People born free, they do natural things when they are children, then they study lies and other bad behaviour. Thus they need a law. But simple laziness doesn't allow us to stay as free in mind as we were back then. We invent silly excuses to our weaknesses and create false mental reality around ourselves. We create false laws in our heads, which appear not to be actual laws, but our vision of what's possible, permitted. Superstitions. Stereotypes.
And those who still are able to dream, to dive into those spirits they felt when playing video or other games as a childs, are gathered here. They still feel warmth and fill their runs and their discussions with it. That totally distinguishs us among other comunities, forums, sites. Some people say this warmth has grown scanty. But hey, WE introduce warmth here, WE keep it. If we lose it, then surely it would grow scanty. But we simply can't permit that, we create it!
Sorry, I still don't understand how exactly it distinguishes TASVideos from other gaming communities. Except the fact that, uh, we don't really cultivate the culture of playing games here. Instead we remember the olden days when we used to play these games... and then proceed creating sequences for emulators to play these games instead of us, after which we pretend it's a superhuman playing the game as we sit and watch. But surely it is not the kind of distinguishing feature you're trying to get across, is it?
I'll reiterate: why do you think it's us here who create the warmth of joyful playing while being free from superstitions, and not any other gaming community? Because we break the games better? Well, that's hardly our achievement, considering the power of tools at our disposal. I can also be free of superstitions and fly a plane to become closer to birds and experience the warm sensation of flight, while some puny BASE jumpers continue their vain attempts to move in a direction other than straight down.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
moozooh, I dunno, I just see and feel it. From the very first day here. Maybe you can't because you've never TASed seriously? The TAS spirit is as real for me as the spirit of our childish games was.
AnS wrote:
DarkKobold, I do not refuse that there may some special kind of fun that I don't get. But I want to make sure you don't confuse "fun experience" with "rewarding experience", as these are completely different feelings. Could you elaborate on that matter? What exactly is fun in exhaustiive frame-polishing (when you're not competing in a framewar with someone else)?
Competition with myself is enough for me as I keep finding improvements and am able to understand how they work. But because of lack of speciffic knowledges I either need help or have to stop perfecting. But yes, not any game is suitable for TAS by me. For now there are only 3 of 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.
some units to measure entertainment, so that ego-people could compete for these units as well as for frames
Then I propose we compete for "maximum average audio volume" (while still beating the game) instead of "minimum frame count". I think that could approximate a measure of entertainment, while still having an emphasis on speed except in some pathological cases. (Anyone willing to try it for April 1st?)
Bisqwit wrote:
"If a child receives a box containing an expensive toy as a birthday present, it's possible that he will enjoy the box more than the toy.
This is creativity.
We're doing the same for these games.
Instead of walking on the paths created for us, we create our own paths, our own legs and so on.
And we're not listening to people who say "you can't do that!".
Just like children."
I've always liked that quote, by the way (at least, ever since I got past the initial strangeness of seeing it where I had expected to see some bland explanation of what TAS means). We're not playing games, we are playing with games instead, and it's useless to accuse us of having fun "the wrong way". (TASing can easily be less fun than playing a game, from moment to moment, but that's not the point.)
DarkKobold, I do not refuse that there may some special kind of fun that I don't get. But I want to make sure you don't confuse "fun experience" with "rewarding experience", as these are completely different feelings. Could you elaborate on that matter? What exactly is fun in exhaustiive frame-polishing (when you're not competing in a framewar with someone else)?
Uh, I'm 100% more on the Lua side - I'd say people like Aqfaq, FatRatKnight, Aglar, theenglishman, and others get fun out of shaving even 1 frame. But, I find Lua totally fun. Most of my TASes get as far as lua scripts, and 1 level - because I just find it a blast to write scripts, and figure out how the game works.
AnS wrote:
DarkKobold wrote:
Don't confuse your opinion of fun as being everyone's opinion of fun.
Don't attack me, okay? I'm still trying to recall my will to TAS, and I don't understand how the hell I had enough motivation for this. Probably it was all because of "world record" thingy which sadly doesn't bother me now.
I don't know how this was an attack... It wasn't meant as one.
Sage advice from a friend of Jim: So put your tinfoil hat back in the closet, open your eyes to the truth, and realize that the government is in fact causing austismal cancer with it's 9/11 fluoride vaccinations of your water supply.
We're not playing games, we are playing with games instead, and it's useless to accuse us of having fun "the wrong way".
This is the exact point of my original post. We want to break some laws, so let these laws be just stereotypes, and breaking them makes no harm at all, but deep joy.
And we set our own rules while playing WITH games, that are above rules set by these games' developers.
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.
Uh, I'm 100% more on the Lua side - I'd say people like Aqfaq, FatRatKnight, Aglar, theenglishman, and others get fun out of shaving even 1 frame. But, I find Lua totally fun. Most of my TASes get as far as lua scripts, and 1 level - because I just find it a blast to write scripts, and figure out how the game works.
Wouldn't you TAS whole game (more than 1 level) if it was actually fun all the way to final keypresses?
(as for Lua stuff, that's a bit different from the point, because programming is fun on its own)
I can see 3 main factors that take away fun from the TASing process:
1. Worn-out goal choice (aiming for speed works well for viewers, not makers)
2. Poor tools (still a lot of tedious work must be done manually)
3. Anticipation of possible negative response (TAS makers must cater for viewers response thus limiting own imagination)
To solve pt.3 there's Youtube, where creators can post whatever poop they like.
To lighten pt.2 I'm working on new TASEdit, also new tools appear from time to time.
But the main problem is pt.1, so new ideas should be encouraged by administration explicitly. Not just April the 1st.
nitsuja wrote:
Then I propose we compete for "maximum average audio volume" (while still beating the game) instead of "minimum frame count". I think that could approximate a measure of entertainment, while still having an emphasis on speed except in some pathological cases. (Anyone willing to try it for April 1st?)
This is rather fresh idea. But wouldn't it easily degrade into abusing same loudest sound all the time? Repetitiveness can be persistent, but not entertaining, so maybe averaged volume is not too good approximation of entertainment. Now what about audio signal envelope shapes? I mean, if we compressed WAV output of the movie, we'd get larger files for movies with more stuff going on (within same time limit). Same goes for AVI (remember old Gunstar Heroes movie that was so colorful that it had unusually oversized encode).
But that would still be too rough and one-sided entertainment approximation. Also it won't directly provoke creativity (like "aiming for speed" boosts it naturally), and we'd better preserve this feature.
When criticizing feos's romantic mumblings I may have appeared too cynical, but actually I beleive that TASing process can be fun. And should be. Like playing Braid is fun even though you don't compete with anyone. Nah, Braid is bad example, because it has man-crafted puzzles that are boring after finishing them once.
I think I should clarify what I meant by fun/rewarding experience.
Fun aspects of the process (TASing):
* competitive enjoyment (frequent here)
* positive feedback (impossible + hard work -> possible)
* personal feeling of achievement (final product)
* community status/ranks/comments/etc (the more the better)
* personal feeling of self-perfection (see feos' BS about asceticism)
When criticizing feos's romantic mumblings I may have appeared too cynical, but actually I beleive that TASing process can be fun.
I agree. TASing is especially fun if it's a game you enjoy playing, or have played over and over and know everything about it (for me: Legend of the Lost Spatula and Frogger 2). Then the fun comes not only from pushing yourself to complete a level and then watching it later but also doing what you always wanted to do: beating your old (childhood) records and finishing the game in the fastest time you can (which becomes the world record, which anyone would be happy to hold).
Also, I like the fun/rewarding experience list. It's a nice way to categorize this idea.
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
I read a few paragraphs out of this thing you're writing here.
These are the things I can understand and find relevant to my existence. It's not specifically related to TAS in the end, but it justifies my interest in it as well. I'm gonna quote random stuff related to that.
feos wrote:
Bisqwit wrote:
I guess I did not understand the repeatedly made point about superstitions.
People born free, they do natural things when they are children, then they study lies and other bad behaviour. Thus they need a law. But simple laziness doesn't allow us to stay as free in mind as we were back then. We invent silly excuses to our weaknesses and create false mental reality around ourselves. We create false laws in our heads, which appear not to be actual laws, but our vision of what's possible, permitted. Superstitions. Stereotypes.
haha yeah, "You've heard their voice for so long, you believe it to be you"
moozooh wrote:
Sorry, I still don't understand how exactly it distinguishes TASVideos from other gaming communities. Except the fact that, uh, we don't really cultivate the culture of playing games here. Instead we remember the olden days when we used to play these games... and then proceed creating sequences for emulators to play these games instead of us, after which we pretend it's a superhuman playing the game as we sit and watch. But surely it is not the kind of distinguishing feature you're trying to get across, is it?
I'll reiterate: why do you think it's us here who create the warmth of joyful playing while being free from superstitions, and not any other gaming community? Because we break the games better? Well, that's hardly our achievement, considering the power of tools at our disposal. I can also be free of superstitions and fly a plane to become closer to birds and experience the warm sensation of flight, while some puny BASE jumpers continue their vain attempts to move in a direction other than straight down.
"True pleasure cannot be attained unless one is out of the ordinary."
"Supreme bliss! Your brain has now been fried by that sort of pleasure. Your life from this point on will consist only of you pursuing that sort of pleasure"
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
"You've heard their voice for so long, you believe it to be you"
"True pleasure cannot be attained unless one is out of the ordinary. Supreme bliss!"
Bingo!
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.
