Posted: 1/19/2007 9:24 AM
(Edited: 8/18/2023 12:58 AM)
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Bisqwit
Editor, Active player (297)
Joined: 3/8/2004
Posts: 7469
Location: Arzareth
There has been some discussion lately regarding Atari 2600 TASes. Mainly, FODA has expressed his support for Atari 2600, but there have been others too. Post #63324 Post #108686 I am mostly concerned about the question whether Atari 2600 TASes can make entertaining watch. I would certainly like to publish Atari 2600 videos, because it is a part of console gaming history, and the historical value in those games is great. It would be a great documentary of those old games. However, most Atari 2600 games tend to be very simple, somewhat slow, and without a definite end. This makes them, at least in my opinion, badly suitable for our current concept. Nevertheless, I would like to find a concept that works for them. What kind of ideas do you have for Atari 2600?
Posted: 1/19/2007 9:42 AM
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tmont
Player (52)
Joined: 10/6/2005
Posts: 138
Location: Oregon
For what it's worth, someone made a "tool-assisted" speed run of Pitfall! (link) over a year ago. I think he just hacked the ROM (no savestates, etc.), although I didn't ever really look at it. And, of course, that score has been matched by two or three people on a console, so it's not that impressive anymore. There aren't a whole lot of 2600 games that have an end. Of the ones that do, I can't think of any that would be interesting to watch. Except maybe Adventure. That dragon is hilarious. And it would be nice to see someone totally rock that damn bat.
Posted: 1/19/2007 9:54 AM
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moozooh
Senior Moderator
Joined: 8/4/2005
Posts: 5777
Location: Away
From my very limited* experience, I must say that Atari games are so excrutiatingly simple that they are almost unexploitable to tool-assistance in a sense that most NES games are. Also, as the hardware doesn't allow the games to have intricated code, most of them are based around repetition of similar actions involving reaction speed, reflex and other primitive aspects of gameplay, thus having little merit for TASing (the examples of such games: [1], [2], [3], [4]; now imagine something inherently more repetitive and ugly, and you'll see the basic picture). Of course, I could be proven wrong, but not by much; I can see some of the runs being somewhat entertaining to watch as long as they're short and comparatively complex, but I still can't see more than 2-3 of those examples coming (someone mentioned Joust as being one of them). But I should say, there definitely are other platforms that need attention, and it seems that we have a near-complete rerecord capabilities support in the respective emulators. * — The main reason for it being so limited is that I can't like these games. The only one of them that held my attention for more than an hour was Pitfall — it was a hidden game on the cartridge of Genesis Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure, and I was really bored at that point.
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Posted: 1/19/2007 10:36 AM
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Dromiceius
Joined: 10/3/2005
Posts: 1332
Was the Atari 2600 the system that had that godawful E.T. game? (The one with a million unsellable cartridges buried in Nevada?) Edit: To answer my own questions, Yes. I'd watch that and maybe Asteroids if that's even available for this system, but mainly for the sake of novelty rather than genuine TAS-awesomeness.
Posted: 1/19/2007 12:41 PM
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Maximus
Emulator Coder, Former player
Joined: 10/2/2005
Posts: 563
Location: Toronto, Ontario
Well, Stella's looking pretty good (just tested 2.3.5). It's open source and they've got save states. I'm assuming implementing recording for a 2600 shouldn't be nearly as difficult as newer systems, as there's really not that much information to capture. As much as I'd love to see this (I started out with a 2600 in like 1985), I doubt that there would be much demand for this. If, however, I'm proven wrong and there's a massive outcry for 2600 TAS', Stella may be a viable option as far as emulators are concerned.
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Posted: 1/19/2007 12:43 PM
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phunqsauce
Joined: 6/5/2005
Posts: 139
I would be interested in seeing Raiders of the Lost Ark TAS'd but mainly because I never figured that game out...hehe
I like stuff...
Posted: 1/20/2007 10:36 AM
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4matsy
Joined: 4/25/2004
Posts: 498
Some games I think might make interesting and/or funny runs: Adventure. Either run through game 2 as fast as possible, or try to manipulate the shortest game 3. Or maybe do the much harder "Suicide Adventure" hack instead. Crystal Castles. I never found out if it has an ending, as I found the game too damn hard. >_< I know the arcade version eventually ends though... E.T. :p Frogger. Levels could be done at ridiculous speed with frame advance. :p Space Invaders at the "invisible enemies firing fast wavy shots, moving shields, and big player sprites" setting. :p Warlords. Probably either an as-fast-as-possible 1-player game, or an entertainment-over-speed 4-player game. Custer's Revenge. *snickers at the thought of frame-perfect...scoring, for lack of a better term*
Posted: 1/20/2007 1:31 PM
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nesrocks
He/Him
Player (246)
Joined: 5/1/2004
Posts: 4096
Location: Rio, Brazil
I'm interested on at least these games, as taken directly from my page: Frostbite (atari 2600) - this would take a while to get fast, so I'd only watch it if it started from a savestate. H.E.R.O (atari 2600) - 20 levels then it loops. I've seen a speedrun of this, but it could be cool to see it optimized. Adventure (atari 2600) - Would be cool to see the fastest route Montezuma´s Revenge (atari 2600) - Also seems to have an end, this is like super pitfall (NES) River Raid (atari 2600) - It would be just awesome to see the plane fly at top speed ignoring the game's difficulty. Seaquest (atari 2600) - this would get insanely fast in just 1 or 2 minutes, and then could be done a score attack. Of course, there must be many other games to surprise me, or games I didn't remember to put on the list. About Bisqwit's question: It's true that there aren't that many games for atari 2600 that fit current standards for this site. Initially, I'd publish the "plays from savestate" on the concept demo section. There are many atari 2600 games that would have to do this because it would be watching 30 minutes of repetitive slow action until it got interesting, at which point the viewer would be too bored to appreciate it. Example: my frostbite score video on youtube. The games that do have an end ("aims for fastest time"), or "aim for highest score" (999,999 or whatever the game's high score is), could very well go in the current system, I don't see why not. Of course, it would have to get a highscore pretty fast, or else it should start from a savestate and go in the concept demos section. Drawing a line for this could be difficult though, but should be up to the player. But I do think of course that there are other emulators with more priority to receiving TAS tools than atari 2600: Something for playstation 1 Kega Fusion = why not? "Fusion is a Sega SG1000, SC3000, Master System, Game Gear, Genesis/Megadrive, SegaCD/MegaCD and 32X emulator for Win9x/ME/2000/XP" It depends on how much work would be spent implementing these tools. I think that for playstation (top priority) it would be harder. Atari 2600 could be easier. And a funny music video from Wintergreen about atari 2600's E.T failure (youtube)
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Posted: 1/20/2007 9:18 PM
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DrJones
Joined: 4/3/2005
Posts: 575
Location: Spain
There's already a video on Youtube of someone beating E.T. I don't know if it was a TAS or not, but it was fun to watch. From the comments, it seems that the game was awful only if you haven't read the manual (which is something that most people do), so you didn't have a clue about the basics aspects of the game: (look if a hole has a piece before falling, don't fall in a hole you just climbed up, how to avoid bad characters, etc).
No.
Posted: 1/24/2007 6:37 AM
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trazz
Player (95)
Joined: 6/25/2005
Posts: 122
4matsy wrote:
Space Invaders at the "invisible enemies firing fast wavy shots, moving shields, and big player sprites" setting. :p
And two players at once, too. I don't think this setting is even possible at real-time speeds. Missle Command might also be interesting if the game uses the "start from the yellow wave + smart bombs" variation--I'm not sure it's even possible to complete some of those waves unscathed even in a TAS. Fishing Derby might be interesting if someone could find a way to win with a shutout. (read: find a way to prevent the CPU from catching anything. Might not be possible.) Asteroids? Three words. Nonstop thrusting demo. Okay, it sounds dirty but it would be insane to see the ship racing around at maximum speed and not going splat. This might require extensive hyperspace or shields to work. If somebody wants to make Atari 2600 speed runs, I wouldn't worry about not getting at least a few interesting speedruns. After all, there's been some great videos from unlikely sources before. (Dark Castle? King's Bounty!? And who would have predicted that an Excitebike video would be insanely good?)
Posted: 1/24/2007 8:31 AM
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ventuz
He/Him
Player (125)
Joined: 10/4/2004
Posts: 940
I have Activision Classics so I will be able to watch and vote if it's one of these game that I have played. The following games that would be interesting to watch in TAS: Enduro River Raid River Raid 2 HERO Frost Bite (I'm not sure about other games, I would have to go over them again -_-..) Whoever that willing attach rerecording function to whichever Atari 2600 emu will have my support.
Posted: 1/27/2007 4:46 AM
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SmashManiac
Player (13)
Joined: 6/17/2006
Posts: 506
The fact that there is not a single good Atari 2600 game makes me say NO. The only entertainment I can see would be for path finding. But there's already tons of FAQs about that, it would be useless to do a video one. Besides, the less worse game for Atari 2600 is Pitfall, and it's already included in the SNES version of Pitfall The Mayan Adventure. Before Atari 2600, I'd start with better consoles, like TurboGraphx and PlayStation. And is it just me or there is still no speedrun of any arcade games even though there is an official TAS emulator for them?
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Posted: 1/27/2007 7:02 AM
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Kyrsimys
Former player
Joined: 4/16/2004
Posts: 1286
Location: Finland
The arcade emulator you are talking about (FBA) is not officially supported here as it lacks some crucial properties required for TASing.