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This run is definitely not with the intention of obsoleting the published SMB any% TAS! This movie aims to present what the fastest and the best SMB PAL TAS would look like. It improves MUGG's submission for 66 frames, and tubby's TAS for 46 frames.
The Europe version of SMB is an official game run in PAL mode. The physics are almost identical, but the speed values are set differently, causing more potential glitches. TASes on this version are only faster due to a different version of flagpole glitch, which allows Mario to skip the castles without the help of other enemies or entering the ground.

New Trick: Falling into the Ground

It's probably no secret that Mario can sometimes fall into the ground after stomping on an enemy in SMB Europe version, but to do this without the help of anything but a lift is something new. The lift is still required for manipulating Y position before jumping. This trick is used in 1-2, saving 18 frames (a frame rule).

Time Saver: Faster Acceleration

It's faster to accelerate on the floor in this version. This simple new way of acceleration saves 18 frames in 8-3, and 10 frames in 8-4 (along with other arrangements).
This run also differs from the normal SMB any% TAS on details. For example, only in this TAS is Mario able to kick some shells in 8-1, and to show the 1-UP mushroom in 8-2, to walljump on the higher floor and to swim through the ceiling in 8-4.
I'm submitting it here mostly to show people what the best SMB PAL TAS would look like, regardless of whether it has reached TASVideos' standard for publication.

Nach: Let me start off by saying that judging this was one of the most difficult to judge TASs. The verdict I'm presenting here is based off of the current rules and knowledge I have regarding this run. It is subject to be revisited if anything significant changes. It should also be noted that no matter what the decision here is, a large chunk of people will not be happy with it. I will however lay out some additional info not discussed in the thread which factored into my decision.
Before I dive in, let me also iterate that this was an entertaining run, and there is little to dispute that, certainly by the audience at large.

NTSC vs. PAL theory

In terms of PAL games in general, different platforms, different companies, and different games all exhibit varying levels of quality. Obviously if a PAL game is the original then it can be easily considered the main version of a game. For some platforms, there are also no difference game-wise if something is running in NTSC or PAL mode. However, for platforms designed to be timed and framed into old television sets, there are important differences between the two modes.
Once there is a difference between the two, games designed for NTSC which are not modified for PAL generally exhibit some very weird behavior. As one example, I've seen fighting games where the key combos to execute various moves barely work when playing in PAL mode, the timing is altered enough that the game doesn't recognize the key presses the same way. As many PAL ports are like this in some fashion, it's ample reason to reject them, Just play the original which works normally.

Game variants on TASVideos

When we look at PAL ports, we must understand that these games are adaptions or variants of the original. Although there are many kinds of variants. Some variants are ports to a later platform. One kind of variant such as those seen in Mario Bros. has completely different levels (even though all the levels are repetitive). Some variants like those in the Street Fighter 2 series are the same game but with changes with varying levels of importance. Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge exists in two variants where the entire game is the same, except one has a boomerang as a secondary weapon, and the other has a throw-able ax. The Pokémon series has game variants at each generation, generally limited to monster selection, where a dozen out of 150+ are different (which may not differ at all with certain glitches exploited), but barely has any affect on how a well planned run plays. Other differences are ports from the NES to SNES to Gameboy Advance and so on. The deciding factor in how these are dealt with on the site always boils down to how identical are the engines, and how unique and interesting is the gameplay that each variant offers over others.
Taking SMB2 as an example, the SNES variant adds on a save game feature which can be abused which can change the warped route considerably. Same for the Gameboy Advance variant, which further has other game changes. Due to these considerable changes in what one would see in a TAS for them, we have accepted them all.
In the case of Pokémon, since the engine/quality of the game between say Blue and Red is identical, and the observable changes in a TAS are insignificant, any new record with one will always obsolete the other.
In the case of various Street Fighter games, there is a large similarity to the TASs being produced. The audience at large doesn't notice much other than some Street Fighter characters are more or less beating up the same set of Street Fighter characters, using many of the same moves. In these kinds of cases, we have the best version of the game obsolete the others. Best version often is based on figuring out which has the broadest set of move possibilities, most fluid version of the fighting engine, and so on.
We haven't had multiple variants of Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge submitted yet, but if someone submits a boomerang heavy run with sizable differences from the existing ax run, I can see accepting them side by side. It's sort of like accepting various X and Zero runs side by side for the later Megaman X PSX games (note: I rejected some MMX5 runs for being too similar to others).
In terms of Mario Bros. since a full variety run of levels while similar is quite different, we have accepted both.

NTSC vs. PAL in practice

If a PAL port offered the exact same engine/quality as the original, it could make sense to have it obsolete the original (and this could make sense to occur in games that are not meant for old television sets). If a PAL port offers a somewhat different engine, the question becomes whether it deserves to be added to the list of accepted variants alongside the original. The answer to that hinges on do the engine differences necessitate very different ways to play the game, and do those differences register with the audience at large. In most cases, PAL runs should be rejected, but based on the various aforementioned criteria, there are cases where PAL runs will definitely be accepted.
Nintendo unlike other companies has always aimed to do a decent job porting NTSC games to PAL. Nintendo is often one of the only companies where you will see the PAL game having various timings corrected to ensure that the game-play closely matches that of the NTSC version. Nintendo is often one of the only companies that adjusts the resolution of the displayed game to match the different resolution PAL televisions are capable of. Nintendo often also does some localization, converting currency, weight, and measurements to be those used locally. The attention to detail by Nintendo in PAL porting started with early NES games, and improved as Nintendo ported more and more and with newer platforms.

This game in particular

For its time in history and in comparison to a bunch of other early NES PAL games, Super Mario Bros. PAL is actually a relatively decent port (although maintains several noticeable differences from the NTSC original in terms of movement and other factors). Since the game is non-original but a decent port (relatively during its debut), it definitely qualifies for consideration as to whether it should be published alongside the original as another game variant.
This game happens to also be a game I'm quite familiar with. I played many of its variants on NES (since the 80s!), SNES, and Gameboy Color. I also dabbled in its programming and made various hacks on NES and SNES versions. In my opinion, I find this game qualifies for having many branches made of it. I can also see the SNES variant qualifies for certain branches as an acceptable TAS to show off a run without as many glitches being possible, and the Gameboy Color variant for some of its challenges that earlier versions do not offer. The question of course is, is there value in this PAL variant that we have lacking from all our other variants and branches thereof?
The first thing I want to shoot down is the idea that SMB PAL is faster than SMB NTSC. There are quite a few parts of the game that are non-playable. These include score countdown, castle animations, pipe transitions, 1-2, 2-2, 4-2, and 7-2 initial cut screens, level banners, vine climbing, and Bowser drowning to our princess is in another castle. When comparing across versions we need to take all this into account and figure out actual game-play time. NES SMB processes the non-playable segments of the games in multiples of 21 frames and 18 frames for NTSC and PAL respectively. Nintendo altered the number from 21 to 18 because 21/60 and 18/50 is 0.35 and 0.36, which should provide a close gaming experience on the port. In actuality, using more precise numbers, NTSC has frames which are ~0.0166 seconds long, and PAL ~0.0199 seconds. This means the non-playable parts are processed in multiples of ~0.3494 seconds and ~0.3599 seconds. Since these non-playable segments run on boundaries that are multiples of these, it means that the NTSC version allows slightly more time to get in activity before the game will round upwards. Conversely, if you just went a bit over a multiple, the PAL version will proceed to the next multiple sooner.
In order to get a better handle on this, I went to time the actual playable segments between the fastest NTSC and this PAL run (note, there may be rounding errors, and it's possible I was a frame off either way for some calculations):
LevelNTSCPAL
1-112.230512.083
1-221.58321.15
4-123.98323.967
4-217.949517.567
8-140.082540.233
8-224.865523.383
8-322.698522.767
8-432.527532.601
Total195.92193.751
Based on this NTSC is slower by ~2.169 seconds (about 130 frames in NTSC). However, there is a flaw with this logic. These runs aim for overall fastest real time, and thereby performs some actions which are slightly slower in the playable segments in order to abuse how the non-playable part is played as well as avoid 3 or 6 castle fireworks animations. However, the NTSC run goes significantly out of its way in 8-2 to abuse this trade off, by ~2.379 seconds in my calculation. If the run would discount non-playable segments to achieve the fastest possible any-variant time, we'd instead be looking at:
LevelNTSCPAL
8-222.486523.383
Total193.541193.751
In this case, the NTSC version is faster by 0.21 seconds (about a dozen frames)!
NTSC improves further if we decide that the mid-level non-playable segments must be included in 1-1, because unlike other levels, going through that here is a decision that can be avoided. In that case the 1-1 times become:
LevelNTSCPAL
1-118.165518.433
Gaining the NTSC run an additional 0.415 seconds (about 25 frames). All in all, PAL being necessarily faster in terms of game-play is doubtful.

Judgment

Armed with all the aforementioned information, how do we look at this? I decided to ask other judges for their opinions for the different possibilities, raised a few counterpoints with them, then assessed how they changed their opinion. I will not list their names because I should be the sole person receiving any fallout for the judgment on this run. What follows is how I characterize the opinions they conveyed to me.
Before I mentioned (counter)points:
JudgeObsoleteNew VariantReject
AAbsurdYes!No
BAbsurdYesMaybe
CYesNo way!Maybe
DAbsurdYes!No
After:
JudgeObsoleteNew VariantReject
BAbsurdNo way!Yes!
CMaybeNo way!Yes
DAbsurdMaybeYes
EAbsurdNoYes!
(One judge was unique in each group)
When I initially saw this run, knowing the differences right off the bat between variants and our aims, it seemed clear to me that obsoletion was lunacy. However my knee-jerk reaction was that I love this run, the engine is a bit different, let's just accept this as another variant. However, those are not good reasons to accept something, we have rules.
Thinking about how this run actually differs from the NTSC when viewing, it's not by much. More than that, there's nothing that really necessitates a difference. Just because one run decided to randomly jump at some point does not make it different from a run which does not. It has to be different as a branch in a significant manner, not just how it was played back in a particular run or mere moments of it. The new glitch, while new, does not look so different going through the wall than going through the wall otherwise. Also, I'm not convinced every run of this PAL branch would require this glitch being abused. So looking at changes across the run, they seem minor, and 4/5 judges I spoke to are now in favor of rejecting.
After assessing everything yesterday for one last time, I was conflicted on what to do. After sleeping on it, seeing no new convincing posts one way or the other, and considering the different factors listed above further, one side in my mind now slightly outweighs the other. In conclusion, while some PAL games are acceptable, and other branches for SMB PAL may be acceptable, this TAS does not seem to be acceptable with what we know right now and how we handle these sorts of things. Rejecting.

Nach: Since some people had a hard time following the above points, I put together a decision tree.

Nach: The last judge (Judge A) has since wrote back to me that in light of additional data/(counter)points, they now also favor rejection.

Summary

Nach: When we accept improvements across game versions, we only do so when there are actual improvements in the game-play by the player(s). The quality of the existing published NTSC run and this submission are practically the same. This submission did not improve upon the existing NTSC publication in any meaningful way. All time-related improvements are due to subtle version differences that the player has no control over. Since there is no improvement upon the existing publication once the version differences are factored out, this submission is not considered an improvement.
The game-play in this submission is similar to existing publications, and there does not seem to be substantial differences to warrant this submission to be published alongside them. After speaking to five judges regarding the similarities, they are all in favor of rejection. Rejecting.

Samsara: Disregard that, let's test Playground!
Samsara: Disregard that test, let's test it properly this time without accidentally using senior level permissions! ._.

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TASVideoAgent
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This topic is for the purpose of discussing #5617: HappyLee's NES Super Mario Bros. "PAL" in 04:55.16
Joined: 11/26/2010
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Voting yes because I find it interesting that the PAL version is faster then the NTSC version!!!
My name is 4N6/Forensics.
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It's nice to see some unique tricks in an SMB TAS. I was definitely entertained, so that's a yes vote! And thank you, HappyLee, for taking your time to optimize even a more obscure category like this!
Current project: Gex 3 any% Paused: Gex 64 any% There are no N64 emulators. Just SM64 emulators with hacky support for all the other games.
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I haven't seen the fall through floors glitch before alright. It's such a shame you couldn't use it in the 4-2 warp zone to save time. I'm voting yes for technical quality and entertainment, although I'm not sure if PAL warrants a separate publication from all the other categories.
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Is the new glitch here possible on NTSC version?
Warning: Opinions expressed by Nach or others in this post do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, or position of Nach himself on the matter(s) being discussed therein.
Player (79)
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I'm sure that this has been asked in one of the other submission threads, but why bother hitting the springboard in 8-2? I noticed that you end the level with the last digit of the timer at 2, so I understand that skipping the springboard would need to save over a second for it to make a difference. Is that what's going on?
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If you can fall into the ground in 1-2, can you do the same thing with the 4-2 warp zone? You know, so you can skip turning around to get to the World 8 pipe?
Here, my YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/dekutony
Spikestuff
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I don't like how it's been done on the PAL version. I feel cheated. Voting Meh. Also claiming for publication if on the off chance this gets accepted.
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
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I'm submitting it here mostly to show people what the best SMB PAL TAS would look like, regardless of whether it has reached TASVideos' standard for publication.
I envy the people with the motivation (and free time) to do this. 🙂 For those who care, for comparison, the NTSC version: [1715] NES Super Mario Bros. "warps" by HappyLee in 04:57.31
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Don't see what the fuss is about. Speedrunners switch to faster versions all the time.
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Kles wrote:
Don't see what the fuss is about. Speedrunners switch to faster versions all the time.
No one wants this to replace the NTSC run, though, the question is whether this should be published alongside it or not. In my opinion, it should.
Current project: Gex 3 any% Paused: Gex 64 any% There are no N64 emulators. Just SM64 emulators with hacky support for all the other games.
The8bitbeast
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I've been wanting to see a well optimised PAL run for a long time and I wasn't disappointed. Yes vote. Nice new tricks and cool glitch at the end of 8-3 with the flag. Good playaround too. For the people that aren't familiar with the PAL, NTSC terminology, if both versions get a published TAS it might be a good idea if they were labelled as US version and European version. Also it would be cool to see a sentence or 2 in the publication description about how PAL usually loses a lot of time over NTSC. For example Sonic, Metroid and nearly every SMS game take 20% longer on PAL. But some games like Mario adjust the physics to compensate, which in this case causes more glitches. This would hopefully avoid confusion of people thinking that PAL is faster for every game, where in reality its usually at a huge disadvantage for most games.
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andypanther wrote:
No one wants this to replace the NTSC run, though, the question is whether this should be published alongside it or not. In my opinion, it should.
I don't see any reason why it shouldn't replace the NTSC run; going by precedent on literally every other game where a version difference has made the run faster without dramatically changing the gameplay (and it really hasn't), this should simply obsolete the old movie.
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scrimpeh wrote:
It's such a shame you couldn't use it in the 4-2 warp zone to save time.
Yeah. If I could have, I would have. This floor clip still requires a lift for optimizing Y position.
Nach wrote:
Is the new glitch here possible on NTSC version?
No, not by any chance. Me and Mars608 have actually proved it impossible using math calculation. I hope this wouldn't bring too much pressure on judging. I'm fine with either outcome.
Recent projects: SMB warpless TAS (2018), SMB warpless walkathon (2019), SMB something never done before (2019), Extra Mario Bros. (best ending) (2020).
MarbleousDave
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I vote yes and I believe this should be a separate publication due to the flagpole glitch working differently.
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PikachuMan wrote:
I vote yes and I believe this should be a separate publication due to the flagpole glitch working differently.
That's not a significant enough issue to warrant a separate publication. We don't have separate categories for games where enemy stats or a single mechanism work differently if the rest of the gameplay is pretty much analogous and I don't believe it should be the case here either.
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Voting No due to the PAL version being a bad port, and the run itself looking almost identical to the current publication to the untrained eye. In my opinion, this submission is a Vault candidate due to the faster time, but certainly not Moon material.
Fortranm
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Easy yet vote. I support this run obsoleting the NTSC run because why not.
Spikestuff
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PikachuMan wrote:
I vote yes and I believe this should be a separate publication due to the flagpole glitch working differently.
You spelt "Falling into the Ground being a completely new glitch that doesn't exist on the NTSC version" wrong. Flagpole means jack in this situation as it isn't the main glitch.
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
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Yes vote. For the reasons stated by others, I also believe that this should obsolete the NTSC version. In case it matters, GoodNES 3.14 calls this ROM Super Mario Bros. (E) (REVA) [!] rather than Super Mario Bros. (E).
Current Projects: TAS: Wizards & Warriors III.
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HappyLee wrote:
Nach wrote:
Is the new glitch here possible on NTSC version?
No, not by any chance. Me and Mars608 have actually proved it impossible using math calculation. I hope this wouldn't bring too much pressure on judging. I'm fine with either outcome.
I would love to see an explanation on this (even if chances are, I won't really understand). 🙂
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I voted yes and also agree it should obsolete the current run. A faster run of the same category is a faster run; the version used doesn't matter as long as it's official.
Dwedit
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Kimimaru wrote:
I voted yes and also agree it should obsolete the current run. A faster run of the same category is a faster run; the version used doesn't matter as long as it's official.
PAL Super Mario Bros is NOT Super Mario Bros. The graphics match, but so many mistakes were made during the region conversion that it's almost like a separate game.
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Dwedit wrote:
Kimimaru wrote:
I voted yes and also agree it should obsolete the current run. A faster run of the same category is a faster run; the version used doesn't matter as long as it's official.
PAL Super Mario Bros is NOT Super Mario Bros. The graphics match, but so many mistakes were made during the region conversion that it's almost like a separate game.
Can you (or someone who knows) please elaborate on this? I don't follow the game's history as much, so me (and likely others) would like to know what exactly is this debate even about.
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Yes for entertainment, no for publication, yes for gruefood delight?
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