For anyone interested in learning this game, there is a new + improved discord server you can join here that is specific to this game:

https://discord.gg/vNxvJ7S

This link should never expire - if it doesn't work, let me know and I can update it.

I wanted to see how much time FDS saves over emulator in this game (for Any% specifically) so I went ahead and frame-counted the loads from my recent PB (31:32) and Leo's WR (28:57) and compiled my findings into this spreadsheet as a reference for everyone else:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Twhx62ygwvWrEYaXHRLcnf8GK0dr_yZF1Y3P0k_sOf0

Oddly enough, a couple loads are slightly faster on emulator, but for the most part FDS is superior and ends up saving ~25 seconds over the course of the run.

UPDATE: I have also timed out the loads from Caveman's PB (29:43) vs. my 31:32 to compare the loading times for Ruff vs. Tumble and have updated the above link with a spreadsheet that also shows this (on a separate tab). I found that the load times for Ruff were only ~1 second faster. However, the video quality of Caveman's PB is quite poor, making it difficult to discern the correct reference frames at the start/end of loads. A number of loads, when compared to mine, differed by only a frame or 2 in either direction, so I can fairly confidently say that character choice does not significantly impact loading times.

Anyone looking to speedrun any of the Pac-Man games is welcome to join the community Discord server here:

https://discord.gg/QtB8Tyy

I have seen several posts from people saying that the invites here are expired, so I have set this one to never expire. Hopefully this solves this issue!

There's now a Discord server for people interested in running this game, which you can join using this link:

https://discord.gg/8eVmghm

After some research as well as some discussion with other Arrangement runners, it has been decided to combine the Pac-Man Collection and Namco Museum Arrangement leaderboards. Any runs of Pac-Man Arrangement should now be submitted here regardless of the version played.

-Joe

This post is to serve as a place to discuss further allowance of disc tray manipulation in Pac-Man World speedruns.

For anybody who is unaware, there is an exploit in Pac-Man World that can be achieved by opening the disc tray on the console to prevent areas of the game from loading until the player has bypassed particular obstacles. This is most notably used in Down The Tubes in all categories in order to skip the bell door and in the overworld to perform gate skip in Any%. Due to some recent discoveries regarding both of these skips, several people (myself included) would like to have a discussion surrounding this trick and whether or not it should still be allowed.

When disc eject was first found, the community surrounding this game was quite small, and all of the platforms they were performing runs on (PS1, PS2, and Emu) could all use disc eject, so since everybody was on equal footing, the trick was allowed from the start. However, as the community has grown and the number of platforms people run the game on has increased, this is no longer true. Players on the PSN download version and on PSTV are unable to perform this trick, and thus are at a disadvantage under the current ruleset. Disallowing disc eject would put all platforms on equal footing in terms of the strat pool that players can pull from. Although certain platforms would become faster than others due to load time differences, I think that it is crucial that any strat that one player is able to do can be done by any other player.

I want to make it clear that disc eject is not a glitch, nor does it cause an effect that cannot be achieved in-game. It takes advantage of an in-game mechanic by abusing something outside of the game itself, which is why it is an interesting case of hardware manipulation, unlike other games, where opening the disc tray, tilting the cartridge, etc. causes glitches that are not normally in the game or cannot normally be done to occur.

If disc eject ends up being banned as a result of the discussion on this post, then the rules will be updated promptly and all runs submitted after the change that use disc eject will be rejected. Any runs currently on the boards would remain since they complied with the submission rules at the time they were completed and verified.

Another option that people may discuss is making separate categories or adding a variable to distinguish between runs that use disc eject and those that do not if it is decided that the trick should still be allowed. I would argue that disc eject is not game-breaking enough to warrant this distinction since unlike level skip, wall skip, etc., the fundamental nature of the run is not changed if disc eject is used or not. Again though, I'm not going to make decisions for everyone, so I want to hear people's thoughts.

I want to know what everyone thinks about this trick. Please keep discussions and arguments both relevant and civil. I'll leave this post up for a week or two so people have time to formulate their thoughts and opinions and then proceed from there based on what people say on this post. Thank you!

-Joe

I've noticed that there are a couple things regarding the PMA leaderboards that could be changed. They are as follows:

1. Add NTSC-J as a region for the game since the game was released in Japan.
2. Add GBP (Gameboy Player) as a console. It's technically the piece of hardware some people play on and should be added as a choice when submitting
3. Clarify in the Arrangement rules that the difficulty settings cannot be modified and all runs must be done on default difficulty, i.e. normal, 3 lives, extra life at 40K pts.

So while doing some testing today on the N64 version, I found out that this version is dramatically different from the PS and DC versions. 6 levels are missing - Slip Sliding Away, Shock Therapy, Sand Witch, Boulder Over, Out To Launch, and Bats A Wrap. Furthermore, after defeating Gobblin, you can immediately fight Mesmerelda provided you have 42 stars. Therefore, I think it is a wise idea to make the consoles separate categories. New categories should now be:

Any% (PS1/DC) Any% (N64) 100% (PS1/DC) 100% (N64)

If someone does a full run of the GBA version, it will also be added as a separate category most likely. Let me know what you all think of this proposal.

-Joe

This post is here to explain the differences between each console and version for Pac-Man World and to illustrate which versions are the fastest for which categories. (Updated December 12, 2017)

Any%: NTSC-U is the fastest version, but only by 2 or 3 seconds over NTSC-J. NTSC-J has a slower final set of moving platforms at the end of Barrel Blast, and the health refills after completing levels make optimal death abuses in Perilous Pipes and Ghostly Garden more difficult to set up, particularly the latter. Although PAL has the fastest movement, Wall Skip, Bell Door Skip, and Gate Skip are all not possible on this version, and these skips save far more time than the faster movement does.

NTSC-U > NTSC-J >>>>> PAL

All Levels: NTSC-J is the fastest version. King Galaxian, the 2nd boss, takes fewer hits per eye to defeat and saves around 10 seconds as compared to NTSC-U/PAL. Krome Keeper, the 5th boss, has 2 less HP on NTSC-J, which makes that fight faster by around 30 seconds as compared to NTSC-U/PAL. PAL has the fastest movement speed, but Bell Door Skip is not possible, putting this version about on par with NTSC-U.

NTSC-J >> NTSC-U ~ PAL

100%: NTSC-J is by far the fastest version. Marathon Mode is not required for 100% completion on this version, saving over 40 minutes over NTSC-U/PAL. Faster movement speed on PAL makes it better than NTSC-U but still far worse than NTSC-J.

NTSC-J >>>>>>> PAL >> NTSC-U

Consoles: PSTV > PS2 FDS >> PS2 SDS > PS1 Emu ~ PS1 ~ PS3 ~ PSN

In the current Any% route, we do the following:

1. Collect the key, friend, and letters in Manic Mines and activate level skip
2. Skip Space Race
3. Collect the key, friend, and letters in Far Out and activate level skip
4. Clip through the wall and skip Perilous Pipes

I have yet to time this out - I came up with it while driving to school this morning - but I believe it will be faster if we do the following:

1. Collect the key and friend in Manic Mines and exit level once we have freed the friend
2. Collect the letters in Space Race and activate level skip
3. Collect the key and friend in Far Out and exit level once we have freed the friend
4. Clip through the wall and skip Perilous Pipes

Although this would involve us both completing and collecting the letters in Space Race, we will not have to collect the letters in Manic Mines or Far Out. We will also not have to go all the way to the ends of these levels and complete them - we can simply exit once we have freed the friends. Realistically I think this route could save 30-40 seconds - 1 minute at the absolute most - but I still have to time this stuff out, which I will do in the next few days. Thoughts?

I'm planning on making a video of this soon, but I just discovered a way to skip the gate in Ghost Island, allowing you to enter the 6th world without completing all of the levels in the 4th and 5th worlds. It involves using disc manip to get inside of and then on top of the small railing that runs around the edge of the path leading up to the gate. Once on top, you can bounce through a certain part of the mountain to the right and then zigzag your way back to solid ground behind the gate.

Differences to the route:

1. Only the key needs to be collected in Barrel Blast - obtaining the level skip from this level is no longer necessary.
2. Spin Dizzy remains the same - collect the letters and free the friend, and then activate the level skip. This level skip will be used to skip Ghostly Garden.
3. Clowning Around no longer needs to be done twice.
4. Using the level skip to complete Clown Prix and Krome Keeper is no longer necessary.

This new skip will save a couple minutes I believe, but it is very difficult and also extremely risky. If you die attempting gate skip, you have the level skip glitch active, so you totally screw with the game and basically have to reset or, to be safe, save after Barrel Blast and re-do Spin Dizzy, which still might be faster than the old route. I'm going to do some attempts of this later tonight, and I have a feeling that with a really good run, sub-45 is now possible. We'll see what happens.

So I recently picked up Spyro 2 for the Get Yourself Speedrunning race that just happened, and while learning/practicing it I found an interesting glitch that has been discovered before but I haven't been able to find anything regarding allowing/disallowing it in speedruns. Whenever I was playing in a save file that had collected the permanent fireball and all the other abilities by watching the final cutscene in the theater in Dragon Shores, if I quit that game and started a new game without the memory card in, I would start the game immediately with the permanent fireball ability in Glimmer. The other abilities - headbash, climb, and swim - did not carry over, strangely enough. This glitch seems very similar to the Furnace Fun Moves glitch discovered recently in Banjo-Kazooie, where you game over in one of the clock minigames in Furnace Fun in a separate file, and when you start a new file, you can carry over all of the abilities learned in that separate file to a new game. That glitch was allowed for that game, and I'm wondering if starting with the permament fireball would/should be allowed in this game. I think it has the capacity to save a ton of time in pretty much every category (I've only run 40 Orb at this point so I'm not entirely sure about the others), but it also seems to be similar to a New Game+ type of run. I'm also not sure if this files under the category of a cheat, like entering in button codes on the start menu to gain all the abilities, change color, etc., so I was wondering what you guys thought about its use in a speedrun.