Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 3517
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
First of all, let me just say that I totally respect the rules. I am "simply" asking for a favor, for an old geezer like me.
As some of you might know, I am working on a 9-run. One input controlling 9 mega men. It's very interesting working on it. Long story short, it's like each new 20-30 frames presents a new unique challenge which I must solve in a way that looks smooth, optimized and what's best for most mega men. So redoing 500 frames or more is a lot, a lot harder than one might think. If this was a single game, then redoing 500-1000 frames is easy peasy, no question about it.
I check frequently for desyncs. I have now tased 5743 frames = 1 min and almost 35 seconds. I just recently bumped into a desync for the first time ever since using Ans's suggestion of changing the setting to: NES/Emulation speed/Set Frame Advance Delay/9999. This method by the way greatly helped me when I restarted the whole thing and using the new method/setting, as it proved to be very accurate and stable.
What's interesting is that my mm4 moviefile seems to desync far earlier than where my wip ends. What this means is that when I checked for desyncs a few weeks ago, it didn't desync then. But now as I wrote before, it desynced far earlier than where my wip ends.
Hypothetically speaking, let's say I manage to tas 50 000 frames and with this current situation perhaps proves that there is no certainty that it will sync later on. Even if you checked for desyncs and it didn't back then.
Adelikat, this means, even using winmerge, it doesn't do much for me given the above example.
To be crystal clear, this is my situation as turska describes it on irc:
<turska> AngerFist: I think that a run that completes multiple games with a single movie must actually complete them all with the same movie. In the hypothetical scenario you're describing there is effectively one movie file that completes 8 games, and a second, different movie file that completes mm4
[22:01] <AngerFist> yeah
[22:02] <AngerFist> would it really kill tasvideos to be lenient one time? :(
[22:03] <AngerFist> towards this run, a highly complex surrounding
Nobody has worked as far as I am concerned on a 9-run so its not like if you would accept my movie, you would get a plethora of 9-runs afterwards referring to my run as an excuse to submit it like the way I am requesting. Would anyone in their right mind think perhaps I cheated in my run upon submission? I have been here for more than 10 years, basically everyone knows me and my reputation that I wouldn't in my wildest dreams consider cheating. Because that's where the shoe won't fit :( The rule states that a movie should sync with the rom. In this case, 9 roms. Currently, 8 of my runs sync while 1 (mega man 4) does not, though the movie file of mega man 4 syncs perfectly with the mega man 4 rom (it obtains the Balloon in Pharaoh Man).
I am humbly begging everyone, publishers, regular users, tasers, owners of this site to please consider everything I've said. I am asking for once a lifetime leniency with my run. A run which is in my humble opinion extremely complex. Would it really hurt tasvideos to grant me this request? :( Would it really be that bad?
What I fear is, worst case scenario redoing from start or 2000 frames or so which I have done once before, is something I am not considering. I am really determined to finish this huge project. Also, it's my birthday, cut me some slack :(
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
If we are lenient, and then someone else makes a similar request in the future, what should be done? Do you think it would be fair to say to that person "sorry, that was just a one-time thing, an exception we granted to a long-time runner; we won't grant you the same exception"? I think that you would agree that showing such favoritism would be a bit questionable, and therefore we would have to grant such exceptions in the future as well, if someone requests them.
Thus the question becomes: Where do we draw the line? What if someone made, for example, a 9-game run where two of the games require a separate file. Do we grant the exception then or not? What if someone made an 8-game run where one of the games requires a separate file? Or a 7-game run? Or a three-game run? what's the allowed minimum?
(Btw, I really wish people did more 2-game runs. They are much more fun to watch, especially if the two games sync visually as much as possible. Million-game runs are technical achievements, but they are too chaotic to be all that entertaining...)
Allowing different input for a "one set of input completes N games" category destroys the whole concept, and I'm sure it would cheapen your own sense of achievement too. If fixing the desync is too time-consuming, then I would suggest removing that game from the set, and doing an 8 game TAS rather than a 9 game TAS.
This desync sounds pretty magical, though. How can the input that synced previously now suddenly desync? If sync has changed, that must be due to something changing. Do you have a copy of the version that synced? Does that still sync? If not, you should consider using version control when TASing, so that you don't have to worry about losing input.
And anyway, if sync is that fragile, it seems pretty unlikely that the TAS would sync on somebody else's computer.
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 3517
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
There is no dispute in what you are saying Warp. We could theorize all day long if we want to. "What/How/When would you react if person X did this or that". But we are here and dealing with this now. And this situation is not your ordinary dish. We need to have a bit more perspective and ask ourselves: are there situations where it feels right to break a rule once? This ain't a single movie we are discussing.
amaurea wrote:
Allowing different input for a "one set of input completes N games" category destroys the whole concept, and I'm sure it would cheapen your own sense of achievement too. If fixing the desync is too time-consuming, then I would suggest removing that game from the set, and doing an 8 game TAS rather than a 9 game TAS.
I understand your view but I think the concept is intact. I am still controlling all 9 of them via one input. Removing Mega Man 4 does not feel right at all :( I honestly do not feel my run is cheating, cheap or whatever you want to label it. Because bottom line is: I am still controlling 9 characters via through one input. If I would tas 8 Mega men and tas afterwards Mega man 4, then of course this whole concept is not a concept. Then it feels 100% no questions asked, cheated. Fact remains, I am still controlling 9 characters via one input.
amaurea wrote:
This desync sounds pretty magical, though. How can the input that synced previously now suddenly desync? If sync has changed, that must be due to something changing. Do you have a copy of the version that synced? Does that still sync? If not, you should consider using version control when TASing, so that you don't have to worry about losing input.
Yeah I know it sounds weird but that's what has happened. I have older copies and now some of them appear to desync too. By some, I mean only Mega Man 4. Others sync just fine. I don't know how to fix this desync. I cannot imagine all it takes is to copy the input from say the Mega Man 1 moviefile and either create a new Mega Man 4 moviefile or edit the current Mega Man 4 file and paste there.
amaurea wrote:
And anyway, if sync is that fragile, it seems pretty unlikely that the TAS would sync on somebody else's computer.
Mothrayas managed to replay and encode just fine my first wip. Same with my current wip except for the Mega Man 4 issue. I am sure Ilari and others would manage aswell, provided they don't own a very old rig.
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
There is no dispute in what you are saying Warp. We could theorize all day long if we want to. "What/How/When would you react if person X did this or that". But we are here and dealing with this now. And this situation is not your ordinary dish. We need to have a bit more perspective and ask ourselves: are there situations where it feels right to break a rule once? This ain't a single movie we are discussing.
You kind of avoided my question.
Do you think it would be fair if we grant you the exception and then deny a similar exception in the future for someone else? (And if you think the fair thing would be to grant the exceptions, where do you draw the line?)
The problem is that your mm1 movie does not sync, but the mm4 one does. This means they do not contain the same input. As such, wether your fault or not, means the idea behind the 9-game run is lost.
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 3517
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Well what do you know ladies and gentlemen. It seemed more movies than mm4 were desyncing. Want to hear a ghost-like story? When I checked for desyncs, none of them desynched except for mm4. Even Mothrayas verified it last night that only mm4 desynched. And now... many of the movie files all the fucking sudden desyncs....
Edit: With that being said, I am putting this run on hold indefinitely. You have no idea how many hours I have spent working on this. I was extremely determined to finish it. This is not how I wanted to finish it :(
Unless someone makes fceux a lot more stable when it comes to background input (I think Luke implemented it 5-8 years ago...) or an application which somehow prevents desyncs or alerts me of desyncs, this project is dead.
Thank you Mothrayas, Ilari, adelikat and Ans for helping me in various ways.
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
That would be useful, but maybe very hard, to find what could have caused the desync. Or some way to fix it at least. Because you'll never know if it can happen again, and maybe with another of the 9 games. Imagine if, at the end, all of them (8 of them, technically) end up with a desync at one point in the run ^^.
I think that's a big threat for the run, destroying the whole purpose, and the time spent on it.
Edit: ouch, and you posted that while I was typing my post. Sorry to hear that what I feared really happened :(
What I fear is, worst case scenario redoing from start or 2000 frames or so which I have done once before, is something I am not considering. I am really determined to finish this huge project. Also, it's my birthday, cut me some slack :(
Maybe other TASers should submit TASes on their birthdays for leniency then...
I think the best option for the future to avoid this problem is if the emulator itself were to be developed to emulate several games at the same time with the same input, in order to make the recording robust.
But honestly, I really wish people made more 2-game TASes rather than trying to break records.
Joined: 8/14/2009
Posts: 4089
Location: The Netherlands
It's a deep shame the run had to end like this. I've followed the project through its entirety, and it always was great whenever more progress was made. AngerFist put a metric crapton of time and effort into it over the past few years, and it's painful to see it has to end like this.
Here's the final encode: (all games with the same input, except MM4, which is different by a single button input in a single frame)
Link to video
http://www.youtube.com/Noxxa
<dwangoAC> This is a TAS (...). Not suitable for all audiences. May cause undesirable side-effects. May contain emulator abuse. Emulator may be abusive. This product contains glitches known to the state of California to cause egg defects.
<Masterjun> I'm just a guy arranging bits in a sequence which could potentially amuse other people looking at these bits
<adelikat> In Oregon Trail, I sacrificed my own family to save time. In Star trek, I killed helpless comrades in escape pods to save time. Here, I kill my allies to save time. I think I need help.
Very sad.
I have also experienced emulators not registering inputs, mainly frame-advance, while I tried comparing different runs at the same time.
Running multiple games in one emulator is a good approach to solve this problem.
I'm sorry to see that you're putting this on indefinite hold Angerfist. I was really looking forward to this and still think you're one hell of a TASer for taking on a project this massive. I think you should be proud of the progress that you made on it.
My user name is rather long, feel free to call me by htwt or tape.
