I will say this Kaizo hack isn’t too special, but I did find it fun to watch I’ll leave whether this will be published to the judges since thats their call and not mine, but I am giving this a yes vote.

I don't see the appeal of Kaizo ROM hacks personally. However, I can tell this is a well-made ROM hack, and the run seems to be well-made, although Kaizo ROM hacks typically only have one way to do things anyway, so... The underwater parts looked fun. Really wish there weren't the auto-scrolling bits---even in a Kaizo setting, they end up more boring than challenging. So I'm giving this a Yes vote. It isn't my cup of tea, but it doesn't have to be either. For ten minutes, this was pretty entertaining, and I like the hard work put into this by both the runner and creator. It shows off some interesting quirks (mostly with the Tanooki suit) that you don't see in normal playthroughs of SMB3, so that's interesting. I had no idea you were temporarily invulnerable after coming out of the statue before this when it was used to walk on those harmful plant enemies.

I'm pretty familiar with the Kaizo hack scene, and this looks like a reasonably good choice of game to show off with a TAS. The run is a good modest length (which makes this a better choice than something like Super Calm Bros), and you take good advantage of playaround opportunities. (My favorite involved the parabeetle airwalks.) I still think Kaizo Bros 3 is a more interesting speedgame, but this has its charm. I don't remember if the judging criteria is still stricter for accepting new hacks. Regardless, I was entertained, and I voted yes. As a side note, it's a shame you have to take an intentional death to refresh the giant powerup blocks. I knew that Kaizo Bros 3 had that problem, but I was hoping future game design would avoid that. Granted, it's only really a problem for deathless runs, which are hard-if-not-impossible for real-time runners...

I played through this hack casually a while back and it was definitely fun to see it get destroyed. Yes vote

Considering this is a small hack and low popularity, should I cancel the submission instead of being rejected?

That way it won't have a chance to get accepted!

A majority of voters voted Yes. What is the criteria for voters finding it entertaining for a hack to be accepted? - Yes: 60%, 6 votes - No: 30%, 3 votes - Meh: 10%, 1 vote Factoring in what a "Meh" vote is, it's at 65% approval right now. Do we need a 2/3rds supermajority or something?

Posting is far more important than just voting when it comes to gauging feedback. So far there's only been three pieces of feedback: 1. "This hack isn't too special, but I voted yes" 2. "I don't see the appeal of hacks like this, but I voted yes" 3. "Kaizo Mario Bros 3 is the better speedgame, but I voted yes" Even if the voting was a little more in the run's favor, that kind of feedback doesn't scream "acceptable" to me. I'll even say that the Meh vote is me, and upon rewatching, it really should have been a No. The run's very well done, but I don't personally find any entertainment in watching TASes of hacks meant specifically for RTA frustration. It removes the point of the hack, you know that it's going to be beaten and it's going to be beaten fast, so there's nothing shocking about it. As a general rule, I'm only confident on a Moon tier/hack acceptance decision if there's a fairly high number of votes (10+, ideally 15+), if the ratio is around 80-85% at minimum, and if there's a good number of posts in the thread that in and of themselves are confidently entertained without needing to add modifiers as to why they voted Yes. Tier judging is the worst part of being a Judge, legitimately. Not a lot of people vote to begin with, let alone post in the thread to back up that vote. Lower ratios would almost certainly be acceptable if there was more voting/posting in general, but given that a good number of submissions don't even get 10 votes or even 3 thread posts, we sort of have to take it on faith most of the time and assume things like "no feedback = no interest = Vault the run or reject the hack". If more people interacted with submissions, not only would tiering be more accurate, but our lives would be much easier in turn.

That's valid and a very fair way to assess it. These runs are mainly meant to be visually appealing---we all know a TAS is going to complete it. And unless it's a Let's Fail or something on YouTube, you'll always see someone beat a game. It's not even for RTA frustration, no one will ever watch it and be entertained by the endless save/loads from failing to do something. These runs of these hacks are literally just meant to show off and I think this video does it well enough with some situations that just don't happen in the game. I'm not suggesting to change the rules---especially for this hack which I do not feel strongly enough about to be fighting for it like that, but why are rules so strict for hacks? Is it a server space issue?

I'm not suggesting to change the rules---especially for this hack which I do not feel strongly enough about to be fighting for it like that, but why are rules so strict for hacks? Is it a server space issue?

It's a quality control thing at this point. Allowing hacks in Vault would be saying "We accept all hacks", and accepting all hacks is a surefire way of killing the audience through repetition. Even if we kept turning away aesthetic hacks and translation patches, there are tons of low quality level hacks out there that could be accepted to Vault, so entertainment needs to be a metric in order to prevent that potential spam. I admit it sounds strict and occasionally is, but the system actually works fairly well in practice. It's directly asking the audience what they want to see published, and if they want to see it published, it will be. If they don't, it won't. It's not a perfect system, it tends to break on edge case hacks like this, but I feel that developing a new system would take a lot of effort and add a lot of complication for everyone while only bringing a small amount of positive change, if any at all.

I'll comment, since I actually watched it some time ago but didn't feel the need to comment back then. It feels at this point that anything called "Kaizo" exists only to see players suffer (on Youtube, of course), and watching Let's Plays of these hacks can be somewhat entertaining. Unfortunately, a TAS removes this very thing, leaving something which looks like a TAS of any other SMB3 hack. Can a new SMB3 hack at least have custom music? Or at least some new mechanics like Mario Adventure? And I can admit that Mario Adventure is outdated nowadays, even though it was pretty cool for its time. Also, I personally prefer hacks that make it look like I will have fun playing it. This hack, being a Kaizo hack, does the opposite.

What is the criteria for voters finding it entertaining for a hack to be accepted?

The only thing that determines whether a hack is accepted (or similarly for non-hacks, what tier a movie should go into) is the judge's opinion. Nothing else. One could even argue that voting is completely useless.

Well, I just wanted to TAS a hard game and I found this hack. I never considered the aesthetics. I feel successful finishing this, and I'm here to share my joy.

And you're perfectly in the right to do that. Like I said, this run is very well made and you should definitely be proud of it! The only "problem" is the hack choice, which doesn't even make you to blame since it's impossible to know how the audience will react without showing them anything. If you're still interested in hard games and SMB3 hacks, maybe you could look into improving Kaizo Mario Bros 3?

I never liked the Kaizo genre, but I gave this a try anyway. The gameplay seems to be on point as far as I can tell, but the hack looks unappealing. I can't give this more than a "meh" and that's mostly due to the short length. To elaborate a bit on my problem with Kaizo TASes in particular, it's really due to the intended gameplay already being based on exploits and speedrunning tricks. So a TAS of such a hack will never look as interesting as one of the base game, since it mostly just does what the hack intends a player to do, just better.

Around 1:35, is it possible to use the pipe glitch to enter the pipe without waiting for the Para-Beetle? Other than that quibble, I quite enjoyed this, about as much as Kaizo 3. I don't feel qualified to comment on the conversation about which has is more worthy, so taking the 5th on that.

This is the same definition of 100% as on SRC, which is actually "all levels", right?

The only thing that determines whether a hack is accepted (or similarly for non-hacks, what tier a movie should go into) is the judge's opinion. Nothing else. One could even argue that voting is completely useless.

This is wrong BTW. It's often that a judge doesn't agree with what the audience finds entertaining or boring, and it's not exceptional to go with the audience in the actual judgment. It's how it's been working ever since 2012. Feedback is fundamentally subjective, and it's meant to be an important part of tiering exactly as subjective tastes. Hacks specifically get handled like Moons branches, which means they can obsolete one another. For this one, it looks like a better (and more popular) SMB3 Kaizo hack has already been published and got much better feedback. So improving that movie instead would indeed be a great idea.

Around 1:35, is it possible to use the pipe glitch to enter the pipe without waiting for the Para-Beetle?

Pipe glitch can only performed at the right side of the pipe to my knowledge and I can't reach there earlier.

This is the same definition of 100% as on SRC, which is actually "all levels", right?

Yes.

Hacks specifically get handled like Moons branches, which means they can obsolete one another. For this one, it looks like a better (and more popular) SMB3 Kaizo hack has already been published and got much better feedback. So improving that movie instead would indeed be a great idea.

In fact, I have moved on to one of the most popular hacks. I don't want to ruin my surprise. vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv

om, nom, nom... minty!