Er, hey all. Sorry if I'm somewhat out of place in this thread, as I'm pretty new to the site (first discovered it about a week ago, while looking for Chrono Trigger translation tools, oddly enough) and most of you seem to have seen damn near every movie on the site. But I thought maybe I could lend a bit of perspective on what this particular newbie feels.
The first video I saw that really blew me away, and what really got me into tool assisted runs as opposed to speedruns (I used to follow Doom and Quake speedruns a few years back), was the two-in-one Megaman X and X2 run. I'd almost suggest that someone try a for a newspost on Slashdot Games (and various other sites) about that run if you're looking to grow the scene, as that's one of the coolest things I've ever seen.
After that I looked for runs that seemed either very short, or unusually unique and impressive, or else were of games that I'm familiar with. Of the non-starred videos I've seen, the most impressive ones were probably NES Dragon Warrior and SNES Super Bomberman 2. Like so many other children of the 80's, I got Dragon Warrior free with my subscription to Nintendo Power. And like most 8-year-olds who played the game, I was never able to beat it. The luck manipulation happening in that video is just absolutely stunning, and I have to say that it's really gratifying seeing someone finally not just beat the game, but kick the holy crap out of it. The Bomberman video is really cool because the player always seems to be five steps ahead of the viewer, and it just really shows a lot of finesse, even knowing the demo was tool-assisted. Also, whoever recorded it has a great sense of humor.
In terms of videos that are already starred, I agree with someone earlier who said a with-warps version of the Arkanoid video would be better. I got the sense from the description that it was quite an accomplishment and would be cool to watch, but I can't say I want to see fifteen minutes of it. The Excitebike video was fun to watch, the jumps were really impressive. Hitler No Fukkatsu looks interesting, and I might pick it up later, but I really can't decide whether that Japanese Nazi version of the game is intriguing or off-putting. Lord knows I can't show it to my Jewish girlfriend. The NES Zelda, Mario, and Metroid runs were less than enticing only because I've seen numerous speedruns of those games before and I can't imagine the tool assisted versions are that much cooler.
The really short SNES Zelda and the NES Megaman 2 were both something of a letdown, because I'm much more interested in seeing someone perfect-play and luck-manipulate a game than just glitch it. I know I'm in the minority here, but that's just how I feel about it - glitching makes it seem like you're not actually beating the game, just beating the programmers. The Megaman 2 video was more enjoyable, at least, because the ways the player gained access to the glitch were pretty ingenious.
I have to say that I'm not very interested in Umihara Kawase just because I've never heard of the game before, and I think it would feel a bit like watching a sport on TV that you don't know the rules to. Only fun insofar as it's utterly bewildering. I should also point out that both Umihara Kawase and Rygar have far, far fewer downloads than any other game on the starred list (Hitler No Fukkatsu is also an underperformer, probably because it's under the J name).
The short SNES Super Mario World and the NES Gradius were both cool as hell, just watched 'em.
So, er, that's my take on things, if it's at all helpful. Hope I'm not overstepping my bounds here.
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