automated runs

2005-12-17 08:14:53 pm

the cause of and solution to all life's problems

Perhaps this question has come up before, but I didn't see it in the faq...

How would you feel if a computer was driving the controller, either via servos & actuators actually pushing down the buttons, or perhaps by behaving as a wireless controller and talking to a console's IR port?

I suppose it could redefine the idea of precision gaming.

Has it been done, and should there be a special category if it is ever done?

Thread title:

Hitaro

Edit history:

Hitaro: 2005-12-17 08:19:25 pm

2005-12-17 08:18:26 pm

Hmm...

Why the hell would you want to see a run like that, other than pure entertainement? And besides, we already have enough TASers; we don't really need (or want) robots or something.

Kibbo

2005-12-17 08:19:10 pm

TIOLET!

I guess that would fall under "Tool-assisted".

slYnki

2005-12-17 08:35:02 pm

XXY

Yeah, it wouldn't be allowed on the site. But that still is a very cool idea o.o;

nugget

2005-12-17 08:53:24 pm

the cause of and solution to all life's problems

Quote:

Hmm...

Why the hell would you want to see a run like that, other than pure entertainement?

Entertainment being the reason I play games to begin with...I'm comfortable to subscribe to that rationale Smiley

It might be interesting for 2 other reasons: curiosity and coaching. To find out if it is possible, even if not humanly possible, to take a certain course or line through a game, and to coach a human to the point where a human could approximate it.

Psychochild

2005-12-17 09:07:06 pm

Didn't the Mega Man TAS have a program play it for eight seconds?

It's not much, but yeah.

Gigafrost

Edit history:

Gigafrost: 2005-12-17 11:20:03 pm

2005-12-17 11:19:31 pm

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

Quote:

To find out if it is possible, even if not humanly possible, to take a certain course or line through a game

That's what we at the Tool-Assisted community already work to answer. The emulator tools are probably as good as we'll get to a machine that can automatically play perfectly.

Quote:

and to coach a human to the point where a human could approximate it.

We do a little of this, but mostly the people speed running the game already know it well enough to understand what we've done and whether or not it's feasible to do in a normal run. Smiley

Quote:

Didn't the Mega Man TAS have a program play it for eight seconds?

It's not much, but yeah.

Maybe it played for 8 seconds, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't 8 continuous seconds. It was used at specific parts to manipulate luck and possibly one other place for a small maneuver, but it is purely random and quite unable to really play at all.

Pweisger

2005-12-18 06:29:09 am

PwNzRd!

Bots can be developed to play games for you (mostly RPGs), but they are very simple currently, in that they only do a certain amount of actions, but couldn't play a whole game by themself. Oh, and by bots I mean programs, not robots.

trihex

2005-12-18 07:22:39 am

Yoshi's eggs are at my mercy!

<completely unrelated to anything currently being discussed>

EGM once featured somebody who built a miniature robot that could beat Level 1-1 of Super Mario Bros.

</completely unrelated to anything currently being discussed>

soteos

Edit history:

soteos: 2005-12-18 08:47:40 am

2005-12-18 08:34:05 am

They already have programs that play the game. It's what makes the computer players punch you in SSB, shoot you in Counterstrike, build up and battle you in rts/turn-based games, etc.

trihex

2005-12-18 09:34:49 am

Yoshi's eggs are at my mercy!

Quote:

They already have programs that play the game. It's what makes the computer players punch you in SSB, shoot you in Counterstrike, build up and battle you in rts/turn-based games, etc.

Oh, I'm sorry, I meant to add that it was built out of Legos, and some sort of battery that automated it's timing.

grndino

Edit history:

grndino: 2005-12-18 09:44:42 am

2005-12-18 09:42:56 am

I've always wondered how scripts get away with being included in runs. You can 180 perfectly, but you can't use a turbo controller? Sure the console is part of Half-Life, but those Mad Cats controllers are Nintendo-Certified. Grin

(err...IIRC)

nugget

2005-12-18 07:23:05 pm

the cause of and solution to all life's problems

Quote:

That's what we at the Tool-Assisted community already work to answer. The emulator tools are probably as good as we'll get to a machine that can automatically play perfectly.

I don't suppose you have a PS2 or X360 emulator... I don't have a program that can talk to a wireless controller either.

Zurreco

2005-12-18 09:20:29 pm

Just call me the cynicism machine

BisqBot can be programmed to play games like this. However, it is really hit or miss, sometimes. You have to program in all of the game's little quirks, and then walk away and let BisqBot play the game at night at some super high speed. Then you have it filter out all movies that involved death, and all movies that do not progress forward level wise, and those that do not reach the final level, and there you will have what you want.

However, the chances of BisqBot playing a full game all the way through without screwing up are so rare that it probably won't happen. The only applicable method for BisqBot is to manipulate luck through strong arming, and a lot of the people at nesvideos already do this ( :-/)

xyzzy

2005-12-18 10:52:17 pm

Rest in pieces.

There are aim-bots for FPS games. They're used online by cheaters, though, but possibly someone would want to make a speedrun using such a bot. Those bots don't know how to use tricks or move after the opponent, and they have to be controlled. Usually cheaters are easily detected by their lousy moving and inhuman aim.
Well, I'm not sure if an aim-bot can be written for absolutely any game. And it's so annoying to duel someone with wallhack who can know where you are without usage of brains. Probably recording runs in this way is a bad idea, it could encourage some people to pretend they recorded those runs without bots. I can't see how inhuman aim could go unnoticed, though, but maybe if you turn aimbot on and off in all the right moments, it could.

Kibbo

2005-12-18 10:57:10 pm

TIOLET!

Experienced players can often tell if an aimbot is involved or not. Most of the time its because of the ridiculous reaction times they yield and glued-on-like precision to target's heads.

xyzzy

2005-12-19 01:31:14 am

Rest in pieces.

True. I wasn't saying it was possible to pretend not to cheat. When your opponent manages to hit you without disruption with shaft, that looks laughable. But probably someone could invent a way to make aim less precise - maybe some enhancement of an aim-bot which would make aim less precise overall and then randomize it or something. 'Players' still wouldn't have to aim, but would look more human.
For instance, Spiterbot 0.52 has different aiming skills, and given about 40% can pass for human. This bot also randomizes shots - the more randomly you move, the more it will randomize. If the authour made aim percentage setting possible for every weapon, that would look even more human.
It's great that it's not an aimbot=}.

Using scripts for an automated run might be useful, too, at least in a game that supports them. This ftp://84.204.210.67/99_q3dm17_apparentlycpmisforbots.dm_68 is ideal strafing, everything is precise and ideal. Fun to watch=}.

Quake 4 singleplayer could be automatically run using scripts in the same way and using aimbots (when they're released). But as strafing and all good things are gone from singleplayer, it wouldn't be that interesting.

True. I wasn't saying it was possible to pretend not to cheat. When your opponent manages to hit you without disruption with shaft, that looks laughable. But probably someone could invent a way to make aim less precise - maybe some enhancement of an aim-bot which would make aim less precise overall and then randomize it or something. 'Players' still wouldn't have to aim, but would look more human. 
For instance, Spiterbot 0.52 has different aiming skills, and given about 40% can pass for human. This bot also randomizes shots - the more randomly you move, the more it will randomize. If the authour made aim percentage setting possible for every weapon, that would look even more human. 
It's great that it's not an aimbot=}.

Using scripts for an automated run might be useful, too, at least in a game that supports them. This ftp://84.204.210.67/99_q3dm17_apparentlycpmisforbots.dm_68 is ideal strafing, everything is precise and ideal. Fun to watch=}.

Quake 4 singleplayer could be automatically run using scripts in the same way and using aimbots (when they're released). But as strafing and all good things are gone from singleplayer, it wouldn't be that interesting.

Enhasa

2005-12-19 03:51:55 am

everybody wanna tell you the meaning of music

I have always said that they could make aimbots and poker bots that would be tough to detect by playing non-perfectly. I don't play either FPS's or poker online anymore, so I guess this can be somebody else's problem someday.

And xyzzy, I love your name. Have you actually played Colossal Cave?

Pweisger

2005-12-19 06:44:02 am

PwNzRd!

Tell me about it xyzzy, that's why I left Soldier of Fortune 2, and I too like your name, brings back memories. Smiley

StrangenessDSS

Edit history:

StrangenessDSS: 2005-12-19 07:29:41 am

2005-12-19 07:29:29 am

Sleeping Terror

Heh. I once used the name xyzzy... long, long ago.

Radioactive Jellyfish

2005-12-19 04:40:00 pm

Isn't it cute?

Ahhhhhhhh... Colossal Cave.....

Great name! Makes me want to break out all my Text Adventures. OHH! Speedruns of Text Adventures! They'd be so boring to watch!

Enhasa

2005-12-19 09:53:53 pm

everybody wanna tell you the meaning of music

Quote:

Heh. I once used the name xyzzy... long, long ago.

Maybe it's your future self, who invented a time machine, went back in time to warn your present self of something, overshot and mucked around in your past, before finally arriving in the present, and is then going to defeat Magus, and finally go see Arche. And perhaps that "something" is... use this magic cheat so that you can win in Minesweeper or else THE MINE WILL EXPLODE! Or it could just be a coincidence.

Quote:

Ahhhhhhhh... Colossal Cave.....

Great name! Makes me want to break out all my Text Adventures. OHH! Speedruns of Text Adventures! They'd be so boring to watch!

I'd watch speedruns of text adventures, although they wouldn't make it on to SDA. MUDs and MOOs are better than MMOs also. Wink

xyzzy

2005-12-19 10:51:59 pm

Rest in pieces.

So nice that many people still remember Colossal Cave!=}. Text adventures are always with us, at least as memories=}.

I can't picture someone speedrunning them, though. That would just require fast typing and learning by heart what to do=}.

Lag.Com

2005-12-20 02:05:42 am

sda loyalist

I played a great deal of MUDs back when I was younger (than now). Now I've moved onto WoW, which is... a graphical MUD. Smiley

VorpalEdge

2005-12-20 03:22:21 am

welcome to the machine

It is dark. You are likely to be eaten by a Grue.