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ais523 wrote:
Just pointing out that the latest Super Metroid run is another argument that total control should be its own category; I think this is the first case we've seen where a total control run has been beaten by a non-total-control run. The debate is, should the total control run be obsoleted?
I'm inclined to say yes because it doesn't do anything with the total control over than winning, but I can see reasonable arguments for no.
As far as I can tell you're saying it's an argument against total control as a seperate category (remember that cross-category obsoletion isn't normal), at least when it's only aiming for game-completion.
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thatguy wrote:
As a general rule, if you have to explain to a layman how the game has just been completed, it's enough to warrant its own category. ACE falls under those criteria.
Considering the amount of people that label jumping over piranha plants in Super Mario Bros. "impossible" and "cheating", that is a very, very poor rule.
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Tub wrote:
Polls would be more fun if the radio buttons were surrounded by <label> tags so you could click the whole text, not just the tiny button. I just can't hit those things with my zapper!
I think your otherwise good point might completely be lost in this thread.
Uhm... What? Am I the only person that sees a problem with this?
TASing (and with that, TASVideos) has always been about 1 thing: creating an as short as possible input file that, when played back, reaches the end of the game.*
It still seems to me that with the advent of ACE (/TC) and suddenly glitching to the end of the game this entire idea has been abandoned. It's as if a bunch of people suddenly thought "Oh, we don't particularly like this anymore, better apply some arbitrary criteria and call it 'glitched' and then stop considering it as proper TASes!" This is ridiculous, these runs are the fastest, and objectively so. You might not like them, but I don't give a shit.
* I realize that this is not the sole goal of TASing, but it has always been the sole criteria for Tool-Assisted Speedruns.
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blahmoomoo wrote:
From what I understand, Esc is the button you press to bring up the menu to return to the main menu. The reason for returning to the main menu is explained in this submission text about text storage, which looks like a pretty in-depth explanation as-is.
Esc isn't used in the submission text, but I suppose whoever wrote the movie description assumed Esc was obviously the way to get to the main menu. Calling the movie "No main menu" wouldn't be proper since you do use the main menu to start the game regardless, so "No Esc" was used instead. Maybe "No returning to main menu" would be better? Or maybe just say "The Esc button is used to return to the main menu." or something like that in the description.
"No Esc" is more accurate because it's not actually returning to the main menu that is needed for game-state manipulation with text storage, it's just a good way to get to a more favorable state (80) quickly. What's important is bringing up the prompt (Are you sure you want to quit?) with Esc. You could also manipulate the game state after selectin "No, continue playing", except the resulting game state (0) is a lot less favorable.
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Nach wrote:
4) Arbitrary code is now a primary tag which should be used on runs which make use of them, and always has a sub tag. Examples of sub-tags and possible cases they may be used:
Arbitrary code - Scene (Pi)
Arbitrary code - Game ending (Fast Super Mario World, Super Metroid, Battletoads)
Arbitrary code - Level ending (Other Battletoads run)
Arbitrary code - New game(s) (SMW Snake & Pong)
Arbitrary code - Adds cheats (aforementioned rejected SMW run)
Motion to split this into just "Game completion" and "Demonstration".
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feos (I'm not gonna bother quoting again):
I understand that you're trying to find a halfway solution, and that's okay. The problem I have with your halfway solution is the way it labels the fastest run, that's why I keep coming back to it.
The problem is one of consistency. We have two ways of publishing movies: they're vault eligible (fastest any% or fastest 100%) or they're entertaining (moons/stars). The problem is that these two things are not mutually exclusive. This means that a movie can be both entertaining and fast.
Say, a new movie is submitted. It's any%, no restrictions, fast and looks optimal. Without looking at entertainment, this makes it suitable for the vault. This means that we're at the very least gonna label/branch/whatever it as the current Any% WR. For the sake of the simplicity of my argument, I'm gonna say we branch it as 'X'.
However, the movie uses a game breaking glitch that allows you to skip almost directly to the ending. There's still some gameplay left before that, and the glitch looks awesome, so the movie is considered entertaining. But hey, that means it's going to moons (at the least). And it's also 'game breaking glitch'/'glitched'/'Y'.
This is what I find weird. We're considering a run 'X' as long as it's in the vault, but if it's entertaining enough to go to moons, we suddenly need to distinguish it from all other movies so we branch it 'Y' [/i]instead[/i].
Yes, being consistent in this means that "if 4 branches avoid X and 1 uses it", we'll end up having a branch for those 4. But why is that such a problem? "Because it's not future-proof", you say. How is it not? I sure hope to god science that 5-7 is pretty much the maximum amount of runs we'd ever have for a given game (and I find that a bit much), so at most you'd label 6. That's still perfectly doable. Sure, you get a new run, you have to adjust 6 labels. Still doable. What's the big problem with this?
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feos wrote:
No any% branch, since it doesn't track your completion %.
... What?
feos wrote:
Don't I say "in-game options" enough? There are hundreds of them, each game can have any amount of them. These options are:
- amount of simultaneously used players
- different characters
- different endings
- warps
- exit amounts
and there are more.
Again, what? I honestly think you're just trying to discuss something that nobody else cares about. The main discussion is pretty much about the 2 options Radiant named. You're the only one talking about labels/branchs/flags ("But do you have a flag?") for all the other restrictions.
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feos wrote:
As for, where we use the label any% then, I have no idea. Just because it doesn't tell anyone anything other than "it's the fastest branch". Man, it doesn't fulfill its own purpose as a branch name: it neither tells by what conditions the goal was achieved, nor does it show how does that branch differ from others.
But it does show/tell those things. It tells you that the only conditions that apply to the movie are the site rules (no cheats), and it tells you that it differs from the others by not having any restrictions. Any% says "this is the fastest you can complete the game without restrictions".
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feos wrote:
Warp wrote:
Since the "official WR" is kind of the "main" run of the game, all the others being runs with alternative goals (which essentially trade speed for entertainment), it makes sense to leave the branch of this "default main" completion unnamed. It's the "default" branch, and thus doesn't need a name.
Yes, and what's the benefit of using exactly unnamed branch for that purpose?
There isn't necessarily any. But this branch is 'any%', and some time during the site's history people decided we didn't label runs 'any%' anymore. It is, however, still the "anything goes" as-fast-as-you-can category, so even the glitched jump-to-the-credits movies are simply 'any%'. I'm okay with bringing back that label, but labeling some of the anything-goes-fastest movie 'any%' and others 'glitched' is just inconsistent and unclear.
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Warp wrote:
IMO the "official fastest completion" is needed for clarity, and as a resource for people searching for that information (either out of personal curiosity, or even for some research, eg. for an article.) This is what I mean with the "official" part. It's saying "looking for the fastest that this game can be completed, under our rules? It's this one." If someone asks, let's say for an online article, "what's the fastest that this game can theoretically be completed?", the official answer is "this".
Since the "official WR" is kind of the "main" run of the game, all the others being runs with alternative goals (which essentially trade speed for entertainment), it makes sense to leave the branch of this "default main" completion unnamed. It's the "default" branch, and thus doesn't need a name.
(As I commented in the other thread that started this, not every single game would necessarily have an unnamed "official world record" branch, if the game is such that it's not suitable for speed completion. The Brain Age TAS would be a perfect example.)
This, 100%. I don't I've ever agreed more with any forum post, ever.
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feos wrote:
Please elaborate on the difference between 2 runs then. I now am not sure what's so conceptually different about them other than "showing more/less of the game".
The old (long) run only overwrited the game state by accessing the intro cinematic. This allows you to skip only the gravitron.
The new run uses text storage to alter the game state. This gives more control (although still limited, you can only increment it certain amounts), and allows you to skip to the ending cinematic. This is only possible due the the sheer luck that teleporting (= 4058) and ending cinematic (= 4080) states are close to eachother.
The main difference as such is the use of text storage through going back to the menu. Because most real-time runners dislike doing this, both are considered different branches.
As such, we got to describing the branch. "No Menu" was suggested, but during testing for the run, I discovered (by being told) that it is possible to get text storage without exiting to the menu. This, however, makes it a fairly useless glitch, as it leaves you (as far as we know) incapable of actually accessing any transitions during which you could alter the game state. I also discovered, however, that it is possible to use text storage without actually ever exiting to the menu, except this means you have to manipulate the game state starting at 0. It would take a lot longer, but the combination of these two allow for the end-sequence warp without ever going back to the menu, I believe. As such, "No Esc" was suggested, as that does disable this option (although you select "No" when given the prompt, you do still press ESC to get the "Do you want to go back to the menu" screen).
As such, although the difference in what you see of the game is enormous, both runs glitch the game in the same spirit.
My own opinion on the matter for which this thread was created is that we should not go back to "glitched" as a branch name. This for various reasons:
1) It suggests there is something wrong (in the cheating sense) with the movie, as we clearly find that it should not serve as the main (= unlabeled) movie for the game.
2) When watching the other, non-glitched run, there is often a note in the publication that states there is a faster movie. Apart from this, there is no indication that the run actually is known to be suboptimal. I believe that if a run is purposely done slower than possible, that should be noted.
3) As stated before, nobody (even among those who want "glitched" to come back) agree on when it should be used. I'm not going to elaborate on this further, jlun2 made this point already.
4) These "glitched" runs have in some cases been console verified. They don't use any external modding or anything like that, and have been proven to work on the actual console, for real. Yet, labeling (and thus seperating) them makes it seem as if we suddenly started taking all the "You're cheating" and "That doesn't actually complete the game!" YouTube comments seriously. To me, it feels like we're admitting that we're cheating.
5) An argument often used against "No X glitch" is that it is not a clear description unless you are familiar with the game. However, "glitched" is never a clear description, even if you are familiar with the game.
Conclusion 1
From this last point I draw the conclusion that everybody who supports bringing back "glitched" is okay with unclear labels.
Conclusion 2
The argument against "No X glitch" is that is leads to cumbersome and overly long branch names. From this I conclude that these people want short and one-size-fits-all label names.
Conclusion 3
People who are against "glitched" indicate that it labels the wrong movie. From this I concluse that the fastest run should not be labeled.
Taking these three conclusions, I suggest we introduce the label "Forgoes time-saving glitches" (name up for discussion) and simply slap this on all the runs it applies to.
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feos wrote:
Radiant wrote:
It's worth noting that VVVVVV's so-called "glitched" rundoesn't use memory corruption, arbitrary code execution, or anything of the sort; it instead exploits a straightforward bug in the code.
It still uses some glitch, and does a sequence break straight to ending. Right? I'd call it "game end glitch". And the one that doesn't do it may be unlabeled (since it doesn't do anything special while completing the game).
Yes it does. It uses dying during the intro to break out of it, and later uses the intro cinematic to overwrite the go-to-gravitron game state. It still sequence breaks the game, using the exact same function (getting the gamestate to a value it shouldn't be in) except it does this in a slightly different way.
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Patashu wrote:
Anything that is heavy memory corruption, arbitrary code execution or arbitrary code editing that gets reached in a speedrun makes it 'glitched' - at that point you're not playing the game, but playing the hardware and whatever memory you can dump over it, and it barely even matters what the game was beforehand now.
... Which is not the case here. There's nothing 'arbitrary' about this entire TAS. It's just sheer luck that it's possible to wrong warp from a teleport to the ending sequence. There's no memory corruption, code editing or code execution here. As such, the 'glitched' branch name would, according to your description, be wrong.
Theoriginalgames are actually Game Maker games, so we wouldn't even really have to wait for Flash TASing to be possible.
PS. I actually still have the source code to the first Karoshi somewhere on a HD, I asked for it to see if I could implement TASing tools in it. Protip: Savestating a system from within that system is hard.
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TheYogWog wrote:
Couple more questions: Is it acceptable to sometimes include my own personal thoughts and opinions about anything note-worthy enough to make it into the notes, such as a given trick or a glitch, or is it best to always be as matter-of-fact as possible?
It's definitely okay to include your own opinion. In fact, there have been plenty of (popular) submissions for which the notes were bordering on a rant. Obviously, it's a good thing to include clear, factual and concise explanations of the tricks you use in the TAS, but feel free to add your own touch to it.
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Warepire wrote:
Spikestuff wrote:
TASeditor wrote:
I hex edited it to write "s" "h" "ades", instead of "s" "h" "ad" "es".
Isn't there a program which disables keyboard limitation?
How would it do that? Magically remove hardware limitations of your keyboard?
It automatically detects buttons you try to press simultaneously but aren't registered by using the webcam to track your fingers, then finds and orders a better keyboard for you from amazon.
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Spikestuff wrote:
Basically it's saying a function which it's not doing and for another run it doesn't mean that it could be used next time to obsolete.
Error: not enough grammar.
"No Storage" would work but is even less clear to the uninitiated and "No save & quit" is incorrect. "No ESC" is simple, concise and correct.
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scahfy wrote:
Even dumber:
(a=map['\x5fdisplay'].game)?a['\x5fstart'](22):
Apparently they patched the game: "you are not allowed to use '\x'!"
Ah well...
u=String['from'+'CharCode'](95);
(a=map[u+'display'].game)&&a[u+'start'](22);
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fsvgm777 wrote:
Sorry if I have to put some vitriol to this submission, but I have one problem with it.
Don't worry, you bring up a good point. As I haven't discussed this with Masterjun, I'll just speak for myself now: I hadn't really considered any modes that may or may not be unlocked. I did check the dialog all the crew members have after restarting the game, and that did check out.
As you say, this mode is not so much a byproduct of completing the game, but rather of completing the "final level". I don't think many people consider it a problem that the final level isn't completed, after all, neither are any of the other levels. The run could be adjusted, of course, but it'd just jump to the final level instead.
In short, I don't consider the mode being locked a problem. After all, the game does consider the game to be completed (see crew dialog).
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amaurea has a good point, actually. Something that at least makes me agree somewhat with Warp.
If a submission has a problem that makes it unsuitable for publication (say, it forgoes a known shortcut), it does indeed feel a bit spammy to point this out when someone already has. In that case, you might end up with a bunch of viewers being entertained ('yes' votes) and just a single post in the forum that states the problem. I'm not a judge, but I'd have a hard time deciding on what to do.
In this case, a 'yes but there's a problem' vote might actually be useful. Of course, this is a bit of a rare case... People here are generally fairly quick to (even repeatedly) point out issues with the submission.
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Warepire wrote:
Am I the only one with this problem:
I click play, get the Loading..., then the video starts playing, except nothing is playing? It's just black.
Changing browser, updating / revering flash versions etc doesn't help.
For me it's just still loading, it takes about 2 minutes for nicovideo videos to start playing.