Unfortunately, this is something that should be noted for anyone who cares about this speedrun. Here are the possible ways to play the game that I'm aware of:

• Disc in PS2 (several hardware variations, disc speed variations)
• Disc in backwards-compatible PS3
• Disc in XBox
• Disc in Gamecube
• Disc in backwards-compatible Wii
• Played off hard drive in fat PS2
• Played off hard drive in XBox
• Played off external hard drive on Wii
• Played off external hard drive on hacked Wii U?
• Played off microSD card through memory card port of PS2 via MC2SIO?
• Played through ethernet port on PS2 (others?) via something like RetroNAS?

I don't think I care enough to do much testing, but I just recently hacked my XBox and noticed the load times off that hard drive were significantly faster than I was used to with my PS2HDD (1-2s vs 4-5s). I had been using a microSD-to-IDE adapter with my PS2HDD and playing in widescreen which are two variables that can be changed to possibly improve PS2 loads. XBox doesn't seem to have widescreen mode and I was using a 2TB SATA HDD.

xbox loads for reference:

As y'all probably know, the US version only has one difficulty setting, while JP has three. This hasn't really been an issue for the leaderboards since nearly everyone runs US. However, a JP Easy IL was just submitted for Max Lvl 5 and it's faster than the only other run which was on US.

When you look at the leaderboard for Max Lvl 5, all the info is there to show they were on different difficulties: https://www.speedrun.com/goof_troop/Level_5#Max

but if you look at the All Levels view for ILs, it only shows the fastest ones: https://www.speedrun.com/goof_troop/individual_levels

So, question is if y'all care about this. Seedy obviously didn't do anything wrong - it's a perfectly valid run and he can run whatever difficulty he wants - but if JP Easy and US runs are mixed together, it becomes necessary to run JP Easy to rank near the top. This will inevitably be the case for full game runs as well.

10k point glitch summary: The player is awarded tank bux each time the player reaches a milestone of 10,000 points. Additionally, if a player runs out of tank bux and dies, the level ends and the player fails. However, if the player runs out of tank bux, dies, then is awarded additional tank bux before the failure screen appears, the player will instead pass the level.

Example:

Implications for RTA: Most notably, this offers an opportunity to cut minutes off the time for Assault on SF. Rather than waiting the full 9 minutes for the level to end, the player can end the level early. It will be possible to end other levels early in RTA, but it doesn't seem possible to skip to the end entirely. For this reason, it doesn't seem necessary to add any rules or categories for RTA.

Implications for the IL leaderboard: An important fact on this matter is that points and tank bux carry over from level to level. Entering a level from the Level Select menu starts the player(s) with 0 points and 30 tank bux total. Entering a level from Campaign mode allows the player to enter a level with any amount of points or tank bux, based on how many the player has accrued in the game up to that point. If a player enters a level with 9,975 points, the player only needs to gain 25 points to abuse the glitch, whereas a player entering from level select would need to gain all 10,000.

Possibilities:

1. No rules regarding starting criteria for an IL. Likely result: the strategy for nearly every level would be to manipulate the point total on the level before it so that the player enters the IL with 9,975 points, then abuse the glitch. Cons: Not only is this totally uninteresting, but the player is spending time performing tasks necessary for achieving the time, but that time is not being counted against the timer, similar to New Game+.

2. Strictly require the player to begin the level with 0 points and 30 tank bux (i.e. Require the player to enter an IL via Level Select). Likely result: The strats for most existing ILs would be unaffected. At least one IL would benefit from still being able to abuse the 10k point glitch.

However, cons: If a player achieves an IL WR during an RTA run, it would be disqualified, regardless of whether or not the player took advantage of the extra tank bux or points. e.g., if a player tied the solo WR for Alcatraz at the end of an RTA by driving straight to the end and killing Cassandra. Additionally, this rule would disqualify some existing co-op ILs which require more than 30 total tank bux. e.g., Champs Elysees and Alcatraz, where the current strats require a Goliath and a tank worth more than the remaining 5 tank bux. If the game provided 30 tank bux each, it wouldn't be a problem, but it only provides 30 total.

3. The player is not forbidden from entering with additional tank bux or points, as long as they aren't used by the player to gain an advantage. (e.g., if you get the WR on Alcatraz in an RTA without abusing the 10k point glitch or using more than 30 tank bux, then it's valid). Likely result & cons: IL records during RTA are no longer unnecessarily disqualified, but the problem of co-op only being able to use 30 tank bux total still remains.

4. Allow players to use as many tank bux as they want, but if their IL run abuses the 10k points glitch, the player must have begun the level with 0 points. Likely result: Assault and possibly a couple other levels benefit from the glitch. No IL runs benefit from untimed gameplay, such as racking up points before entering a level. Co-op runners are allowed to use the tanks of their choosing, rather than being limited to 30 tank bux. Cons: allowing players to use accrued tank bux but forbidding them from using accrued points is somewhat arbitrary. Rule #2 is much cleaner and consistent in this regard.

Hopefully this is a fair assessment of the options and their pros & cons. Personally, I can't stand overly-complicated leaderboards and arbitrary rules, but I do see this as a very grey area and I would prioritize fun, interesting, diverse runs over boring, identical, loophole-type runs with lower numbers.

This community is very small as of now and may likely stay that way. After chatting with lolaway, lazycomit and AC, I think we're all in agreement #4 is the way to go. I hope anyone new to this game can take the time to read this and understand why the rule exists. If not, feel free to share your thoughts here.

NOTE: Due to protection of routes, the videos for this category will not be made public, as it includes challenges and bonus levels, and you can't see other people's replays ingame either.

For those unfamiliar to speedruns of this game, can you explain why this is in place for the 100% and All Levels+ categories? What are the routes being protected from?

_

edit: threads locked now, but I just wanna say, based solely on this thread, y'all were pretty cool about it. Gave your reasoning, listened to the other side, talked it over and were willing to change it in the end. Good on ya.

Shouldn't mystakin's 100% run also be at the top of the Any% All Music Sheets leaderboard, since he collected all the music sheets during it?

Rather than updating the info in both places, I'll just link the SDA thread here for now

https://forum.speeddemosarchive.com/post/thomas_was_alone.html

Rather than updating the info in both places, I'll just link the SDA thread here for now

https://forum.speeddemosarchive.com/post/1402.html

Rather than updating both sites with info, I'll just put a link to the SDA thread here for now

https://forum.speeddemosarchive.com/post/disneys_aladdin_genesismega_drive_26.html