http://marp.retrogames.com/inp/al_hpolym84_450960_win36b11.zip

His clone score doesn't report autofire (variances are with in tolerance though bit averages are very low). But tthe hpolym84 goes below the varience tolerance and the bit averages are lower than the clone score.

I don't really know what to do because he obviously has been saying he hasn't been using autofire and others were trusting him.

-- Anonymous, September 24, 2000

Answers

OK... here's my take on it:

(1) Obviously, there are a lot of things we cannot check on T&F-like games. We can never be sure about "methods" and "artifacts" used, nor can we be sure that the player didn't have a second person controlling the jump/angle button. As long as that is the case, I am not very impressed by scores on these games, while at the same time having my doubts about some of the "achievements" (like I know Pat has). Alex himself has expressed doubts a few times about Jeff Wolfe's scores in these games, and I myself have doubts on a lot of the scores on these games. Maybe even Tommi's. Now, I know that Tommi has shown he is really good at T&F at Funspot, that still doesn't mean he didn't cheat on MARP. I guess that's the main, general, problem. No matter how many times someone has proven himself under "controlled" circumstances, it only proves that that person is capable of doing it. It doesn't mean he didn't cheat on his MAME scores.

(2) I am not sure on what the rules are on T&F and similar games when a judge is watching, but I'd guess that using lighters, handkerchiefs, electric toothbrushes, etc., is not allowed. But you could take this one step further... some people (Alex being one of them) can do better while rotating (or something similar) a joystick. The real machine didn't have a joystick (or, most of them didn't, anyway). So where does that leave us? Because if you wouldn't allow using a joystick, then you shouldn't allow any controls (keyboard, gamepad, etc.) as long as they're not the same as the machine.

(3) Therefore, as long as it's not obvious (RLH or autofire), I'd rather leave T&F alone. I don't think that, regardless of how "secure" the version of MAME is, we can ever really be sure of what people do on these short burst games.

I'd say we just leave them alone. At least until we find new, better, methods of checking games like these.

Cheers, Ben Jos.

-- Anonymous, September 24, 2000

The problem of course with just leaving them alone is that we've already dismissed so many because "analinp said it was autofire". By leaving it alone we're saying most all of the ones we dismissed will have to be checked again. It's just a big mess anyway you go.

-- Anonymous, September 25, 2000