Introduction to TAS: Tool-Assisted Speedrunning (What, How, Why?)

Welcome to my glorified PowerPoint aiming to simplistically explain exactly what a tool-assisted speedrun, or TAS, actually is, as well as how they are created!

Misinformed comments I've received on my uploads during 7.5 years of TASing about how "it's cheating" and that "a computer/robot makes these" are a couple of the sparks that motivated me to write, record, and edit a video like this. I hope I managed to clearly convey what being a TASer is like and the time-consuming effort players have to put into their speedruns to achieve a successful final product.

Feel free to post any questions you may have in the comments, and if you have any suggestions on other topics for videos like this, go ahead and let me know! Don't forget to leave a "thumbs up" if you enjoyed the video :) Happy 2/22!

Links:

Special Thanks:
Tyler Kehne
1ted59
PlushSM64
SwedeWithAnAccent
Gaehne D.
Kaze
MKDasher

Background Music:
"Cutie Roll" from Rockman 9 Arrange Soundtrack (Mega Man 9 Arranged)

[moosemaimer]

I look at is as: speedrunning is about finding out *how fast you can beat a game.* TASing is about finding out *how fast a game can be beaten.*

[mischacarlberg]

I always thought TAS was some really insane speedrunner who had a lot of world records.

[YTSunnys]

Great explaination. I'm getting so tired of seeing these "TAS is cheating" comments.

[TASSnoop]

Finally when someone says "Cheater" I dont have to write a whole book to them anymore... now i can just send them this video! :) Very nice and good job explaining everything.

[Santarrosa]

Common Comments I've encountered:

> "TAS is cheating"

- How is this cheating?
Are they fooling the game? No, because a game is just an scenario with simple objectives like “beat the final boss”, but players are free to decide which way to do it, some players go with full power ups, some will go well equipped, some will prefer the challenge of doing it without weapons, some will take the short path, and some will take the long path, TASers just do the same thing in a different way, or is solitaire the only right way of playing with cards?

Are they fooling the community? No, TAS players keep things separated from normal runs, if a TAS run beats a normal run time record, they don’t claim the previous record was beaten, because is a different category, TAS runs are only compared to other TAS runs because they belong in the same category, they don’t try to discredit the normal run achievements.

Are they fooling the viewers? No, they just show some amazing gameplay so people can see things they couldn’t with normal runs, they gameplays are meant to be enjoyed by people who like to see incredible speedruns, not to make them think is a normal run, that’s the reason they put the word “TAS” in the title, so anyone can know that is not a normal run, if they wanted to fool someone they woulnd’t put that tag

> "It has no merit"

- So, taking weeks or months for a 5 minute perfect run has no merit? Setting a new record that demands other people to have lot of patience, dedication and knowledge to beat even with tools has no merit? Just because they use tools doesn’t mean the process of making the runs are effortless, it requires a lot of time to do something good, because the bar is too high, they don’t do simple good runs, they do as close to perfect as possible runs

> "With glitches anyone can do it"

- Yes, anyone can do awesome things with glitches but not anyone can do perfectly optimized runs (usually because of lack of knowledge/dedication/time), sure, you have a glitch that lets you beat the game under 3 minutes, but can you beat the TAS record of beating the game in 2 minutes 8 seconds? Is not as easy as it sounds

> "That way the game can't be enjoyed"

- This is very relative, TASers like to do what they do, maybe they don’t play the game as intended, but they still enjoy it, TAS-target-spectators are people who know what a TAS is, and they like it anyway so they still enjoy the run because of it’s awesomeness. If someone doesn’t enjoy it, is not the TASer fault, is just that he/she is watching something not aimed for its tastes, is like watching horror movies when you hate being scared

> "They hack (modify the game), to make it work differently"

- No they don’t, the use natural bugs that are present in the original game, so those things are possible on real consoles, some are replicable and some aren’t, but that’s because of human limitations, but aside from that, the glitches are a natural part of the original game. They don’t modify game elements to do the gameplays, the exceptions are for creating new content and ways to play, like creating new levels, but that’s a different subject

[OleSMM]

That TAS guy is an actual legend, he gets WR on EVERY game, He's so epic

[caspardebruyn]

so if i underdtand right, a person could do the same as a tas, if he would be able to do everything frame perfect?

[magik]

My pastor says TAS is sinful because you're not using the tools God gave you to speedrun.

"Did Jesus use save-states when he turned water into wine?"
"If God intended us to execute frame-perfect inputs, he would have given us emulators instead of brains."

[ORaYBeast]

Even though I know what a tas is I still came on this video and you are really good at explaining

[pixcalibur]

Nice explanations to clear up common misconceptions, which aren't really that prevalent nowadays given most people are aware of the differences between RTA and TAS.

RTA is basically how fast can you complete the game using the resources and RNG you're given, trying to minimize human error as much as possible.

TAS is basically answering the question of how fast could you beat the game if you could control every RNG variable and get every input perfect.

[PollPerson]

I always pronounced it "tass" instead of saying the letters individually

[Varooooooom]

Really glad this exists, but it kinda sucks that most people who claim "FAKE" on TASes are most likely too dumb to understand most of this video.

[Chris_Tower]

I've been wondering about TAS for quite a while, tried looking the definition up and hearing things like "memory watch" left me massively confused. Here you spell things out in a very clear manner and I thoroughly enjoyed it thanks a lot!

[loansharkjoe]

excellent video! i understand this MUCH better now and i really love the way you made this video! also am obsessed with your 120 star tas i thought it was phenomenal! love your TASs even more since i understand how difficult they are to make now as opposed to before

[BrandNewByxor]

I've always wondered how to make a TAS until now. Thank you.

[tetsuo]

thanks for educating me! I had a concept of what a TAS run was but I didn't consider the time and painstaking effort to perfect every frame of game input, or that it only relies on game glitches alone. I just thought it was using a gameshark or something. highly informative video 👍

[TompaA]

Pretty nice video! I'll probably link this when I answer TAS comments on Youtube now :).

[StevenCasteelYT]

Thank you. I typed TAS software to learn and your video told me EXACTLY what I wanted to know.

[teksosthegamer]

Thanks for explaining the whole TAS meaning in video games since i have been working on speedrunning Ocarina of time and Super mario 64

[taylorross]

Very well done! Before, I was confused at what exactly a TAS was. Now, I know what it is and can respect the time each individual run takes.