This is a TAS for a full $20,000(20k) run of Family Feud(NES) utilizing a deep understanding of the game's mechanics that were figured out be ThreeCreepio. It makes use of the 1p2c strategy to skip the player-2 family introduction cutscenes.

Game objectives

  • Emulator used: FCEUX v2.4.0
  • Objective: Have the Player-1 Family Win $20,000
  • How To Achieve: Play four perfect games that earn you $5,000 each.

Question Seeding

  • Whenever starting a game of family feud, a "seed" gets selected. At the start of a run, this happens when either the One-Family Game or Two-Family Game option is selected.
  • Once the seed is determined, the 5 Fast Money Win (FMW) questions are locked in. There is a list of 400+ possible question and the 5 FMW questions will be a consecutive series on that list.
  • The seed also effects which standard questions can be the first question. There are 8 possible first questions from a list of about 400+ options. The 8 possibilities are consecutive on that list. NOTE: the FMW and standard questions use different lists, although there are some common questions between them.
  • The second question will be from one of the 8 questions on the list immediately after the first question, and so on if further questions are needed.
  • After winning a FMW and choosing to continue for the 20k, a new seed will be determined.
  • A perfect game seed is one where you can get 2 100-point questions in a row, followed by a Fast Money Win where it is possible to get 200+ points with only one set of answers. Not all perfect game seeds are created equal. Fewer/Shorter answers are ideal for speed.

Answering Standard Questions

  • Each standard question has 3-12 answers. They can be answered in any order, but Player-1 should answer the top answer first during the buzz-in.
  • Answers often have multiple ways they can be given. For Example: ENGINE/MOTOR and CAT/DOG/PET.
  • Answers need not always be fully spelled. For Example: STRAWB can be submitted for STRAWBERRY. Numbers must be fully entered. US States can use their two letter postal abbreviation, i.e. CA for CALIFORNIA.
  • To answer a question as quickly as possible, determine the minimum number of inputs needed for each answer. This is not always the answer with the fewest letters because of how the keyboard can be navigated. The game takes a little longer to decide if an answer is valid when not fully spelled, so for TAS purposes it is usually just better to fully spell a word.
  • Sometimes a question with more short answers can be faster the one with fewer long answers.

Answering Fast Money Win Questions

  • Each FMW questions has 2-12 answers. One answer for each questions in a first round then if the points from those answers don't get 200+, an additional answer per question in a second round.
  • Answering all #1 answers will not always get 200+ points depending on the seed, forcing a second round.
  • When a 200+ point first round is possible, it is sometimes faster to answer a few lower point answers if they can be entered faster. So long as the combination of points reaches 200.

Interesting Things About My TAS

  • Since I sometimes had to wait several frames to get a perfect seed or question, I was able to "add" those extra frames to earlier parts of the run without losing overall time. So you'll notice I sometimes spell out family names instead of selecting just a single letter. The player-1 family is the ABBA family, and there is a WAX family at some point. I also would sometimes linger on an question/answer longer so that a viewer might get more time to read them, although things still go by so fast it doesn't help much.
  • There are no repeated questions in the run. That is deliberate. I recall from when I made this that there was going to be a repeated question, which would have been faster, but I decided to make the TAS have all unique questions. Not sure exactly how much extra time that cost.

Samsara: Claiming for judging.
Samsara: I've replaced the file with a version truncated to the last input. No changes were made to the author's input.
It's a lovely feeling when you come out of judging a run with all of the questions you had about it answered. "Why are two players used?" Because it takes a LONG time for the CPU intros and second player has no other impact on the run whatsoever. "Why are full names typed out?" Because it does take a lot more time to process shortened answers than it does to type out full ones. "What's with the category?" The game automatically kicks you out once you make it to $20k, providing a natural endpoint for the run. "How much time would repeated questions save?" I'd say it's negligible, probably only a couple seconds, and it's an acceptable entertainment tradeoff anyway. Speaking of acceptable, this run sure is! I'm going to do that!
I've also removed the branch, as I've determined that $20000 should be the standard category for this game as it provides a suitable endpoint, and that the usage of the 2nd controller is justified as the only purpose it serves is to save cutscene time and does not affect the run in any other way. Consider it similar in nature to Zelda 1 TASes using the second controller for savewarping.

despoa: Processing...

TASVideoAgent
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This topic is for the purpose of discussing #7784: SpaceColonizer's NES Family Feud in 06:58.81
Spikestuff
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Answers can be truncated. First game alone: TIME -> TIM NEWSWEEK -> NEWSW US NEWS -> USNEWS -> UNSE PEOPLE -> PEOP SENOR -> SEN MONSIEUR -> MISEUR -> MISE HAIR -> HAI MAMA -> MAM MILK -> MIL JOG 6 BULL -> BUL "2 controllers/players" is in my opinion an unimportant thing to mention, as the only thing player 2 is used for is inputting the family name as quickly as possible.
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Spikestuff wrote:
Answers can be truncated. "2 controllers/players" is in my opinion an unimportant thing to mention, as the only thing player 2 is used for is inputting the family name as quickly as possible.
The game takes longer to "confirm" an answer when you shorten it. because of the perfect inputs possible in a TAS, typing a few extra letters can often cost less frames then the frames lost by those delays. the other controller is also used to skip a "cutscene". on the SRC leaderboard. we separate that strategy as a subcategory/variable.
ShesChardcore
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Examples of games currently not allowed in standard are: Creative games, such as Mario Paint Free objective sandbox games, such as Harvest Moon Game show games, such as Jeopardy and Family Feud Has that rule changed/is it on the table to be changed?
Samsara
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ShesChardcore wrote:
Examples of games currently not allowed in standard are: Creative games, such as Mario Paint Free objective sandbox games, such as Harvest Moon Game show games, such as Jeopardy and Family Feud Has that rule changed/is it on the table to be changed?
My ultimate goal with the movie rules is to find ways to make every game and genre acceptable, so yes, it is on the table to be changed. General advice for the thread: Instead of approaching things from the angle of "This submission doesn't follow the current rules, so reject it", let's approach it from "It doesn't follow the current rules, so let's look at the rules and see how we can change them using this submission as a guide".
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ShesChardcore
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Wasn't saying it should be rejected (though I see how it would come across that way and I apologize) but more for my own knowledge. I've refrained from working on some TASes (not this game specifically, SpaceColonizer did a great job and I very much would not have haha) due to the rules being the rules. Knowing what I now know is good as I'll be less picky about the stuff I submit.
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I missed the restriction on game shows. I guess it would be useful to discuss what the original motivation behind that restriction was and if those apply to this run in particular. I'm not an active member of this community, but in my opinion a TAS should demonstrate a depth of understanding about the game, and that understanding being utilized to achieve goals valued by the community, like speed. A TAS shouldn't be "arbitrary", which can be highly likely for a game show game where the questions you get are heavily dependent on RNG. If someone just answered the questions the game randomly gave them as quickly as possible, that wouldn't demonstrate "control" of the game. I think my run meets my personal standard for a good TAS. I manipulated the RNG to get desirable seeds and I did a lot of research into finding the fastest way to answer questions, including creating a "calculator" to determine the minimum number of inputs needed to enter a particular sequence of letters so that i could quickly compare answer variations. The only decision I made that caused the run to be slower than the fastest possible TAS was making it so that each question was unique. I made that decision because when I wrote this TAS (maybe over a year ago) I remember reading something that implied that there was favoritism towards "entertainment value".
Αsumeh
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Just a reminder that this (abandoned) WIP exists: https://tasvideos.org/UserFiles/Info/51605269075741208 I don't feel that a run aiming for speed would be publication worthy. An SNES Family Feud publication exists too, so I'm not sure how TASVideos a run of the NES version can be accepted (if it can).
I'm Asumeh, semi-expert SMB1 TASer. :) Check out some of the TASes I don't submit/upload to TASVideos on my YouTube channel, if you'd like: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyDD727I6LYNJTPEKCzauCw In progress: - Record my older TASes (excluding any obsolete TASes) and upload to YouTube; other than that, nothing at the moment.
Dimon12321
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SpaceColonizer wrote:
The game takes longer to "confirm" an answer when you shorten it. because of the perfect inputs possible in a TAS, typing a few extra letters can often cost less frames then the frames lost by those delays.
If I remember correctly, feos and Spikestuff provided proofs that word cuts do save time in previously rejected submissions. Still, word cuts make the movie less entertaining.
TASing is like making a film: only the best takes are shown in the final movie.
Spikestuff
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Dimon12321 wrote:
SpaceColonizer wrote:
The game takes longer to "confirm" an answer when you shorten it. because of the perfect inputs possible in a TAS, typing a few extra letters can often cost less frames then the frames lost by those delays.
If I remember correctly, feos and Spikestuff provided proofs that word cuts do save time in previously rejected submissions.
Different game. Also this is something quickly validated, the truncating the words actually don't help in any way cause the game checks for it. It's only in the last question where truncating is actually worth anything.
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ShesChardcore wrote:
I've refrained from working on some TASes (not this game specifically, SpaceColonizer did a great job and I very much would not have haha) due to the rules being the rules.
I wonder: Is that why you never submitted a Battle Chess TAS despite speedrunning multiple categories of that game?
ShesChardcore
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FractalFusion wrote:
I wonder: Is that why you never submitted a Battle Chess TAS despite speedrunning multiple categories of that game?
Pretty much.
Samsara
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Weirdly, when I responded to this thread a week ago, it didn't quite sink in that game show games were still barred from standard publication. It has definitely sunk in now, and in fact it sunk in so far that I've updated the rules to allow them.
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warmCabin wrote:
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Post subject: Movie published
TASVideoAgent
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This movie has been published. The posts before this message apply to the submission, and posts after this message apply to the published movie. ---- [4931] NES Family Feud by SpaceColonizer in 06:58.81
Editor, Skilled player (1938)
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I didn't even realize this was the NES version until I saw the screenshot for the publication. (This is despite the site clearly stating the system name at least a hundred times, each time not having the "S" in front of "NES"). I guess this is proof of how revolutionary [1248] SNES Family Feud "playaround" by Heisanevilgenius in 06:46.71 was. Definitely worth watching again.