Joined: 4/17/2010
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Now what do you mean by categories?
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.
I mentioned before a speedrun (speed primary goal) category and a superplay (entertainment primary goal) category before. This would replace the current moons and vault tiers making them equal by separating them by primary goal. Stars would remain the same.
I would like to say that I am 100% in favor of everything arkiandruski is saying. That page zeuper made looks like a good starting point. The vault/moon thing seems to me like an outdated model that site has simply outgrown, which I consider to be a good thing.
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Joined: 11/3/2004
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Well said. The number of unobsoleted publications as quadrupled since the vault was introduced.
The goal was to have the site changed to a game based system by now, the starting point of which, Zeupar linked. This was my plan years ago, and some good work was done on the site code with this goal in mind.
It seems weird for people to keep suggesting they are in favor of this system. It isn't a question of support, it is technical reasons as to why we are stuck in the system we have.
Urls like what Zeupar linked are already in the site code, but they aren't done. If someone wants to be innovative and tinker around with what we have, talk to me on IRC. I don't have the time for the tinkering, but I can give you some direction as to what the site is capable of. arkiandruski perhaps? You seem motivated.
the new game list is pretty good,why isn't it the standard yet? it's already done
I want all good TAS inside TASvideos, it's my motto.
TAS i'm interested:
Megaman series, specially the RPGs! Where is the mmbn1 all chips TAS we deserve? Where is the Command Mission TAS?
i'm slowly moving away from TASing fighting games for speed, maybe it's time to start finding some entertainment value in TASing.
Joined: 4/17/2010
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Destroying those categories we were talking about can't be done imo. Because they set rules for judging depending on goals.
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.
Joined: 4/21/2004
Posts: 3517
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
I do not believe each and every player fully understands how this Tier discussion works. Is that to be blamed to those who implemented it? The fundamental problem is the disconnection between how the vault works vs "did you find this movie entertaining?". If my Wonderboy 3 run completes the game entirely differently and is therefore entertaining in a different manner, should my run then be obsoleted by a much faster run which completes the game in an entirely different manner but is still entertaining?
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.
Joined: 8/14/2009
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The current system allows a fair bit of leeway for different branches for games - but only outside the Vault tier, so only for runs considered adequately entertaining. It just happens to be that the Wonder Boy 3 movies don't pass the entertainment criteria based on the votes and ratings that those runs got. Hence, they go to the Vault, where the faster run obsoletes the slower one.
If your Wonder Boy 3 run got a better entertainment rate than a mediocre ~5.5/10, then it could've been in Moons and we probably wouldn't be having this discussion.
This is just how the current Vault/Moons dynamic works. We can allow different branches for games that stand out (ratings-wise), but Wonder Boy 3 happens not to be one that stands out.
http://www.youtube.com/Noxxa
<dwangoAC> This is a TAS (...). Not suitable for all audiences. May cause undesirable side-effects. May contain emulator abuse. Emulator may be abusive. This product contains glitches known to the state of California to cause egg defects.
<Masterjun> I'm just a guy arranging bits in a sequence which could potentially amuse other people looking at these bits
<adelikat> In Oregon Trail, I sacrificed my own family to save time. In Star trek, I killed helpless comrades in escape pods to save time. Here, I kill my allies to save time. I think I need help.
Joined: 11/13/2006
Posts: 2822
Location: Northern California
"Did you find this movie entertaining?"
YES - Moons
NO - Vault
There's a disconnect there? Please explain what it is.
The entire existence of Vault is based on the fact that we stopped considering the game's entertainment value as a reason to accept or reject runs. If the audience deems a run publishable, but not entertaining, then it goes to Vault. As a rule, arbitrary categories (i.e, anything that isn't any% or 100%) are not allowed in Vault because it doesn't make sense to publish niche categories that no one is interested in.
Your run was in Vault, this improvement was accepted to Vault. Entertainment is not a factor at all. What this is, is a routing improvement. This isn't two different categories. You even said yourself that it's two any% categories. Why would we publish both of these simultaneously? We don't have boring Chrono Trigger and glorious, exciting Chrono Trigger published simultaneously and they're even in different tiers to boot. Don't they complete the game in entirely different ways too, under your definition?
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on Bluesky
Joined: 4/21/2004
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Location: Stockholm, Sweden
In my opinion, if we have two entirely two different ways of finishing a game, if the audience deem both runs to be very different then sure why not keep both? Even the author of current published run of Wonderboy 3 agrees with my point. Have you even seen our two runs? Ogreslayer and I concluded if we would've tased Wonderboy 3 the way The8bitbeast did, we and the audience would not find it equally entertaining than the path we took.
Joined: 11/13/2006
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TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on Bluesky
Shouldn't this read, "If the audience deems a run not entertaining, but the judge deems it publishable, then it goes to Vault?"
Pertaining to the topic at hand, I am not sure that Moons/Vault is the best way to present runs to viewers, but by the same token, Moons/Vault provides a baseline standard regarding goal choice that is applicable to most (if not all) publishable games.
There is a part of me that is intrigued by the notion of having a more game-based system, but that opens up the door to all sorts of niche categories that fewer people are likely to be interested in, which, in my opinion, dilutes the purpose of the site (providing fastest known technically possible game completion).
I am still the wizard that did it.
"On my business card, I am a corporate president. In my mind, I am a game developer. But in my heart, I am a gamer." -- Satoru Iwata
<scrimpy> at least I now know where every map, energy and save room in this game is
Joined: 4/21/2004
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The question is wrongly asked. Warp has pointed this out a million times before. Either keep that question and add another question like "should this run be published?" or a more relevant question. "Did you find this movie entertaining?" is too vague for viewers. You can find a run entertaining but deem it unworthy publication. I don't think a new viewer can connect that question that it helps judges to lean towards publishing a run. It can assume it, but the "vagueness" is still there.
This further should enlighten the underlying problem. Entertainment is not a factor at all, yet what does the submission ask us? "Did you find this movie entertaining?"
Joined: 11/13/2006
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But like Invariel said, the judge ultimately determines the fate of the run's publication. The audience is a means to determine the tier. If there are improvements that the audience knows about, they will bring them up in the thread and that can lead to the judge deciding to reject the movie. But overall, the question is not the issue here. It's peoples' misunderstanding of it. Some people still treat it as "Should this run be published" when that's not the point of it at all. Some people vote No for stupid, petty reasons like "the moderator told us to stop derailing the thread". Some people vote Yes literally just because a run is Sonic the Hedgehog even though the run itself is monotonous and boring. Changing the question will only lead to more confusion, as there will still be people who vote for bad reasons or don't even bother reading the question, but then there will be people that are used to the current question still voting the way they used to for a while.
AngerFist wrote:
Samsara wrote:
Entertainment is not a factor at all.
This further should enlighten the underlying problem. Entertainment is not a factor at all, yet what does the submission ask us? "Did you find this movie entertaining?"
Entertainment is not a factor for Vault runs. Had you not cherry-picked that line and actually read the two before it, you would have understood what I meant.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
Joined: 4/21/2004
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Location: Stockholm, Sweden
I have not taken a line out of context, it is my perception of the whole situation. things that seem clear to you can be unclear to others. I have still not fully understood how the system works which I have explained.
Samsara wrote:
Changing the question will only lead to more confusion
That depends entirely of the question and with change, adjustment will always take time.
Nitrogenesis wrote:
Guys I come from the DidyKnogRacist communite, and you are all wrong, tihs is the run of the mileniun and everyone who says otherwise dosnt know any bater! I found this run vary ease to masturbate too!!!! Don't fuck with me, I know this game so that mean I'm always right!StupedfackincommunityTASVideoz!!!!!!
Arc wrote:
I enjoyed this movie in which hands firmly gripping a shaft lead to balls deep in multiple holes.
natt wrote:
I don't want to get involved in this discussion, but as a point of fact C# is literally the first goddamn thing on that fucking page you linked did you even fucking read it
Cooljay wrote:
Mayor Haggar and Cody are such nice people for the community. Metro City's hospitals reached an all time new record of incoming patients due to their great efforts :P
Joined: 11/13/2006
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I don't understand what's so unclear about it.
* The Vault tier does not take entertainment into account as a reason for rejection. In other words, it catches every publishable submission that the audience does not find entertaining.
* The bar for entertainment is set fairly high, with judges generally treating anywhere above 80-85% voting support as the level to reach for Moons.
* The Vault tier only allows any% runs and 100% runs, because it's arbitrary to publish niche categories that no one has any interest in.
* Both your run and 8bitBeast's run were deemed not entertaining enough by the audience, whether it be in the submission thread or in the publication ratings. This means they are Vault runs.
* Because they are Vault runs, they cannot exist side-by-side. If they were truly different categories, then one of them can't be an any% run by default, and thus it cannot be published to Vault.
* Both your run and 8bitBeast's run are any% completions. This is something you have stated yourself.
* Because they are both any% completions, we have to treat the 10 minute faster one as a 10 minute improvement, not an entirely separate category in terms of game completion. As I said: It's a route, not a category.
* We obviously can't publish different routes that lead to the exact same level of completion, otherwise we wouldn't have any obsoletions, and thus no level of actual competition.
Is there something else that's unclear?
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
I think Angerfist is arguing more that the structure of Vault should be changed to allow these sort of submissions.
In his submission text he mentions the Tasmanian sword and says that he decided not to use it. So at the time of the submission there were faster routes known, yet it was still accepted.
Personally, I think the original TAS should have been accepted to moons, and I feel that it might have been if it was more well known. It's very interesting since the game is usually very difficult and the swimming glitch is cool. As a new person coming to the site I would be interested to see my final time, but overall would probably rather watch Angerfist's run. New users will just see "obseleted the old any% run" on my TAS and will have no indication that Angerfist's is entirely different and might be worth watching.
One of my potential TAS projects is to complete Wonder Boy 3 without charmstone doors, but using the Tasmanian sword. This would show off new glitches and be a much more entertaining run. But unless it beat my TAS or got moons, there would sadly be no place for it.
I see my TAS to be closer to a game end glitch while Angerfist's omits this. The only difference between my TAS and a warp to final boss TAS is the 15 minute grind. Perhaps we should define 100% to be all bosses, call Angerfist's TAS 100% and be done with it.
For my general view on the vault topic, I think the main change should be that vault publications show up by default. The (all) option is not very clear and I had been browsing TASvideos for a long time before finding the vault category. There were a lot of games that I knew in there and I personally preferred some of them over what I had already seen in moons and stars. Generally, I will watch a TAS because I know the game, not paying attention to the vault, moons, star symbol. So its good to display as many as possible by making vault default.
I think that emphasis on game choice should be removed from the judging criteria. It's good to have runs of well known games, but often what is a well known game can vary. For example, more Master System publications would attract more people from PAL regions where it was much more popular than the NES. A good start would be showing vault by default, since moons and stars only shows 42% of Master System games and hides some good ones. I personally like to TAS hidden gems to try to show people some very good but not well known games.
Joined: 11/13/2006
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The8bitbeast wrote:
I see my TAS to be closer to a game end glitch while Angerfist's omits this. The only difference between my TAS and a warp to final boss TAS is the 15 minute grind. Perhaps we should define 100% to be all bosses, call Angerfist's TAS 100% and be done with it.
This is what should have been argued this whole time, differentiating the two categories in such a way that considers them both to be publishable no matter what. I don't have nearly as many qualms about this solution, though it would be nice to have a completely stable definition of what 100% is for this game before we would consider it. The huge problem that arose from the previous argument was that both runs were being treated as any%, which we obviously can't have published alongside each other. Had this been the argument the whole time, I'm absolutely positive it would have been the accepted solution. Just from the evidence presented at the time, however, I fully support GoddessMaria's judgement decision and I think the harsh criticism of it is unfair.
If you and AngerFist and/or anyone else who's familiar with the game can present a detailed case for why the obsoleted run should be considered 100%, or better yet bring the RTA community's definition of 100% over here, then we'll absolutely take a second look at it, but as long as both runs are being treated as any% then there's nothing we can do to keep both runs published.
I think that emphasis on game choice should be removed from the judging criteria. It's good to have runs of well known games, but often what is a well known game can vary. For example, more Master System publications would attract more people from PAL regions where it was much more popular than the NES. A good start would be showing vault by default, since moons and stars only shows 42% of Master System games and hides some good ones. I personally like to TAS hidden gems to try to show people some very good but not well known games.
Game choice is almost completely nonexistent as a judgement criteria, the Vault is to thank for that. Now "game choice" means no more than "choose an actual game", something that has actual gameplay and value and isn't a storybook about Noah's Ark or something.
I started this thread because I had concerns about the Vault tier in its current state, some of which I and many others still have to this day (though there are quite a few I've lost over time, most of which coming from getting a look behind the scenes as a staff member). I agree it's a huge shame that people tend to avoid games they know nothing about (especially Lord of the Sword, seriously underrated TAS), and as such those games end up getting pushed to Vault, but it's not really something we can deal with at the moment without some huge site architecture changes... Although we are looking into doing that in the near future, so who knows what could come about from that...?
That's not to say that we'd have a site redesign ready anytime soon even if we did decide to put it into motion, it would still take months of re-coding the site/forum architecture from scratch and all of our coding wizards have lives outside of the site, so sadly our current ways of doing things will have to remain for quite a while.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
better yet bring the RTA community's definition of 100% over here, then we'll absolutely take a second look at it,
For what it's worth, SpeedDemosArchive and Speedrun.com suggest that a 100% run of this game would include obtaining all the different items (weapons, armor, shields).
One thing is a bit unclear to me: If an any% run is accepted to Moons because of high entertainment value, and then later someone makes a boring but faster any% version which obsoletes it, will this new run be (kind of) "demoted" to Vault, or will it remain in Moons?
I'm still not sure why Moons has to be this mix of different categories, rather than a pure "non-any% non-100% runs that are worthy of publication" category, with Vault being for all any% and 100% runs.
(I would still like to see Vault being lifted from its "garbage dump" status to a place of glory: Only the very best runs get the honor of being published there. The rest get either rejected because of being sub-optimal, or just dumped to Moons because people found it entertaining enough to publish. Getting your run to Vault should be badge of honor, for being the best, for achieving the top, the world record for that game. It should not feel like infamy and shame.)
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Warp wrote:
One thing is a bit unclear to me: If an any% run is accepted to Moons because of high entertainment value, and then later someone makes a boring but faster any% version which obsoletes it, will this new run be (kind of) "demoted" to Vault, or will it remain in Moons?
It's much more likely that Vault runs get elevated to Moon rather than the opposite, but it can happen and has happened in the past. Example: Chrono Trigger. In general, however, straight improvements without much variation in entertainment will stay in the same tier. There has to be a significant raise or drop in entertainment level/audience feedback for us to consider re-tiering.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
Now infrequently posting on BlueskywarmCabin wrote:
You shouldn't need a degree in computer science to get into this hobby.
One thing is a bit unclear to me: If an any% run is accepted to Moons because of high entertainment value, and then later someone makes a boring but faster any% version which obsoletes it, will this new run be (kind of) "demoted" to Vault, or will it remain in Moons?
I'm still not sure why Moons has to be this mix of different categories, rather than a pure "non-any% non-100% runs that are worthy of publication" category, with Vault being for all any% and 100% runs.
That would be messy and weird.
Warp wrote:
(I would still like to see Vault being lifted from its "garbage dump" status to a place of glory: Only the very best runs get the honor of being published there. The rest get either rejected because of being sub-optimal, or just dumped to Moons because people found it entertaining enough to publish.
???? That would just flip flop the problem to Moons being the garbage dump instead of Vault.
Warp wrote:
Getting your run to Vault should be badge of honor, for being the best, for achieving the top, the world record for that game. It should not feel like infamy and shame.)
True for the most part, but what if you TAS like Where's Waldo or something and it takes you 15 minutes? Like, should you be proud of that?
effort on the first draft means less effort on any draft thereafter
- some loser
I'm still not sure why Moons has to be this mix of different categories, rather than a pure "non-any% non-100% runs that are worthy of publication" category, with Vault being for all any% and 100% runs.
That would be messy and weird.
I don't understand. How would having two clearly-defined unambiguous tiers for different types of runs "messy and weird". It would be significantly less "messy and weird" than the current system, where Moons is a mishmash of different categories with no other common requirement than a subjective "it's entertaining enough".
Warp wrote:
(I would still like to see Vault being lifted from its "garbage dump" status to a place of glory: Only the very best runs get the honor of being published there. The rest get either rejected because of being sub-optimal, or just dumped to Moons because people found it entertaining enough to publish.
???? That would just flip flop the problem to Moons being the garbage dump instead of Vault.
No, Moons would be the tier for all non-any% non-100% runs. It would be easier to get your run published there because the only requirement is entertainment, rather than beating someone else's high score. But that doesn't mean it would be a dump for everything. It would be a different category.
Warp wrote:
True for the most part, but what if you TAS like Where's Waldo or something and it takes you 15 minutes? Like, should you be proud of that?
Yes. You got the world record on that game. That ought to be an achievement worthy of recognition. Why not?