We've removed TSA's runs from the site [locked]

2011-03-28 11:16:28 pm

.

Quote from arkarian:

lol who gives a fuck about tsa

>:[

2011-03-28 11:46:45 pm

The thing is, TSA, when you are unable to record everything in one go, if you need to change DVD, VHS or whatever, you simply pause the game and then continue the recording. What were your reasons to redo from scratch up to the point you left off and then continue recording? That's the real issue here.

When it comes to the TLoZ run, you said that the run was all recorded in one go. But this has been proven wrong because of the bomb drop from the blue octorok. What is your explanation here? I also verified this on console myself and the outcome was always the same, which was a regular rupee drop from the octorok instead of the bombs.

TSA

Edit history:

TSA: 2011-03-29 10:35:04 am

2011-03-29 12:06:30 am

Retired

Quote from mikwuyma:

CrypticJacknife: These runs were verified back in 2004-2006, and verification was a lot different back then. One verifier was common, and the results were never publically posted.

I don't think verificaiton really needs to be changed because of this incident.

EDIT: Even if you didn't mean to cheat TSA, you still passed off segmented runs at single-segment.

Quote from andrewg:

How can you record a single segment speed run in chunks? That makes no sense.

Just for clarification sake:
http://www.archive.org/details/ZeldaOoT_525

Quote:

There is discontinuity in this run that probably nobody would notice, and even though it has zero effect on gameplay or time, I felt the need to still mention it. I "magically" have the Deku Nut icon in my sub menu somewhere through the run, but it reads as zero. How did I get them, and how did I dispose of them? I start/stop record my runs cuz these raw files use up a ton of memory, and I don't have the greatest hard drive in the world. So I have to conserve memory, and I break up files and send then as I do runs, and delete them after they are sent. Thus, it is a real one time run, but I interrupt recording, and we don't factor in the time to change to a new file.

I wasn't actually - when recording the runs - doing segmented by your guys current definition. By current definitions it was real-time attack. As I've tried telling people, this was how some of my runs were done back then, and it was public knowledge. However, the wrongdoing here is me submitting incorrect parts of a playthrough, resulting in parts from different attempts getting mixed up. In all honesty, this screwed me over more than helped me.

And again, for clarification's sake, not all my runs were guilty of this mix-up. None of the segmented runs were (FSA, TWW, MM), and any of my older runs digitized from VHS should have zero issue under the harshest of scrutiny. And some of these were before and after the messed up runs.

Tompa - No, I was not correct in what I said. That run was done on the GCN version and was done on my old card actually. I dug through whatever I could find from back then (which isn't much), and to be clear in how I did capture - for the sake of making whoever combined my files back into one, I would stop at a transition, usually BEFORE going into a dungeon or cave or whatever, pause, stop capture, start capture, and move on. I said earlier it was the length, but out of habit and to make things go smoother, I would just break the attempts into logical spots. I also though it would make it easier for somebody to detect cheating and/or see what I obviously did so there would be no issues. The inconsistencies in item drops and other things has to be because of the intermingling of clips from different attempts. When I was first approached about this issue - this didn't make sense to me. I re-watched my runs on Archive.org, and put two and two together. Some of these inconsistencies are on worse runs...meaning better runs I did after weren't an issue. Because it was so long ago and I don't have the original files to re-submit for scrunity, I do agree the single segment runs needed to come down (whichever still stood).

[quote="mikwuyma"]CrypticJacknife: These runs were verified back in 2004-2006, and verification was a lot different back then. One verifier was common, and the results were never publically posted.

I don't think verificaiton really needs to be changed because of this incident.

EDIT: Even if you didn't mean to cheat TSA, you still passed off segmented runs at single-segment.[/quote]

[quote="andrewg"]How can you record a single segment speed run in chunks? That makes no sense.[/quote]

Just for clarification sake:
http://www.archive.org/details/ZeldaOoT_525

[quote]There is discontinuity in this run that probably nobody would notice, and even though it has zero effect on gameplay or time, I felt the need to still mention it. I "magically" have the Deku Nut icon in my sub menu somewhere through the run, but it reads as zero. How did I get them, and how did I dispose of them? I start/stop record my runs cuz these raw files use up a ton of memory, and I don't have the greatest hard drive in the world. So I have to conserve memory, and I break up files and send then as I do runs, and delete them after they are sent. Thus, it is a real one time run, but I interrupt recording, and we don't factor in the time to change to a new file.[/quote]

I wasn't actually - when recording the runs - doing segmented by your guys current definition.  By current definitions it was real-time attack.  As I've tried telling people, this was how some of my runs were done back then, and it was public knowledge.  However, the wrongdoing here is me submitting incorrect parts of a playthrough, resulting in parts from different attempts getting mixed up.  In all honesty, this screwed me over more than helped me.

And again, for clarification's sake, not all my runs were guilty of this mix-up.  None of the segmented runs were (FSA, TWW, MM), and any of my older runs digitized from VHS should have zero issue under the harshest of scrutiny.  And some of these were before and after the messed up runs.

Tompa - No, I was not correct in what I said.  That run was done on the GCN version and was done on my old card actually.  I dug through whatever I could find from back then (which isn't much), and to be clear in how I did capture - for the sake of making whoever combined my files back into one, I would stop at a transition, usually BEFORE going into a dungeon or cave or whatever, pause, stop capture, start capture, and move on.  I said earlier it was the length, but out of habit and to make things go smoother, I would just break the attempts into logical spots.  I also though it would make it easier for somebody to detect cheating and/or see what I obviously did so there would be no issues.  The inconsistencies in item drops and other things has to be because of the intermingling of clips from different attempts.  When I was first approached about this issue - this didn't make sense to me.  I re-watched my runs on Archive.org, and put two and two together.  Some of these inconsistencies are on worse runs...meaning better runs I did after weren't an issue.  Because it was so long ago and I don't have the original files to re-submit for scrunity, I do agree the single segment runs needed to come down (whichever still stood).

Rakuen

Edit history:

Rakuen: 2011-03-29 01:08:21 am

Rakuen: 2011-03-29 01:07:57 am

2011-03-29 01:05:05 am

Weegee Time

Quote from andrewg:

How can you record a single segment speed run in chunks? That makes no sense.

The same way you record a really long SS run and change the DVD in the recorder, except DVDs are physical media and files are logical media. So instead of swapping the DVD, you're swapping the file. To continue the analogy, the error would be sending in mismatched DVDs. For example, DVD1 is from attempt A, DVD2 is from attempt B, DVD3 is from attempt A, etc.

TSA's explanation seems sound to me. I know when I record some things just for personal speedrunning and use, I end up shooting about a dozen videos of the same thing before I go back through the files. In retrospect, this is a Bad Idea, and I've managed to delete and preserve the wrong files at least once. I have a feeling a lot of you can say the same thing has happened at some point or another in your recordings. So, he made a bad judgment call with his style of recording, and it caused the obvious mistake it would cause.

Based on that, I'm won't condemn you TSA, for whatever that's worth. I will say, though, that I'm disappointed you didn't put a bit more care wasn't put into the recording and submission process, and when you realized the mistake, that you didn't come forward. Of course, you know that now.

[quote="andrewg"]How can you record a single segment speed run in chunks? That makes no sense.[/quote]
The same way you record a really long SS run and change the DVD in the recorder, except DVDs are physical media and files are logical media.  So instead of swapping the DVD, you're swapping the file.  To continue the analogy, the error would be sending in mismatched DVDs.  For example, DVD1 is from attempt A, DVD2 is from attempt B, DVD3 is from attempt A, etc.

TSA's explanation seems sound to me.  I know when I record some things just for personal speedrunning and use, I end up shooting about a dozen videos of the same thing before I go back through the files.  In retrospect, this is a Bad Idea, and I've managed to delete and preserve the wrong files [i]at least[/i] once.  I have a feeling a lot of you can say the same thing has happened at some point or another in your recordings.  So, he made a bad judgment call with his style of recording, and it caused the obvious mistake it [i]would[/i] cause.

Based on that, I'm won't condemn you TSA, for whatever that's worth.  I will say, though, that I'm disappointed you didn't put a bit more care wasn't put into the recording and submission process, and when you realized the mistake, that you didn't come forward.  Of course, you know that now.

Vugmer

2011-03-29 01:11:11 am

Cigar Man

I laugh at the people who say they are disappointed...sounds like a self-righteous, ignorant parent talking to a kid.

Zealie

2011-03-29 04:42:29 am

Isn't this front site news worthy?

Also, I didn't expect this to happen. When I said if a cheater has been found and I thought all his run regardless of if they were cheated or not were to be removed in IRC there didn't seem to be much support for it.

Wether he did it intentional or not I will not discuss, the only thing I find odd is that he never noticed they weren't from the same run, because as far as my memory goes I certainly do know how it went and how I played it so if I would watch it back and other stuff happened it would strike me as odd at the very least.

arkarian

2011-03-29 05:00:41 am

gamelogs.org

Quote from Zealie:

Isn't this front site news worthy?

not really. his runs were all garbage even with the cheating.

InsipidMuckyWater

2011-03-29 05:34:54 am

Visit my profile to see my runs!

Kinda saw this coming. Well, not exactly THIS. But, remember that argument TSA had with somebody else a looooong time ago where he kept claiming to have a brand new record (I think for Zelda 1) RIGHT after the other guy announced a new record of his own? The second that guy announced his record, TSA basically came out and said "hey, I've got a better one, but I've just never submitted it. Also, I don't plan to ever submit it, because I can do better." Like a week of pleading from the community to show it to SOMEBODY, later, and moderators came in and basically told everyone to shut up about it, and other members came in and said that TSA's reputation was enough to lend his claim credibility. If I remember correctly, the other guy was kind of "booed" off the site because nobody believed his record, which I always thought was a bit hypocritical. Needless to say, TSA never did show any evidence of that run he claimed to have.

While TSA is undoubtedly skilled at Zelda games despite the cheating, our only option is to make an example out of him and remove all of his runs, not least of all because we cannot risk maintaining runs on the site that potentially could be cheated, like at least some are confirmed to have been, and we also cannot taint the credibility of our Zelda runs by leaving up ones that have been produced by someone who was not forthcoming about the manner in which they were produced.

Kinda saw this coming.  Well, not exactly THIS.  But, remember that argument TSA had with somebody else a looooong time ago where he kept claiming to have a brand new record (I think for Zelda 1) RIGHT after the other guy announced a new record of his own?  The second that guy announced his record, TSA basically came out and said "hey, I've got a better one, but I've just never submitted it.  Also, I don't plan to ever submit it, because I can do better."  Like a week of pleading from the community to show it to SOMEBODY, later, and moderators came in and basically told everyone to shut up about it, and other members came in and said that TSA's reputation was enough to lend his claim credibility.  If I remember correctly, the other guy was kind of "booed" off the site because nobody believed his record, which I always thought was a bit hypocritical.  Needless to say, TSA never did show any evidence of that run he claimed to have.

While TSA is undoubtedly skilled at Zelda games despite the cheating, our only option is to make an example out of him and remove all of his runs, not least of all because we cannot risk maintaining runs on the site that potentially could be cheated, like at least some are confirmed to have been, and we also cannot taint the credibility of our Zelda runs by leaving up ones that have been produced by someone who was not forthcoming about the manner in which they were produced.

VorpalEdge

Edit history:

VorpalEdge: 2011-03-29 06:15:33 am

VorpalEdge: 2011-03-29 06:14:39 am

VorpalEdge: 2011-03-29 06:13:06 am

VorpalEdge: 2011-03-29 06:11:26 am

2011-03-29 06:09:01 am

welcome to the machine

Quote from Zealie:

Isn't this front site news worthy?

No. I don't think it's even topic-worthy, but someone would have eventually noticed that runs are missing and asked about them anyways, so eh. And if there is an 'important' part, it's that the runs are down. Deciding how much to blame TSA is a waste of time.

That said, this has been on my mind long enough that I do have one question for TSA, mostly out of curiosity. I'm pretty sure you submitted the majority of your runs to TG on tape (I would check TG now to see exactly which runs were, but TG recently began requiring registering to view scores, and fuck that). Now, your TG times were submitted on VHS, which presumably didn't have pauses while you stopped and restarted the capture card recordings, both for practicality reasons and because that's against their rules. Now I'm pretty sure you didn't do each run twice for a different site and come up with the same time both attempts. So on one hand there's the runs you submitted to SDA, which are to have used the equivalent of many disk changes, and on the other there's the runs you submitted to TG, which didn't. Why the discrepancy, and why didn't you just replay the tapes and capture only one run?

[quote="Zealie"]Isn't this front site news worthy?[/quote]

No.  I don't think it's even topic-worthy, but someone would have eventually noticed that runs are missing and asked about them anyways, so eh.  And if there is an 'important' part, it's that the runs are down.  Deciding how much to blame TSA is a waste of time.

That said, this has been on my mind long enough that I do have one question for TSA, mostly out of curiosity.  I'm pretty sure you submitted the majority of your runs to TG on tape (I would check TG now to see exactly which runs were, but TG recently began requiring registering to view scores, and fuck that).  Now, your TG times were submitted on VHS, which presumably didn't have pauses while you stopped and restarted the capture card recordings, both for practicality reasons and because that's against their rules.  Now I'm [i]pretty sure[/i] you didn't do each run twice for a different site and come up with the same time both attempts.  So on one hand there's the runs you submitted to SDA, which are to have used the equivalent of many disk changes, and on the other there's the runs you submitted to TG, which didn't.  Why the discrepancy, and why didn't you just replay the tapes and capture only one run?

gia

Edit history:

gia: 2011-03-29 06:57:44 am

2011-03-29 06:57:12 am

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

Quote from Rakuen:

TSA's explanation seems sound to me. I know when I record some things just for personal speedrunning and use, I end up shooting about a dozen videos of the same thing before I go back through the files. In retrospect, this is a Bad Idea, and I've managed to delete and preserve the wrong files at least once. I have a feeling a lot of you can say the same thing has happened at some point or another in your recordings. So, he made a bad judgment call with his style of recording, and it caused the obvious mistake it would cause.

I have, but then you delete the whole screwed up set, curse the heavens and continue. For capture cards, buy a 1TB+ hard drive, it's like 150$ at most, and it is a good investment to convince your yourself/parents with. As long as you time and put new records aside after each run you shouldn't have problems.

ShadowWraith

2011-03-29 07:03:18 am

.

Quote from arkarian:

Quote from Zealie:

Isn't this front site news worthy?

not really. his runs were all garbage even with the cheating.

They were just records here because we felt bad for him, clearly.

Zealie

2011-03-29 07:14:35 am

Quote from ShadowWraith:

Quote from arkarian:

Quote from Zealie:

Isn't this front site news worthy?

not really. his runs were all garbage even with the cheating.

They were just records here because we felt bad for him, clearly.

The reason I asked had nothing to do with TSA himself nor the quality of his runs, but purely the event of this happening.
Also I have no idea why such a thing wouldn't even be worth a thread.

If you ask me such events are meant to be known and not kept in the dark regardless of who it was and what kind of runs he/she produced. I cannot see why the community should not be informed by such things.

I'm not going to say any more because I see this thread spiralling into a flame trolling thread.

DJS

Edit history:

DJS: 2011-03-29 07:48:14 am

DJS: 2011-03-29 07:46:14 am

DJS: 2011-03-29 07:38:36 am

DJS: 2011-03-29 07:38:28 am

DJS: 2011-03-29 07:35:06 am

2011-03-29 07:34:17 am

torch slug since 2006

wow you(or someone else) must had patience, splicing the videos together with perfect (or maybe not perfect) fade-out/fade-in timing and stuff...
i remember when i came here in 2006ish thinking "HOLY, did someone play oot for 5hours straight and beat it??!?!?!", but now that i know you didnt do this in a single-sitting i am quite sad (and dissapoint), ofc with the equipment you had back then you did have a problem.

Rakuen

2011-03-29 09:19:30 am

Weegee Time

Quote from gia:

Quote from Rakuen:

TSA's explanation seems sound to me. I know when I record some things just for personal speedrunning and use, I end up shooting about a dozen videos of the same thing before I go back through the files. In retrospect, this is a Bad Idea, and I've managed to delete and preserve the wrong files at least once. I have a feeling a lot of you can say the same thing has happened at some point or another in your recordings. So, he made a bad judgment call with his style of recording, and it caused the obvious mistake it would cause.

I have, but then you delete the whole screwed up set, curse the heavens and continue. For capture cards, buy a 1TB+ hard drive, it's like 150$ at most, and it is a good investment to convince your yourself/parents with. As long as you time and put new records aside after each run you shouldn't have problems.

Well, the problem is still catching a mistake you yourself made, compounded by your brain's tendency to "self-correct" your own mistakes. If I record something 10 times in a row, and then preserve the wrong one, the only way I can easily tell is if there's something in the game that shows me something is wrong. The inventory is clearly off, or the timer is different, those are big red flags. If the only thing wrong is getting a certain item in a certain place because of how a certain algorithm works, that's quite a bit easier to miss.

Obviously, in this scenario, someone incredibly knowledgeable about the game noticed it. That's good, because it means we were hosting invalid runs. I think maybe there should be a check for the same thing in the other runs before removing them, but removing all of them from the site is still a sound decision. All I'm making a case for is the plausibility of the mistake with the information I've got. Considering it's the difference between stupidity and being labeled cheater-for-life, I think it's a good time to exercise my Devil's Advocacy.

As far as my own recording goes, everything has been PC-based with FRAPS, which honestly promotes lazy recording :P. You're right though, I really should start dragging the latest file onto the desktop or something.

Quote from VorpalEdge:

So on one hand there's the runs you submitted to SDA, which are to have used the equivalent of many disk changes, and on the other there's the runs you submitted to TG, which didn't. Why the discrepancy, and why didn't you just replay the tapes and capture only one run?

That's a good question, and I'm curious about the answer myself.

[quote="gia"][quote="Rakuen"]TSA's explanation seems sound to me.  I know when I record some things just for personal speedrunning and use, I end up shooting about a dozen videos of the same thing before I go back through the files.  In retrospect, this is a Bad Idea, and I've managed to delete and preserve the wrong files [i]at least[/i] once.  I have a feeling a lot of you can say the same thing has happened at some point or another in your recordings.  So, he made a bad judgment call with his style of recording, and it caused the obvious mistake it [i]would[/i] cause.  [/quote]
I have, but then you delete the whole screwed up set, curse the heavens and continue. For capture cards, buy a 1TB+ hard drive, it's like 150$ at most, and it is a good investment to convince your yourself/parents with. As long as you time and put new records aside after each run you shouldn't have problems.[/quote]
Well, the problem is still catching a mistake you yourself made, compounded by your brain's tendency to "self-correct" your own mistakes.  If I record something 10 times in a row, and then preserve the wrong one, the only way I can easily tell is if there's something in the game that shows me something is wrong.  The inventory is clearly off, or the timer is different, those are big red flags.  If the only thing wrong is getting a certain item in a certain place because of how a certain algorithm works, that's quite a bit easier to miss.

Obviously, in this scenario, someone incredibly knowledgeable about the game noticed it.  That's good, because it means we were hosting invalid runs.  I think maybe there should be a check for the same thing in the other runs before removing them, but removing all of them from the site is still a sound decision.  All I'm making a case for is the plausibility of the mistake with the information I've got.  Considering it's the difference between stupidity and being labeled cheater-for-life, I think it's a good time to exercise my Devil's Advocacy.

As far as my own recording goes, everything has been PC-based with FRAPS, which honestly promotes lazy recording :P.  You're right though, I really should start dragging the latest file onto the desktop or something.

[quote="VorpalEdge"]So on one hand there's the runs you submitted to SDA, which are to have used the equivalent of many disk changes, and on the other there's the runs you submitted to TG, which didn't.  Why the discrepancy, and why didn't you just replay the tapes and capture only one run?[/quote]
That's a good question, and I'm curious about the answer myself.

grndino

2011-03-29 09:21:57 am

TG is really picky about posting a record that also has a video publicly available. Doesn't make much sense.

Shame TSA didn't admit his situation earlier, but at least he eventually did.

StephenColbert

2011-03-29 10:23:25 am

A tip of my hat goes to the fine young gentleman that have discovered the massive contradictions contained in the house of LIES that are TSA's runs. Your obsessive attention to detail will get you all far in life.
A wag of my finger goes to TSA. In addition, I hereby grant you the official title of "Cheater Cheater Pumpin Eater."

Flip

Edit history:

Flip: 2011-03-29 10:25:49 am

2011-03-29 10:24:25 am

1-Up!

Quote from VorpalEdge:

Quote from Zealie:

Isn't this front site news worthy?

No. I don't think it's even topic-worthy, but someone would have eventually noticed that runs are missing and asked about them anyways, so eh.

This. There was going to be a thread eventually (once somebody looked for WW, more than likely) so I thought it was best to have it coming from us. Also even though none of the existing staff are directly involved back then I thought we ought to own up to it since we did host the runs. We don't want to keep it a secret and we certainly don't want to be accused of keeping it a secret to protect our own hides.

Rakuen: if you need more proof I advise you to contact Kryssstal or Tompa via irc. They can probably give you the best information and to my knowledge they found the initial break of continuity in lttp that got the ball rolling on this.

kariohki

2011-03-29 10:25:06 am

waifus are laifu

Cheating or not, since he knew about it, he should've come forward back when the runs first went up, not years after. That's the part that pisses me off.

Rakuen

Edit history:

Rakuen: 2011-03-29 10:29:22 am

Rakuen: 2011-03-29 10:27:16 am

2011-03-29 10:26:53 am

Weegee Time

Quote from Flip:

Rakuen: if you need more proof I advise you to contact Kryssstal or Tompa via irc. They can probably give you the best information and to my knowledge they found the initial break of continuity in lttp that got the ball rolling on this.

I don't need more proof. I totally trust that it happened in the games that were mentioned. Wink

I was just saying I think it'd be better to find evidence of problems in the other games before taking them down as well, but that's me. I understand the reason for removing all the runs and support it.

Angelmark

2011-03-29 10:40:15 am

The Anomaly

Since the only reason this was spotted was because of inconsistencies, what's stopping people from doing this in games that doesn't have anything that gives them away?

Flip

2011-03-29 10:44:49 am

1-Up!

Um, if you're capable of cheating perfectly then... please don't. Smiley

Angelmark

Edit history:

Angelmark: 2011-03-29 10:51:45 am

Angelmark: 2011-03-29 10:48:25 am

2011-03-29 10:48:14 am

The Anomaly

Quote from Flip:

Um, if you're capable of cheating perfectly then... please don't. Smiley

Some people do anything to earn a bit of fame, even if it means faking an accomplishment.

mzxrules

2011-03-29 10:52:48 am

zeldaspeedruns.com

Quote from Angelmark:

Since the only reason this was spotted was because of inconsistencies, what's stopping people from doing this in games that doesn't have anything that gives them away?

If there's a game like that out there, then it probably isn't worth running anyway.

Zyre

Edit history:

Zyre: 2011-03-29 10:54:02 am

2011-03-29 10:52:50 am

The Speedrunning Teacher

Quote from Angelmark:

Since the only reason this was spotted was because of inconsistencies, what's stopping people from doing this in games that doesn't have anything that gives them away?

Nothing is really stopping them, just their own conscience. We're on an honor system, so when runs are verified, we trust that no cheating or rule breaking is involved. Verifiers do look for inconsistencies, but you can't really expect them to go over every submission with a fine-toothed comb.

Angelmark

Edit history:

Angelmark: 2011-03-29 10:59:02 am

Angelmark: 2011-03-29 10:57:30 am

2011-03-29 10:57:03 am

The Anomaly

Would it be too much to ask for video proof that SS runs are in fact done in one sitting?

Dunno, seems pretty reasonable to me.