Clever analysis and exploitation of two known flaws to blow the previous state of the art solution out of the water?

Without any offense intended, this article is basically canonical Hacker News; if you see fit to complain about it, you may not enjoy your stay here.

It depends on your definition of "properly," since SMW coincidentally also has a massive shortcut (the Star Road) that lets you beat the game very quickly without bending the Matrix. A TAS of such a playthrough is only 10 minutes.

There's also a TAS of 100% completion playthrough of SMW's 96 exits, which takes considerably longer. (about 1.5 hours)

There's a TAS style for every person. :)

This isn't about beating the game in 3 minutes. It's about exploiting a bug. Not just fiddling with code either, but actually doing it through the game itself. That's what makes it really interesting to see.

You can find plenty of non-exploit speed runs if you prefer them. If you don't like this kind, might I suggest not watching them?

i get what you mean. everyone has their preference and thier right to it.

an analogy would be like a runner taking a taxi during a marathon.

More like materializing a taxi out of thin air and then riding it through buildings to the finish line.

At that point the focus is no longer on the running aspect of the race.

It's the difference between a baseball game and a home-run derby. Nobody's complaining that home-run derby is "cheating" because all the pitches are ideal. It's a different game altogether.

The tool-assisted speedrun people are simply playing a different game.

A better analogy would be a guy taking a taxi 26.2 miles and you coming along and saying, "I hate it when people move a marathon distance by any mode except running" for no discernable reason.

You might be interested in Let's Play then.

http://lparchive.org/