Suppose I have two values of the form A=a*10b and B=c*10d and I would want to interpolate between the two (using an interpolation factor between 0.0 and 1.0) in such a manner that the mantissas get interpolated linearly and the exponents get interpolated linearly. In other words, I would end up with this:
x = a*(1-factor) + c*factor
y = b*(1-factor) + d*factor
result = x*10y
I have the strong feeling that there's a simple function that allows doing that without having to deal with the mantissas and exponents separately, ie. calculating with the values A and B directly. In other words:
factor = someFunction(factor)
result = A*(1-factor) + B*factor
However, I'm not at all sure what the function is. Probably something dealing with exponentiation or logarithms, but what exactly?
Managers and people without a clue want piracy protection, but it is not worth it.
At least on iOS, in-app purchases can be verified in such a manner that they can't be cheated without modifying the executable binary of the program itself. Anybody who has a rooted device and the proper software installed can cheat in-app purchases for any game (that performs no checks), with zero knowledge or skill required. However, an app that performs the check it's significantly harder because the game binary itself needs to be hacked.
Essentially you would need to replace the system's disc drive with a chip that emulates the disc drive and feeds the data to the console at a deterministic speed.
The problem I see with all this is that it starts becoming less of "console verification" and more of "how can be mod a console to make it run a TAS?"
The more modifications you do to a console to make it work, the less legit it feels. Optimally a TAS would be console-verified solely by connecting a device to the gamepad port, and make the device emulate a gamepad, and nothing else. This is how it works with the NES and the other older systems that can be run this way. But as we move to the systems with disc drives...
Almost 100% of YouTube videos use a 16:9 aspect ratio. Would it be possible to have the forum's video tag default to a resolution using that aspect ratio?
So what? That logo as absolutely nothing to do with site policy. And that's not even going into the fact that "superplay" is 100% a backronym invented years after the acronym "TAS" was popularized.
I always love when people refer to that silly logo as some kind of counter-argument to anything. People have done it so often that I often think they are doing solely to tease me. But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.
It's just as easy to steal your session cookie id as it is to steal your password. Unless the entire site is protected by https, your cookie id is vulnerable, hence making the site no more secure than before from the site's point of view.
That would be undesirable, of course, but if I understand correctly, simply hijacking your session doesn't allow the attacker to change your password (I haven't actually tried to change my password on tasvideos.org, but I'm assuming you need to enter your old one to be able to do it).
Your account could be used to post spam etc. this way, which is bad, but logging out and in again ought to quickly fix that. If I'm mistaken, please correct me.
Quite ironically, I consider trying to shove ACE demos among tool-assisted speedruns, as if they were somehow comparable, exactly that. That's why I'm such a huge proponent of a completely separate and independent section of the site dedicated to these demos and playarounds that people are clearly interested in, but don't really fit into the concept of a speedrun.
That would imply that if somebody submits a new ACE demo for the game, and it obsoletes the current one, the current one wasn't "high quality" enough after all.
How do you even measure "quality"? In things like any% TASes the measurement is rather simple: Check that the run does what it should, and just count the number of frames.
With an ACE demo, how do you measure which one of two is "better" and "higher quality"? Why should one demo obsolete another? What happens if they are deemed to have pretty much the same quality? The old one remains and the new one is rejected, because the old one got there first? Or does the new one obsolete the old one because it's new and fresh?
Why are people so eager to reject great works of art and technical skill, or throw them away? Sometimes I just don't understand this community.
The password moves from the user's computer to the server through the internet when logging in from the login page. It doesn't move constantly anywhere else.
Of course the entire site could be behind https, but I don't know how heavy that is on the server.
The latest version of Firefox has started warning if passwords are going unencrypted (ie. I'm assuming if it's not through https). Would it really hurt to set up https for the login page?
Or alternatively, we're saying "They're awesome, let's publish and highlight the best of them!"
And let's throw the previous ones away? Why?
whereas you're saying "They suck, let's create a dumping ground for them below the lowest tier, and mix the good ACEs with the bad ones so people won't notice them."
Why does it have to be "lower" or "higher" than anything else? It would just be a different kind of art.
As for your idea of how ACE TASes should be treated, there's one thing that I'd like to know: Since you're basically suggesting that it should be possible to publish an infinite number of ACE TASes for one game at the same time, as long as each of them are "something notable and exceptional", should regular playarounds be treated the same way? As of now, it seems like ACE is treated like a variation of "playaround".
I don't think there's any reason that, assuming that a completely separate independent section of the site is created for tool-assisted demos, there should be some kind of artificial limit to how many such demos are published for a given game. Limit as in an actual number of them (of course there can be a requirement of notability, exceptionality and/or entertainment). Even if there were two dozen such demos published for a given game, as long as they are received well by the users, I don't see a problem why they couldn't be published. (Perhaps they could be ranked by ratings, as the current TASes are.)
If a more "regular" non-ACE playaround is notable or entertaining enough... why not. Just publish it, in this new demo section. It doesn't hurt anybody. I don't see why there should be an artificial limit.
There could still be "playarounds" that get to the actual moons category, using some (yet to be determined) criteria, and maybe those could be limited in amount, as it is now. Perhaps if some playaround doesn't get accepted to moons, but is still well received, it could be published in the demo section.
(And yes, I do understand that all this would require a large amount of server-side development work, and I fully understand that this wouldn't be a small undertaking. It still doesn't stop me from dreaming.)
Personally, I would suggest just upscaling the footage while maintaining the aspect ratio and uploading it as is. Even in 2017, not everyone has a widescreen monitor, and it's mad infuriating when people pillarbox their videos to fit in a 16:9 format regardless.
Fully agree. If the footage is 4:3, then upload it as 4:3. Don't add anything else to the video!
I find a degree of irony in the fact that I don't really consider ACE demos a legit form of TASing, yet I'm arguing for ways to have more of them published, while most other people here consider them legit TASes and would want less of them published. There's a certain... cognitive dissonance in all this, for a lack of a better term. "They are awesome! Let's have less of them published!"
It feels a bit similar to the situation with the "vault" tier. I have been pushing for years the notion of elevating this tier to the top, rather than it being considered just a garbage dump for all the "mundane" and "boring" TASes. I have been pushing for the idea that getting your run published in vault would be a privilege, the highest possible prestige, very similar to getting to the top of a category list of a given game at speedrun.com. In other words, if you get your run published in vault, you hold the world record; you are the best of all.
But no, vault is still considered just a garbage dump where runs that don't get to moons get dumped. Rather than being a badge of honor, it's almost a badge of shame. And I seem to be in a very small minority who seem willing to have this notion reversed.
I just find those particular requirements on payload content to be rather peculiar, perhaps in a sense even strange. It's essentially putting a requirement on the theme of an ACE demo, which seems unusual and strange.
The core requirement for an any% run is to reach the end of the game is as few frames as possible (and not use unallowed cheats, etc.) This is a very concrete and unambiguous requirement. So much so that it could be checked automatically by a simple program. A frame count is not up to subjective opinion.
The requirements for 100% is to achieve certain in-game goals, reach the end, and do so in as few frames as possible. Again, as long as those in-game goals are very explicit (as they usually tend to be), these are very concrete and unambiguous technical requirements that are not up to opinion and could ostensibly be programmatically checked relatively easily.
The same is usually true for other less usual self-imposed goals (such as using a less-than-optimal playable character). Concrete, unambiguous, not up to opinion, ostensibly checkable automatically.
Obsoletion is, usually, rather simple: If the new submission manages to achieve the imposed goals in less frames, it obsoletes the old ones.
But the requirements for ACE runs goes to a completely different realm altogether. It delves into the theme and topic of the custom code. Not only is it not an unambiguous technical requirement, this is also not something that could be automatically checked, and both publication and obsoletion are very much up to subjective opinion.
I suppose what I'm saying is that these ACE demos are being published among TASes as if they were such tool-assisted speedruns, yet their rules, theme and content as so far removed from speedruns that it feels really out-of-place. It also puts unusual limits and requirements on them.
I'm still left wondering: If somebody were to publish a new ACE demo using this particular game, what would happen? Would this one be obsoleted and made to, effectively, just disappear?
"Playarounds making use of arbitrary code must still appear to complete the game"
So they don't even have to complete the game, as long as it resembles a bit like they do.
Why? If it's not even required to complete the game, why require the appearance that they do? I don't get it. For what purpose or reason?
Personally I'm not completely happy considering it a legit speedrun if ACE jumps to the game code that runs the ending of the game, but at least an argument can be made about accepting that. But here the run doesn't even need to do that. It's enough if it shows something that resembles the ending of the game, even though it might have nothing to do with it.
Also, I notice the guideline doesn't deal with the question of obsoletion.
I will never understand why black borders bother people so much.
If they ever get an ultrawide monitor (21:9), will they watch everything stretched to that aspect ratio, because they hate black borders so much?
Have you read Nach's lengthy explanation on why the recent Pokemon run was accepted? It seems to me that answers every single one of your questions here.
Not really. Why does it obsolete the other run? On what grounds? It received more positive comments?
If somebody submits a new one, on what basis will it obsolete, or not obsolete, this one? Why should it obsolete this one?
Having just one ACE run of a particular game makes little sense. Which one is the "official" one? The newest that has been submitted? Will every submission automatically obsolete the old one, as long as it's "entertaining enough"?
It strikes me that the issue is not so much "these questions have gone unanswered"
Where are you getting that "unanswered" thing from? Not from this thread, at least.
but it would be vastly more productive if you start with describing the current answers and what exactly you dislike about them.
If seven relatively lengthy posts in this thread are not enough, then I don't know what is.
Because there are clear rules and guiding principles on both acceptance and obsolecense, and Nach (among others) is using those
What are they? I didn't find any in Nach's judgment of the run. Unless you count "User feedback for this run was terrific." Can it get more subjective than that?
(Yes, you can use that as a reason to publish. I don't see how you can use that as a reason to obsolete a previous run.)
I also liked this: "The votes were good too, not that that matters."
Not that that matters.
(4 choose 3)*8/52*1/51*6/50*1/49*4/48*1/47 = 1 in 19 million
I don't really understand why it has to be multiplied by (4 choose 3). Doesn't the 8/52 already take into account that one of the players may get any of the four kings or four queens?
Maybe you missed the "as long as it's something notable and exceptional, it would be ok" part?
To me, not having a separate "demo" tier for ACEs, and trying to shove them into the same space as all the regular TASes is what makes no sense. Acceptance is completely arbitrary, as there are essentially no rules nor guiding principles, "obsoletion" is completely nonsensical (how and why exactly would an ACE demo "obsolete" another? On what criteria?) and there would just be this strange situation where a few ACE demos for a certain game are accepted, but their number is artificially kept down because the normal TAS principles are being applied to them, even though those principles do not make much sense (because they were designed for TASes that aim at fastest completion).
"Completely arbitrary" is the key issue here, IMO. There is no rhyme or reason, there are no guiding principles, there are essentially no rules. (In fact, I'd say that ACE demos break the rules, pretty much, because they don't complete the game nor break any existing records.) Publishing them is subjective to the highest degree. Not publishing an ACE demo is subjective to the highest degree.
If somebody were to submit a new ACE using pokemon yellow, using a completely different payload, what would happen? Would it be accepted alongside the recent one? Would it be rejected? Would it replace the recent one? What? And why?
I'm one of the very few people who is especially sensitive to video footage stretching. If a video (especially a live action one) uses an aspect ratio that's wrong by just a few percents, I notice it. The more it deviates from its original aspect ratio, the more I notice it and the more it bothers me. 4:3 -> 16:9 stretching goes well beyond what I can tolerate. I can't watch such video footage. It's way too annoying.
