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Raistlin
Registered: Mar 2007
Posts: 588 |
Intro Compos - and Size Coding
I wanted to bring this topic up again.. as I know it was discussed before between TheRyk, Krill, Jammer, GPZ and others.
Size-limited intro compos. WHY are they restricted to limited RAM?
An intro compo, for me, shouldn’t be about pretending that C64 has limited memory. Intros should really just be appropriately sized “hey, we cracked this, we’re awesome, hello to our friends!” things to impress.
A 1k intro would normally be linked to a <4k game.. so if it chose to expand to 48k, but only added 1k or less to the file size, that would be fine. In the real world. The person playing the cracked game really doesn’t care less what the intro’s doing. It’s just an intro.
The argument that “we’re turning an intro compo into a compressed demo compo” seems backward. That’s not it at all. By adding the extra restrictions, you’re actually saying it’s not an intro compo at all - it’s now a size-coding compo.
My 2c.
Ps. Recent discussion on this was here: https://csdb.dk/forums/?roomid=12&topicid=158496&showallposts=1 |
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Mermaid
Registered: Jan 2002
Posts: 338 |
Is there anything stopping someone who is unhappy with the rules from making their own "intro" compo with their own set of rules? |
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Raistlin
Registered: Mar 2007
Posts: 588 |
Quote: Is there anything stopping someone who is unhappy with the rules from making their own "intro" compo with their own set of rules?
Of course not :-) .. but The Ryk -did- start with the rules how I suggest to begin with .. but then bowed to community pressure.
The CSDb Intro Compo is also annual, well managed and supported so I don’t think another is needed as it would just dilute the awesomeness - or possibly just fail miserably… |
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Mermaid
Registered: Jan 2002
Posts: 338 |
Presumably because he changed the rules in the first place? If it's supposed to be an annual thing and a continuation of Didi's original competition, right down to using the exact same name for the compo, I'd just stick with Didi's rules, they seemed to be pretty straight forward, easy to understand, easy to check, and yielded some amazing intros.
Every 4k demo compo I've looked at so far has no runtime restrictions, only the file size counts. So clearly there are a lot of other opportunities for people who don't want to deal with the sort of restrictions traditionally associated with the annual intro competition. Why not go make something for one of those compos, instead of getting rid of the one competition that has a different rule? Or make your own intro compo with a different name, and blackjack, and hookers.
If the annual intro compo shouldn't be about pretending that the C64 has limited memory, is it also a problem that some music compos don't allow samples, or that some graphics compos are limited to char mode, or 4 colours, or don't allow mixing screenmodes, or don't allow the use of sprites, colour cycling, animation? Many compos have rules that, it could be argued, are quite arbitrary. I don't think it makes them less interesting. |
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TWW
Registered: Jul 2009
Posts: 542 |
Quote:but then bowed to community pressure.
The tyrrany of democrocy :) |
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Burglar
Registered: Dec 2004
Posts: 1054 |
Quoting RaistlinSize-limited intro compos. WHY are they restricted to limited RAM?
The restriction was invented by Didi for his crack intro competitions. The reasoning is simple: to leave room for the game.
afaik only Didi's crack intro compos use this extra restriction. All (yes all) other size-limited compos do not have any restriction on RAM usage. |
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tlr
Registered: Sep 2003
Posts: 1737 |
Well, intros used to be _all_ about size. The TRIAD "Mr. Z intro" is a good example.
It could be argued that size doesn't matter so much anymore when there are really fast loaders and alternative storage solutions with more space, but IMO an intro for a crack should try to be below 1k.
...and size coding is fun! |
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Krill
Registered: Apr 2002
Posts: 2871 |
The memory footprint restriction is sensible for an actual intro (not size-restricted demo) compo, and it's the only of its oddball kind.
It's just the fine-print that was always a little bonkers and needlessly complicated, rather than simply providing a large incompressible bitsalad file or three to link with. =) |
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Raistlin
Registered: Mar 2007
Posts: 588 |
Quote: Well, intros used to be _all_ about size. The TRIAD "Mr. Z intro" is a good example.
It could be argued that size doesn't matter so much anymore when there are really fast loaders and alternative storage solutions with more space, but IMO an intro for a crack should try to be below 1k.
...and size coding is fun!
Definitely intros were always about size. I say that in my original post. IMO, an intro shouldn’t add much more than 25% to the size of the initial game it’s linked to.. preferably much less.
But… my point was that if a 1k intro is linked to a 1k game, why not use the other 62k? Outside of compos, proper intros could definitely do that - why wouldn’t they if they allowed them to be somehow cooler? By using the extra 62k, I don’t mean increasing the size of the crack (intro + game), I’m talking about the intro generating code and/or data to somehow improve the intro’s effect.
But I guess intro compos aren’t just about intros.. the added restriction makes it more like a size coding compo with restrictions. Which I can of course understand the interest in. |
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tlr
Registered: Sep 2003
Posts: 1737 |
Quoting RaistlinBut… my point was that if a 1k intro is linked to a 1k game, why not use the other 62k? Outside of compos, proper intros could definitely do that - why wouldn’t they if they allowed them to be somehow cooler?
At runtime, sure. But not in binary size, because loading time and space it takes up on a disk.
Quoting RaistlinBut I guess intro compos aren’t just about intros.. the added restriction makes it more like a size coding compo with restrictions. Which I can of course understand the interest in.
You could argue that the whole c64 (and retro computing) scene in general is all about restrictions already. Nothing wrong with a few more to encourage creativity. |
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Krill
Registered: Apr 2002
Posts: 2871 |
Quoting RaistlinBut… my point was that if a 1k intro is linked to a 1k game, why not use the other 62k? [...] I’m talking about the intro generating code and/or data to somehow improve the intro’s effect. This boils down to the same "pls provide payload to link with" argument.
Question would be how to properly formalise that for a compo. Either you make the payload so big as to implicitly enforce a memory footprint restriction on the intro, or the payload is smaller and then... require the intro to be no more than a fourth of the payload's size? On disk? After decrunch? Or require crunched intro+payload not to exceed 125% of payload size? Etc. =) |
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