Are Using Weapons/Items Cheating?

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,104]

55 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

What about the "pause" technique in Rad Racer?

I would put that in the same category as the pause trick in Mega Man 1. Exploiting glitches are typically banned in any competition, so I would consider them cheating as far as legitimately completing a game.

[RH | 4,895]

41 minutes ago, Bearcat-Doug said:

I would put that in the same category as the pause trick in Mega Man 1. Exploiting glitches are typically banned in any competition, so I would consider them cheating as far as legitimately completing a game.

Is the Rad Racer trick simply that when you pause it, the game freezes without changing the state of the game or screen?  IMHO, I wouldn't consider that a cheat, however, if you have a turbo controller that can pause/unpause the the game 10x a second, well, that is cheating because you are using an external tool to exploit the behavior of a game.

[fcgamer | 4,719]

This is where I'm confused though. So a stage select isn't legit, a glitch isn't legit, but a warp in Mario "1" is or isn't legit? It's only legit if you can complete it without? If you only skip one level? Etc. The whole thing seems extremely slippery to me.

For the record, I personally feel you need to play through every panel in Mario 3 to beat it. Even with alternative paths, still gotta complete the other stages.

[Sumez | 2,933]

What's the point here?

Whether anything is "legit" depends entirely on what your goal is.

If you don't want to play every stage in SMB1, and skip a majority of the game using warp zones, that's what they are there for. But the result is that, well, you won't be playing every stage. You could also just not play the game at all, and thus skip every stage if that's what you want. It's all valid.

I'm the guy who'll tell you that if you truly want to "beat" a game, you need to do it without using continues. But in reality you're the only person who gets to decide what you want to do or not.

Edited December 17, 2019 by Sumez

[fcgamer | 4,719]

@Sumez the point is simply for us to chat about this topic

I personally feel no need to 1CC a game or whatever it's called, though I've personally completed some games (like rescue Rangers) getting all flowers and items, never taking damage. But I personally just play games for fun, and imo stuff like that is not particularly fun.

So I'm just curious about this topic, how everyone feels. I'd reckon that if I mentioned using save states or a game genie, everyone would agree it's cheating, why not ask about other situations?

[RH | 4,895]

I feel like the conversation is branching off into "speedrun rules" territory.  It's not cheating to ever beat a game the way it was designed. I'd even argue it's not cheating to exploit glitches to beat a game because the contrary side to that is that if a game is glitchy and you make a near-perfect run without glitches, but on a rare chance you hit something, a glitch could lock your game up.  I know game-stopping glitches are rarer than game-breaking glitches, but using the glitch to "win" is fair game.

However, for competitions, using glitches or warps are always accounted for within the rules.  "No glitches" or "No warps" are common rules, as are "Anything Goes" rules.  So, I agree with @Sumez, it depends on context.  If you are playing the game on your own, anything goes.  If you are playing with friend, still anything goes, unless you agree on specific rules.  If no rules are called before a game starts, then exploit those glitches, or pick Eddy Gordo all you want! You might be mocked endlessly, but if it's not a rule, it's not a cheat!

[JamesRobot | 5,786]

1 hour ago, DarkTone said:

Nope. You can make it a challenge to handicap yourself, but thats part of the games design.

Now.... using glitches to speedrun a game? THAT'S a problem!

I disagree.  Speedrunning is more about exploiting the game to reach the end as fast as possible.  Glitching is generally permitted in speedrun competition assuming there is no outside influence.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

31 minutes ago, RH said:

Is the Rad Racer trick simply that when you pause it, the game freezes without changing the state of the game or screen?  IMHO, I wouldn't consider that a cheat, however, if you have a turbo controller that can pause/unpause the the game 10x a second, well, that is cheating because you are using an external tool to exploit the behavior of a game.

I had to look that one up myself, as I wasn't familiar with the term.  Apparently it's pausing and unpausing the game rapidly after you crash, which causes your car to land and be moved to the middle of the track much quicker than if you let it happen normally.  In the video I watched, it looked like it only took 1-2 seconds off the clock for the player to land and be reset and ready to go again, whereas it should take frustratingly longer than that.

[RH | 4,895]

1 minute ago, darkchylde28 said:

I had to look that one up myself, as I wasn't familiar with the term.  Apparently it's pausing and unpausing the game rapidly after you crash, which causes your car to land and be moved to the middle of the track much quicker than if you let it happen normally.  In the video I watched, it looked like it only took 1-2 seconds off the clock for the player to land and be reset and ready to go again, whereas it should take frustratingly longer than that.

Ah, I see.  That is different. I stand by my statements.  Even in that context, it's not cheating unless you are in a special competition or speed running and those special rules are outlined. But, of course, if you were in a Rad Racer speed running competition, you shouldn't be crashing.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

Just now, RH said:

Ah, I see.  That is different. I stand by my statements.  Even in that context, it's not cheating unless you are in a special competition or speed running and those special rules are outlined. But, of course, if you were in a Rad Racer speed running competition, you shouldn't be crashing.

Well, I would put it as if you were in a Rad Racer speed run you would hopefully not be crashing.  Anyone feel free to prove me wrong, but unlike a lot of games that I see as popularly being speedrun (SMB, Ninja Gaiden, etc.), I'm fairly certain that the "enemy" cars in Rad Racer are randomly generated, whereas in a lot of the other popular speed run games, most, if not all, of the initial enemy generation is static, so you can plan for where those are going to be and how you're going to react to get around them.  When, in Rad Racer, one car shows up in the middle, then suddenly two appear in either side line when you move to pass, boxing you in, I've never seen that consistently happen in the exact same spot, with the exact same progression of cars, leaving it (in my eyes) as a much greater challenge (and requiring more luck) to speed run most efficiently/effectively.

[fcgamer | 4,719]

10 minutes ago, darkchylde28 said:

I had to look that one up myself, as I wasn't familiar with the term.  Apparently it's pausing and unpausing the game rapidly after you crash, which causes your car to land and be moved to the middle of the track much quicker than if you let it happen normally.  In the video I watched, it looked like it only took 1-2 seconds off the clock for the player to land and be reset and ready to go again, whereas it should take frustratingly longer than that.

Yeah, I think by pausing and unpausing, it slows down the timer

[Sumez | 2,933]

40 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

imo stuff like that is not particularly fun.

See this is where we can chat. I think this is a more interesting subject than just "would you label this as cheating".

Because "cheating" in a single player game essentially comes down to whether you're "cheating yourself". So let's get the meme out of the way

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFJqOlYaJbs

Like I just said, no one can or should tell you "how" to play a game. But I do often come across a certain unwillingness to accept a game's merits given certain challenges. People tend to assume that something isn't fun without even having given it a decent attempt. Or the good old "I'm and adult with a job and a dog that needs walking, I don't have time to play games in a non-platonic manner!".

People tend to immediately assume that attempting any challenge in a game, self-imposed or not, is something reserved for either people more skilled, or people with more time to spend playing video games, or just people who are willing to put more effort into a video game than should be expected.
But here's the thing - even getting through Ninja Gaiden using countless continues took me two days as having fought hard enough one afternoon caused me to take a break and start over the next, going all the way. With that out of the way I could have stopped there, and the game would still be fun, but given a few more days I managed to beat it without using continues. A feat that feels incredibly satisfying given how impossible it seems on your first attempt.
It really doesn't take incredible skill to do this, all it demands is a tiny amount of determination and willingness to learn the mechanics of the game. And it's this dive into how the game really works that allows you to experience it in the way it was designed to be played. It's fine if you don't want to go for this, but I do think anyone who hasn't at least tried will have a harder time understanding just how good that game is. Conversely, I could have also taken it further. You could go for a no-death challenge, or a pacifist run. Hell, you could even start speedrunning the game. And this just goes back to how it's all subjective. I play plenty of games that I credit-feed though and then never touch again, because I don't feel like they'd give me any more. But it's an approach that makes it very easy to miss out on some of the better video game experiences out there.

And I think especially given the design you see in most modern games, it can be difficult to readjust your mindset to the way most action games were designed in the 80s and early 90s. A modern game is a single run through that frequently can last anywhere from 10 to 100 hours, and although there may be challenges available to anyone who wants to start over and experience it again, no one is expected to do so.

In the 80s when you owned maybe three games, and one could essentially be completed in less than an hour, things were different. It really depends on what game you are talking about of course, but for this subject I'm focusing on arcade inspired actions games like Castlevania, Ninja Gaiden, Super Mario Bros., Ninja Warriors, Ghouls n Ghosts, Contra, Mr. Gimmick, Gradius, Mega Man, Hagane, Final Fight, etc. - the list goes on.
These are all games designed with the mindset that anyone owning them would play them again and again to hone their skills and get better, getting continuous enjoyment from them. Not all games keep being enjoyable played like this, but in my opinion any great action game should.

So how do you get the best enjoyment given spending more time with them? Again, it's really up to you. As a kid I'd play SMB1 over and over again taking every warp zone getting me to 8-4 as fast as possible. I was never timing my runs like a speedrunner, but I think the ability to beat the game in a matter of minutes is one of its many great assets.
But looking at the concept of continues/credits, what would the idea of having them on top of a lives system be, if your primary goal isn't to avoid using them? The screen usually says "Game Over" right? Most games of this type will give you X amount of lives and unlimited continues allowing you to essentially keep banging your head against the wall until you eventually break through. Some games will add a bit of challenge even with this approach, by making a continue take you further back than a lost life. Meanwhile others will allow you to just respawn immediately, making the concept of extra lives completely pointless if you choose not to limit your continue usage.
That's definitely the best way to get through the first time. And if you don't feel like you enjoy the game well enough to keep playing it after that, it's completely fine.
Hell, if you only ever played worlds 1 and 8 of Super Mario Bros. 3 using the warp whistle every single time it's not like you can't have a ton of fun doing that. But you'd also be well aware that you are missing out on worlds 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7, full of stages that might be just as fun.  

Edited December 17, 2019 by Sumez

[RH | 4,895]

@Sumez, I hear what you are saying. When I was young, there weren't many games I could beat, but I would definitely warp whistle every chance I could get in SMB3.  Regardless of beating a game or not, at some point, progressing again and again the same way does get boring, so you start explore the game from a different perspective.  Again with SMB3, this meant that I would actually try no warp runs.  For me, these were extremely difficult and I often couldn't get past world 4. However, I would change it up, and  try to just warp to specific worlds to explore them.  One of my favorites was the Giant world.  I'd try to go in with as many lives as I could get so I could play it as much as I could. The goal wasn't always to race through every level but to simply enjoy seeing everything OVER-SIZED.

You get out of games what you want to get out of them.  For many, it's beating games.  For me as a gamer who sucks at gaming, sometimes it's just enjoying the play experience, even if I don't win.  

[DarkTone | 984]

42 minutes ago, JamesRobot said:

I disagree.  Speedrunning is more about exploiting the game to reach the end as fast as possible.  Glitching is generally permitted in speedrun competition assuming there is no outside influence.

You're right. Still, not a fan of the exposure.

[fcgamer | 4,719]

@Sumezthe problem is I grew up in that same era, you're preaching to the choir bro. For you it may be 1CCing a game, for me it's completing every panel, getting every item, for the next guy it's not using weapons or whatever. Which all goes back to my main point, which was partially inspired by a dude on a different forum who only counted a victory if he 1CCd something.

[Sumez | 2,933]

5 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

which was partially inspired by a dude on a different forum who only counted a victory if he 1CCd something

Well, if the game straight up tells you that you lost, but you continued to play to the end after that...   You finished the game of course, but in my world a "victory" implies not having failed.

Edited December 17, 2019 by Sumez

[Tulpa | 3,488]

1 hour ago, fcgamer said:

@SumezWhich all goes back to my main point, which was partially inspired by a dude on a different forum who only counted a victory if he 1CCd something.

That was probably pegboy. He was/is a shooter/arcade guy, and 1CC is relevant when you're going for a high score, as a game over will erase the score.

If you are just looking to see what the ending is and no other considerations, 1CC is irrelevant to your play through.

Edited December 17, 2019 by Tulpa

[fcgamer | 4,719]

@@Sumez : Fair enough, but most wars consist of more than one battle. So you lost one battle, but you kept fighting and overall achieved and won the war

[Gloves | 11,761]

9 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

@Sumezthe problem is I grew up in that same era, you're preaching to the choir bro. For you it may be 1CCing a game, for me it's completing every panel, getting every item, for the next guy it's not using weapons or whatever. Which all goes back to my main point, which was partially inspired by a dude on a different forum who only counted a victory if he 1CCd something.

You don't have to go to another forum for someone with the 1cc rule, I'm right here. 

[Tulpa | 3,488]

4 minutes ago, Gloves said:

You don't have to go to another forum for someone with the 1cc rule, I'm right here. 

You're not as militant about it, though.

Every NES/Famicom game I have beaten has been a 1CC run. Though I don't hold it against anyone who plays differently.

[Gloves | 11,761]

1 minute ago, Tulpa said:

You're not as militant about it, though.

Every NES/Famicom game I have beaten has been a 1CC run. Though I don't hold it against anyone who plays differently.

I mostly apply it to shmup. Beating a game means 1cc, completing is 1lc. For Backloggery purposes anyway. 

[T-Pac | 7,513]

[guitarzombie | 924]

This thread makes my head hurt.  Play the games how ever you want and cheating only applies to contests.

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,104]

2 hours ago, RH said:

Is the Rad Racer trick simply that when you pause it, the game freezes without changing the state of the game or screen?  IMHO, I wouldn't consider that a cheat, however, if you have a turbo controller that can pause/unpause the the game 10x a second, well, that is cheating because you are using an external tool to exploit the behavior of a game.

Yes. I actually think you have to keep pausing the game right before a second would run off the clock and that's what freezes the timer so a turbo controller wouldn't do it correctly. I'd still consider it a cheat/glitch since it's giving you an advantage over playing the game normally.

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,104]

1 hour ago, Gloves said:

I mostly apply it to shmup. Beating a game means 1cc, completing is 1lc. For Backloggery purposes anyway. 

I apply it to everything, but I would use the same definitions. If a game gives you continues and you finish the game, I would call that completing it, but to say you beat the game would require a 1cc run.