Current Events > Tool Assissted Speedruns are not impressive at all

(+) Yeah! (+)

Change my mind

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I think the patience required to play a game frame-by-frame is impressive.

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Lateralus is a performance enhancing album
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catIRL posted...

I think the patience required to play a game frame-by-frame is impressive.

Nah, anyone can do that just most have more sense than to do it

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The Super Mario Bros world record is pretty damn close to the TAS run, aint that impressive?

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I like them both. Seeing a human at their best is great. Seeing what could potentially be the peak performance in a game is interesting.

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Foppe posted...

The Super Mario Bros world record is pretty damn close to the TAS run, aint that impressive?

The Super Mario Bros world record is impressive, the fact that it's close to the TAS is super impressive

The TAS itself is not impressive

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dolomedes posted...

i mean some people are into that kind of thing

if you aren't that's cool

i'm not. i don't ever think about it. i tend to forget that's a thing.

This tbqh
I dont personally find speed runs in general to be all that impressive, and that's okay because lots of people do

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Kaldrenthebold posted...

I like them both. Seeing a human at their best is great. Seeing what could potentially be the peak performance in a game is interesting.

Agreed that TAS can be interesting

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They take a long time to make, and are an expression of deep game knowledge rather than skill with a controller. TAS runners are typically the most knowledgeable players of a particular game, and TAS only glitches often lead to important RTA breakthroughs when a setup is found to consistently get difficult inputs. But know that theoretically every single frame where there can be an input the TAS runner has put some thought into how to make it the most optimal frame by frame. Imagine it as a sort optimization puzzle.

This is part of why many speed runners find good TAS runs impressive, and also why it is not as easy to understand why a particular TAS is impressive or important without knowing the mechanics of the speed game in question imo. Knowing the RTA equivalent run and understanding why they're different offers a new level of appreciation.

Of course, if you aren't impressed by deep game knowledge, that's fine. A lot of people are, hence the popularity of that Mario 64 parallel universe idea/meme.

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https://youtu.be/OPcV9uIY5i4

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I think it can be interesting to see how theoretically fast a game can be beaten but the element of human input and error will always out way the appeal of a TAS

Jabodie posted...

hence the popularity of that Mario 64 parallel universe idea/meme.

Tell me more about this, this sounds interesting.

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KillerSlaw posted...

The Super Mario Bros world record is impressive, the fact that it's close to the TAS is super impressive

The TAS itself is not impressive

But the TAS run is the reason that the world record is super impressive.

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Garioshi posted...

https://youtu.be/OPcV9uIY5i4

Okay, I guess this would be a case of the knowledge behind it being impressive to me. I'll give you this one.

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KillerSlaw posted...

Tell me more about this, this sounds interesting.

https://youtu.be/kpk2tdsPh0A
TASers have absolutey fucking bonkers knowledge of the games they run.

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Foppe posted...

But the TAS run is the reason that the world record is super impressive.

But it's done by a program so it isn't impressive. The fact the person can come close to the program is what is impressive.

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Garioshi posted...

https://youtu.be/kpk2tdsPh0A
TASers have absolutey fucking bonkers knowledge of the games they run.

Yeah, but I want to know more about this parallel universe idea/meme

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KillerSlaw posted...

Yeah, but I want to know more about this parallel universe idea/meme

That's why you should watch it

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Garioshi posted...

https://youtu.be/kpk2tdsPh0A
TASers have absolutey fucking bonkers knowledge of the games they run.

Yeah, this long ass video for a meme run (theoretical minimum A press run) explains it. It is also where the half A press meme comes from. It's long, but it's pretty entertaining.

Take the Super Mario Bros run. The most relevant TAS was probably made years ago, and back then flash pole glitch was probably brand spanking new and only a few "deep knowledge" types knew about it. So somebody made a TAS, and over the years people have found setups for frame perfect inputs to match it. It may not be impressive now since humans can replicate it in RTA (and it's a fairly short run), but back when it was made things might have been seen differently.

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Garioshi posted...

https://youtu.be/OPcV9uIY5i4

https://youtu.be/Ixu8tn__91E

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Garioshi posted...

That's why you should watch it

I'm pretty sure I've seen this video before and it's about how they get through SM64 holding the A button. I don't remember anything about parallel universes but it's been a while so I'll watch again.

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Its interesting to see a theoretical perfect run, even if its impossible for a normal human to input.

arbitrary code is great though

https://youtu.be/JxgEXDnXD6M


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KillerSlaw posted...

I'm pretty sure I've seen this video before and it's about how they get through SM64 holding the A button. I don't remember anything about parallel universes but it's been a while so I'll watch again.

This guy made a few videos about minimum A press runs. But this is probably his most ridiculous strategy so he made a video about it.

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Watched TASBot beat Mega Man II at MAGFest this January.

For the most part is was pretty okay to watch.

Then he went up against the dragon in Wily's Castle and started jumping off the blocks that the dragon was throwing at him and I'm like "okay this is pretty cool".

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Jabodie posted...

This guy made a few videos about minimum A press runs. But this is probably his most ridiculous strategy so he made a video about it.

I must have seen one of the other ones then. I'll watch it

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There's also more TAS runs that are sort goals for runners. For instance, SM64 will occasionally have a "fastest possible human input" sort of TAS using the current possible/ popular strategies for humans, which gives runners an idea of how much optimization is possible. Easier to motivate yourself for WR attempts if you know there's a whole 5 minutes to save or whatever.

Edit: I meant to say these are not very impressive, but they are still useful. But they are naturally a lot easier to make.

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I kinda agree with TC.

One time I watched a youtube video of this guy obviously using tool assisted on his run. Problem was he didn't care to mention he was using any tools so I called him out on it in the comments, and he admitted that he was using tools. I told him if he was using tools that he should mention it in the video or at least in the description but he refused. Like wtf...

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sometimes when a game's engine/physics are expressive enough a TAS can be really cool as just a demo of how much freedom the player theoretically has and how much power the game really provides you that you can never realistically harness

TASes that are just "here's a pretty normal looking run just very optimal down to the frame" are not that interesting imo

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Veggeta X posted...

I kinda agree with TC.

One time I watched a youtube video of this guy obviously using tool assisted on his run. Problem was he didn't care to mention he was using any tools so I called him out on it in the comments, and he admitted that he was using tools. I told him if he was using tools that he should mention it in the video or at least in the description but he refused. Like wtf...

Probably for the views/ watch time. Kinda scummy, tbh.

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I don't care what kind of music that speedrunners listen to. The idea of getting an 'assist' from it is ridiculous

I like crazy TAS videos, like this when the three first Megaman X games are being played at the same time with the same inputs.
https://youtu.be/To3d6XKsMcQ

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I enjoy TASes to see insanely broken shit people cant do and as a hypothetical ceiling to how much people could break the game

smb portal run from last years agdq is not impressive as a run its just fuckin fun to watch

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TAS not only takes a lot of patience, but an intricately deep understanding of the game.

TAS also help human runners because they can use info gathered from the TAS to develop new strategies and routing

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TAS are impressive, just for different reasons. More about technical display than human limits.

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i wish they made speedruns with every cutscene intact.. ideally with text which can be sped through since you(the viewer) can always pause.

that way you see people play at their best while still being able to catch whatever plot the game has.
actual speedruns just skip everything and let's plays etc. are more or less played by people who seem to play the game for the first time and take their time with everything.

anyways one thing that's always fun to watch are cool fight choreography in fighters which would never happen without tool assists:
https://youtu.be/bwkzd504eaE

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AsucaHayashi posted...

i wish they made speedruns with every cutscene intact.. ideally with text which can be sped through since you(the viewer) can always pause.

that way you see people play at their best while still being able to catch whatever plot the game has.
actual speedruns just skip everything and let's plays etc. are more or less played by people who seem to play the game for the first time and take their time with everything.

That wouldnt be going as fast as possible though. You also do realize that some runners do thousands of runs in a game. It would obviously be awful having to sit through cutscenes if you could skip them

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Alpha218 posted...

That wouldnt be going as fast as possible though. You also do realize that some runners do thousands of runs in a game. It would obviously be awful having to sit through cutscenes if you could skip them

it would be in the context of your own control. the only thing you're not allowed to skip are cutscenes which always move at their own pace. doesn't mean people have to do it thousands of times, i just wish there were somebody who did it once per game.

for instance one game i see as literally impossible to speedrun in the traditional sense where you skip asap is max payne 3. cutscenes are unskippable for the most part and iirc the times it does allow you to finally skip when the game is "done loading(xfd)" are different for everybody.

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