Posted: 7/17/2014 6:58 PM
Post subject: Branch names
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Zowayix
Joined: 12/29/2007
Posts: 489
After a couple months of getting used to the new branch names, I think it's appropriate to bring this up: In terms of the goal of TASVideos, the old branch names made more sense. For the vast majority of movies on this site, the goal is to beat the game as fast as possible, and (effectively) nothing else. For those games where "as fast as possible" effectively wrecks any semblance of regular gameplay (e.g. Yellow save corruption), we have alternate movies, namely the Cooltrainer move glitch movie and the 7-badge movie. Using the Cooltrainer move glitch movie as an example, the problem with the current "warp glitch" title is that the primary goal of the movie is not to perform the warp glitch. It's simply to beat the game as fast as possible, without hard resetting. If some other glitch were found in the future that didn't involve save data corruption or the Cooltrainer move and still beat the game faster than 28 minutes, that movie would presumably obsolete this one, although the branch name would require changing. A similar, more contentious (and hopefully enlightening) example occurs with the current "11 exit" Super Mario World movie. Its branch name is "warps". Going by that name (or the previous "11 exits" name), why shouldn't Masterjun's "modify the player's coordinates" ACE movie obsolete it? Why shouldn't the cloud glitch be allowed? The nice and simple answer is that the primary goal of the movie is not to beat the game with warps/11 exits. The goal is to beat the game without relying on arbitrary code execution.* Therefore, I support renaming the branches back to the convention used before, i.e. describing the primary goal of the movie. Feel free to either back me up or provide counterpoints. *Yes, I know that the "stack corruption" movie that beats the game from YI3 would then obsolete it. This could be remedied by making the branch name "no ACE, no final boss skip" or something similar; many other movies have multiple clauses in the branch name, such as "70 stars, No BLJ" and several Super Metroid movies.
Posted: 7/18/2014 4:27 AM
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Personman
Other
Joined: 4/20/2008
Posts: 465
I think maybe we want two different things, a (rigorously defined) category definition and a (helpful to humans) route description. It's not clear which one ought to be in the title, though.
A warb degombs the brangy. Your gitch zanks and leils the warb.
Posted: 7/18/2014 3:35 PM
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feos
Site Admin, Skilled player (1254)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11475
Location: Lake Char­gogg­a­gogg­man­chaugg­a­gogg­chau­bun­a­gung­a­maugg
NES TAS of 2011
Make sure to have read this post http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15247
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.
Posted: 7/18/2014 6:50 PM
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Zowayix
Joined: 12/29/2007
Posts: 489
@above: Are route descriptions truly necessary? I'd argue that runs are defined by their goals, not their routes. Taking the SDW run as an example, there's no branch separating the "warps from World 1 and has to go through Misty Star World" run from the "warps from World 2 to Desert Star World, skipping the MSW autoscroller but requiring more level completions" run. They're different routes for sure, but the route difference doesn't make them dissimilar enough to branched - because they have the same goal. The goal should be what's in the title, not the route.