Post subject: Analogy for TAS: musicians and sequencers
Emulator Coder
Joined: 6/8/2005
Posts: 14
I think the presentation/explanation of TAS could be improved by making a strong analogy to modern music sequencing versus playing live, and referring back to it often. The FAQ mentions movies, but I think the music analogy is a richer source of proper notions about TAS runs. With movies, there was always a non-live aspect and ability to edit things together, but music can be done completely live, like video game playing. For example: Musicians who use sequencers don't claim their music is being played live. Some people might prefer it to live music, but that's partly because sequenced music can do things live can't. The musician wants to make sounds that are satisfying to listen to, and sequencers opened new possibilities. Where before a musician's physical skill was a limitation, with a sequencer he is limited only by his mind. This doesn't mean that making satisfying music is easy for anyone to make if they have a sequencer, so it's still an enjoyable challenge for the musician. On the other hand, people probably have more respect for live music, since sequenced music highlights its unique aspects better. Probably when music sequencers were first introduced, musicians using them were accused of cheating; at the time, it was probably reasonable to wonder whether sequencing would hurt music.