Anyone else having problems with the NEWS page at MARP (and

[BeeJay]

I can get to most other pages but the NEWS page that I have as my default MARP link always times out without displaying the actual news frame. The top frame with all the links displays ok - assuming IE decides to paint it 1st, so I can link to most of the rest of the site but not all of it. Seems to be mainly the "static pages" that I have problems with. The generated pages are ok however.
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Anyone else having the same problems?!

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I'm against points leaching in principle, especially if there is very little risk involved to the player in doing it. However, for instance with Scion you can keep deliberately destroying your bombing ship and each new one you get scores you increasingly more points. However, the attacking enemy still continues to get harder so I think that one's ok. In Vulgus just after the second space stage there is an enemy formation that is always a bonus life. Its possible to keep shooting this down, getting the extra life and then die straight away so you can repeat the same section. This will allow you to get more points with each life and eventually build up lives based on score. This one is borderline because you're still at risk of being shot before you get back to the extra life formation. However, if we are going to permit Pterry hunting in Joust surely we should not prevent points leaching in any game without removing any Joust scores that used the Pterry bug. Likewise if we permit Pterry hunting why don't we permit the non-shooting bug in Galaga, or 255 lives in Mr Do and Sinistar, or points leaching in Ghosts 'n Goblins as all of these are simply making use of bugs in the original game. It could also be argued my score in Traverse USA (I prefer the name Zippy Race) should not count as I was not trying to get to 1st place but rather just points leaching by avoiding crashing and picking up as many fuel barrels as possible. The same argument goes for Road Fighter where you are better to collect as many 10k rainbow cars as possible rather than going for 1st place. The real problem comes down to deciding which techniques are acceptable and which ones are too obviously cheating and should not be permitted. Would anyone like to argue scoring exactly 100 extra lives on defender between 990000 and 1000000 points is a form of leaching as it effectively gives you 100 unwarranted (points wise anyway) extra lives?!

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To summarise then, while I'm against leaching in principle who's going to decide what's not allowed and what's a valid point scoring technique for any given games?!

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Time to get off my soapbox,

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Cheers,
BeeJay.

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PS: Now back to practicising my Wonderboy playing because I've got some catching up to do !!!!!!!

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bjohnstone@cardinal.co.nz

[Angry]

MARP seems to be working okay for me, but I did notice the entire Retrogames collective (including MARP) was offline around 1:00am (GMT-08:00).

As for the specific leaching comments, here are my views on each:

Scion - This sounds resonable and acceptable, as you would still be playing the game as intended, and the difficulty continues to increase. More of a strategy than a cheat.<br>
Vulgus - Very borderline issue. Since you slowly build up lives via the score growing, you could possibly play forever. I would lean on the illegal side of this strategy. I have noted another similar item below.<br>
Joust - Pterry hunting (and similar techniques on other games) should be illegal - however, since there are multiple ROM versions of this game, and the trick can only be performed on the Red Label version, this could be allowed *only* on the specific version.<br>
Galaga - The no-shooting trick should also be illegal (again, if there was only 1 ROM-set that supported this, then maybe). With the scores that BeeJay & Krogman are achieving *with* enemy fire, this is a moot issue IMO.<br>
Mr. Do/Sinistar/Food Fight - All bonus life tricks (i.e. 255 lives), should be illegal.<br>
Defender/Centipede/Xevious - The bonus life issues in these games were intended by the programmer's, and should be allowed. (Each of them awards 1 Extra for each point scored - this doesn't help much in Centipede, with it's 6 life limit).<br>
Traverse USA/Zippy Race/Road Fighter - What you describe isn't really a trick, as it is a gameplay strategy. The object of these games is to finish each leg of the race and continue play for as long as possible, not to finish in 1st place.<br>
Naughty Boy - It is possible to achieve extremely high scores on sitting along the top of level 2. This is well shown by the current top 2 scores for this game (mine included :p)<br>
Roc'n Rope - This game also allows players to repeat a single level repeatedly to achieve higher scores (level 3). See the top 2 scores for this game (again, one of these is mine :p)<br>
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Alien Syndrome - It is possible to earn multiple extra lives in this game by using the "?" boxes. When the players' score is exactly 100,000, the game rewards the player with an extra life for these boxes. If you don't shoot any enemies, you can walk through the level, pick up 2 (or 3) lives, die, and repeat on your next life. I would consider this an illegal technique, if used for more than the number of "?" boxes on a level (i.e., you get 1 pass - then continue playing).

I think that the best bet for these issues is to identify the techniques that are illegal (if necessary, removing existing scores from MARP), and maintain a listing of all illegal techniques. This is how Twin Galaxies managed it back in the old days (the players' were at the heart of defining illegal actions).

Phew... that went a bit longer than I planned. I need to get that *other* Frenzy score now.

Happy New Year!

=Angry=

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greggg@ix.netcom.com

[Zwaxy]

>> To summarise then, while I'm against leaching in<BR>
>> principle who's going to decide what's not allowed<BR>
>> and what's a valid point scoring technique for any<BR>
>> given games?!
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I guess the best thing to do would be to have a list of what's allowed and what isn't in the user guide that Angry wrote (available by clicking 'Help' in the top frame). As for actually making the decisions, it seems like there's usually a majority opinion on this board, don't you think? There's probably a common-sense solution to most of these dilemmas.

Chris. (your democratic (or is that 'gutless'?) webmaster )

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zwaxy@bigfoot.com

[Krool]

i forgot all about that but i wouldnt use it, although it has happened by accident (it does that ) its just onw of those BUGS tha happen...anyone who exploits that (or other like it)...well...we all know ^_^
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KROOL
insert coin(s) and prey

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kellyq@ihug.co.nz