“Framerules” in Super Mario Bros. speedrunning on NES is probably the most memed analogy for a (very slightly) more complicated concept I know of.
The game can only send you to a new level every 21 frames (about .3 seconds), so there are tons of levels where timesaves don’t lead to any benefit, because you have to save a full .3 seconds in order to see any benefit.
In the community, this has been explained with the same analogy so many times that “Imagine there’s a bus” has become a well-known meme.
So, imagine there’s a bus that only leaves the station every .3 seconds (21 frames). Because the bus only leaves at the times on its schedule, arriving early for the bus doesn’t get you to your destination any faster, because you still have to wait for the time the bus will leave. For this reason, any new time saves in SMB1 must reach a new “framerule” (get there early enough to catch the previous bus) for there to be any real timesave.
“Framerules” in Super Mario Bros. speedrunning on NES is probably the most memed analogy for a (very slightly) more complicated concept I know of.
The game can only send you to a new level every 21 frames (about .3 seconds), so there are tons of levels where timesaves don’t lead to any benefit, because you have to save a full .3 seconds in order to see any benefit.
In the community, this has been explained with the same analogy so many times that “Imagine there’s a bus” has become a well-known meme.
So, imagine there’s a bus that only leaves the station every .3 seconds (21 frames). Because the bus only leaves at the times on its schedule, arriving early for the bus doesn’t get you to your destination any faster, because you still have to wait for the time the bus will leave. For this reason, any new time saves in SMB1 must reach a new “framerule” (get there early enough to catch the previous bus) for there to be any real timesave.
Thanks darbian.