable with almost anything.
But I don't want to go that way ― not the least because to achieve equivalent quality with MPEG1 than with H.264, you need to create ten times as large files…
What does publishing a submission mean?
--It gets encoded for mass consumption
--It is inserted into the site in a much more prominent location (easier to browse to, search for, stumble upon)
--It creates marginally more load the site/torrent seeders, and also "dilutes" current publications in terms of browsing
(Am I missing anything?)
From those I will say: Encoding makes a movie easier to watch, but it takes resources to encode and host, and a non-trivial number of users can/want to watch them as emulator movies. I would also argue that the site is already too "diluted", and naturally it will continue to grow. Fighting that by restricting movies doesn't really address it properly, and in fact introduces the threat of stagnation since as more movies are published there will be more and more resistance to introducing more. The right way to combat that is to create infrastructure to organize publications, and this is something that is happening especially with the new site layout.
My point is, more movies should be published, perhaps with encodes being an optional step. If people want a giant load of SM movies, great. Make a page devoted to them. Have the any and 100% in the SNES section. Publish movies that 2/3 of people like. If no one wants to encode, fine. If enough people want an encode, someone will take pity on them, or perhaps someone new will try to take it upon themselves.
Just my 2 cents, again ;)
