5 Man Asteroids

[dickmoreland]

Since Gyruss has now been set up as a 5 man track, I'm hoping we can do the same for Asteroids. This will actually be a much easier task than Gyruss as the parent for Asteroids was changed to Asteroids (rev 4) not too long ago and there are only a few scores that would need to be changed and they all used current versions of MAME. The #1 score already has a note as to what their 5 man score is.

I don't think I have authority to set up a poll and get this done so I'll need some help. Anyone want to help a brother out?

[Zhorik]

We should probably have a discussion thread on it first for at least 7-10 days where people can make an argument for or against the change before we start the poll. I'd recommend we use this thread for discussion.

[kernzy]

i vote yes.
yes for all games.

[simpsons99]

what's the point of getting free ships/guys then.. You guys are really wrecking the art of the high score .

[CrazyKongFan]

what's the point of getting free ships/guys then.. You guys are really wrecking the art of the mindless boring saucer-hunting marathon.

FTFY

[mahlemiut]

what's the point of getting free ships/guys then.. You guys are really wrecking the art of the high score .

Didn't see this coming...

[kernzy]

[kernzy]

brian obviously enjoys life without choices or options...

[simpsons99]

I am really starting to dislike this fourms and site .

[homerwannabee]

This is a horrible idea. It's not right. Create a different track if you have to, but it's preposterous to take marathon scores, and only count the first 5 men. Now I am not saying don't create a different 5 man track. I am saying don't castrate some pretty historic marathon scores, and make them 5 man. It would be sort of like saying OK you know all those Marathon times runners have been doing for decades. Well they don't really count anymore. Instead we are only going to count the first 5 miles that all these runners did, and create a new 5 mile standard, and see if modern day runners can beat their 5 mile times.

For instance I can see already the meaning of many scores getting destroyed by a rule change like this. The best example would be Krogman's 20 million point Galaga score. I can't imagine only taking just the first 5 men, and only accepting that. It would be like taking the Mona Lisa, and cutting out just her face, and burning the rest of the painting. Another good example would be the 1942, and 1943 scores. Games that actually have endings, but give out more than 5 men. For many that is a huge accomplishment to get to the very end of these games. With the 5 man rule it's basically throwing that accomplishment into the trash.

This also affects me on a personal level. I take a lot of pride in my 13.95 million point DK3 score. It took me over 10 and a half hours without any breaks to get that score. I didn't go into that game thinking. "Oh I have to get one of my best 5 man starts of all time." There are 37 men given total in the game. What you do in your first 5 men is not a huge priority because it all evens out when you are given that many men.

So here is my suggestion. If you are completely against keeping track of marathon scores, than put all marathon scores in a different category, and suspend taking any more marathon scores. I say suspend because who knows, maybe 15 years from now a different hierarchy will want to keep track of marathon scores again.

Sides wouldn't going through every single game that gives out more than 5 men, and keeping track of the first 5 men actually be harder than continuing to accept marathon scores. I mean this database has been around now for what 17 years? That is a huge amount of games to go through.

I really think this is the wrong path to take. Let's not screw with the historic scores on this website. We owe those who spent their time, and effort on those games that much.

[homerwannabee]

Also I just want to say I really don't have much of a problem with Gyruss, and Asteroids (Version 4) being changed. Gyruss simply because the 5 man was far and away superior to the Marathon score. It's obvious that he could have destroyed the marathon Gyruss score if he wanted to. The Asteroids (Version4) doesn't really have any historic scores. The 5 million Gyruss score also is nowhere near the Arcade Gyruss world record as well. So I can swallow that a tad bit easier.

My main argument is Kernzy's statement of making all games with more than 5 men, 5 men scores. That I do have a problem with. If there is a situation where there isn't really a big time historic score on board it is not much of a loss in my opinion.

Edit: Didn't realize the Gyruss lead Marathon scorer wanted it 5 man to begin with. I can see why that won 15 to 1.

[Chad]

I would postulate that almost all of the people who would vote yes to keep a 5 man track still enjoy playing and watching marathon scores, that's why we would never remove ALL marathon scores. This is a "action replay" site geared for action and competition, not only a marathon site, which if we didn't have votes like this, it would be. marathoning is a "single" style of play, it can never truly dictate how all games or clones are measured.

[simpsons99]

TY George

Glad someone has my back on this site

[BeeJay]

what's the point of getting free ships/guys then.. You guys are really wrecking the art of the high score .

Limiting ships on just one of the many clones is not wrecking the art of the high score but rather is forcing people to improve their game play, styles, techniques to maximise their high score with more limited resources at their disposal. To say this "wrecks" the art of the high score is like saying the kill screen in pacman or the donkey kong "kill level" ruins the art of the high score and we should only compete on versions of pacman and donkey kong where those programming bugs have been fixed!! But we don't do that, and that is part of the reason why there was such intense rivalry in trying to get the 1st "perfect score" on pacman or maximise the points on donkey kong before reaching the level where there is not enough time to complete the stage. Would there ever have been a "king of kong" if there wasn't a programming bug in donkey kong that artificially limited game time?

I could take a similar cynical view and say that games with kill screens ruin the art of the high score and what's the point in playing games that have bugs in their logic that stop you in the middle of a game when you still had more lives available. The whole point of having one clone, or the parent romset, artificially restricted to 5 lives is to increase the competition for obtaining the highest possible score before reaching the artificially induced "kill screen". This is especially the case on those games where the extra lives are awarded with such frequency that a competent player is never at risk of losing all their lives.

You've made it quite clear already that you don't want to play those games limited to 5 lives, and that's fine and you're perfectly entitled to that opinion. The issue is that you keep bleating on and on about your opinion over and over again, and that's what is rubbing people up the wrong way. I personally think pacman and DK are both stinking pieces of shit games. I also just don't get why people like DK Junior either as to me that's also a crappy/stupid game as well. Would you get upset if I kept repeating over and over what a piece of shit DK junior is and that anyone who bothers recording scores for that game are just lame? You'd probably have pretty strong opinions about that subject, but so do people who want to have a more intense competition on games that are just too easy to marathon, so you can imagine what they think every time you keep posting yet again about how shit you think that idea is!!!

Cheers,
BeeJay.

[simpsons99]

you just named 3 of the greatest games of all time Crappy . I know everyone likes different games .. You think your only talking to my about dkjr .. George likes the game also ..