Starting today, submissions of runs performed on emulator are allowed (again). I also went ahead and reinstated all runs that were removed due to the emulator ban in 2019.

One reason for this is that I am stepping down from my role as moderator for this game. To make things easier once someone else wants to take the reins, a uniform leaderboard makes the most sense. Additionally, my original ban was made with too little testing. In all honesty, it was a hasty change that never should have gone through. The other reason is accessibility. I very much agree that gatekeeping speedrunning just hurts the hobby.

To the future moderator(s), here's what I changed:

• I have enabled millisecond submissions, though as specified in the rules, runners are not to submit them. I only enabled this to distinguish two runs by the same runner for the same category. Without milliseconds, SRC defaults to the chronologically earlier run, which isn't necessarily the slower run (even if you'd assume later runs are faster by at least a second). This currently only applies to the IL for "2-4 Lava Fields." I manually adjusted the milliseconds for both runs so that the faster run, which was performed first, sits at the top. I don't think there's a more elegant solution for this.
• I have adjusted all run times back to their original RTA time and re-timed everything.
• I have also removed all runs that no longer have available video evidence.

Things I strongly encourage looking into to establish a healthy competition:

• Only allowing one specific emulator for submissions, preferably DuckStation. Testing would need to be done to ensure loads aren't faster than hardware runs. As to whether the emulator should be on par with or slightly slower than hardware, that's up to future moderation to decide.
• Even on hardware, there are big discrepancies in loading and in-level cycles. I am not entirely sure what the optimal console/disc setup is to run this game, but more testing could be done and compiled in a thread to inform runners. Refer to this existing thread for more information.

Ultimately, I'm not sure what the best way to ensure an even playing field is, or if a split leaderboard makes sense, but I'm sure someone who's willing to put in the effort will come up with a good solution.