When I complete "Bull In a China Shop", I immediately drive over to the train platform where the carbine rifle cop can spawn. During the drive, but before reaching the stairs, I shoot a cop, triggering a 3 star wanted level. This seems to always cause the carbine rifle cop to spawn. It has yet to fail me. The only downside is that unless you execute everything near perfectly, the next mission marker will appear before you get back, costing some time.

Leaderboards create competition, even if you're competing against yourself. Competition leads to better speedruns.

Let's not forget, isn't "speedrunning" just a showcase of one's skill? It is.

Major League Baseball in the U.S., rule 1.10, regarding bats. http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/official_info/official_rules/objectives_1.jsp

Summary: The bat shall be a smooth, round stick not more than 23/4 inches in diameter at the thickest part and not more than 42 inches in length. The bat shall be one piece of solid wood. NO EXCEPTIONS!!!

Are there not other types of bats which would help the player hit the ball further? Make it easier to hit the ball further? I understand that there are many reasons for having this rule and it's a necessary rule to have, but, people, the showcasing of one's skill occurs in all walks of life, behind sets of rules, rules that make the final goal more challenging. It's not that I'm actually upset or angered by what led me to create this thread. It's more that I'm dumbfounded that people still bring this up on streams and in chats, exposing their ignorance, and it's led me to final create a post on the topic. The point of this thread and all of my posts is simply to end the hypocrisy and to remind some people that "rules" exist in all walks of life. Speedrunning is no exception and shouldn't be. End the hypocrisy and quit with the hate.

Arbitrary- "based on random choice or personal whim, rather than any reason or system".

Let's not get caught up in the names of things. The idea that there are "rules of the game" is also not worth getting into because there are actually no "rules of the game". These are rules set up by a community, not the game designers.

S, what developer/designer told the pioneer(s) of GTA speedrunning that a cheat code is not allowed in the "Any%" category. Better yet, what developer/designer told the pioneer(s) of "speedrunning" that a cheat code is not allowed during the speedrun? This never occurred. It's the community who wrote the rules and therefore, it is just as arbitrary as not allowing a taxi in an offshoot category. It's simply the strong foundation of "speedrunning" which makes a person think otherwise.

When you get into what "breaking the game" really means, you're instantly digging yourself into a hole, as it's all a matter of opinion. If the only way to get out of this hole is to stop stating ideas and reasoning based on opinion, then you'd have to completely end the conversation on "breaking the game". We can all get tangled up in "did the developer intend for this to happen?", "can we exploit bugs?", "can we exploit glitches?", etc., but it's all useless as the point of this thread was simply to bring to light that it's all "arbitrary" in one way or another and how arbitrary it really is is left up to a person's opinion.

One thing I'm left thinking about at this moment is why duplication glitching is allowed in Vice City and III. Is it because the developers didn't intend for these things to happen within their game? Regardless of whether or not the developers intended for these things to happen, does it not still "break the game" in the same way a cheat code ¤may¤? Do we really know if the developers intended for these duplication glitches to happen? Probably not, but it doesn't matter. So, should I be left with the belief that if the developer intended for something to be used within the game, which leads to an outcome that could be considered "breaking the game", then it shouldn't be allowed? Come on people, do you not see how silly it is to continue to think down upon a category when the category you ¤may¤ be running is just as f¤cked up in it's rules?

Cheat codes were placed in the game's code to be used. Taxis were placed in the game's code to be used. You are not forced to use either. Both are equally easy to use. A taxi makes the speedrun easier and faster, a cheat code makes the speedrun easier and faster. Depending on the game, the level that a cheat code impacts the game differs. You can disallow certain cheat codes and allow others, or you can disallow/allow all cheat codes. It's equally arbitrary as there's just as much of a system behind one idea as there is another.

...people bashing the "Classic%" category of GTA IV & V.

"It's stupid. It has stupid rules. This is a speedrun, not a slowrun! Arbitrary this, arbitrary that."

Believe me, I see it enough.

The moment you do a "speedrun" and refuse to use the "cheats" which are there the moment you pop in the disc or install the game, you're refusing to use a part of the release which ¤may¤ save you time during the run. "Any%" is not actually "anything at your disposal can be used", at least for some or all of the GTA series.

For all of you that this pertains to, let's not be hypocrites anymore, ok?

(I'm also aware that everything I or anyone else posts in this thread will not change the way of thinking of someone that I would deem as an "ignorant hypocrite" because, well, a person who says something along the lines of "It's stupid. It has stupid rules. This is a speedrun, not a slowrun! Arbitrary this, arbitrary that." is likely too far gone to understand logic)

"A part of the full run shouldn't be its own category." -full run really means full Any%/Classic% run ::: The other two Misc. categories will probably go as well, they were kind of like a test anyway.

Anyway, more people had done Los Santos% and as of current day, I believe there're actually more people doing LS% than there are doing RS, yet LS% was removed some time ago. I never saw that leaderboard, LS%, but there had to have been more times posted and if not, there had to have been tons of LS% times/videos existing at the time which had yet to be posted. Sort of like RS, but on a larger scale. What is the purpose of a leaderboard when there're a handful+ of really good runners that either never felt like highlighting a really good RS time and/or never posted a RS time? I named these people above and sure, most spent there time running this game before the category was on the leaderboards, but ALL of these runners are still around either watching GTA IV speedrunning or even running the game a bit here and there.

The leaderboard category might as well not exist. A) Many of the best IV runners show all the signs that they don't care about it B} Most of the the times posted to that leaderboard were obtained during a SRL race, therefore, these "best RS times" are already on SRL C) There are a handful of runners who have a RS time beyond 1:30:00 that never were posted to that leaderboard category D) Given that the majority of times under that leaderboard category were obtained during an SRL race, I know people will continue to do RS runs, at the rate they were already being done... E) I can think of a couple of runners that do Classic% every now and then, less than I do, but more than the rest, and now that this category is removed, I really do see at least one of these runners putting more focus on the full run. Call me crazy, but I really can picture it happening in my head. When I spoke of "Misc. categories just take focus away from the full runs", I didn't really believe it as fact, just as a possibility, but now I really do believe it as fact. As I said, call me crazy, but I do see this change positively affecting GTA IV speedrunning.

Also, there were a handful, maybe even more, of runners with pretty good RS times that weren't even posted on the leaderboards. Itsab, Dispersor, Grekokov, Ryedawg, Jasper, Heinki, and likely at least someone else I'm forgetting (all between 1:10:00 - 1:30:00). Just a very messy leaderboard/situation. (This post was regarding R.S. WITH Brucie.....many, many more were missing from R.S. w/o Brucie)

I can see someone coming on here saying that they only run that category......and I'd bet that same person does a run of it once in a blue moon. You don't keep a category around because someone decides to do a random run of it every few weeks or even months.

I'm very close to just removing these two categories (RSw/B & RSw/oB). A part of the full run shouldn't be its own category. I view keeping these two categories around in the same way I view allowing a stain to remain on a shirt. They really need to go. In the big scheme of things, not many people view IV's full run leaderboard all that much either, but it needs to remain, clearly. Roman's Sorrow is a much different issue. Name someone who only runs Roman's Sorrow at least once a week and has no intention of ever putting time into the full run? There's no one. These type of categories are already on SRL anyway, they're race categories. I said I was close at the beginning and now that I've typed up to this point, I've made my decision. I'm taking this issue into my own hands and removing the category. It's silly to keep these two categories on the leaderboard. Categories which are not a part of the full Any%/Classic% run will remain though.

Edit: I shouldn't say "no one cares about your best time for specific section of the game" because people do care. This just doesn't mean it should be its own leaderboard.

^

Today, someone, and they'll remain unknown unless they want to be known, brought to my attention that ExplodingCabbage actually did the hot dog skip in one of his videos and also explained how to do it on the SDA forums a year+ ago. (the video is 3+ years old)

https://forum.speeddemosarchive.com/post/gta_4173.html

If you're curious as to how he set up what is required for the skip to work, segment 1 is where to look:

It's been over a week, the last post was on the 23rd, so this poll will now close.

The winner is #5, which is: 5. BOTH free and paid DLC (exclusiveness doesn't matter) (disallows use of pre-order/returning bonuses and DLC/gains/advantages which are no longer obtainable)

#5 basically says, you can play on whatever console you want, you can use whatever you want, you can use the free dlc for that console, you can use paid dlc for that console, you don't even have to use dlc, it doesn't matter if the dlc is exclusive to one console, it doesn't matter if a certain feature is exclusive to a console and THE ONLY RULE IS "disallows use of pre-order/returning bonuses and DLC/gains/advantages which are no longer obtainable". There's a reason #5 blew the others out of the water.

The DLC debate and poll was mainly to figure out where the community stands on this issue. These poll results don't mean there can only be two categories, "Classic%" and "Any%", with #5 attached. If there ends up being "Classic% PS4/Xbox One w/ ALL DLC", "Classic% PS4/Xbox One w/ FREE DLC", "Classic% PS4/Xbox One w/ NO DLC", "Classic% PS3/Xbox 360 w/ ALL DLC", "Classic% PS3/Xbox 360 w/ FREE DLC", "Classic% PS3/Xbox 360 w/ NO DLC", "Classic% PC w/ ALL DLC", "Classic% PC w/ FREE DLC", "Classic% PC w/ NO DLC", as individual categories, then I guess we'll have......A LOT of categories! I personally feel this is the wrong way to go, but if this is how things end up, I'll be posting my times in the PC category which lays way for the fastest time.

We need a thread to keep track of all which falls under "disallows use of pre-order/returning bonuses and DLC/gains/advantages which are no longer obtainable".

Most Wanted wiki: http://gta.wikia.com/Most_Wanted

District: Dukes, Broker, Bonham http://guides.gamepressure.com/grandtheftautoiv/guide.asp?ID=4832

District: Algonquin http://guides.gamepressure.com/grandtheftautoiv/guide.asp?ID=4833

District: Alderney http://guides.gamepressure.com/grandtheftautoiv/guide.asp?ID=4834

Timing: Timer begins when you cancel the opening cutscene and ends when you've completed all 30 Most Wanted.

Rules: Take out the thirty fugitives in Liberty City.

1. It's faster
2. Early shotgun
3. If security guard spawns, you'll get a pistol, w/o time loss, by using this shotgun

It has been added under Misc. along with an initial submission. Kappa I hope to see others pick up this category. It's really something. I've uploaded the splits as well.

Races should start from a new game. Non races can happen at any time during gameplay.

Final Destination "quick kill", saves about 30 seconds

You don't want to land any closer and you don't want to move closer once out of the heli. The SMG can reach. See the edge of the building to my left? This is an excellent marker as to where to land.

Lighnator, that comment was meant for Misc. categories that are speedruns of portions of the full run. A bowling category doesn't give off the impression that portions of a full run are just as important as the full run. I'm sure you already understood this, but I had to say it, for others. Also, it can actually be speedrunnable because depending on your input, the speed of the ball varies. Your inputs have to be quick, to avoid wasting as little time between frames as possible. Lastly, there is skill involved here as for getting a strike, or a spare and maybe even managing to get a spare when faced with a split. I'm not sure who's aware of this, but you're actually in control of the ball after the toss. You control it with the analog stick.