Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Poke Ilari on #lsnes irc.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
I don't see significant difference between the way you clip for a bit and the way you clip for the whole level. So it looks like a similar OOB technique, which would look out of place in a run that avoids OOB.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
ThunderAxe31 wrote:
We also already allow different hardware revisions, for example the different PSX BIOS versions, for which in some aspects may feature even deeper differences than GB vs GBC. You insist that GB games haven't been designed for the GBC platform, but that also applies for any other platform game that was developed before introducing hardware revisions. Is there any reason why we should treat the Game Boy differently?
I generally feel the same, I don't see the fundamental difference between newer game modes and hardware revisions. Whatever we decide should benefit the TASers and the community, and the community have agreed with my suggestions. Our job is boiling down the logistical part of the rules to something we could use in the future, without contradicting existing rules. And I'm not seeing fundamental contradictions with the current rules either.
ThunderAxe31 wrote:
It's not just for the sake of console verification. In my opinion, GB-in-GBC should be also considered as a stylistic choice for improving aesthetic of a movie, as well as be allowed to taking advantage of hardware differences that may allow for a more optimized movie (apart from the BIOS screen duration difference).
If there are no glitches at all caused by the newer mode, then it's an artistic choice. If there are slight but noticeable glitches, we want them to be justified.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
Everyone familiar with the situation finds it acceptable and valid way to play and consider it to be a reliable method for TASing purposes.
That definition has two fundamental problems:
Subjectivity. If I'm familiar with situations that are covered by our movie rules, and I stop considering some of them valid and acceptable, then the rule itself is not legitimate anymore?
Emergence. The more people you inform about the situation, the more variety of opinions you get. Those opinions may include notions that completely disprove your initial beliefs, leading to quality changes in the whole situation, which will then need to be reevaluated, and different questions will need to be asked. You may also opt to stick to just those few people that agree with you, but then that's called echo chamber.
Due to the above, I find this definition to be impossible: to use and rely on, and to even take seriously.
Nach wrote:
As you know, we often clarify how to handle new situations on the basis of how we handled previous situations. So how would you define our allowance of VC in such a way that it doesn't open the door to anything that may come along later?
You probably also know that over the years, the rules whose development I've been involved in, I've been trying to define in the most future-proof way we can pull off. And from having had tons of brainstorming sessions with staff members, I can say that 100% future-proof rules are impossible. We can't predict 100% of everything that happens in the future, and even if we could, accounting for it all would make the rules infinitely long, and coming up with perfect wording would also require infinite time. No one has resources for that at their disposal. So we limit this to what covers the most probable situations, however exotic they may be.
So as of right now, I don't think we need any extra rules that ban VC TASing in any form. All we might want to do is saying that if TASing the VC bundle results in similar gameplay as without it, we prefer without it, for the sake of originality. If TASing the VC bundle showcases gameplay as different from original as we require for Moons branches, be that features or glitches, we publish that separately. Some for differences that count as separate game modes (vaultable).
If some other company ever develops a comparable virtualization+enhancement layer from scratch, alloys it together with their previous game, and releases it as a uniform bundle for a certain console, similar to all other releases for that console, we can extrapolate this approach over and include that system in the VC rule.
Nach wrote:
That's because the platform itself is inconsistent.
Arbitrary purism may describe any platform as inconsistent.
Nach wrote:
You want to block DMG games on CGB when there's some noticeable issues, which I agree with. It's a combination Nintendo wants to support, but their success rate was not perfect. Same for VC, they want to support all these games they're bringing over, but their primary focus here is the $, not whether the game runs perfectly well or not. They're not extensively testing them like they would a brand new game. If there's AV issues in VC that aren't exhibited on the original platform, why should we support it?
Because I consider the VC layer a part of the game. The benefit being that we showcase two different things, and they have different superplay, not limiting creativity that can be applied to that newer platform, because that creativity would be unique: you can't replicate some of that stuff on just the original or extracted game. The original movie isn't hurt, and the movie on the extracted game isn't hurt.
With GBx, the new mode is not a part of the game that you buy from the publisher, and the enhancements aren't either, so the incompatibility bugs aren't inherent to the game image.
Nach wrote:
I spoke to a friend of mine over the weekend who is more familiar with some of these differences, and he told me the flickering in DMG Zelda on a CGB I mentioned earlier is due to the fact the game was made understanding the ghosting effects of the poor quality screen the DMG has. The CGB having a better screen without these ghosting effects has a flicker in several places. SGB or emulators with older televisions or computer screens had ghosting effects and also looked great, but playing them on a new higher quality screen has flickering issues unless you turn on some kind of frame blending or motion blur. The Zelda DX version fixed this by redoing some of the visual effects the game uses, and when necessary, draws these effects on more frames so it doesn't require the screen to exhibit ghosting issues to look right.
Although this differs to the situation when we talk about the randomness being different, and thus the enemies act differently, or somehow instantly kill you and become unbeatable. The game was made with a particular design in mind, and was tested that way.
We don't account for those "nuances" in how the games used to look when played on console. We don't apply NTSC artifacts to your video, we don't simulate luminophore glow, we don't put scanlines in our encodes. So in any encode of GB Zelda, you will see the same flickering when watching on your computer, regardless of the mode.
Nach wrote:
Most of the push back I've been getting on this thread appears to be about not understanding the situation. Why should I accept a differing viewpoint when I know the other viewpoint is missing information which I have?
How many people you want to come in and say "I'm fine with all those subtle differences" to finally understand that information you bring up is not being missed?
Nach wrote:
I have no problem where we say look we're using an emulator, it may have some differences from the original, but we try to avoid that.
I do have a problem where we say, nope it's perfect, because we compared it to something which is another emulator.
No one is saying GBx modes are perfect though. We're saying they're good enough, for the most part.
Nach wrote:
I agree with this. However, not all our judges are necessarily familiar with the game in the original mode to know if something even looks suspicious or not.
If it doesn't look suspicious for the judge who is looking closely, and for the audience who often knows the game, then it's not a significant difference.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
This is now taking my statement out of the original context. If you now deem the later emulated release as valid, you open it up to bugs and other kinds of new releases. The new releases we're talking about here isn't just the game, but all sorts of software added to the game. The point I was making is that we either have the exact same game (use the original), or it's not the same (is it then legitimate?).
I'm going to need your exhaustive definition of the word "legitimate", because it's becoming impossible to discuss anything without having the same questions asked over and over. You define it once and for all, and in the future I'll only refer to that definition when discussing anything "legitimate" with you.
Nach wrote:
feos wrote:
If other publishers release their IP bundled with emulators they haven't created or contributed to, we don't need to support those "releases".
Why not? If a company legally releases their IP bundled with an emulator, why shouldn't we support the release? What difference does it make their level of involvement?
VC is quite clearly unique compared to all those bundles. Limiting a unique rule to the unique situation means you don't need to extrapolate anymore (hooray).
Nach wrote:
feos wrote:
If the game is separated from that layer, even if it loses those enhancements or tweaks, it's fine.
I find this debatable.
You disagree with your own ruling?
Nach wrote:
My criteria is simple:
Is it the original game (can easily be verified by comparison of the files) - play on original.
Is it close to the original game which also works on the original console (differences might be a harder gameplay mode or something, can check to see if it works on original) - play on original.
Game has enhanced features only present on VC - play on VC.
If it's the original game, but VC still somehow enhances it on the VC - play on either.
Close to original game, works on original console, and VC enhances it - play on VC.
Except none of that helps with prejudice/inconsistency towards the platform itself.
Nach wrote:
I don't think we need to consider every kind of release and combination legitimate or the correct version to play. You yourself agreed which should disregard potential use cases if it causes A/V bugs.
VC games were explicitly re-released with this extra layer, I don't see any difference between them and non-VC games officially released for Wii. The point about AV bugs was about GB games that weren't explicitly re-released for newer modes, instead the console itself was tweaked to support them.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
Just because you don't easily see the issue doesn't mean it's essentially the same. If enemy patterns change, then you're not playing exactly the same game.
I wouldn't say we've had zero problems in our emulators, from working on emulators I know we've had emulators where the enemy in the game acts differently than on an actual console.
Why exactly are you not arguing for absolute purism regarding emulator accuracy though? If an enemy behaves differently, then you're not verifying how it works on console, so it's not the same game anymore. Consistency please.
Nach wrote:
feos wrote:
So this is all in line with what we've been doing for years.
Except it isn't, because suddenly I'm hearing the DMG is being redefined as the CGB or AGB, and that verification on those later consoles is considered true verification. You're not longer comparing emulator with a console, but comparing an emulator with some other console which does pseudo-emulation.
What is being verified is how a game runs in GBC and then on console. If the differences between GB and GBC for a given game are subtle, then running it on actual GB would still fundamentally work after some resync. If the difference is significant, we prefer the original thing of course.
Nach wrote:
From my perspective, you have all absolutely lost your minds.
I won't tell you what people think about your posts from their perspective.
Nach wrote:
And how do you know that if you're verifying it against a non-original mode?
So now I see a run, and I suspect something, and it would force one to have to console verify it?
You ask the author to prove that whatever looks suspicious is also there in the original mode. If it's not there, and the difference is significant, reject.
Nach wrote:
If you're copying a single value describing something it should be legal.
Which value do we need here?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
I'm not talking about nearly identical game versions, I'm talking nearly identical runs. I don't need to see HappyLee's SMB in under 5 minutes published on every Nintendo console, with a frame added here or there to account for minute timing differences.
That's what I mean as well. Though logically, if you get nearly identical runs from different game versions, then you can consider the versions nearly identical. We already do this with game versions that result in nearly identical runs. Just in this case, they would complete across platforms.
Nach wrote:
In China, Snes9x/Mednafen/VBA/whatever have a huge player base. It's how they remember those games that they have legally purchased in China from the creator of the Chinese ARM-based console, and are considered the copyright holder of that creation in China.
As an aside, I'm pretty sure some of the early NES games have outsold themselves on the NES compared to whatever sales the VC is currently doing for them.
If other publishers release their IP bundled with emulators they haven't created or contributed to, we don't need to support those "releases".
Nach wrote:
And despite not having offhand examples, I don't find it legitimate to exploit bugs in the emulator if there is such a thing.
That means you consider VC illegitimate altogether.
It has an emulation layer of some sort, which is perfectly fine. That layer may enhance or otherwise tweak the games, also fine. If the game is separated from that layer, even if it loses those enhancements or tweaks, it's fine. If separation makes it unplayable, it's not fine to separate it. But guess what? If it can't be safely separated, one has to play the VC version, with all the emulator bugs, abusing them like a maniac.
If you ban abusing emulator bugs in VC only in some situations, then you're allowing them in others. In which case you're not being consistent. And from what I've been saying so far, arbitrarily so, because you decide for the company who owns the IP for all those games as well as the console, that it's not official enough for us to bother approving of whatever they release for it.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
Again, you're missing the point. I don't know how many ways I can explain this. There is a subtle difference causing the obvious problem here. This subtle difference will exist in many games, even when it's not obvious.
How many times do I need to reply to this? If subtle differences don't cause problems in gameplay, audio, or graphics, then it's essentially the same superplay as on the original system, barring differences in randomness, which we've had zero problems with in our emulators. Yes, emulators also have subtle differences compared to actual consoles. Yes, it can affect randomness and other things that may not be obvious. And we only really ban bugs in emulators that aren't present on actual hardware if the emulator bug abuse is the only way to pull off some trick, fundamentally. If it can be easily resynced to work on console, it's not an emulator bug worth rejection, just slight inaccuracy. And if there are obvious problems, exactly as described in that thread, like games not working, not completing, or distracting audiovisual problems, we already have a rule against that:
http://tasvideos.org/MovieRules.html#PlayGamesThatAreEmulatedWell
So this is all in line with what we've been doing for years.
Nach wrote:
How do you define normal gameplay?
The way it works in the original mode.
Nach wrote:
Terrific. Therefore you cannot consider "verification" made with only the new system to necessarily replicate the other one. You won't know if there's a bug or not until you do proper verification.
With how I worded the rule suggestion, one doesn't have to verify things that aren't obvious glitches.
Nach wrote:
It'd be better if the file format would include some information copied from the game's header.
Is distributing parts of ROMs like that legal?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
Why not just TAS the game on the original system?
No one is suggesting to ban TASing it on the original system.
Nach wrote:
Why are we publishing nearly identical runs for the same game twice?
If they're nearly identical, we can prefer some version we agree about.
Nach wrote:
If you're just looking to exploit bugs in the emulator, then what are you even doing?
Even you admit that VC is not simply emulation. It's some kind of a virtualization+expansion layer on top of the original games, tweaked or not, developed specifically for those games, packaged as an integral game image for Wii, and officially distributed by the copyright holder.
Nach wrote:
Then why not exploit bugs in any emulator? It's how people remember the game because more people have an emulator than the original.
VC releases have huge player base, it's how they remember those games that they have legally purchased from the creator of Wii and the copyright holder of those games. If other publishers release their IP bundled with emulators they haven't created or contributed to, and the player base is small, we don't need to support those "releases".
Oh and I still see no "examples of actual problems with the future of tasvideos if we still allow people to TAS VC images as they are, without extrapolating this to anything less known and common, like bundles where we know an existing emulator has been included" in your replies.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
feos wrote:
I finally read the linked thread about problems in GBx games in later modes. They don't seem to even discuss all those "subtledifferences" only old DMG experts can spot. They talk about games that either don't run at all, or have obvious glitches in audio or graphics.
Have you been reading the same thread I have?
Sachen games are usually incompatible with anything newer than whatever was around when it was released. I have one of their mono 4 in 1s from the mid 90s which doesnt work on a GBC or up. And Beast Fighter, which is also a mono game - even though it was released in 2000 - does work on a GBC, but not a GBA.. unless you use a Game Genie, then it works maybe 1 out of 10 times. Sachen is weird.
Sounds like some randomness difference, which Alyosha mentioned earlier, so that's not obvious glitches in audio or graphics is it?
No, it's saying that the game "doesnt work on a GBC or up", does not work on a GBA, or "works maybe 1 out of 10 times".
Nach wrote:
Burai Fighter (the original monochrome one) doesn't work right on the GBA, and possibly the GBC. You die almost instantly as soon as the first boss appears.
Doesn't sound like obvious glitches in audio or graphics, does it?
No, it talks about the game not working, you die where you shouldn't be dying, and therefore you can't even complete the game.
Nach wrote:
I don't know why, but for some reason most of the replies in this thread again and again keep missing the main point. It's not about the A/V issues, those we can easily see. It's the differences we cannot easily see. If reading back from the output is being used, or something that relies on specific timings or something else, the CGB will act different from the DMG. There's ample evidence of this, the cause behind this is known. I don't get why you keep ignoring this. From the two comments I just quoted, you see it goes deeper than just what is being output.
If you can't play the game and complete it, it's not even remotely a "subtle difference we cannot easily see". It's an obvious problem.
Nach wrote:
feos wrote:
[*]If glitches that are caused by newer mode can't be easily noticed and don't hinder gameplay, the newer mode is allowed for the sake of console verification.
Disagree. What does hinder even mean?
It means the bug is getting in the way of normal gameplay in some way.
Nach wrote:
feos wrote:
[*]If newer mode doesn't cause any glitches at all, it's allowed.
What's considered a glitch here? Although if we know some game in particular runs identically down to the last detail on either platform, then I would agree we can run it on either platform.
Any bug in how a given mode replicates the other one
Nach wrote:
Does the file format include what system the game is supposed to be for?
It has the ROM name that the author used, but it can vary, and one has to match the hash (also contained in the header) against some list of games, and determine the intended mode from that.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Well I get the impression that in your opinion, allowing people to TAS VC images as they are (even if the extracted game works properly) is absolutely fundamentally completely unacceptable and no one is allowed to ever question this, but I'm not seeing any examples of actual problems with the future of tasvideos if we still allow people to TAS VC images as they are, without extrapolating this to anything less known and common, like bundles where we know an existing emulator has been included.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
I think if a graphical glitch or a broken sound tone/tune is apparent for several seconds, or distributed around the run in an obvious way (say, you can't accidentally miss it if you're watching normally), and it generally sticks out, then a different, non-glitched mode is required, and console verification would need a resynced movie instead.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
I didn't enjoy it at all. The worst parts are the constant jumping sample and the slow speed. If you look closely, there's quite some stuff scattered around the levels that is meant to slow you down, but most of the time it feels like an autosroller. It gets old very quickly, and none of the gameplay differences in various levels was able to help with that impression. Voted No.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
So back to Gameboy.
I finally read the linked thread about problems in GBx games in later modes. They don't seem to even discuss all those "subtledifferences" only old DMG experts can spot. They talk about games that either don't run at all, or have obvious glitches in audio or graphics.
Some games weren't explicitly designed for GBC or GBA modes, even though those platforms try to enhance them explicitly, by having certain colors for certain games coded in the boot ROM. Previously, the rules didn't evenmean to stick to "platform the game was released for". And the latest revision doesn't address games with slightly enhanced graphics in GBC. But Mothrayas said that disallowing GB-in-GBC was an oversight, not an intention.
People that support GB-in-GBC are those who currently contribute to GBx emulator coding, to GBx console verification, and to GBx TASing. If that doesn't make the demand legitimate, I don't know what does. In addition to those, staff members also agreed (here and on discord) that unless there are obvious problems with newer modes, console verification is a good enough reason to allow those modes.
Suggested rule.
If glitches that are caused by newer mode hinder gameplay, we don't want that mode.
If glitches that are caused by newer mode are obvious to unarmed eye/ear in normal viewing conditions, we don't want that mode.
If glitches that are caused by newer mode can't be easily noticed and don't hinder gameplay, the newer mode is allowed for the sake of console verification.
If newer mode doesn't cause any glitches at all, it's allowed.
Categorization seems to need that publications of DMG games are labeled as GB, but how do we automate that in the parser?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Screenshot suggestion?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
False alarm. Restored.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
You're opening up the door to quite a lot with this statement. Capcom has released their CPS-1 library multiple times with different versions of MAME. Their NES library with different NES emulators. I've seen Acclaim, Accolade, and Midway sell some of their SNES games bundled with Snes9x 1.43 - illegally at that, or Mednafen. I'm sure there's plenty more that I haven't seen.
We could also limit this to just VC, at least for now.
First of all, we can't even know if they used any of the emulators available on the internet, or made their own. Since randomly substituting games in the VC layer doesn't always result in a playable game, those could be either barebones emulators targeting only specific games, or not even emulators in the usual sense, but running some game programs on actual hardware. Nintendo said about VC SMB that “emulation program in question was created by Nintendo internally”, and I couldn't find evidence disproving that.
Second, I feel strongly against requiring people to fiddle with officially shipped game images. We've only ever allowed it in cases when the game would've been simply unTASable otherwise, and now outright require it unless the extracted image itself doesn't work? That breaks the authentic connection between the game image and the environment it was made for (using an existing game image as a foundation in this case, also belonging to that copyright holder). It's the same as requiring that the game gets patched. And most importantly, this "patch" may directly affect how the game was meant to be played on that platform.
Third, if we require extracting those games, we should ensure that it comes from the actual VC release, and that it was extracted cleanly, without additional edits. This will have to be verified by the judge, by reproducing the extraction process and comparing the results to what was used in the movie, or by comparing what was used in the movie to some "known good" database. Does such a database exist, like we have redump for example?
Finally, are we sure extracting games in this manner is perfectly legal?
Nach wrote:
This also gets into a gray area. Who is the publisher in various areas? Many Asian countries don't respect copyright law of other countries. In Iran or China you can walk into a store and purchase a DVD or flash drive from a respectable Iranian or Chinese company loaded up with many video games and popular emulators, and it's legal there. They're using various versions of FBA, MAME, Snes9x, mGBA, DeSmuME, Mupen64, PCSX, and more. Billions of people have access to these, and between that and those importing off of AliExpress, quite probably most people on the planet that have experienced the most popular games have done so via these emulators.
We don't want emulators to be illegally used in such bundles of course, and we don't want bootleg bundles. But we can't suspect VC releases in any of that so far.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Here's the table I got, with framerate made to match nico's 30fps (gameplay mechanics aligned nicely):
https://files.tasvideos.org/common/SubmissionFiles/6866S/diff.png
Times in the nicovideo run where it's faster than you (level starts):
15:11.067
18:43.767
23:55.233
38:40.067
40:17.033
43:47.167
47:01.267
50:40.367
51:52.500
54:10.333
Can you elaborate why your run is slower there?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Yeah it's always better to take your time and do everything properly (I'm totally not referencing tmnt4 here, lol).
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
Why is it wrong when we publish a run which uses an emulator bug from one of our emulators?
And before you jump to answer that, bear in mind that some companies are reselling their old console games as PC games, making use of some of our emulators, bugs and all.
Should we be publishing the results of relying on emulator bugs?
I don't see a problem with TASing the officially released bundle, with or without bugs within that bundle. It's how it's been released by the publisher, so people are playing it that way and experiencing those same bugs. They could've fixed those bugs, but they haven't. Exactly how we TAS original games with bugs that devs could've fixed.
Bugs in unofficial emulators are not okay, because those don't belong to the release people are meant to be playing, on the original system without any extra layers.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
It's not that we know better. I'm sure Nintendo is aware of most of these bugs as well, and they just don't care about preserving the original game play. It's about the fact we are able to differentiate between the game itself, and other software. We know when a bug is part of the game itself or not.
Once again you're making it sound like publishing 2 different runs that look differently, on 2 different platforms, is completely impossible, unacceptable, bad for the site, and obviously wrong.
Also:
feos wrote:
Why exactly banning one of the options (the one where the resulting gameplay looks different enough) makes things better?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
I do not agree on limiting creativity on a legitimate environment the game has been officially released for. If they've introduced different bugs when preparing that release, why should we decide "no it's not a legitimate environment, don't trust the official publisher, we know better"? Why exactly banning one of the options (the one where the resulting gameplay looks different enough) makes things better?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
Nach wrote:
Yes, it's an official release. But it's an official derivative release in a buggier form. If we can extract and play it in its original platform, I think that's what we should do.
That same "unique gameplay" might even be possible in emulators that we non-Nintendo employees make, but we reject those because it's not true to the original. Sure these new Wii emulators are officially sanctioned by Nintendo's greed, but they're still not true to the original game. We're intelligent enough to differentiate a pure game release, and a game release that's really supposed to be for a different platform.
Your point is that the new release is not a part of the game anymore. Which is quite arbitrary to decide for the publisher of that game, based on which of their publications we like or not.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Site Admin, Skilled player
(1236)
Joined: 4/17/2010
Posts: 11268
Location: RU
If it's an extracted N64 image, we publish it as an N64. If it's a Wii image, we publish it as Wii. It remains consistent with what the game was meant for, there's no confusion and no false claims. If you run a VC release on Wii via some kind of a tasbot, it will look the same as in the TAS. Banning official releases is a much harder sell if you ask me. If it was released with glitches in its virtual machine, then that is the legitimate technique to abuse in speedruns, especially if it results in different gameplay. "We don't want unique gameplay because official release contains bugs" is the opposite of http://tasvideos.org/WelcomeToTASVideos.html#Why
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
