Posts for Warp


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PikachuMan wrote:
Power Ponies and Pinkie Pride are Leo Award nominees.
What odd choices...
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Derakon wrote:
I wouldn't worry too much. ACE is getting its time in the limelight right now, like multiruns did awhile back. It won't ever disappear completely but it's not like more "traditional" runs aren't going to continue being made.
I'm not so sure of that. I fear that it will have the same status as the reset button. Once it was discovered that you could abuse the reset button to corrupt savestates and whatnot, it came to stay (IMO ruining all TASes where it's used.) I fully admit that hacking the game into running arbitrary code is a thousand times more impressive and admirable than abusing the reset button (and if I had to choose between the two, I would definitely have the former), but that doesn't mean I like it as a technique for "true" game completion.
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thatguy wrote:
1) Who's to say what the route intended by the developers is, particularly in RPGs/sandbox games where exploration is very much the focus? And how strictly does it have to be defined - how large do the shortcuts taken have to be before they are outlawed?
Most games are pretty straightforward. You want to dismiss a branch because with some games it can be difficult to define?
2) Runs in such a category would never get large improvements, since macro-optimisation is impossible once a route has been prescribed for all runs to follow. It is likely that interest in such categories would suffer as a result.
The vast majority of published runs get no significant improvements. I see no problem.
3) It runs contrary to the very philosophy of TASing: the game is just a game, a set of rules, and you must exploit those rules as efficiently as possible.
You could dismiss alternative goals like "100%" or "uses suboptimal character" with the same reasoning. It has never been a problem.
4) People can already watch real-time speedrunners. They're pretty good.
But they are not perfect, and that's exactly the point. Some would like to see the human factor removed from the equation.
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andypanther wrote:
Not using cheat codes (except for cosmetic things or gamemodes/characters inaccessible otherwise) is a general rule of the site, just like the usage of the hardest available difficulty. Of course a TAS shouldn't violate those. But what if the fastest way to beat a game was to actually "create" a sort of cheat code by using arbitrary data execution? I think this technically should be allowed.
I don't think the existing rules are (nor should be) set in stone, never to he changed or amended. For example, if a consensus is reached that using ACE to reach the game end is not a valid "any%" game completion (instead being more akin to a "playaround demo"), then the rules ought to be amended as such. (I'm not saying this must be done, even though personally I would advocate it. My point is that the rules ought to not be so rigid as to not allow this.) Btw, would this be a good occasion to, once again, advocate an old idea of mine? A "uses intended route" branch. Many people would like to see a game played through (rather than glitched through) with perfect accuracy. Many games lack such a TAS because glitches that skip large portions of the game are the de-facto standard. While this is cool and all, it would still be nice to see the original intended route being played with perfect accuracy. Hence a "uses intended route" branch.
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Tub wrote:
You may be confusing him with nate
Now that you mention it, you are absolutely correct. I apologize for my mistake.
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andypanther wrote:
The unnamed (any%) branch should always be the fastest way to reach the credits, no matter how this is achieved.
So if the credits can be reached faster by inputting a cheat code, it should be allowed? (My point is that "anything goes" implies "within certain rules".)
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Whether highly-glitched runs, which nevertheless do not run custom code, ought to be considered "normal" valid completions of the game is an interesting question in itself. However, I think that the distinction between "arbitrary code execution" and everything else is quite unambiguous: Does the runner input machine code into the console's memory and make the CPU run it? If not, then it's not ACE. Since the beginning of time there has always been a camp that detests excessive glitching in TASes because it feels like too much of an abuse and too little of actually completing the game by playing it. I understand this sentiment perfectly, and in fact in recent years I have started to appreciate it more because heavy glitching has become more and more like a gimmick and not something so... "cool", I suppose. Although it depends on the type of "glitching". For example I still like zipping and going out of boundaries (like in Megaman and some of the Castlevania games). In general, techniques that abuse poor boundary checks and similar bugs or defects in the game engine. However, I'm not so fond of glitches that corrupt memory, like filling the player's inventory with extraneous items or things like that via wild pointers or other such bugs. (And as some might remember, I absolutely detest abusing of savedata corruption, and in general abusing anything with the reset button.) However, I'm perfectly and painfully aware that putting limits to this is extremely hard and arbitrary. "I don't like this type of glitch but that other type of glitch is fine" is very subjective and very much personal opinion. Regardless, I think it may be a good idea to relegate arbitrary code execution to its own, separate category.
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Not to badmouth him or anything, but wasn't Radix one of the most vocal opponents and bashers of TASing back in the day? I seem to remember something like that. If that's the case, I find this answer from him a bit... disingenuous: "I didn't like that it was portrayed as a legitimate play through. I had no problem with the concept though."
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I really think that the star tier should be a representative list that demonstrates TASing, rather than a raw comprehensive list of the highest-rated runs. If you want the highest-rated runs, just list the games in order of rating. This representative list ought to avoid needless redundancy and repetition. For example the same game ought to appear only once (at the very most twice) on the list, rather than all of the branches of that particular game appearing, regardless of how highly rated they may be. Also, if the TASes of two different games are highly similar (one does not show off anything that the other doesn't), it may be better to just include one of them rather than both. The list should also be diverse: Unusual games and techniques ought to appear (if they have some TASing notoriety), even if those particular TASes don't happen to be on the top-100 best-rated list. Even if the star tier isn't a "newcomer's first time list" anymore, I still think it should retain its "manual selection of representative TASes" quality.
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I know nothing about this game nor the techniques used in this run, but it just looks very unoptimized. The absolutely shortest paths are not taken, the runner stops for significant fractions of a second at many places for no apparent reason (although this might be related to enemy manipulation, but I have the slight suspicion it isn't) and so on. Also Spikestuff's video above shows that even starting the game is highly unoptimized. I get the feeling that this is more like somewhat-quick tool-assisted playthrough rather than a highly-optimized speedrun that cuts every unnecessary frame.
Post subject: Arbitrary code execution
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Hacking a console game into executing any machine code you want solely by pressing buttons on the gamepad is an impressive feat, worthy of awe in the general public and articles in online magazines (at least the first few times it has happened.) However, there's a problem in classifying this in the same category as "normal" tool-assisted speedrunning: Once you can input any machine code you want and have it executed by the console, all bets are off. You are basically writing your own custom "ROM" (colloquially speaking, as the technical term is a bit of a misnomer here) into the memory of the console (with a game cartridge plugged in which you can use for whatever you want.) This has stopped being a speedrun of the game, and it has simply become showing off a custom program. (The custom program may be able to use assets from the game cartridge that's plugged in, but it's nevertheless just that: A custom program.) I don't think this should be even considered a regular TAS anymore. If anything, I think this should be a separate category where the time is not from startup to game completion, but from startup to the point where you can start inputting machine code into the console's memory. At that point the timer should stop, and that's the official time of the "TAS", because after that it's not a speedrun of the game anylonger. And it should not obsolete any of the TASes that do not use the technique. Consider this: What is a "100%" completion of a game? It of course depends on the game (and not all of them have a sensible meaning), but in many cases it's eg. collecting all items. Well, consider that with arbitrary code execution you can make the game think you have all the items and then jump to the end of the game. This would probably be just some frames slower than a fastest possible jump to the end. So the question is: Would you think such a "TAS" ought to obsolete a "100%" branch that doesn't use the technique? If your answer is no, then why would you think it should obsolete the "any%" branch either? IMO it shouldn't. (Note that I'm not saying that this is what's necessarily happening, or going to happen. I'm just writing some thoughts on the subject for you to consider.)
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Inzult wrote:
Sorry, what's exactly being suggested here
Actually I think you are making a good point here at a more general level. I find myself slightly confused about the topic being discussed. Could someone write a short summary of what the problem is exactly, and what the proposed solutions are? Like a kind of short distilled recap of the entire thread.
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MUGG wrote:
Well, it just didn't do it for me. And I've seen like one or two episode reviewers that have noted that people who don't like dry humor won't appreciate the episode as much and I guess I'm one of those.
It wasn't the humor. (Sure the humor was an extra bonus, but it wasn't the main reason why the episode was so great.) Character development, character interaction, storytelling. Maud herself was a very different and interesting character. She wasn't a bright-colored hyperactive fourth-wall breaker, she wasn't a brash tomboy with a feminine side, she wasn't a sophisticated fashionista, she wasn't a meek and shy animal-lover, she wasn't a neurotic perfectionist, she wasn't a demigoddess, she wasn't an ex-fallen angel trying to find her place... She was different, and in an interesting manner. She had hidden depths. She was relatable to many.
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Scepheo wrote:
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.*
There are rules that can be broken that may disqualify it. Such as using cheat codes. (In the vast majority of cases using cheat codes disqualifies even from publication, but there are always exceptions...)
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MUGG wrote:
I liked it better than Maud Pie
WTF? That was one of the best episodes of the entire series. Not just season. Series.
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I thought the star was the "recommended for newcomers" tier and symbol. The "looking for examples of why TASes are great? Try these" icon.
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Nach wrote:
The issue is that the fastest run is really subjective.
tasvideos.org has become a kind of de-facto "authority" of all things tool-assisted via the fact that it's the biggest and most popular TAS website out there (which is a great thing.) Thus it's most likely the source that people will use to get information on tool-assistance and tool-assisted speedruns. Let's assume that someone is eg. writing an article on tool-assisted speedrunning; this might be even some publication of great prestige (perhaps all the way up to such notorious publication as the Guinness Book of World Records, some day perhaps... we can dream). If they are looking for the "world record" completion time for a certain game (perhaps to compare it to the unassisted run, or simply to list it as such), it would be good to clearly mark the branch that's our official such record. With the vast majority of games the record time is quite clear, in most cases because there is only one TAS of it (or at most two, the other often being clearly longer and labeled with something like "100%"). With other games it can be less clear, if there are numerous branches and their goals are less clear to the average viewer. What will most likely happen is that the visitor will either choose one of the branches pretty much at random (because they might even be unaware that there are other branches, so they will choose the first one they stumble across), or simply the branch with the lowest time. In many cases the latter will probably be ok (after all, if it has been published it ought to conform to the publication rules, and if it has the fastest completion time, it is the "world record".) However, it may be that in some cases the fastest completion time uses some odd technique that, while not disqualifying it from publication, may "disqualify" from being the "official" word record. (Also, some games just don't have a "world record" completion time because of their nature. They might only have a playaround that doesn't even try to complete it as fast as possible using any means possible.) (Of course if we marked world record runs somehow, it would also be necessary to make it clearer that such marks exist and what they mean.)
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Why give special status to SMW?
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Warp wrote:
I envision this causing obsoletion problems (which is one of the reasons why I think that the branch name should not fix any of the techniques used.) If a new run is submitted that uses a different set of the techniques than the old one used, should the branch name be changed or a new branch created?
Has this been properly answered?
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So the consensus is that the branch name should define the techniques/methods/glitches/routes used to complete the game (which is basically the opposite of what I suggested)? I envision this causing obsoletion problems (which is one of the reasons why I think that the branch name should not fix any of the techniques used.) If a new run is submitted that uses a different set of the techniques than the old one used, should the branch name be changed or a new branch created? This could be avoided if the branches, at least the "major" ones, are named in a more abstract manner, ie. in a manner that does not fix how the game was completed. If you want to get rid of the "nameless branch" idea because the concept of a "default" TAS for a game is too controversial, that's not really the major problem IMO. I was just thinking that it would be nice if there were some kind of "special mark" for the "official speed record" branch, which could aid people in finding it. "This game can be completed in 23:15 using tool-assistance." If there are 10 branches, one of them ought to be the official speed record. It would be useful to mark is as such.
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feos wrote:
Warp wrote:
As I said, in my opinion it shouldn't be the role of the branch name to describe the details of the run. The "default" branch has one goal, and one goal only: Complete the game as fast as possible, using any means possible. How it achieves that is completely inconsequential (with respect to the branch name.) If this goal is achieved by using some specific techniques, those can be expressed with the tags and in the description of the run.
You (for some reason) keep referring to the priority system that doesn't work anymore. I think I described why in several posts. As in, Moons don't have any default goals except for "to entertain". Nor do they have default condition sets. Whatever looks good meets the goal. So one can't rule Moons with the Vault approach without victims.
What I wrote has absolutely nothing to do with tiers. I don't even understand why you think it does.
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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? What if someone isn't looking for "fastest ever", but needs to know the gameplay conditions? For most unnamed branches gameplay conditions would differ, just as do most of our branches differ. Which means the goal set fails to be represented by that unnamed branch name. It's also inconsistent: all games have branches that show what game features they use to complete the game, and bam! suddenly some refuse to tell the viewer that information.
As I said, in my opinion it shouldn't be the role of the branch name to describe the details of the run. The "default" branch has one goal, and one goal only: Complete the game as fast as possible, using any means possible. How it achieves that is completely inconsequential (with respect to the branch name.) If this goal is achieved by using some specific techniques, those can be expressed with the tags and in the description of the run. Also, as I said earlier, the other branches can be named whatever you like. A branch could be called "Steve's run" for all the naming convention cares. Its only role is to distinguish it from the other branches of the same game. (If the branch name also happens to be descriptive, all the better, but that's not its primary goal, IMO.) If you want to describe the techniques used in the run in the "info line" of the run, then I think it would be better to implement what I suggested earlier: "Major" tags that could be added to said info line. If this is not possible for practical reasons (eg. lack of resources), then just give more prominence to the existing tags. (The difference between the "major" tags and the branch name would be that the tags do not define the branch. They just describe it. A new submission that obsoletes the same branch could have a different set of "major" tags, but the name of the branch would stay the same.)
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thatguy wrote:
Not really Warp, because to a mathematician π is so much more than the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter. In this case, the sum is linked to Taylor series of trigonometric functions, whose solutions involve π.
Given that sines and cosines are closely related to circles...
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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.)