Removing Japanese Version
7 years ago
Texas, USA

I'm at work and can't read all of this but in my opinion I don't think versions should be banned (atleast legit versions, emu is silly for some games) Even if there isn't much activity in it. Having the option to submit for different versions or whatever could make people more willing to learn the game cause I'm sure there's tons of people, myself included, that can only run on VC or would like to run on VC but it doesn't matter cause it's not a category so I can't. I'd go into it more but I have to go to work so I'll type more later

Take the amount of categories that exist already with one version alone. Every version added increases that number by 36. Only a few people have managed to actually do runs for every category on one version. Japanese, besides a few runs are no where near worked on/optimized at all. I think we already have enough categories as it is and things to work with that we hardly have time to get to them all. Do we seriously need more? Again, I am keeping neutral with my choice what ever is come up with. I will continue to run the game and work on it.

GhillieGuide
He/Him, They/Them
7 years ago

You're only repeating the opinions of Pikashy, if you believe we should have NA N64 only have the conviction to stand up for what you believe we should do. Does you and Pikashy being concerned about having empty or lowly optimized categories really outweigh the numerous times people have been frustrated when they couldn't submit a run? Does it outweigh the benefits of having a leaderboard that tracks all the versions? You and Pikashy are the only people I have ever heard complain about the lack of optimized runs on JP. We have however had a stream of complaints by ssb64 speedrunners, speedrunners interested in running the game and even mods of this website encouraging us to find a way to integrate runs of all official versions. The perception of our leaderboards is not diminished in any capacity by having a visually segregated category. Forcing people to buy the 2nd most expensive version to be featured on this leaderboards is not right, it's not encouraging them towards running on NA N64 it's flat out demanding it if they want to be featured. Segregation worked to encourage people away from running on emulator but banning it outright would have massive backlash, the same logic should apply to other official releases to form logical consistency on rulings.

Edited by the author 7 years ago

(edit: at the time of me making this, RubberDuckyAssassin’s post was the last post made, so this response was made not including the posts that came after it, but I will make an edit at the bottom to include those)

I had no intention on calling you a criminal in any way, and you never did anything that could be called a crime. Why you turned my post into a legal issue is beyond me (aside from a very easy way to make me look bad for no reason, and to essentially dismiss everything I said in this post). However, the way you have been treating me over the last 3 years has been horrible, and me calling it similar to being a bully is not too far off in my opinion. You target me when things don’t go your way. You flame me, shame me, and even try to turn people against me or paint me in a bad light, if I don’t do what you want. If something goes wrong, even if I had nothing to do with it, you often seem to throw me under the bus.

I have spoken to other active runners over the years (when they were active, that is). Some of them have mentioned to me that they are scared to say something against you, because if they do, you’ll treat them the way you treat me. So if you wonder why I’m the only person ever speaking up against you when I disagree with what you say, maybe it’s because they’re scared, and honestly, I don’t blame them. If I was in their situation, I’d be doing the same. I prefer to avoid conflict any chance I get. Unfortunately, you’ve already targeted me as the “villain” of the community, so it doesn’t matter at this point.

In this post, I will respond to 2 sentences you made in your last wall of text:

“I have shown a willingness to compromise from my positions again and again throughout the 3 years of version inclusion discussion and the evidence is in these forums, don't take it from me look it up. I changed my position repeatedly and you haven't made a single compromise.”

To anyone who has no idea what has happened in the history of the decision making for the smash 64 speedrunning community, that comment makes you look like the hero of the community, and me the villain. In those two sentences, you literally discredited almost everything I said in this whole thread, and anything I ever said in any discussion.

You’re telling me to look it up? I will. This whole post is a response to that, going through the entire history of decision making in the smash 64 speedrunning community, since I joined it three and a half years ago. Not only is your statement a complete lie, the roles are reversed. I have been the one who has tried to compromise, and you are the one who never did.

  1. In-Game Time vs Real Time.

When I first entered the community, everyone was running in-game time, and doing races with the timer off. When I noticed how the in-game timer works, I immediately thought it was a horrible timing system, so I didn’t use it, and used real time instead. I also discovered that by turning the timer off, you could save a second per stage in the bonuses. I told people about it, and encouraged it in races. Everyone was in agreement with it. Everyone… except you. It took about a month before you finally agreed that real time was a better timing method than in-game time. That whole month, you tried to convince people to stay on in-game time, but everyone had already transitioned over. Even when you transferred over, it seemed you still didn’t agree with it. You were not willing to compromise.

  1. The iQue.

To anyone who has been in the community around 2 years ago, either as a runner or as a viewer, they know the story. But for those who are new, I’ll say it. I’m separating it into several paragraphs due to how long this story is.

You made it obviously clear that you are trying to collect every version of the game, so getting the iQue was obvious. However, why you chose to run on the iQue, I don’t think anyone really knows for sure. Anyways, that doesn’t matter. The point is, you were doing runs on the iQue, and version legality became an issue. I’ll start from the beginning, before you even got the iQue.

OoT discovered the iQue, and some runners were starting to use it. It saved time due to not lagging. This is very obvious on the Tower Collapse cutscene, where the audio doesn’t even come close to finishing before the cutscene is over. The price ($200) was more than most runners were willing to pay for it. Immediately, it caused a split on whether or not version legality should be allowed. I was watching a fair bit of OoT from several runners at the time, and their opinions were completely split, some to the point of aggressive hatred for the other side. Overall, it had a massive negative effect on the OoT speedrunning community.

You announced that you were going to buy the iQue and try doing runs on it. Immediately, before you even purchased the iQue, I suggest we have a discussion on its legality. My fear was that the iQue would split the smash 64 speedrunning community just as it did the OoT community. People were busy, people were lazy, I don’t know what happened, but we weren’t able to get a full discussion in before you got the iQue. We should have had the legality discussion then, but you started doing runs before we even had a chance to do so. Once you started doing runs, and people realized how much better the iQue actually was, everyone immediately voted to ban the iQue. Anytime you brought up the iQue in the Skype group, the group told you it was banned. You literally brought up the iQue legality in the Skype group several times a week (at one point nearly every day). And regardless of what the community decided, you kept running on the iQue. You were completely unwilling to compromise.

I had seen the community’s arguments on why to ban the iQue, and was leaning towards banning myself, but did not want to truly pick a side until I heard both sides of the argument. I went to you on Skype, and suggested we both, together, try to build a case for legalizing the iQue. Nobody in the community even knew I was doing so. I did it to try to include you back into the community, and to prevent bad blood between us. You basically told me to shove off, and then told your stream (and probably Twitter) that I was the ringleader in banning the iQue, and the community was just doing what I said. You flamed me, shamed me, threw me under the bus so hard. I was willing to compromise and help you try to build a case for the iQue. You weren’t, and just shoved me away, throwing me under the bus in response.

After you realized that the community was never going to accept the iQue, you left the Skype group, and cut off most communication with anyone in the community. You said in your stream (and I think on Twitter as well?) you believed that if you got enough World Records on the iQue, the community would be forced to accept the iQue. I have no idea how that logic works, but that is what you said several times. You said other similar things to this that I can’t remember, all along the same lines. Basically, you decided that if the community wasn’t going to accept the iQue, you were going to force the community to accept the iQue. You decided you were right, and that the community wasn’t willing to compromise to your decision.

While running the iQue, you flamed the entire rest of the community for not accepting the iQue. Our reasoning didn’t make sense, our decision didn’t make sense, and… basically, we were idiots for wanting to ban the iQue. You went to the point of saying you did soo much for the community, and this was our way of repaying you. And if there was any one person you would isolate and target, it was always me. I was apparently the leader of the community, and I apparently decided to ban the iQue.

You even went to the point of saying that you and I were in a power struggle for control over the community. There was no power struggle. There was no “leader” of the community. There was just a community, and you were isolating yourself from it. No matter how much we tried to mend that split, you would split it even more. No matter how much I would personally try to go to you and try to find a way to fix it, you would target me even more, flame me, shame me, etc. Some people in the community got tired of the drama and quit. I followed soon after, when the flaming and shaming became so great I couldn’t handle it anymore.

In summary, you wanted the iQue legal. The rest of the community voted unanimously to ban the iQue. You flamed and shamed the community repeatedly for not doing what you wanted. Anytime I came to you to try to help, whether by trying to find arguments for legalizing the iQue, or just to be supportive, you turned it all around on me and targeted me as the leader of the community and the one calling all the shots. You split yourself from the community, not the other way around. The drama you caused made several people, me included, quit running the game. I was willing to compromise, and tried several times. You were completely unwilling to compromise, and in doing so, made several people quit.

  1. Creating the new leaderboards. When I made the suggestion to make a new leaderboards, people were in favour of it. I got Shadow, you, and me to be the ones who were the “leaders” in the making of the leaderboards, one because we were the “active” runners at the time, and two to hopefully mend the cracks that have been made over the last two years. At first, things were going well. Any disagreements we had, we would discuss it, and come to a consensus, or leave the decision until later in the creation process (maybe a different decision we make changes how we see this decision). Everything was going perfectly fine at the start.

We had agreed that we should have the boards start off as NA only (it wouldn’t take much to change it later in the building process). However, to test to see how a different version would look like if it were included, we put the Japanese version in, just to test. It was only meant to be a test. Suddenly, you shoved all your Japanese runs on the leaderboards, and did runs on the Japanese categories you did not have yet, just to completely fill the leaderboards. Suddenly everyone is putting their runs on the leaderboards. The leaderboards were still under construction, yet you saw the Japanese version, wanted it legal, so you shoved all your runs on there. Not only did you go completely against what we agreed on, but you halted the entire leaderboard creation. We would have to record every single run that was submitted in a separate place, and then delete every single run, just to do some of the changes that were still being suggested. There was nothing else Shadow and I could do, we were stuck with what we had.

The discussion of which versions we included on the leaderboards is something we could have very easily done at the end of the building project. Once everything is all set up how we like it, it’s a 2 day discussion, and then the versions we want can be on the leaderboards. You made the decision yourself, at the cost of halting the entire leaderboard building process.

Since everyone had submitted their runs, we were stuck with a work-in-progress leaderboards. Yet you left the construction, leaving just Shadow and I. There was nothing we could do, so we didn’t do anything. The incomplete leaderboards was what we were stuck with.

And then comes the old leaderboards. Knowing we still had work to do on the new leaderboards, I wanted to keep the old leaderboards so that when we eventually got back to finishing the new leaderboards, we had the old one we could temporarily put the runs in. It was a safe place to save every run. However, you left the leaderboard creation, Shadow lost motivation, I lost motivation, so the new leaderboards did not get finished. I kept the old leaderboards assuming we would eventually finish the leaderboards.

You eventually come back, and tell me to delete the old leaderboards. You harass me for months telling me I need to delete it, making several random reasons why. You got others to come and attack me to delete the leaderboards as well. I had reasons to keep the old leaderboards, but you were so obsessed about getting them deleted that you literally turned everyone against me. I had enough, I saw the leaderboards going nowhere, I didn’t want anything to do with it anymore, I was tired of getting attacked by everyone, so I gave supermod powers to you and removed myself. You got to be supermod of the leaderboards by bullying me off of it. As I give you supermod, I give you a massive long list of reasons as to why I did not delete the leaderboards. It took you over a month to finally delete the old leaderboards that you harassed me for, and turned everyone against me for. Even during that month, you came to me time and time again asking for help on the leaderboards. After I gave the supermod powers to you, and tried to rid myself of anything related to the leaderboards, and told you what needed to be done before the leaderboards were deleted, you came back to me and essentially got me to tell you what to do, and you took all the credit for it, giving me none (I think you threw me under the bus after that as well).

In Summary: You wanted change in the leaderboards, but wanted to put no effort into making the change, and basically tried to get me to make the change by myself. You even got everyone to come after me when I wasn’t doing anything to change the leaderboards, even though I wasn’t able to do anything because you ruined it. You ruined the leaderboard creation, and then blamed me for not continuing creating the leaderboards. When I gave the responsibility to you, you didn’t know what to do at all, and came back to me for help.

So as far as compromising goes, you were unwilling to compromise. You wanted Japanese on the leaderboards, so you made Japanese be on the leaderboards. You wanted the old leaderboards deleted, so you harassed me to delete the old leaderboards. The only time you were willing to compromise was when you were given supermod and had to do everything yourself, and instead came to me to tell you what to do.

Me, on the other hand, I tried to make a group effort into making the leaderboards. I was trying to make it so that Shadow, you, and me, all worked together on the leaderboards, and made them exactly how we wanted them to be made. I made sure to get both of your guys’s opinions before anything was done, and if a disagreement happened, I waited until we were all in agreement before I made any changes. If you didn’t agree, the change wasn’t made. So as far as compromising goes, I don’t think you can be more compromising than that.

  1. Removing Japanese (this whole thread, or at least what it’s supposed to be about).

For the last year, nobody has shown any interest in running any other version aside from NA N64 from what I have seen. The only other “version” I have seen ran in the last year is emulator, which is already accepted on the leaderboard. Having a leaderboard for nobody does not make sense. So, I suggested removing the Japanese version. If we get enough interest in the category again, then we can add it back in again. However, nobody runs the category, nobody showed any interest in running the category (at the time of me making the initial post of this thread), so having it on the leaderboards made no sense at all.

As far as my “willingness to compromise” goes for this discussion, I said, very clearly, that if nobody is running on that version, then it makes no sense to have that version on the leaderboards. However, if people start actively doing runs, then we can add it back. I am willing to compromise if reasons to keep another version come up, and people actually actively run the game. That said, up until my last post, nobody ever showed any interest, so I said we should remove it. You kept saying you talked to people who wanted to run on all these different versions. It’s been a year, nobody ever did. So for you to continue to use that as an argument, to me, is no longer valid. It’s been a year, and nobody did any runs. If we had an active group of people doing runs on Japanese, that’s a different story. But nobody is doing runs on these versions. It’s had its chance, and nothing happened. If people do start doing runs, then we should look into this again and consider re-adding it. That was my compromise, and to me, it seems fair.

You, on the other hand, wanted Japanese (or bucket) on the leaderboards. You made a completely biased poll on Twitter, adding the link to my reasoning in a comment that most people wouldn’t even see, and probably wouldn’t even read, and let anyone who has no idea what the discussion is about vote on the poll. Your biased poll resulted in a 16-2 vote in favour of you, which is completely not surprising, given how you made the poll.

As far as discussions here go, you’ve been nearly entirely in favour of having another version (whatever it happens to be), and have made it clear time and time again that you will not remove Japanese. No matter what gets said, no matter what people say, you are unwilling to change your opinion, and because you are the “supermod”, you decided that whatever you want is what goes. You have been unwilling to compromise at all, and anytime I say anything against what you want, you turn it against me. Almost every single one of your posts look like attempts to make you look good, whether or not they are even related to the topic of the discussion (version inclusion), as well as some combination of making me look like a villain, flaming/shaming me, or just complete ignorance of anything I say that supports the removal of the other versions. I have made several very valid arguments for removing Japanese, and you completely ignore them, and instead find a way to make my opinion invalid.

As far as your “willingness to compromise” goes for this discussion, you have shown little to no willingness at all. Anything I say against your side is turned against me. Attempting to discuss this is next to impossible, since anything I say, you’ll turn it into your favour and make fun of me along the way.

Going back to the original message you made:

“I have shown a willingness to compromise from my positions again and again throughout the 3 years of version inclusion discussion and the evidence is in these forums, don't take it from me look it up. I changed my position repeatedly and you haven't made a single compromise.”

I think I have shown in this whole post that everything in that quote is a complete lie. You have been unwilling to compromise at all in the last 3 years, and if anything, get your way by bullying away people who think otherwise, or scaring them from even saying something against you. I, on the other hand, have been fully willing to compromise, even trying to compromise with you after everything you’ve been doing to me. I go out of my way to try to mend the crack that you made between us. And every time I do so, I get treated worse and worse every time.

Trying to have a debate with you is next to impossible if you’ve already made your decision. You are unwilling to even consider the other side of the argument, and use biased information to support your side. Nearly every member in the history of the smash 64 speedrunning community gave up even attempting to argue with you, since it’s no use, even if the entire community agreed on a decision and you didn’t. It’s a waste of time, effort, and completely unnecessary stress. I am basically the only person who will even attempt to debate against you. Even then, I find it frustrating to the point where I basically give up. I didn’t plan on making another response in this thread anymore since it was no use, but saw that quote you said, and decided to respond to it (because, as I have clearly shown in this post, it is a complete lie). The reason why it always looks like I’m the only person even trying to argue against you is because, quite frankly, nobody else wants to because it’s not worth it, and I’m reaching the point where I don’t even want to argue anymore either. I’ve put probably close to 10 hours making responses here, taking a lot of time and effort that I honestly can’t afford (I have a test tomorrow that I need to study for, and I am typing this all out). Yet every time I make a post, you just turn it into nothing, making it a complete waste of my time and effort.

No matter how hard anyone tries to debate the other side for anything, you will always go with what you want anyways. You did it with absolutely everything. You did it for In-Game Time vs Real Time for a month, you did it for iQue for… probably over a year, and you did it with the leaderboard creation. You’ve already shown you’re going to do it for Version Inclusion, so I don’t know why I’m wasting my time even attempting to argue against you. It doesn’t matter who’s right, who’s wrong, or what the discussion is even about, you do what you want, and the community can follow or get flamed. Some community members left for legitimate reasons, like family, but I’m sure some left because they had enough. I left twice before because of this, and honestly, every time I come back, I come back to this. It’s just not worth it.

Edit: Everything I wrote above was written when RubberDuckyAssassin’s post was the last one made. Before posting, I refreshed, and noticed two posts came afterwards. I would like to make a comment on the last two posts made, by InprisonedShadow, and by GhillieGuide.

Ghillie, your comment to Shadow’s post literally reflects everything I just said in this post. Shadow has made it clear, in his first posts in this thread, that he is undecided on what the correct course of action is. His first one showed support for both sides, and concerns/problems for both sides. His second post showed mostly concerns and problems on your side, yet stated he is still undecided. However, you saw that his post was not in support of your side, so you made a comment that completely threw Shadow under the bus.

You basically said in your comment that Shadow and I are trying to remove Japanese, against the wish of “several” people who complain that other versions don’t exist on the leaderboard. You literally just said Shadow and I are trying to make a decision that is against the community’s best interest. All because he made a few points that were against what you are supporting. He has never said which side he is in support of, nor has he ever done anything wrong to you. Yet you just threw him under the bus, all because he said something that did not immediately support your side.

You wonder why I am the only person who is ever even trying to argue against you in any discussion that happens. Your last comment sums up the entire reason by itself. Shadow says one or two things you don’t like, and you immediately throw him under the bus. Any attempt to argue with you, by anyone, is just met by disrespect, flaming, and shaming, as well as a complete waste of time. If this is how you are going to go about any discussion, then don’t expect anyone else to attempt to argue against you, because it’s not worth it what-so-ever. If you don’t get your way, you flame, shame, and throw those who didn’t support your side under the bus. Frankly, it’s not worth it, and frankly, I’ve had enough of it.

tl-dr:

Ghillie, you are the one who has never shown a willing to compromise, and I am the one who has tried to go out of my way to try to have a discussion with you. Yet every time I do so, you throw me under the bus. Anytime anyone says something that doesn’t support your side, you are disrespectful to them, you flame them, you shame them, you throw them under the bus. Your quote:

“I have shown a willingness to compromise from my positions again and again throughout the 3 years of version inclusion discussion and the evidence is in these forums, don't take it from me look it up. I changed my position repeatedly and you haven't made a single compromise.”

is a complete lie, and in this post, I have shown that not only is it a complete lie, but the roles are reversed. I am the one who is willing to compromise, and you are the one who refuses to do so.

Edited by the author 7 years ago
GhillieGuide
He/Him, They/Them
7 years ago

Conveniently no actual screen shot evidence is shown supporting any of these claims, I encourage anyone reading to go through the text history and make up your own opinions. Bullying is a crime in this country, by accusing me you were slandering my name. I didn't believe that you had the intent of calling me a criminal but that's precisely what you have done. I have made statements on this forum showing my compromises in position to legality discussion. I regret agreeing to make this leaderboards only NA N64 only but the strongest voices on the matter other than me both believe that is the best course of action. If there is any further action against me as moderator of this leaderboards I will gladly step down because my inclusion in this affair is quite obviously just a waste of everyone's time. Regardless of the accuracy of Pikashy's statements against me my efforts to make this leaderboard prosper have not met with any success and I feel my best course of action is likely to resign as moderator of this leaderboard.

Edited by the author 7 years ago