The biggest challenge that I see in all of this is ensuring that
proper settings are being used. For example, I don't think it would
be enough to say "All games can use default settings!" There are way
too many that are extremely easy on default settings. That's the
whole point behind Twin Galaxies Tournament Settings (TGTS). Who's
got time for 24 hour marathons when there's a boatload of games to
play!!
<p>
It appears as though we'd have to look at all valid MAME games and
determine what the settings should be. Over the past 15+ years,
Walter Day has compiled a lot of TG settings, but there are still a
great number of games that have no standards. Now we could start out
with defaults and then refine the settings as we learn more about the
newer games. This information would have to be posted and kept
up-to-date. Mark and Walter already have a much of this information
readily available.
<p>
Verifying TGTS/Default settings is a major problem right now.
Unfortuately, I don't think Mark's TG3 handles this because every game
has a different "signature". For tourneys I use a custom program to
check each recording. We would need someone to maintain this same
program. Fortunately, updates would only occur twice a year, as that
is basically the release schedule for MAME FINALS (currently every 6
months as it would be for TG MAME).
<p>
Most importantly we have to get Zwaxy's blessing! After all, this is
his site and he may not want to offer a separate TGTS leaderboard.
This idea is a good one but needs some careful planning. I'd like to
see it better speced out--perhaps have a planning commitee of 3
volunteers. The LB itself would have to be somewhat policed by the
players themselves, such as now where respected players have MARP
confirmation privledges. That said, if we can get though all these
issues, I'd accept the position of MARP Judge.
--
laffaye@ibm.net