The problem is defining the meaning of "semi-important goal". Does it mean "something which you would have to do if you were playing the game for the first time and had no previous knowledge about it, but you could skip it if you knew it already"? Or perhaps "a goal which *technically* isn't necessary, but without it it would be quite difficult to beat the game in normal playing"? Or does it mean "a goal which the makers intended to be mandatory but which actually can be skipped (ab)using a design/programming oversight, and skipping it does not cause the game to become unbeatable" (a game may become unbeatable if you eg. don't collect a mandatory item)?
Perhaps more shortly: Does it mean "optional goal, even in regular gameplay", or "game developers intended for it to be mandatory, but it can be skipped by bug abuse, yet the game is still beatable"?
In a way, when a speedrunner (those who make regular speedruns) says that making a TAS does not require skill, they are right. However, what they are talking about are the playing skills and reflexes which come after years of playing the game, those which are necessary to perform incredible stunts in real-time. The same kind of skill that eg. a juggler needs to juggle 7 balls at the same time or a basketball player needs in order to be one of the best NBA players.
What many of them don't seem to understand or they outright dismiss is the vast amount of hard work which goes into making a top-quality TAS of a hard game (hard to TAS, that is). It requires other type of "skills" to do that, although these skills are more related to knowledge, experience, hard work and patience, not about real-time reflexes. It's the same kind of skill as eg. a painter needs in order to paint the Mona Lisa or a sculptor needs in order to make a statue. It's not about reflexes and speed, but about knowledge and patience.
It's really sad that so many speedrunners dismiss these other skills simply because they are different.
I think that the only situation where the speed of the language may be an issue is when making a robot which searches for optimal keypresses: If there's a huge amount of sequences to test, the speed of the program may indeed play an important role. On all the other regards such a scripting language sounds like a great idea.
I had thought the generators only looked at last 10 seconds or something. Guess not.
Random number generators usually don't work on a time-based way, ie. asking the RNG a number at a precise time would give a certain value. Instead, they use a seed value which changes each time a new random number is requested. IOW, a typical RNG looks a bit like
In other words, it doesn't depend on time but on the number of times the RNG has been called. I suppose that most RNGs in (S)NES games use user input etc to affect those values which are multiplied/added/whatever to the existing seed, which causes it to give different results each time (if different input is given).
I think he means taking someone else's movie of the game and copying his button presses for the specific luck-manipulated sequence verbatim. The "morality" of this kind of copying is a fair question (but I think it's generally considered ok, especially if due credit is given).
But as Bisqwit said, such copying would most probably not work because random number generators used in the game are usually affected by *all* the previous input. Thus any change previous to the position where the "copy" would be used would affect the RNG in such a way that the same button presses would not give the same result.
I think that there are basically two possible techniques used when luck manipulation is prohibitively laborious to do "by hand":
1) Find and study the RNG code in the game and see how it behaves. Create a piece of code which simulates it to see how it behaves and what keypresses are necessary to generate a certain result. Possibly configure the emulator to show relevant memory values during the run to help with this (I think some emulators support this?).
2) Create a program (=robot) which automatically searches for the desired result.
My problem with that word is that it can give a very wrong impression of what is it about. "Fake" has the same connotation as "cheating" and "hoax", ie. something made to deceive people. If someone claims that a piece of glass is a diamond, but it turns out that it is fake, there's deception there. "Fake" is something which may look valuable but in fact is worthless, just a cheap copy, something with no value at all.
In other words, "fake" has a very negative connotation to it, which is something I'm not happy about when people talk about TASes. I'm not happy with people getting the impression that TASes are worthless cheap fakes made by cheating and with the intention to deceive.
Somehow the word "fake" when used in the context of TASes still irritates me a lot. One of the comments says: "need I remind everyone of how everyone thought that one smb3 video was real and it turns out it was fake."
Seems like people use "fake" when they mean "it was not what I thought it would be". However, that's not really what the word means. It has a much much stronger negative connotation to it. Well, I suppose I just have to learn to live with it.
Voting 0-10 seems a bit odd, too, given that all movies that would score below 4 get rejected or obsoleted.
http://tasvideos.org/274M.html has an average entertainment rating of 3.2. I suppose the lowest rating someone has given to it must be pretty low.
There are probably other examples. That's the one I found first.
It's not a question of discussing the meaning of a word. It's a question of defining better what the ratings mean, giving voters a clearer picture of what they should be looking at.
Currently the ratings are described by a couple of words and people are free to interpret these words as they like. Of course one could argue that people are free to do whatever they want anyways, but this just poses the quesiton of why have any rating at all if people are going to vote arbitrarily anyways? We may as well just put a rand() value there.
Rating makes sense when people rate something specific. However, if that something specific is badly defined, the value of the ratings diminishes.
Are you asking me to name out everything that is a glitch?
Not you specifically, but the community in general. It may well be that whether something is considered a glitch or not is a question of opinion, and it may be a good idea to set clear rules about it. It makes it clearer what the goals and limitations of the run are (for both the TAS creator and the viewers). It would also be interesting to read.
xoinx wrote:
I guess Vatchern has already set out the premise of his run... ie nothing that abuses anything unintended by the programmers even if it is reproducable without TAS easily.
That would then mean that luck abuse cannot be used either?
Of course this poses a rather difficult dilemma: What is considered luck abuse and what isn't?
Btw, someone said that a no-glitch run should only use techniques doable on a console. How about luck manipulation? That's certainly impossible in a console. OTOH, seeing all those contiguous big drops is cool.
As for not using glitches at all, I think it may need to be specified and "standardized" what is considered a glitch and what isn't in this game. Else it may be difficult to judge whether the run is perfect or not.
I'm not the one who turned this thread upside down because of one No vote.
That's certainly true. It required quite many people to create such a flamewar. Without many people attacking each other there would indeed be no flamewar. You are part of it too, unfortunately.
I'm not the one who doesn't know when to shut up.
That doesn't seem to be so.
You're the one who started this. They certainly don't deserve what you started either.
So, because I, the very wicked and bad person, started a flamewar (kindly joined by many "helping" people), it is then completely ok for you to participate in the sabotage too. Yes, that makes sense. It really helped to stop the flamewar.
You should just admit you were wrong
I would readily admit being wrong if I had been proven wrong. Unfortunately this is something which is impossible to prove. Thus "admitting being wrong" would be lying to myself.
stop posting here and maybe then this thread will get back on track.
You should know by now that the more you keep taunting me, the longer the thread will be. Do you really expect me, the wicked bad agitator, to not to answer to an accusation?
I am being insulted, words are put into my mouth, and my texts are interpreted in the most twisted ways in order to make me look completely horrible. Of course this is just ok, isn't it? I deserve that. I am the only guilty party here. I dared to accuse someone of dishonesty! That really deserves team punishment. Nobody else is guilty of anything because they fight for the good cause. The end justifies the means.
Can you honestly say there was absolutely no overreaction to my original post? None at all?
I just voted no out of spite for Warp and hope he has a aneurysm.
Ah, yes, Bisqwit and Finalfighter really deserved that because I am such a despicable person. You can badmouth me all you want, I don't care, but do you really have to make your childish stunt on someone else's work? IMO they don't deserve that.
I hate to nitpick, but that's not true. The previous thread was about whether glitches are a desired part of a TAS or not. This thread is not about that subject at all. I didn't argument against his opinion on that subject.
You admit that you assumed that his vote was a form of protest, and that you believe that he is lying about what he says. That, in itself, is a personal attack on him: you think he is a liar. Due to this, you think it's logical to say that anything he says is questionable
I beg your pardon? I have never and nowhere said or implied that *anything* he says is questionable. I just questioned the veracity of *one* thing he said (ie. whether he truely voted "no" originally because he honestly thought this movie is worse than the previous one). When I wrote "I can't expect honesty from you" I was referring to that one claim. Sure, that sentence may be interpreted as me claiming that he lies always and everywhere, but it was not what I was trying to say when I wrote it.
Your extrapolation from there is an exaggeration which is not true.
With that, I REALLY don't want to post in this thread anymore. I would have figure that when many many people started to tell you that you were wrong to decry Necro, you would maybe accept his stance.
It is logical that friends will defend friends. If a friend is being "attacked", everyone will come to his aid. The number of people defending him does not prove anything. Ironically, what you are proposing is probably an argumentum ad populum.
Instead, you have only admitted that you did make assumptions, though "you still have a strong feeling about them," which means bubkus.
I always try to be honest, and if I have made an accusation based on an assumption, I will admit that. However, "it was only an assumption, and assumptions are often wrong" is not an argument convincing enough, sorry.
Because you post the same thing over and over? (just a guess)
The same thing? What same thing? I don't understand what you are talking about. The topic has remained the same for the last couple of dozen posts in this thread, yes, but isn't that normal? People make claims and ask questions, and other people answer them.
And may I point out that I am not the only one who has made quite many posts about the same subject. Yet I am the only one who is requested to stop.
I am accused of trying to impose rules on others, yet it feels like the other way around.
Why? I can't stand other people's opinions (at least according to some) and thus I am not allowed to post mine either?
Why is it precisely me who is requested to stop posting? Seemingly everyone else is allowed to post their final word on the subject, but I am requested to not to answer them? In other words, everyone else is entitled to their opinion and granted unrestricted posting, but I am the only one who should stop? Exactly why is this?
Ad Hominem :
-A fallacy that attacks the person rather than dealing with the real issue in dispute.
-an argument "against the man" or person. This is a device employed to attack not the issues but rather the one you are arguing with, especially on a personal level or basis. It is usually employed by those whose arguments are weak
(thanks Google!)
A logical fallacy is a line of argumentation which may in some contexts sound convincing, but does not in fact imply truth. For example, saying "all students own a calculator - my uncle owns a calculator - thus my uncle is a student" is a logical fallacy. It makes a claim ("my uncle is a student") and tries to give argumentations supporting this claim. Although it might in some situations sound credible, the logic does not hold, making it a fallacious argumentation.
Argumentum ad hominem is also a similar logical fallacy. In a way you can think of it a bit like this: People who are not physicists don't know too much about gravity. Person X is not a physicist. Thus person X does not know too much about gravity.
There's a logical fallacy there. The three sentences can be also expressed as I did in the earlier post: "He is not a physicist, thus everything he says about gravity is questionable." This is an argumentum ad hominem because it gives a fallacious line of argument to prove a claim.
I don't see how a direct insult is a logical fallacy. If I say "you are an idiot", how is that trying to prove or disprove a claim through argumentation?
Many sources give argumentum ad hominem an alternative expression: "Personal attack." However, in the context of logical fallacies it means a personal attack for a purpose: To try to discredit the person who makes the claim, thus making the claim questionable. In other words, the attack has to be somehow related to the original claim. Just saying "you are an idiot" is not such an argumentation. It's just insulting.
When you say "requesting honesty is futile", you're actually saying "I can't expect honesty from you." That is an act of attacking the person rather than their claims.
My impression was that he just voted "no" as a form of protest, perhaps even without having watched the movie, and only *afterwards* did he come up with his "opinion" that the video is "worse" then the previous one, and only because I mentioned that. However, even if this assumption of mine is true we will never know because I am quite certain he will never admit it. He will probably claim ad infinitum that he did honestly vote "no" because he thought that this video was worse than the previous one. This is what I meant with me not expecting him to honestly admit that.
Sure, I can be wrong in this presumption.
Who says it's a protest? Is it that hard to believe that someone doesn't like this run?
Ok, I admit that I assumed his "no" vote was a voice of protest directed against overglitched runs in general. I admit that there's the possibility of this assumption was wrong. However, I have the strong feeling that it was exactly that.
Yeah you're only saying how it's *I* must vote, and since I voted otherwise, I'm sabatoging it and abusing it :P
In fact, I didn't say anywhere how you must vote. I just said that using the voting system to express a protest is foolish and useless. It has no effect on anything and adds no information.
Of course in typical flamewar fashion words are constantly being put into my mouth by others.
