TASBot SGDQ 2015 feedback thread for improving future GDQ appearences

2015-08-05 03:51:32 pm

Keeper of TASBot

As keeper of TASBot I wanted to get some feedback on what realtime runners and the SDA community in general would like to see in future GDQ TAS blocks and provide a thread for feedback about the SGDQ 2015 TAS block. This seems like the best forum location for this but moderators, please feel free to move it. My thoughts about the SGDQ 2015 TAS block:

The awesome:

I was able to organize exhibiting Mega Man, Sonic Advance, and Ikaruga with commentary from respective realtime runners (cleartonic, Kirbymastah, and ShinerCCC - Thanks!)
The Mega Man game-end glitch run $10k donation incentive was fully met and then some, thanks in part to a $5k donation from Notch himself
Based on unofficial SGDQ 2015 statistics viewership during the block ranged from 135k to 139k
Combining the data from the last two sources shows the block helped raise over $35k for MSF (! - that's why I do this
The speed TASing competition announcement resulted in over 1,000 downloads of Streemerz from the mirror we set up and over 150 legit submissions completed the game with Mothrayas as the final winner
Arthur 'Mr. Podunkian' Lee, the original author of Streemerz, gave me permission to use his work, joined the #tasvideos freenode IRC channel during the competition, and even made a donation directly prior to the results playback
thefox who ported the original version of Streemerz to the NES gave me permission to redistribute the NES ROM file and even posted helpful memory addresses
While I was onsite at the event I often had TASBot with me and a number of people took selfies with TASBot - whenever I walked around *without* TASBot I might as well have been invisible

The not so awesome:

I did not do a good job of explaining why Rockman was in an emulator (we can't reliably console verify that run due to DelayStageClear glitch timing) or why Ikaruga was a video (we sort of touched on the disc read speed issues that will forever prevent console verification of consoles with discs but it could have been disclaimed better at the start); some people didn't understand we console verified Sonic Advance but even then the existence of content that wasn't console verified was a minor point of contention
Commenters in Reddit and elsewhere were downright abusive in describing how badly I disappointed them by not blowing their minds again (I won't be linking it, it's mostly vitriolic), with many incorrect references to "last year was awesome, this year sucked" even though the AGDQ 2015 TAS block was only 6 months ago
We didn't have everything worked out on the speed TAS competition judging methods due to some last minute scrambling and as a result the TASJudy script didn't have adequate time to run through all of the submissions, forcing me to announce the best results we had tabulated thus far (and slighting faster entrants including Mothrayas in the process). We later discovered I made an error in my beliefs of the sync stability between FCEUX and BizHawk which also caused problems; in the end, a real submission was made with the help of multiple authors
Overall, in the balance I'm very happy with how this event turned out, but I do have serious regrets for not doing a better job communicating while on stream that viewers should expect console oriented shenanigans at AGDQ and less extreme showings at SGDQ simply due to the amount of time preparing big exploits require

I have every intention of making TASVideos participation happen at AGDQ 2016 so any feedback you have on how this event went would be appreciated below. Thanks!

Thread title:

As keeper of TASBot I wanted to get some feedback on what realtime runners and the SDA community in general would like to see in future GDQ TAS blocks and provide a thread for feedback about the SGDQ 2015 TAS block.  This seems like the best forum location for this but moderators, please feel free to move it.  My thoughts about the SGDQ 2015 TAS block:

The awesome:[list][*]I was able to organize exhibiting [url=http://tasvideos.org/1686M.html]Mega Man[/url], [url=http://tasvideos.org/1665M.html]Sonic Advance[/url], and [url=http://tasvideos.org/2836M.html]Ikaruga[/url] with commentary from respective realtime runners (cleartonic, Kirbymastah, and ShinerCCC - Thanks!)
[*]The [url=http://tasvideos.org/2601M.html]Mega Man game-end glitch[/url] run [url=https://gamesdonequick.com/tracker/bid/3186]$10k donation incentive[/url] was fully met and then some, thanks in part to a [url=https://gamesdonequick.com/tracker/donor/42900/16]$5k donation from Notch himself[/url]
[*]Based on unofficial [url=http://irc.alligatr.co.uk/sgdq15/]SGDQ 2015 statistics[/url] viewership during the block ranged from 135k to 139k
[*]Combining the data from the last two sources shows the block helped raise over $35k for MSF ([b]![/b] - that's why I do this :)
[*]The [url=http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=16969]speed TASing competition announcement[/url] resulted in over 1,000 downloads of [url=http://fauxgame.com]Streemerz[/url] from the mirror we set up and over [url=https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/10X9Rw5fEWGrMJH6USfzumeKCviP5Fns-Et99-HZEqbI/edit?pli=1#gid=1740121230]150 legit submissions completed the game[/url] with [url=http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=414183]Mothrayas as the final winner[/url]
[*][url=http://www.superfundungeonrun.com/]Arthur 'Mr. Podunkian' Lee[/url], the original author of Streemerz, gave me permission to use his work, joined the #tasvideos freenode IRC channel during the competition, and even made a donation directly prior to the results playback
[*][url=http://kkfos.aspekt.fi]thefox[/url] who ported the original version of Streemerz to the NES gave me permission to redistribute the NES ROM file and even [url=http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=414116]posted helpful memory addresses[/url]
[*]While I was onsite at the event I often had TASBot with me and a number of people [url=https://twitter.com/Popskyy/status/627556359374901249]took selfies with TASBot[/url] - whenever I walked around *without* TASBot I might as well have been invisible :)
[/list]
The not so awesome:[list]
[*]I did not do a good job of explaining why Rockman was in an emulator (we can't reliably console verify that run due to DelayStageClear glitch timing) or why Ikaruga was a video (we sort of touched on the disc read speed issues that will forever prevent console verification of consoles with discs but it could have been disclaimed better at the start); some people didn't understand we console verified Sonic Advance but even then the existence of content that wasn't console verified was a minor point of contention
[*]Commenters in Reddit and elsewhere were downright abusive in describing how badly I disappointed them by not blowing their minds again (I won't be linking it, it's mostly vitriolic), with many incorrect references to "last year was awesome, this year sucked" even though the [url=http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15787]AGDQ 2015 TAS block[/url] was only 6 months ago
[*]We didn't have everything worked out on the speed TAS competition judging methods due to some last minute scrambling and as a result the [url=http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=414261#414261]TASJudy[/url] script didn't have adequate time to run through all of the submissions, forcing me to announce the best results we had tabulated thus far (and slighting faster entrants including Mothrayas in the process).  We later discovered [url=http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=413924]I made an error in my beliefs of the sync stability[/url] between FCEUX and BizHawk which also caused problems; in the end, a [url=http://tasvideos.org/4783S.html]real submission was made with the help of multiple authors[/url]
[*]Overall, in the balance I'm very happy with how this event turned out, but I do have serious regrets for not doing a better job communicating while on stream that viewers should expect console oriented shenanigans at AGDQ and less extreme showings at SGDQ simply due to the amount of time preparing big exploits require[/list]
I have every intention of making TASVideos participation happen at AGDQ 2016 so any feedback you have on how this event went would be appreciated below.  Thanks!

jpnance

2015-08-05 05:33:34 pm

I was in the audience for the entire TAS block so I'll jot down my thoughts on everything in order:

As somebody who's not very familiar with TAS methods, I really appreciated the introductory demo but it seemed like it went just a little bit over the "okay, we get the idea" threshold.
Mega Man was fun and I had no complaints with it.
Sonic Advance stole the show. It was a great idea to use a side-by-side video with one screen specifically tracking Sonic the entire way. Very well done!
The Ikaruga run got tedious for me after eight or ten minutes. I remember that the timer didn't start for it and there were multiple times when I found myself thinking, "How much longer is this going to last?" I'm sure that came, in part, from never having played Ikaruga myself (although I've never played Mega Man or Sonic Advance, either) but, to my eye, it was somewhat of a one-trick pony TAS. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my feeling that it was a little lame to just be watching a video, even though I understand that that's essentially what Mega Man was. I don't care as much as some others seem to, though.
The TAS challenge was a fantastic idea and I thought it was executed very well. Specifically, it was perfect that the game choice was something that could be finished in half an hour or so and TAS'd down to about six minutes.

Overall, I enjoyed the TAS block quite a bit and I certainly hope it sticks around. My main suggestion would be to always have some sort of introductory demo bit. Never assume that the people watching have seen this all before and, in fact, I think you should assume the opposite. I, personally, had a working knowledge of how a TAS is made but I'd never seen somebody actually do it. The demo was great for me.

I was in the audience for the entire TAS block so I'll jot down my thoughts on everything in order:

[list]
[*] As somebody who's not very familiar with TAS methods, I really appreciated the introductory demo but it seemed like it went just a little bit over the "okay, we get the idea" threshold.
[*] Mega Man was fun and I had no complaints with it.
[*] Sonic Advance stole the show. It was a great idea to use a side-by-side video with one screen specifically tracking Sonic the entire way. Very well done!
[*] The Ikaruga run got tedious for me after eight or ten minutes. I remember that the timer didn't start for it and there were multiple times when I found myself thinking, "How much longer is this going to last?" I'm sure that came, in part, from never having played Ikaruga myself (although I've never played Mega Man or Sonic Advance, either) but, to my eye, it was somewhat of a one-trick pony TAS. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my feeling that it was a little lame to just be watching a video, even though I understand that that's essentially what Mega Man was. I don't care as much as some others seem to, though.
[*] The TAS challenge was a fantastic idea and I thought it was executed very well. Specifically, it was perfect that the game choice was something that could be finished in half an hour or so and TAS'd down to about six minutes.
[/list]

Overall, I enjoyed the TAS block quite a bit and I certainly hope it sticks around. My main suggestion would be to always have some sort of introductory demo bit. Never assume that the people watching have seen this all before and, in fact, I think you should assume the opposite. I, personally, had a working knowledge of how a TAS is made but I'd never seen somebody actually do it. The demo was great for me.

dangodofthunder

2015-08-05 05:46:28 pm

I totally would have recognized you without TASBot. I do well recognizing voices and also, you were wearing the same shirt that you had on during AGDQ. Wink

I feel as though TAS Block was more technically impressive than it was a home run like AGDQ. I know Ikaruga is a difficult game, and I understand how impressive the TAS was on an academic level, but it didn't hit me in the WTFOMG part. I will admit that I was waiting for that, especially when Sonic Advance broke the camera. While I understand and appreciate Ikaruga TAS for what it is, it felt more like a TAS for TAS'ers than a TAS for the masses.

My complaint with the TAS Competition was that it felt very... hamfisted? I didn't even know it'd be on the schedule until I saw it, and I was there for TAS Block. Maybe I just have bad hearing, I dunno. Maybe putting it on the schedule next time would be very helpful, even if no details are divulged. That way people would know it's a thing without being able to prepare, which I'm sure was the point of the contest.

I totally would have recognized you without TASBot. I do well recognizing voices and also, you were wearing the same shirt that you had on during AGDQ. ;)

I feel as though TAS Block was more technically impressive than it was a home run like AGDQ. I know Ikaruga is a difficult game, and I understand how impressive the TAS was on an academic level, but it didn't hit me in the WTFOMG part. I will admit that I was waiting for that, especially when Sonic Advance broke the camera. While I understand and appreciate Ikaruga TAS for what it is, it felt more like a TAS for TAS'ers than a TAS for the masses.

My complaint with the TAS Competition was that it felt very... hamfisted? I didn't even know it'd be on the schedule until I saw it, and I was there for TAS Block. Maybe I just have bad hearing, I dunno. Maybe putting it on the schedule next time would be very helpful, even if no details are divulged. That way people would know it's a thing without being able to prepare, which I'm sure was the point of the contest.

azkiboh

2015-08-05 05:50:28 pm

Terribad is as terribad does

I will freely admit that I am an utter n00b when it comes to things like how TASing actually works, but most of the time, I enjoy watching the runs, or recording of runs. That said, Ikaruga was a bit overlong. It was a very technically impressive run, but didn't have the "oomph" of other TAS's I've watched. You did kind of go a bit...overboard at AGDQ 2015; allow me to apologize for people being ignorant and not understanding that doing the same thing over and over and over and over and over again loses its punch.
Overall, though, I enjoyed the TAS block, as I have in previous years. Keep up the excellent work at making us miserable humans look like we don't know what were doing with video games. Cheesy

(Also, finding the balance between explaining everything and letting the audience enjoy is quite tricky, but you seem to manage every time I've witnessed TASbot or yourself onstream or otherwise.)

dwangoAC

2015-08-05 06:09:46 pm

Keeper of TASBot

Quote from dangodofthunder:

My complaint with the TAS Competition was that it felt very... hamfisted? I didn't even know it'd be on the schedule until I saw it, and I was there for TAS Block.

This arrangement wasn't ideal for me either. My original submissions pitch included the speed TAS competition as its own "run" but it was rejected, at which point I tried to work out how I could get it to fit into the existing time we had and only fill up "setup" time by doing the replay during the setup block for Chrono Trigger. Staff was on board with that so the speed TAS competition got to stay but it never made it on the schedule. I tried to highlight in a donation comment that it was happening but my comment was rejected because the screener had never heard of TASVideos.org and had been told to reject all comments with web addresses. Thanks for the feedback, though!

dangodofthunder

2015-08-05 06:33:54 pm

Quote from dwangoAC:

Quote from dangodofthunder:

My complaint with the TAS Competition was that it felt very... hamfisted? I didn't even know it'd be on the schedule until I saw it, and I was there for TAS Block.

This arrangement wasn't ideal for me either. My original submissions pitch included the speed TAS competition as its own "run" but it was rejected, at which point I tried to work out how I could get it to fit into the existing time we had and only fill up "setup" time by doing the replay during the setup block for Chrono Trigger. Staff was on board with that so the speed TAS competition got to stay but it never made it on the schedule. I tried to highlight in a donation comment that it was happening but my comment was rejected because the screener had never heard of TASVideos.org and had been told to reject all comments with web addresses. Thanks for the feedback, though!

I was on donation station during SM64, Super Metroid, TASCompetition, and the first bit of Chrono Trigger. At around that point, I'd say we got maybe one donation every five seconds. It was a really bad time to try to do it. I know I processed Arthur Lee's comment, and it was a miracle I didn't accidentally chuck it despite being told to look out for it.

[quote="dwangoAC"][quote="dangodofthunder"]My complaint with the TAS Competition was that it felt very... hamfisted? I didn't even know it'd be on the schedule until I saw it, and I was there for TAS Block.[/quote]

This arrangement wasn't ideal for me either.  My original submissions pitch included the speed TAS competition as its own "run" but it was rejected, at which point I tried to work out how I could get it to fit into the existing time we had and only fill up "setup" time by doing the replay during the setup block for Chrono Trigger.  Staff was on board with that so the speed TAS competition got to stay but it never made it on the schedule.  I tried to highlight in a donation comment that it was happening but my comment was rejected because the screener had never heard of TASVideos.org and had been told to reject all comments with web addresses.  Thanks for the feedback, though!
[/quote]

I was on donation station during SM64, Super Metroid, TASCompetition, and the first bit of Chrono Trigger. At around that point, I'd say we got maybe one donation every five seconds. It was a really bad time to try to do it. I know I processed Arthur Lee's comment, and it was a miracle I didn't accidentally chuck it despite being told to look out for it.

SirNiko

Edit history:

SirNiko: 2015-08-05 07:21:30 pm

2015-08-05 07:19:57 pm

I enjoyed watching the TAS block, but only caught Megaman and Sonic. I very much enjoyed it, but I'm also very familiar with TASVideos and had seen the Sonic Advance camera hack run before.

I liked the introduction to TASing, and it was fun seeing the tools. It went on a little long, though. You really only needed to get hit once or twice before dodging to illustrate the point. Getting the lowest score in Megaman 1 was a poor example since we never had a chance to see how many frames were saved at the end during the score tally. In a future segment I would very much enjoy seeing more examples of RNG manipulation on a familiar game, like illustrating how you can force items from enemies to get an improbable result like three 1ups in a row or manipulating a boss's behavior to get good patterns (eg, have a save state ready to show how you can get Phantoon from Super Metroid to give an ideal attack pattern, as he is a boss regular GDQ viewers are familiar with). Testing the game beforehand to know the proper frames would speed things up, (eg, on the third attempt you should have gone directly to the correct frame for 50k points).

Games run as a video as opposed to a console don't bother me, although the technical wizardry behind running a TAS on actual hardware was impressive. The only negative is if you showcase an old but impressive video that I would have already seen on TASVideos. Keeping the videos short is very much ideal, and mixing in one console run in the mix is a good idea.

The TAS contest with Streemerz was doubly fun because I was familiar with the title, so I'm probably in a minority of viewers for that segment. It'd be very cool if you did another contest like it, especially if you teamed up with an indie developer again.

It might be fun to set up the TAS block so that one of the titles is played by a realtime player just before, during or after, with a discussion on how the ideal strategy for a realtime run differs from a TAS (eg, the TAS can perfectly manipulate RNG and employ risky strategies or frame perfect strategies that are impossible in real time). This would probably get very technical, though, and while I enjoy that kind of discussion it might not appeal to the wider audience. The ideal title would be played very differently by a TAS and a realtime player, like the wall zip tricks in Megaman 1.

I really like how TASVideos and SDA have strong synergy, and it's very cool to see you teaming up for GDQ!

I enjoyed watching the TAS block, but only caught Megaman and Sonic. I very much enjoyed it, but I'm also [u]very[/u] familiar with TASVideos and had seen the Sonic Advance camera hack run before.

I liked the introduction to TASing, and it was fun seeing the tools. It went on a little long, though. You really only needed to get hit once or twice before dodging to illustrate the point. Getting the lowest score in Megaman 1 was a poor example since we never had a chance to see how many frames were saved at the end during the score tally. In a future segment I would very much enjoy seeing more examples of RNG manipulation on a familiar game, like illustrating how you can force items from enemies to get an improbable result like three 1ups in a row or manipulating a boss's behavior to get good patterns (eg, have a save state ready to show how you can get Phantoon from Super Metroid to give an ideal attack pattern, as he is a boss regular GDQ viewers are familiar with). Testing the game beforehand to know the proper frames would speed things up, (eg, on the third attempt you should have gone directly to the correct frame for 50k points).

Games run as a video as opposed to a console don't bother me, although the technical wizardry behind running a TAS on actual hardware was impressive. The only negative is if you showcase an old but impressive video that I would have already seen on TASVideos. Keeping the videos short is very much ideal, and mixing in one console run in the mix is a good idea.

The TAS contest with Streemerz was doubly fun because I was familiar with the title, so I'm probably in a minority of viewers for that segment. It'd be very cool if you did another contest like it, especially if you teamed up with an indie developer again.

It might be fun to set up the TAS block so that one of the titles is played by a realtime player just before, during or after, with a discussion on how the ideal strategy for a realtime run differs from a TAS (eg, the TAS can perfectly manipulate RNG and employ risky strategies or frame perfect strategies that are impossible in real time). This would probably get very technical, though, and while I enjoy that kind of discussion it might not appeal to the wider audience. The ideal title would be played very differently by a TAS and a realtime player, like the wall zip tricks in Megaman 1.

I really like how TASVideos and SDA have strong synergy, and it's very cool to see you teaming up for GDQ!

kirbymastah

Edit history:

kirbymastah: 2015-08-05 10:58:42 pm

2015-08-05 10:57:28 pm

<(^_^)>

Quote from dwangoAC:

Commenters in Reddit and elsewhere were downright abusive in describing how badly I disappointed them by not blowing their minds again (I won't be linking it, it's mostly vitriolic), with many incorrect references to "last year was awesome, this year sucked" even though the AGDQ 2015 TAS block was only 6 months ago

Implying that people's unrealistic expectations is actually your fault. Though as you mentioned, it would've been nice to emphasize that AGDQ will have the more extreme "wtf" showings. But if people's complaints are that this tas block wasn't amazing compared to AGDQ2015, then they're setting their expectations high and it's not your issue at all.

Also reddit.

Sir VG

2015-08-06 01:03:19 am

Fucking Weeaboo

The /r/speedrun reddit has really started to become the next 4chan. Feel free to ignore it.

dwangoAC

2015-08-06 09:32:52 am

Keeper of TASBot

Quote from jpnance:

My main suggestion would be to always have some sort of introductory demo bit. Never assume that the people watching have seen this all before and, in fact, I think you should assume the opposite. I, personally, had a working knowledge of how a TAS is made but I'd never seen somebody actually do it. The demo was great for me.

That's a really good point, one I share fully - between not feeling my greatest health-wise and getting tripped up on my pre-memorized timings I didn't do as well as I could have in the explanation at the beginning (specifically, it *is* possible to start pressing buttons on frame 142, but I somehow was holding down select at the same time so it didn't work and it threw me off, we were only supposed to go through the bonus cycle three times, once for 70k, once for 100k to show the worst possible, and finally 50k, but I digress). If I had one thing that I was the most disappointed in myself it would be how poorly I did explaining what to expect at SGDQ compared to AGDQ and adding disclaimers to why certain things were videos. I don't dislike Dolphin but I didn't trust it to not desync and we've been plagued with those issues in past GDQ's.

Quote from SirNiko:

The TAS contest with Streemerz was doubly fun because I was familiar with the title, so I'm probably in a minority of viewers for that segment. It'd be very cool if you did another contest like it, especially if you teamed up with an indie developer again.

The feedback for the race has been extremely positive, albeit we could have handled things better (I said the wrong name for the doctor when announcing the game name and branch, the main TASVideos.org website went down because it wasn't set to enough simultaneous users at first, my git push that announced the name and branch name apparently didn't get pulled so others were scrambling to get the right branch name up, etc.). I seriously hope we can do it again but have the speed TAS'ers up against realtime runners who know the game ahead of time. And, yes, I would *really* like to pair up with an indie developer again, especially if we can get said game into a Humble Bundle. If someone reading this can help make this happen let me know! Smiley

Quote from SirNiko:

I really like how TASVideos and SDA have strong synergy, and it's very cool to see you teaming up for GDQ!

This is to me the most awesome thing that's come out of these, starting with my predecessor, DarkKobold. I want to continue to strengthen the ties between the two communities as much as possible, and for TASVideos I think that means improving our game resource pages further to give realtime runners more of the in-depth information than what exists on other walkthrough sites.

Thanks for the feedback, all! This is very valuable for me to know what to improve for next time. AGDQ will have the classic AGDQ wow factor, and the next SGDQ should have a really solid TAS playback with console verification if I can make it work out. Keep the feedback coming. Smiley

[quote="jpnance"]My main suggestion would be to always have some sort of introductory demo bit. Never assume that the people watching have seen this all before and, in fact, I think you should assume the opposite. I, personally, had a working knowledge of how a TAS is made but I'd never seen somebody actually do it. The demo was great for me.[/quote]

That's a really good point, one I share fully - between not feeling my greatest health-wise and getting tripped up on my pre-memorized timings I didn't do as well as I could have in the explanation at the beginning (specifically, it *is* possible to start pressing buttons on frame 142, but I somehow was holding down select at the same time so it didn't work and it threw me off, we were only supposed to go through the bonus cycle three times, once for 70k, once for 100k to show the worst possible, and finally 50k, but I digress).  If I had one thing that I was the most disappointed in myself it would be how poorly I did explaining what to expect at SGDQ compared to AGDQ and adding disclaimers to why certain things were videos.  I don't dislike Dolphin but I didn't trust it to not desync and we've been plagued with those issues in past GDQ's.

[quote="SirNiko"]The TAS contest with Streemerz was doubly fun because I was familiar with the title, so I'm probably in a minority of viewers for that segment. It'd be very cool if you did another contest like it, especially if you teamed up with an indie developer again.[/quote]

The feedback for the race has been extremely positive, albeit we could have handled things better (I said the wrong name for the doctor when announcing the game name and branch, the main TASVideos.org website went down because it wasn't set to enough simultaneous users at first, my git push that announced the name and branch name apparently didn't get pulled so others were scrambling to get the right branch name up, etc.).  I seriously hope we can do it again but have the speed TAS'ers up against realtime runners who know the game ahead of time.  And, yes, I would *really* like to pair up with an indie developer again, especially if we can get said game into a Humble Bundle.  If someone reading this can help make this happen let me know! :)

[quote="SirNiko"]I really like how TASVideos and SDA have strong synergy, and it's very cool to see you teaming up for GDQ![/quote]

This is to me the most awesome thing that's come out of these, starting with my predecessor, DarkKobold.  I want to continue to strengthen the ties between the two communities as much as possible, and for TASVideos I think that means improving our game resource pages further to give realtime runners more of the in-depth information than what exists on other walkthrough sites.

Thanks for the feedback, all!  This is very valuable for me to know what to improve for next time.  AGDQ will have the classic AGDQ wow factor, and the next SGDQ should have a really solid TAS playback with console verification if I can make it work out.  Keep the feedback coming. :)

TheTrout

2015-08-06 09:58:52 am

I really enjoy the TAS Block, and make sure I tune in no matter what whenever it appears. And I particularly liked the Mega Man and Sonic Advance runs, though I agree the "tutorial" part of the former went a bit long.

The Ikaruga segment, however, was really disappointing. Even though I was bummed out that it was basically just a video I could see on YouTube, the major downside was just that it wasn't very interesting to watch, and it went on forever. I felt like we got the gist of the run after the first level, but it kept on going for another twenty minutes of what - to me - felt like the same thing over and over again. Also, given that this is Games Done Quick, it didn't feel like an autoscrolling shmup was really the best fit for the marathon.

That said, I still look forward to future TAS runs!

dangodofthunder

2015-08-06 11:54:47 am

Quote from Sir VG:

The /r/speedrun reddit has really started to become the next 4chan. Feel free to ignore it.

I am of the opinion that scouring even the worst of the depths of the internet has value as long as you don't take it to heart. Sometimes even the peanut gallery has snippets of truth in their anger. I do feel like the bulk of the anger towards TASBlock came from expecting it to top AGDQ2015. I'll admit that was my expectation as well.

Worn_Traveler

2015-08-06 01:02:46 pm

Formerly known as Skullboy

I was at AGDQ 2014 and 15 and I watched the TASBot block from home last week and I enjoyed it. I wasn't expecting anything super crazy like at the AGDQ's or hoping for it to be honest since I'd rather see the more technical side of things like was done this time. The Sonic advance run was really cool to see with both cameras. I had seen the Mega Man TAS before (if it's the one from a few years ago) but seeing it again was cool.

I don't mind score runs like Ikaruga or shmup runs but I can see how it can get old quick for those wanting pure speed. Great job though and I look forward to whatever is planned next.

kirbymastah

2015-08-06 01:24:34 pm

<(^_^)>

Quote from dangodofthunder:

Quote from Sir VG:

The /r/speedrun reddit has really started to become the next 4chan. Feel free to ignore it.

I am of the opinion that scouring even the worst of the depths of the internet has value as long as you don't take it to heart. Sometimes even the peanut gallery has snippets of truth in their anger. I do feel like the bulk of the anger towards TASBlock came from expecting it to top AGDQ2015. I'll admit that was my expectation as well.

Eh. reddit's ok for most things that aren't related to GDQ. Of course, it's completely filled with GDQ-related threads during AGDQ/SGDQ and spreading false information and arbitrarily hating on stuff, so it becomes a complete hellhole :/

Mystery

2015-08-06 03:20:56 pm

My only real feedback is that whatever you do, make sure it's ready for the marathon. For every marathon now, everything has just been a rush and half-done by the time it got to the marathon. Whatever you choose, make sure you have time to finish it and make sure to finish up all preparations WAY before the marathon starts. For example, this speed competition. We knew it was going to hit the site hard. The site has gone down during the marathons before. We knew it was going to be a problem again. And yet, it happened again. Preparation is key. Everything else has been said.

And lastly... thanks for an entertaining part of the marathon and keep up the good work! Don't feel down because of some negative feedback. Performance may not have been stellar, but it has still been far better than nothing at all!

dwangoAC

Edit history:

dwangoAC: 2015-08-07 09:47:39 am

2015-08-07 09:41:35 am

Keeper of TASBot

Quote from Mystery:

My only real feedback is that whatever you do, make sure it's ready for the marathon. For every marathon now, everything has just been a rush and half-done by the time it got to the marathon.

This. More than anything, this comment sums up the most frustrating aspects of organizing something this big. For instance, last year my "deadline" was December 9th, 2014 (for *all* AGDQ 2015 prep except the final, final payload). We discovered very near that time that the original payload we were planning on deploying simply wasn't going to work (I won't say what it was as we may yet be able to salvage it in some form in the future), so we abandoned that path and Pokemon Plays Twitch became the new thing to do but it was a mad rush to get all the pieces in place. For SGDQ, I thought we had the auto-judging script handled the week before the marathon but it fell through and other people had to rush in at the last minute to rescue it. We actually *were* prepared on the website front in the sense that the server hosting the competition never went down but there was a misconfiguration with TASVideos.org itself on the number of simultaneous users allowed that prevented access to both the homepage and the iframe hosting the competition content. But that's still no excuse, we really, really should be ready on all fronts far earlier, and this remains my highest priority for the next GDQ events.

In fact, it's such a priority that this weekend I'll be making threads in the TASVideos forums for AGDQ 2016, SGDQ 2016, and AGDQ 2017 planning. What I have in mind for 2017 (which I discussed with several people at the marathon and involves the word "chaining") will take such an extreme amount of effort that I don't feel comfortable trying to shoehorn it into AGDQ 2016 simply because I really, really don't want to be doing the same scramble yet again. We'll show something interesting for AGDQ 2016, so have no fear. Thanks for the feedback!

[quote="Mystery"]My only real feedback is that whatever you do, make sure it's ready for the marathon. For every marathon now, everything has just been a rush and half-done by the time it got to the marathon.[/quote]

This.  More than anything, this comment sums up the most frustrating aspects of organizing something this big.  For instance, last year my "deadline" was December 9th, 2014 (for *all* AGDQ 2015 prep except the final, final payload).  We discovered very near that time that the original payload we were planning on deploying simply wasn't going to work (I won't say what it was as we may yet be able to salvage it in some form in the future), so we abandoned that path and Pokemon Plays Twitch became the new thing to do but it was a mad rush to get all the pieces in place.  For SGDQ, I thought we had the auto-judging script handled the week before the marathon but it fell through and other people had to rush in at the last minute to rescue it.  We actually *were* prepared on the website front in the sense that the server hosting the competition never went down but there was a misconfiguration with TASVideos.org itself on the number of simultaneous users allowed that prevented access to both the homepage and the iframe hosting the competition content.  But that's still no excuse, we really, really should be ready on all fronts far earlier, and this remains my highest priority for the next GDQ events.

In fact, it's such a priority that this weekend I'll be making threads in the TASVideos forums for AGDQ 2016, SGDQ 2016, and AGDQ 2017 planning.  What I have in mind for 2017 (which I discussed with several people at the marathon and involves the word "chaining") will take such an extreme amount of effort that I don't feel comfortable trying to shoehorn it into AGDQ 2016 simply because I really, really don't want to be doing the same scramble yet again.  We'll show something interesting for AGDQ 2016, so have no fear.  Thanks for the feedback!

scaryice

2015-08-07 10:08:02 pm

I think you should work together with some TASers to find a quality new submission that's nearing completion, and then keep it under wraps until the marathon so it can be debuted there.

ahdok

2015-08-09 07:55:47 am

Hi DwangoAC!

I watched the TASblock from the comfort of my lovely flat in the UK, and I wanted to say that I enjoyed it immensely, all the "this didn't blow our minds like last time" nonsense is just rubbish, ignore it.

I'll offer three bits of feedback that I think could make it even more awesome next time.

1) The step-by-step for how to actually TAS was pretty informative, but I agree that most viewers probably grasped it about halfway through. I reckon it was good to include for SGDQ because of the competition following, but I reckon if you're to repeat the competition in future marathons, the GDQ community is getting more familiar with what TASing involves now. On the other hand, detailed "How to" videos on TASvideo.org would be super cool, especially when you're offering tools to try it yourself, and sample games to work through! Putting all the "try it yourself" stuff together with the tools, how-to guides, and sample games to practice with on your site would be pretty neat!

2) I really enjoyed the competition and the run of streamers, but it did suffer a little from not knowing who submitted the videos you raced against each other... without a name to attribute to them it's a bit difficult to root for one or other half of a race. I guess the people who made each video could probably recognise their own runs though.

3) The competition was super cool, and I'd love to see similar competitions in future GDQs, perhaps even with a prize for the winner! - however it'd be really good to have it on the schedule so that people can be prepared, both for installing all the appropriate tools in advance, and for making sure they're not busy during the time-slot they're going to try to TAS in. The timeslot for the speed-TAS competition happened to overlap with a meal that we'd prepared to eat, so I didn't have much chance to take part. Knowing in advance that there'll be a competition between a specific set of times means I can make sure to keep that timeslot free to play along... and with everyone ready, all you need to do to set the race going is to put the game file up on the site and say "go" Smiley

But overall, the TASblock was awesome, and I thought it was presented very well.

Hi DwangoAC!

I watched the TASblock from the comfort of my lovely flat in the UK, and I wanted to say that I enjoyed it immensely, all the "this didn't blow our minds like last time" nonsense is just rubbish, ignore it.

I'll offer three bits of feedback that I think could make it even more awesome next time.

1) The step-by-step for how to actually TAS was pretty informative, but I agree that most viewers probably grasped it about halfway through. I reckon it was good to include for SGDQ because of the competition following, but I reckon if you're to repeat the competition in future marathons, the GDQ community is getting more familiar with what TASing involves now. On the other hand, detailed "How to" videos on TASvideo.org would be super cool, especially when you're offering tools to try it yourself, and sample games to work through! Putting all the "try it yourself" stuff together with the tools, how-to guides, and sample games to practice with on your site would be pretty neat!

2) I really enjoyed the competition and the run of streamers, but it did suffer a little from not knowing who submitted the videos you raced against each other... without a name to attribute to them it's a bit difficult to root for one or other half of a race. I guess the people who made each video could probably recognise their own runs though.

3) The competition was super cool, and I'd love to see similar competitions in future GDQs, perhaps even with a prize for the winner! - however it'd be really good to have it on the schedule so that people can be prepared, both for installing all the appropriate tools in advance, and for making sure they're not busy during the time-slot they're going to try to TAS in. The timeslot for the speed-TAS competition happened to overlap with a meal that we'd prepared to eat, so I didn't have much chance to take part. Knowing in advance that there'll be a competition between a specific set of times means I can make sure to keep that timeslot free to play along... and with everyone ready, all you need to do to set the race going is to put the game file up on the site and say "go" :)

But overall, the TASblock was awesome, and I thought it was presented very well.

MopeyJoe

2015-08-09 08:56:25 am

Something witty

I was in the room for the whole TAS block. My comments on it:

1: Like others have said, the segment on what is and how to TAS at the start did seem to go on a bit long. Not that it wasn't a good idea for people unfamiliar with the subject, but I think people got the idea after seeing how RNG manipulation works by loading save-states and trying new frames.

2: I thought the Sonic Advance 2 showing was a really neat idea with the console vs. camera-hack video. I feel like it shows just how ridiculous some TASs can go when attempting to get a "perfect" run (I know 2D Sonic TASs tend to have camera-hacks on them anyway).

3: I feel as though the Ikaruga TAS was really only something that you could appreciate the quality of if you have played Ikaruga. Some people I've heard talk about this TAS (who have played Ikaruga before) were talking about just how insane it was, but I haven't played Ikaruga before so it was didn't seem nearly as interesting to me. This is pretty standard with TASs being shown to people - they don't really understand unless they've played the game themselves - but I feel like it's more of a problem with Ikaruga because it wasn't nearly as popular as other games that could've been shown.

Overall, I thought this TAS block was a good introduction to TASs for people who've never seen it before given the "what is and how to TAS" segment at the start and the wide dynamic between the three games being shown (from a super broken NES game to a more modern GBA game that people might not think is broken to a score attack of an STG).

I was in the room for the whole TAS block. My comments on it:

1: Like others have said, the segment on what is and how to TAS at the start did seem to go on a bit long. Not that it wasn't a good idea for people unfamiliar with the subject, but I think people got the idea after seeing how RNG manipulation works by loading save-states and trying new frames.

2: I thought the Sonic Advance 2 showing was a really neat idea with the console vs. camera-hack video. I feel like it shows just how ridiculous some TASs can go when attempting to get a "perfect" run (I know 2D Sonic TASs tend to have camera-hacks on them anyway).

3: I feel as though the Ikaruga TAS was really only something that you could appreciate the quality of if you have played Ikaruga. Some people I've heard talk about this TAS (who have played Ikaruga before) were talking about just how insane it was, but I haven't played Ikaruga before so it was didn't seem nearly as interesting to me. This is pretty standard with TASs being shown to people - they don't really understand unless they've played the game themselves - but I feel like it's more of a problem with Ikaruga because it wasn't nearly as popular as other games that could've been shown.

Overall, I thought this TAS block was a good introduction to TASs for people who've never seen it before given the "what is and how to TAS" segment at the start and the wide dynamic between the three games being shown (from a super broken NES game to a more modern GBA game that people might not think is broken to a score attack of an STG).

JaggerG

2015-08-10 02:50:15 am

Jumping Turtle

A peeve of mine is saying something a TAS is doing is "really good" and continuously comparing it to human records. It's fine from time to time, but I felt it had been missing some of the explanation that the goal is nothing less than perfection, and pointing out examples of both insanely difficult tricks in real time, and straight-up impossible tricks. Maybe bring up memory addresses.

Good luck next year!

z1mb0bw4y

2015-08-10 09:08:29 am

Gets the cake.

I'd like to say that while I enjoyed the TASBot block despite having already seen all of the TASes in it, I understand the criticism Ikaruga is getting. That's one of those games that I don't believe a lot of people have necessarily played, and it's unfortunately not as entertaining to those that have no experience with it. Perhaps a better choice for a longer game during the block would be something like SM64 70 star (highly movement based, a lot of people have played it, also likely too long for a single game during the block unless you get your block time lengthened) or OoT any% (also pretty dependent on movement, a few "WAIT WHAT" glitch moments even for people that have seen ganondoor already, significantly shorter than SM64 70 star). I know that gamecube TASes are basically impossible to console verify, but now that we've played video for ikaruga we could potentially do similar things for Melee since that's a game that's been gaining some momentum recently, and the Samus Adventure TAS is really really cool.

dwangoAC

2015-08-10 09:33:41 am

Keeper of TASBot

Quote from JaggerG:

A peeve of mine is saying something a TAS is doing is "really good" and continuously comparing it to human records.

I felt we discussed this a fair bit, including referencing how you would need to do 22 frame-perfect inputs in a row during Sonic Advance and during Ikaruga pointing out the different strategies that human runners employ compared to what the TAS did.
Having said that, I *really* blew the explanation in my opinion despite practicing it several times and reshaping it more than once - when I got on camera my pre-remembered input of 142 as the first frame of Mega Man that should have started the movie didn't work for some reason and it threw me off completely and I wasted over a minute trying to find a new offset that started the game with the shortest bonus counter. I re-watched my own presentation and discovered that I was somehow bumping the select button which prevented my input.
Because I wasn't playing on my "script" I got thrown off and I was feeling so physically ill and jittery that when I finally got into the level and I was trying to show how jumping slightly would affect enemies I kept hitting the wrong buttons and because I was already going long I decided to cut my losses and just start the replay. I hope to rehearse an intro segment for AGDQ 2016 and do this far better. I want to make it very clear to viewers that what is being shown is as fast as the hardware can possibly handle it, removing the limitations of human skill and reflexes.

Quote from z1mb0bw4y:

I'd like to say that while I enjoyed the TASBot block despite having already seen all of the TASes in it, I understand the criticism Ikaruga is getting. That's one of those games that I don't believe a lot of people have necessarily played, and it's unfortunately not as entertaining to those that have no experience with it.

Out of all the feedback I've received it seems like Ikaruga was the most divisive run. On the one hand, several people at SGDQ told me that they have a huge amount of difficulty getting their shoot'em'up games into the marathon and how much they enjoyed Ikaruga but what I've discovered is that the people who liked the Ikaruga run *really* liked it and most everyone else thought it went on too long or was a poor choice. One thing worth repeating is that if viewers have had an opportunity to play a given game in the past it's far more impactful when it's torn to shreds in front of their eyes, and the lineup we pitched that was accepted wasn't exactly the games that most people had previously played. We're hoping to lean back toward mainstream titles as best we can, although we'll generally be limited by whatever content is actually available, i.e. things where TAS's exist of the right length and there's an obvious difference between realtime runners and the TAS.

I like your OoT suggestion but honestly I think the realtime community might have surpassed the TAS community. Smiley

This is perhaps a good time for someone to come in and make a new TAS that works with micro500's N64Bot but I think it would only be a good idea if the TAS route was different than what was just shown at SGDQ 2015. I'd definitely like to represent me some Zelda, though - the only GDQ Zelda TAS appearance so far was the AGDQ 2014 bonus stream where we ran through Zelda II (man, that seems like so long ago... Smiley

Thanks again for all the feedback, all - there are now forum threads on TASVideos.org in the Sites forum for planning the next three events that I'm deliberately not linking from here but you are welcome to go there if you want to be spoiled and/or want to help out.

[quote="JaggerG"]A peeve of mine is saying something a TAS is doing is "really good" and continuously comparing it to human records.[/quote]

I felt we discussed this a fair bit, including referencing how you would need to do 22 frame-perfect inputs in a row during Sonic Advance and during Ikaruga pointing out the different strategies that human runners employ compared to what the TAS did.
Having said that, I *really* blew the explanation in my opinion despite practicing it several times and reshaping it more than once - when I got on camera my pre-remembered input of 142 as the first frame of Mega Man that should have started the movie didn't work for some reason and it threw me off completely and I wasted over a minute trying to find a new offset that started the game with the shortest bonus counter.  I re-watched my own presentation and discovered that I was somehow bumping the select button which prevented my input.
Because I wasn't playing on my "script" I got thrown off and I was feeling so physically ill and jittery that when I finally got into the level and I was trying to show how jumping slightly would affect enemies I kept hitting the wrong buttons and because I was already going long I decided to cut my losses and just start the replay.  I hope to rehearse an intro segment for AGDQ 2016 and do this far better.  I want to make it very clear to viewers that what is being shown is as fast as the hardware can possibly handle it, removing the limitations of human skill and reflexes.

[quote="z1mb0bw4y"]I'd like to say that while I enjoyed the TASBot block despite having already seen all of the TASes in it, I understand the criticism Ikaruga is getting. That's one of those games that I don't believe a lot of people have necessarily played, and it's unfortunately not as entertaining to those that have no experience with it.[/quote]

Out of all the feedback I've received it seems like Ikaruga was the most divisive run.  On the one hand, several people at SGDQ told me that they have a huge amount of difficulty getting their shoot'em'up games into the marathon and how much they enjoyed Ikaruga but what I've discovered is that the people who liked the Ikaruga run *really* liked it and most everyone else thought it went on too long or was a poor choice.  One thing worth repeating is that if viewers have had an opportunity to play a given game in the past it's far more impactful when it's torn to shreds in front of their eyes, and the lineup we pitched that was accepted wasn't exactly the games that most people had previously played.  We're hoping to lean back toward mainstream titles as best we can, although we'll generally be limited by whatever content is actually available, i.e. things where TAS's exist of the right length and there's an obvious difference between realtime runners and the TAS.

I like your OoT suggestion but honestly I think the realtime community might have surpassed the TAS community. :)  This is perhaps a good time for someone to come in and make a new TAS that works with micro500's N64Bot but I think it would only be a good idea if the TAS route was different than what was just shown at SGDQ 2015.  I'd definitely like to represent me some Zelda, though - the only GDQ Zelda TAS appearance so far was the AGDQ 2014 bonus stream where we ran through Zelda II (man, that seems like so long ago... :)

Thanks again for all the feedback, all - there are now forum threads on TASVideos.org in the Sites forum for planning the next three events that I'm deliberately not linking from here but you are welcome to go there if you want to be spoiled and/or want to help out.

Mystery

2015-08-10 09:44:55 am

You don't think it would've made an impact showing a Zelda any% TAS after the realtime run, showing how to perfectly get into position and getting the item on the first try, every time? At least it could be good for showing off what a TAS is, I think.

dwangoAC

2015-08-10 09:48:20 am

Keeper of TASBot

Quote from Mystery:

You don't think it would've made an impact showing a Zelda any% TAS after the realtime run, showing how to perfectly get into position and getting the item on the first try, every time? At least it could be good for showing off what a TAS is, I think.

Possibly so, but I *really* don't want to make it look like we're shaming a human - while we could definitely demonstrate how we have full mastery of luck manipulation I somehow think doing that would have been in poor taste. It's... a tricky balance. You're probably on to something, though.

Mystery

2015-08-10 11:34:05 am

Yeah, but eventually we'll end up trampling someone's feet, though. This year had several mario 64 runs, so even if we were to pick that game, we'd be "tramping" over those runners. I think it is best to make it entirely clear that a TAS is more like an art - you make something like a movie in advance and then play it back, while speedrunning is about demonstrating skills, often in the fact of unpredictability and memorization. And of course, make it absolutely clear that TASes aren't meant to compete with real-time runs.