It appears it is a pretty accurate emulator, so it should be fine. I would still recommend Mesen over it if possible.

Hirexen and I have been talking and we have decided to change the timing for when the run ends. Time currently ends when Tom's head hits the ground, which is arbitrary, hard to tell when it happens, and is hard to actually split for. There is also the Tom Zombie glitch, which causes him to not die and the game to not end, so this would make sure time does not end before the game is over.

We are going to change the end timing to when the screen is completely black after defeating Tom after the HUD disappears, this is much more definitive to see when the run ends, and also easier to split. This is about 2.5 seconds later than the old timing, so I don't believe it pushes anyone to a higher minute mark.

The start of the run will remain the same, just the final split will change.

If anyone has any issues, let us know here, otherwise everyone's runs will be retimed to be accurate with the new timing rules.

It's pretty simple, jump, flap once at any time in the air and let go, then press and hold A about 2 pixels above the ground before you land. It is a 2 frame window.

I think for now we will probably just stick with Beat the Game, which is 2 loops, as the main category. I personally am really not a fan of only 1 loop, as it gives you no ending, and is really only playing half the game. I think the extra mode, HELL mode, could make for a good single loop category tho because a password is the only way to get there. An All Artifacts run would probably fit under Misc if someone wanted to do it, as it is the same as Beat the Game, just longer. Those are my initial thoughts.

While it is pretty novel that the game has IGT, I don't think it is particularly useful for an RTA run. For one, it only goes down to the second, which is not accurate enough. Running the game should be about doing it as fast as possible, including menuing. The fact that someone could hypothetically wait around in the menus and take hours longer to finish a run, RTA timing-wise, but have a faster IGT, seems to defeat the purpose of beating the game as fast as possible. All parts of the run should be taken into account in the final time.

I feel like it's fine to note the IGT on a submission, but the RTA timing should clearly take precedence and be the actual deciding factor of leaderboard positions.

Wrong warps are now part of the Any% run, so I think the current category should be renamed to 'No Wrong Warps' and a new Any% category made for runs that use wrong warps.

I feel like there is no need for a Deathless Glitched category. The whole point of the Deathless category is to go through the game normally without dying, using wrong warps goes against the spirit of the category, so a Deathless Glitched category seems unnecessary. While the route is interesting, to me it is just a slower Any% route.

Yeah, this was not made for NES, so can you change the platform from NES to Arcade?

We have decided to add more of a full game goal for this game, as the point categories we came up with are really arbitrary. This game has no ending, but according to the TAS notes the game runs out of unique stages and starts repeating after beating Wave 39, so I believe that would make a solid category. I am going to add it but feel free to give any input.

Sure, added.

I agree with how you are splitting categories, my only gripe is the category name. I think the category should just be "No WW", it should no longer have "Any %" in the name if there is something major that is not allowed, it just doesn't make sense as a name.

This is a picture that shows the order of the slot machines that contain the warps. The order is the exact same every time, but the speed of each wheel varies. Credit to Yogidamonk for coming up with the order, I just made the picture.

https://imgur.com/a/sU8KN

Not very hard, I just looked on ebay and messaged 2 people asking if the cart had an 'A' on the back, one said yes and one said no, so I got the one that said no. So just look for 5 screws and then ask if it has an 'A' on the back label, that's all I did

I just got my hands on a US PRG0 Rygar cart, the version you need to be able to do the Any% route, aka bounce off the red bats.

Just wanted to document it so hopefully people will be able to identify more of them.

So from what I've been able to tell, they are for sure a 5 screw. On the back label the will not be an "A" stamped into the upper right corner, if it has an "A" there it will not work. And not sure if it's guaranteed, but the front label of this one does not have 'Made in Japan' printed in the bottom left corner. And of course the board inside says NES-RY-0 PRG, that is the correct version.

The only way to be absolutely sure it's the right version would be to open up a cart and check, but again, the other possibly identifiable characteristics are

-5 Screw -No "A" stamped on back label (I think this is the biggest tell) -No 'Made in Japan' on front label

Pics of the cart https://imgur.com/a/q5AA0

Feel like these should be documented somewhere.

Elephant boss quick kill

Act 4 Strat

She has admitted to submitting an emulator movie, so the issue is now resolved.

No response after reaching out on Twitch DM, Whisper, and messsaging both her Youtube channels, so run has been removed. Leaving the video here for history's sake.

I will try to contact her, I guess I'll send a whisper/twitch message and a youtube message, don't seen any other social media, and ask her to explain all the issues. Then we can go from there

The mods are looking at removing Sanaefroggy's 11:58 run on suspicion that it is a TASed run and would like to get some opinions from the community. I have created a video that compared the strats from Sanaefroggy's last 2 PBs. I will just copy whats in the description below. Keep in mind that the all the clips used are from only an hour apart in the same stream. This run was also submitted to the board before verification was required, so no mod actually had to verify it.

This is a video that compares a number of very different strats in Sanaefroggy's last two PBs, a 12:38 and an 11:58, both performed a mere hour apart on the same stream. Strats so different that I don't believe someone would just throw into an amazing run without any practice in between.

4-1 12:38 - Does the normal strat, which is actually faster 11:58 - Does a weird wall clip to get up the ledge, slower

4-3 12:38 - Kills both Tysons and then wall climbs up 11:58 - Kills only one and boosts up onto the wall, harder strat but a little faster

6-2 12:38 - Does normal boost over the gap at the end 11:58 - Does early boost over gap, faster but not something you just throw in without practice

6-3 12:38 - Normal boost up at the start followed by normal left side climb in 2nd room 11:58 - Really strange boost up at the start followed by right side climb in 2nd room, both are super risky and not something to do without practice

6-3 12:38 - Normal, slow looking wall climbs 11:58 - Crazy fast, TAS-like wall climbing. Never seen anyone climb that fast

6-3 12:38 - Normal slow wall climbs 11:58 - More TAS-like climbs

Jaquio 12:38 - Slow strats, intentionally taking a hit up high onto the wall to get slashes in iframes, doesn't do more than 4 damage per round, 5 rounder 11:58 - Fast strats, doesn't take the hits up high, does at least 5 hits per round, 3 rounder

Demon Statue 12:38 - Slow mashing, barely kills the boss 11:58 - Fast mashing, really good kill

Credits 11:58 - After getting a sub 12, and I believe 4th place at the time, during the middle of the credits loads up a fighting game that covers the gameplay, does a combo and then just stands there for 5 minutes. Very strange thing to do at the end of a seemingly amazing run. Possibly covering the gameplay to avoid seeing a 'Movie Ended' text on emu? This part is also cut out of the official submission, but remained in the full vod.

So just comparing the strats between only an hour of attempts it is highly unlikely that it is the same person playing. Anyone that has seriously grinded this game knows this is not how PBs work in this game. Sub 12 is incredibly hard to attain and it takes a ton of grinding and chipping away second by second to get it. It is just not realistic that someone gets all golds and a 40 second PB, with some wildly different strats, to take them to sub 12, since the level of play required is vastly different for this particular game.

Here is a link to the full original broadcast if anyone wants to see it.

So the mods are looking for anyone elses opinion on the matter, because we are heavily leaning towards removing the run based on the evidence that it is a TASed run.

I really don't see how not using "glitches" warrants it's own category, apart from the fact that most things listed aren't even glitches. If you aren't interested in doing ceiling skips or rope skips, that's fine, you are still running Any%, there really doesn't seem to be a need for it. No one is forced to do glitches, but I don't think consciously choosing to go slower for arbitrary reasons necessitates it's own category.