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Posted: 7/1/2004 3:59 PM
Post subject: If they don't like us that much, we'll form our own town!
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Viewer
Joined: 6/4/2004
Posts: 284
Who will come and live a life devoted to chastity, abstinence, and a flavorless mush I call "rootmarm"? Seriously, though--I am honestly baffled by the schism between those who create "legitimate" speedruns of video games, and those who create "tool-assisted" speedruns of video games; it would seem that a similar, if not equal amount of effort, goes into the creation of both. Granted, with "legitimate" speedruns, the skill of the person making the run has to be already honed to a very fine edge, and that edge must be kept throughout the entire run, without any opportunity for pause--especially if it isn't a straight run, but a fancy run; this is a luxury that "tool-assisted" speedrunners have, for the most part. By the same token, however, those who make a "tool-assisted" speedrun, especially for this page, must be dilligent, and above all else, patient. Just because the "tool-assisted" users have extra items at their disposal to make the run doesn't make it easier; the best speedrunners are those who are hardest on themselves, to the point of repeating a single segment--even if it's only a span of a few seconds--over and over and over for minutes at a time, as slow as possible, trying to shave just a few more miliseconds off. That, in its own way, requires a huge amount of effort. Nonetheless, it should be remembered that in the end, these are but video games--mere diversions. If it becomes a huge matter of "honor", this is likely to be forgotten.
Posted: 7/1/2004 8:19 PM
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Booda
Joined: 4/26/2004
Posts: 149
Let's use a footrace as a metaphor. Suppose you go into a footrace with rollerskates. Well, obviously, you are cheating. You're using artificial apparatus to boost your performance. A good racer shouldn't need any kind of artificial enhancement. Therefore, racers should run barefoot. But they don't. Instead, they have special shoes that are flexible and give a better grip on the ground to enhance the runner's performance. The difference between running shoes and roller skates is that running shoes enhance your ability to run while roller skates let you bypass running. Relating this to time attacks, as long as the player isn't completely bypassing the challenge of the game, it should be okay to use a tool to help his performance. The player is still running; not roller skating.
Posted: 7/1/2004 8:36 PM
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Boco
Former player
Joined: 3/30/2004
Posts: 1354
Location: Heather's imagination
ctually, I think the roller skates analogy is good. Someone wearing roller skates isn't allowed to compete in the 100-meter dash, for example, just as someone using rerecord isn't allowed in a speedrun competition. But there are separate competitions for people wearing skates, and the people who run don't think the people who can go faster because they have wheels are stealing their glory.
someone is out there who will like you. take off your mask so they can find you faster. I support the new Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
Posted: 7/1/2004 9:08 PM
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Bob_Whoops
Former player
Joined: 3/19/2004
Posts: 710
Location: USA
Heh.I tried using a similar argument once. The guy argued that it is not a good analogy, because the spectators can clearly see that the guy is using roller blades, so they know that he is cheating. However, if the person has cyborg implants in him, everyone else would look really bad. I tried telling that if he was making the movies for himself, then he shouldn't care what other people thought, but he just flamed me a lot.
Posted: 7/1/2004 10:24 PM
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Booda
Joined: 4/26/2004
Posts: 149
Cyborg implants? So, basically, he's saying it's not cheating unless you get caught. The roller skate and running shoe scenario is about perspective. To people who see it as okay, emulators are running shoes. They give you an advantage that does not come from yourself, but it is an acceptable tool. Those who object see emulators as roller skates, which allows the person wearing them to win without really trying. It's just sour grapes I think. "I had to start from the beginning each time I messed up, so you have to." No, we don't actually. There's no official Olympic-video-game-playing rules that everyone must adhere to. You know what they should do? They should label their "non-tool-assisted" runs as "barefoot" runs. That way, when people ask what the hell "barefoot" means (that is, if they give a damn) they can point out the difference.
Posted: 7/2/2004 6:27 AM
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qFox
Joined: 4/25/2004
Posts: 615
Location: The Netherlands
i'm sorry, but what is the point of all this? arent you preaching to the choir here?
qfox.nl
Posted: 7/2/2004 8:14 AM
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Reese_Kaine
Joined: 5/28/2004
Posts: 28
Location: St. Albans, WV
What I don't get is: Those that hate it so much, why are they even coming here? Do these people honestly believe that we'll start thinking "OH! I just realized something! I shouldn't use re-recorders to make a MOVIE!" Did I miss something? I thought this was just us having fun making movies. IMO, it's still just us making movies. Why are the non-believers still hanging around? I don't get it. It's like this in every damn environment with a forum.
Posted: 7/2/2004 8:49 AM
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Viewer
Joined: 6/4/2004
Posts: 284
qFox wrote:
i'm sorry, but what is the point of all this? arent you preaching to the choir here?
Perhaps I wasn't speaking to the regulars here, but more so those who either have no opinion on the matter or are opposed to it, so that a greater understanding of the effort involved is reached.
Posted: 7/3/2004 5:14 AM
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Bag_of_Magic_Food
He/Him
Player (206)
Joined: 5/29/2004
Posts: 5712
Oh, have the naysayers and malcontents and hemhawers and wackywaters come around again recently? (Can't decide on a good name for them.)
put yourself in my rocketpack if that poochie is one outrageous dude
Posted: 7/3/2004 6:13 AM
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Deviance
Former player
Joined: 3/8/2004
Posts: 706
the speedrunners who utterly despise time attacks are in the minority. There are quite a few legit players out there who find emulated runs a useful tool in assisting the planning of future record attempts. No need to form your own town just yet. :)
Posted: 7/3/2004 3:46 PM
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Booda
Joined: 4/26/2004
Posts: 149
Deviance wrote:
the speedrunners who utterly despise time attacks are in the minority.
Ever notice it's the minority that complains the loudest?
Posted: 7/6/2004 8:26 PM
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TSA
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 186
That minority is also pissing off the majority of "legit" gamers as well. Honestly, legit gamers do it for the spirit of the game and fun. I have an ulterior motive - promote Zelda and keep Zelda popular. I up-play everything I do/see related to Zelda to make it a spectacle - so that fans want stay interested. To the point - I don't do this for fame or fortune. It does give me a sense of pride, though, when I do something I thought I couldn't. When I did that 35:50 LoZ video on VHS in 3 tries, compared to last summer where it took me 2 weeks to get 37:50 - it showed how much of a better gamer I have become in such little time. To me, speed runs measure how much I improve as a gamer. I don't like to compare myself to other gamers - I never thought speed running was a viable way to prove your "skills" in comparison to another. If you want to show you're a great gamer, go into Fighting Game tournaments or join the PC FPS ranks. That is where true competition lies. I don't get why they get so mad. I don't recall anyone claiming any video made by an emulator was some sort of record or an amazing personal feat. I just remember people saying it was either "cool looking" or "this is impossible to do, it's fake". They act like the world is going mad and that "legit" gaming is going to hell. Additionally, if you even hint that videos from this site and others are "good", they brand you a traitor and make up viscious lies - like that my videos are all fake. Honestly, their tactics ar just to bash you into the ground until you feel worthless or frustrate you into doing something stupid. Their conduct, however, is very unbecoming. They're quite arrogant and ignorant, and I really don't care much for them. They remind me of drunken frat guys who's life depends upon a fragile balance that if shattered, they fall into oblivion. On top of all this, except for sdkess, I don't know any of these other guys yelling. sdkess is one of the more reserved arguers, but these other more ignorant guys are relative nobody's. I've asked on several occasions for them to provide me with links to stuff they've done, even just a forum where they claim stuff, and I've gotten no response. One of them sent me Super Mario World videos, but they were audio-less (suspicious to me) and better than anything I've seen (ex: a 10:48 SMW run). Yet this video was sent in secrecy and is not onlne for public viewing. They champion people like SnapDragon and The-Elite.net players, but when I chatted with them and asked The-Elite crew if they knew ANY of the people who were bashing Emu Assited Runs, they were all like "who's that?". I think in one of the chats I saw, Jason Whalls was there. But he didn't speak at all. I tried Googling these names, and all I could find was a LoZ emulator run...done a few years ago. Anyway, I am just going to ignore them from now on. I think if anymore of this crap heads this way, ban the user and lock the thread up. It's not necessary, it's just trolling. I go to Archive.org and I see a HUGE disclaimer before all Emu Assited Runs which makes it very clear they weren't done in the same was as other runs. And Archive.org will outlast any "competitive" site in the end. Nobody claims these runs are records, and nobody thinks they are. I seriously have like...this urge to want to bash their heads against a wall for being so stupid and ignorant. And they also act like they rule the world, when they have no credentials. I believe the name for these type of people is "posers". That's what we used to call wannabe aggressive skaters in 6th grade who wore the clothing and talked the talk, but had an excuse for every occassion when asked to back it up. That's what these guys are. And they're not TG. Twin Galaxies is about to improve. They're database will be updated, and they will update in the future quickly. It seriously will gain back respect. In fact, all The Elite times, as well as the MarioKart64.com times, are going to be logged there. It's going to reflect the best of the best. The-Elite and other niche sites will continue to focus on specific games for competitions, but TG is eventually going to emerge as the dominant verification site. And their rules and refs are stricters and more adept to the technological threats to legit runs. So from where I am standing - anyone who continues to insist "Tool-Assisted Runs" destroy legit gaming needs to wake up. I'm willing to bet (as sad as it is) that all of the people whining about this are American...figures. And as I proposed to you guys awhile back - challenge these fools. Beat them at their own game and make them respect you. I challenged that Mister Dan guy to anything Zelda related. I bet his excuse will be "You're a nobody, you can't challenge me!" or something. Anyway, I think it's time to just ignore this and let the issue die. Things are in motion that will end this all and render the "posers" obsolete.
Posted: 7/7/2004 4:49 AM
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Josh_the_FunkDOC
Former player
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
TSA: Good post! One thing though, what did you mean by that comment about Americans near the end? And yes, it seems like a lot of these guys have no proof of their "skills". I once got IMed out of the blue by someone claiming to be a "friend" of Mister DAN; I somehow doubt this was true, considering the guy had his exact writing style and arguments. Anyway, I told him how Twin Galaxies people have supported tools-assisted videos and he just responded with "They all suck, NONE of their records are legit", and claimed that he had friends who could legitimately beat Genisto's SMB3 emulator time. And whenever I asked him for proof of any of this, he said nothing. I told him about how my history in fighting game tournaments as an example of how even someone like me who isn't that great can have some sort of record (in my case, published results), and he just shrugged it off as "It's not the same thing, you're not old school enough". Also, during this conversation, I kept telling him how the phrase "tools-assisted" comes from the Doom speedrunning community, and how it was actually the legit speedrunners who WANTED to be able to make these types of movies. His response was to say that no, I was wrong, Bisqwit and Michael Fried are making all this terminology up as they go, and Doom is a shitty game so it means nothing in this conversation. So I mention Compet-N (the main Doom speedrunning site for many, many years) to him, and tell him how one of the top players there has made an EVIL CHEATED FAKE MOVIE for this site, and he tells me that nobody besides me has ever heard of the site or player in question. Folks, if you want to see who's right and who's wrong, do a Google search for "Compet-N". =P So, yeah, given their stubbornness and ignorance of history and the facts, I say ban these assholes if they ever come up again. Note that I don't mean everybody who disagrees; people who can defend themselves INTELLIGENTLY are perfectly cool IMHO. -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Posted: 7/7/2004 4:56 AM
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Deviance
Former player
Joined: 3/8/2004
Posts: 706
and claimed that he had friends who could legitimately beat Genisto's SMB3 emulator time.
he's lying, he couldn't possibly have friends.
Posted: 7/7/2004 5:11 AM
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Michael_Fried
Former player
Joined: 3/8/2004
Posts: 1107
he's lying, he couldn't possibly have friends. You could also know he's lying by looking at it in a mathematical way. For example, there's no possible way a human could shoot fireballs as fast as you can shoot them with autofire. Autofire would be 30 times per second. I would consider myself a pretty fast button presser and I can only repeatedly press a button about 8 times per second (maybe a little more if I didn't always get so little sleep). The fastest button pressers I've heard of can go at 10-15 times per second, but even at 15, which is insanely fast, it's still pretty far away from 30. Just because of this alone, you'll lose at least a few seconds just in the fight against Bowser, and considering how close to perfection Genisto's movie is, there's no way you could beat it while losing so much time because of slow fireball shooting. If I wanted to I could go through the whole game showing all the places where humans are guaranteed to lose time, and you'll see that no one will ever come close to the time in Genisto's movie legitimately. Then when you take into account all the random elements of the game, such as the hands, and the movements of certain enemies, and also all the jumps that require your button presses to be perfect, not a frame too early or too late, you'll see that there's no possible way to avoid losing time throughout the whole game.
Posted: 7/7/2004 6:06 AM
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sdkess7
Joined: 4/12/2004
Posts: 13
TSA wrote:
On top of all this, except for sdkess, I don't know any of these other guys yelling. sdkess is one of the more reserved arguers, but these other more ignorant guys are relative nobody's.
I don't want anybody to think that I'm one of these "yellers". I've stayed out of the recent arguments at GameFaqs because the exchanges were not kept civil. I have no problem with most of the people here on a personal level, but I do have a problem with people being stubborn jackasses on either side of the argument. Anyway, I just don't want anyone to get the wrong idea about me. My opinion of emulator assisted videos has not changed (I don't like them), but I'm not "with" the flamers that TSA is talking about. I don't even know who they are. They just came out of the woodwork with zero karma accounts and commenced flaming. They're actually hurting their own cause by behaving the way that they do.
Posted: 7/7/2004 6:06 AM
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Phil
Active player (411)
Joined: 3/16/2004
Posts: 2623
Location: America, Québec
Deviance wrote:
and claimed that he had friends who could legitimately beat Genisto's SMB3 emulator time.
he's lying, he couldn't possibly have friends.
I really really really agree with you ^_^
sdkess7 wrote:
Anyway, I just don't want anyone to get the wrong idea about me. My opinion of emulator assisted videos has not changed (I don't like them)
Can you tell me what's wrong with those videos!?
Posted: 7/7/2004 6:41 AM
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Boco
Former player
Joined: 3/30/2004
Posts: 1354
Location: Heather's imagination
Michael Fried wrote:
The fastest button pressers I've heard of can go at 10-15 times per second, but even at 15, which is insanely fast, it's still pretty far away from 30.
Takahashi-meijin (better known to English-speakers as Master Higgins) became famous not only because of his superb gaming skill but his ability to consistently clock 16-presses-per-second.
someone is out there who will like you. take off your mask so they can find you faster. I support the new Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
Posted: 7/7/2004 6:48 AM
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KaitouKid
Former player
Joined: 6/6/2005
Posts: 384
...Good heavens, it's the Japanese version of Mickey Dolenz! o_o
Posted: 7/7/2004 7:08 AM
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Deviance
Former player
Joined: 3/8/2004
Posts: 706
I read on TG's "Greatest Gamers Nominees" page about David Wonn being able to press a button at a rate of nearly 20 times a second.
Posted: 7/7/2004 7:10 AM
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Phil
Active player (411)
Joined: 3/16/2004
Posts: 2623
Location: America, Québec
Wow that's pretty fast.
Posted: 7/7/2004 7:11 AM
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sdkess7
Joined: 4/12/2004
Posts: 13
Phil wrote:
Can you tell me what's wrong with those videos!?
I like the final result. It demonstrates a near perfect play which is very interesting to watch. I have a fundamental problem with the methods used to make the videos which makes my admiration of them irrelevant. I do, however, admire the work and thought that goes into the videos, which is why I don't go around bashing every one that I see. So, to answer your question, the methods are what I have a problem with, specifically slowing the game down and using save states. In contrast, I really like what Marshmallow did with Yoshi's Island. He played just the individual levels without slowing the game down or using save states. This allowed him to maintain a pretty high level of play due to the greater granularity of playing single levels at a time.
Posted: 7/7/2004 8:14 AM
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Josh_the_FunkDOC
Former player
Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
sdkess: Perfectly understandable. Personally, I appreciate tool-assisted runs and legit runs both, in entirely different ways; theoretical perfection (even when taken to the most extreme extent, as in the Dragon Warrior video) and legitimate skill both captivate me. But you definitely aren't wrong for thinking the way you do... -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
Posted: 7/7/2004 8:54 PM
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TSA
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 186
sdkess - I didn't mean to put you in that group. I meant that at one time I saw you arguing here about this issue, but it wasn't anything near what the GameFAQs guys did. Not old school enough, huh? They guys probably weren't even old enough to have played the Atari/Arcade games of the late 70's/early 80's when competitive console gaming was at its pinnacle. I mean, that's when the greats competed in games like Donkey Kong, Pac-Man, Space Invaders, and Pong to see who was the best. It was all score based. It was all done live. This whole "video" thing is like the Touch Typing For Kids edition of competitive gaming. You can try as many times as you want. I "see" a difference between tool-assited and "legit" runs, but in all honesty - the essence of video runs and emu runs is the same. Try as much as you can to get the best score/time. Why I tend to get offended when these new wave of competitive gamers say they can own my "times" and think I'm no good: I actually used to compete in Super Mario tournaments in my town against other schools in the early 90's in live tournaments. I won them all. I competed in a Nation wide Diddy Kong Racing tournament in 1997 - when NOBODY had ever played the game before entering - and won my area by lapping the next best competitor. I beat Super Mario 64 70 star collection in under 2 hours for the manager of Blockbuster in a bet one day after I was in there day after day just playing the N64 Station - not even owning the game - in October of 1996. Yes, many gamers can beat me in a "try as many time as you can" scenario - this "new age" of competing. But if you were to take me on in a new game, of if we had played it the same amount and then competed live, it's a different story. This is why I always thought of myself as a great gamer. But thanks to today, I feel my value has diminished. I try my best to do runs for everyone to put online. But no offense, after about 3 or 4 attempts, I feel like it's just cheating. Every "record" or "video" I have done - I did within 4 attempts. I did my ALttP record with just "beating" it by memory once, on the fly imagining improvements, and then took three more times to get sub 2 hours. My Ocarina of Time runs all took one try each. My LoZ video up now took three tries - because of a random bomb drop factor I couldn't control. My The Adventure of Link record, while not good to most, I achieved on my 4th time to EVER play the game. And it was 100% completion at 1:57. Boco tells me 1:36 is the true WR...and lord knows how many times they've played that game over and over. Alex Penev complained my Super Mario 64 time wasn't close to WR. No crap. I hadn't played the game in 3 years, had no strategy. I just up and picked up the damn controller and beat it. And it was less than 30 mins short of the "best" time ever. If I had the best route and practice... As for old school, those morons wouldn't know old school if it smacked them in the face. PC gaming and Arcade Tournaments are about all that remains fo the "old school" competition. So while times must change, I must insist a vast majority of gamers out there claiming to be the best...aren't. The best do it conistently, and can do it in front of a crowd. Sure, somebody can beat me in The Legend of Zelda speed run if they try hard enough on tape. But challenge me to a live competition. I'm not meaning to brag, I'm trying to drive home a point. What exists now is **** compared to what was. So while I sympathize with both sides, and have been very understanding - since the day TG contacted me about doing a Zelda run after seeing one my claims - I have regretted getting into this realm of speed running. However - somethings done nowadays are still damn impressive. Some people can do stuff that nobody thought could be done no matter how many tries they got. To me, that is still the sign of a great gamer. So thus ends my rant and you know where I am coming from. I truly am "neutral" as to competitive gaming now. Sometimes I care about doing a run. Sometimes I don't. In fact, I only do a run when I feel like it. I say I will do my AoL run this weekend...that may or may not happen. It's just whenever. But I do know when the time comes, I will beat my previous best. There you have it. I really, really don't care, this is just for fun. But I'll just tell you like it is as long as I am involved in this realm.
Posted: 7/8/2004 2:23 AM
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Josh_the_FunkDOC
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Joined: 3/13/2004
Posts: 706
Location: Elyria/Oberlin, OH
TSA: Interesting. I don't know much about the history of competitive single-player gaming, do you know of any resources out there? And yes, you summed up a big part of what I find thrilling about fighting games. We do have our own area of "repeat it until it's perfect and put it on a video" (this being compilations of glitches and combos), but it's just a side attraction rather than the main focus of the scene. Who knows, maybe in the future real tournaments might become en vogue again... -Josh
but then you take my 75 perchance chance of winning, if we was to go one-on-one, and then add 66 and two-thirds ch...percents...i got a 141 and two-thirds chance of winning at sacrifice
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