Tracking Games Multiple Times Limit Needed

Hi, I've noticed that some games are tracked many times.

I have even seen some games, where the exact same game is tracked many many separate places.

So I honestly believe that there should be a some type of limit on the number of times a game variation is tracked.

Maybe make the limit 5 or something because if you don't put a limit on it you end up just seeing the exact same game over and over again and it becomes ridiculous.

Many video game companies seem to just like to re-release their older games for newer consoles and other platforms. For example: Nintendo virtual console

I don't mind if something is tracked a few times, but if its over like 10 times then that's absolutely ridiculous. It means that if you want to know who all the best players are you have to check out 10 different tracks and then merge them all together by hand.

Hi erockbrox:

-> Some titles have perhaps two (2) variations, such as a few classic arcade titles (marathon and tournament settings)
-> Some titles have build-in numbered track/variations, such as Atari 2600 "Skiing" games 1-10
-> Some titles have a LOT of different track/variations and challenges, such as "F-ZeroX" (24 different tracks with fastest lap, fastest race and highest speed for each
-> Some titles have a "doubles", "triples" and even "quartet" option such as "Joust" (doubles), "Rampage" (triples) and even "Quartet" and "Trog" (quartet)

There are other permutations as well, custom to certain titles based on popular gamer wants/needs...

-> "Super Mario Brothers" (NES) has highest points, fastest minimalist completion, fastest full completion
-> "Donkey Kong" (arcade) has highest points, highest score (stage 1-1), and perhaps highest score (1st life end of stage 2-3)
-> "Mario Kart 64" (N64) has "shortcut" vs "non-shortcut" records tracked for a few of the specific courses in accordance with the norm as tracked by the Mario Kart 64 gaming community from back in the day (these actually made sense to track separately, FYI)

There are other issues which further complicated the tracking of some titles, and even a few entire platforms.

In the past some gamers voiced their opinion over titles with multiple variations, stating that TG should just pick one or two that "define" the game...and TG never did that because that would be entirely subjective and unfair to players of that game who may feel otherwise.

But, admittedly, there are some titles that I feel (and felt) were just out of control. For example, I was asked by a gamer to establish variations for the entire "Wipeout" series, all titles, all variations, on both NTSC and PAL as he played both. All in all that was more than 1300 variations added to the TG database to cover everything, and I only received submissions for less than 100 of them when it was all said and done.

Another example is the "DDR" genre. There are literally hundreds upon hundreds of songs from all the variations and "mixes", and on top of that there are other considerations to track even the same song multiple ways. Same for the "Guitar Hero" series. Same for the "Golden Tee" series.

I'd really like to know what specific title(s) you are referring to as there may be a reason for these titles having so many variations in the TG database. Not all the reasons may be good ones as after 2006 the variations just ballooned for some reason. I know, for example, that Atari 2600 "Skiing" all of a sudden had games 1-10 split into difficulty "A" versus "B" just to name but one.

I agree that in a perfect world, for applicable titles, the capacity should exist to know who the "best" is by adding the sum totals on all available tracks...providing a player has a registered score on each for purpose of comparing apples-to-apples. This is programmatically do-able...just a matter of when Jace can have his team do so for selected titles.

This is bizarre...I made this reply at LEAST several days ago if not longer, and right now it is showing that I made this reply today !!

Oh, what I meant was... not putting a limit on the number of variations on a game title, but putting a limitation on how many times a certain track is duplicated on another system.

For example.

Street Fighter 2

There is a SNES track.
There is also a Nintendo Wii Virtual Console track
There is a PlayStation Capcom classics track

And this is the same game just duplicated over and over many times.

And yes I'm aware that the Arcade version of SF2 is different yet has the same name.

There are many other games where this happens too.

Like there is the arcade version of the game.
Then there is the MAME version of the game.
Then there is like a Namco Classics game that has like all the same arcade games in it only for like PS2.

So your just tracking the same exact game over and over and over again. That is what I'm talking about and requesting some kind of limit for it because video game companies seem to like to re-release their older content on newer platforms, but if you are already tracking that same game why does there need to be even more additional tracks?

I agree on that count...it does get to become repetitive...especially with each new release of a system.

Namco, Konami or Williams classics on the PS1, on the PS2, on the Xbox, etc...then the arcade original, then MAME, and hopefully not Multi-Cade and/or Ultracade...far too many for the same game with little differentiation between the translations.

I actually don't mind if they are tracked many times, but only if there was a MASTER TRACK where the Twin Galaxies website would combine all the same tracks into one complete list.

Because if you don't then like 5 different people can say that they have the world record on a game.

It's like I got the Dig Dug world record!!!! WOOOOOO!!!! YES!!! Yeah, its on the Playstation 1 Arcade classics edition (which no competition is on it), but hey I still got the world record!!!

This possibility had actually been discussed both recently within another forum thread as well as with the then-TG CTO Brien King back in the pre-2003 developmental era. Just comes down to programming, and right now infrastructure is top priority. Once fully ready then Jace can embrace the idea and take it to his people, I would imagine.

You have to be VERY careful when trying to split up gaming scores based on platform.

Even if they are arcade emulations, they have subtle nuances and differences on consoles.

I'm currently playing a lot of ms pac man.

i've made and noted the differences in console versions here:
================================================== ============
http://strategywiki.org/wiki/Ms._Pac...on_comparisons

NOTE : the latest PAC-MAN MUSEUM for xbox 360/ps3/pc
================================================== ================
[pac man HAS A KILL SCREEN (none of the other home ports had one)]
on all other home ports, the KILL SCREEN has been fixed, allowing
scores in multiple millions. i have 7.1 million on the xbox 360
leaderboard.

ms pac man has the KILL SCREEN FIXED on all the home arcade
console ports that NAMCO has released.

It is possible to score 1,000,000+ on the home version,
which has never been possible on the arcade versions.

among all the other versions, the NAMCO museum has slightly
different timing on the N64, dreamcast, PS2, and XBOX 1
possibly.

then there are versions for modern consoles.

some of the newer ports, have the games playing at a faster,
and harder variation than the arcade, even on defaults.


a separate issue : related to scoring
----------------------------------------------------------------------

also, RTM, or anyone else, i noted a scoring discrepancy in the
TENGEN Genesis version here:
================================================== =============
https://www.twingalaxies.com/showthre...l=1#post719280

basically, its this:

Ms Pac Man - Genesis - Tengen
====================
Rank Score
Points Player Date Achieved Verification
Method Shy by
1 1,548,400 Todd Rogers Sep 30 2004 Video 0
2 1,238,450 Ron Corcoran Jan 28 1998 Referee 309,950

Single Player Only, Pac Booster Off, Normal Difficulty, Arcade Maze Selection, Starting Level 1

Special Rules: None
======================================

ok, how do you get 1 million in this mode? (or any of them?)

---------------------------------------------------------
there's 32 boards, and it ends...
so even if you perfect 4 ghosts on every board - 31x12,000 = 372,000
and throw in a few thousand points for boards 32x4,000 = 128,000
that's about half a million...

unless you can figure out how to get bananas on 20+ random boards = 20x5,000= 100,000

that's still only 600k , nowhere near 1.2 million or 1.5 million...

am i missing something here?

maybe it was multiple games, with the score added together.

later
-1

Hi negative1:

Did not see this until now. Honestly I had pretty much zero to do with the Sega Genesis platform...I barely watched any submissions and never made any of my own, plus I cannot even remember how many variations I added to the database over the years. We really never got too many submissions on this platform save from perhaps the "Metroid Team" from Brazil.

I'm not even sure who verified these two scores. As to the matter you mentioned about how 1M is possible...haven't a clue. Corcoran is gone for good, and Todd is at least still accessible. Drop him a line via FB if you have an account, but I am unsure he has made any new TG posts here since Jace re-opened the forums.

Wish I could help more but I had nothing to do with those score submissions. Sorry :(