Hey there, I see your point, and how it appears, and honestly it could just be that we need to clarify our position and why that rule is worded the way it is.

The reason that we use the SRL rules for emulator usage is specifically in reference to the version and type of the emulators. It is a well known fact that there are certain emulators that operate at a different speed than others, moving faster than actual hardware and giving an unfair advantage to the player. This is what the spirit of the rule is as it is intended to be interpreted. However, I completely see your perspective on this. After discussing it, I think we as mods are still in agreement that this run's usage of the savestates doesn't really give an unfair advantage to the run, rather just adds a bit of convenience in a very reset heavy game.

Is it worth rejecting a run because they happened to use a save state while the stream was recording? From the beginning of the run (when the timer is started) to the end of the run (when the timer is ended) was a save state used? Save states are often banned to prevent RNG manipulations and other things, which hasn't happened here.

I suggest that we update the rules to be more clear on this, but that is just my 2 cents.

I don't see how that's a contradiction. By unfair advantage, I was speaking to specifically the speedrun. By using the savestate, he doesn't get a better time, which is what I meant by unfair advantage. I'm not conflating the convenience of starting a reset-heavy run over more quickly with using a savestate to get a specific RNG seed, which is what I believe the issue would be here. The savestate is to a place before that becomes a factor.

If this video had been cut so that the savestate was never recorded, nobody would have known they were used.

RNG is possible to manipulate in this game without the use of savestates. CardsOfTheHeart has proven that, and if that is what the savestate was attempting to do, I would 100% agree with you on that it had given an unfair advantage.

At the end of the day, I don't really think I have a major opinion one way or the other. I think that it's a wording of the rules issue rather than a emulator advantage issue, and unless someone can prove that this video has used savestates to give an advantage in this specific speedrun, I don't think there's a valid argument other than the rules are vague and broad and need to either be reworded or we need to remove the run because it falls under the broad umbrella.

We can come to a decision on save state use later (and I would personally ban them since Pokemon Gen 1 bans them for probably the same reasons that their community used), but I need to clarify a term of reference that is being thrown around in this thread.

When the rules talked about "emulator usage," they were referencing which emulators were actually allowed and that was it. The FAQ listed in the rules was purposefully linked to the specific section of that page that covers that issue, quoted below:

[quote]Can I play on an emulator? If the emulator is accurate and the community for that game accepts emulator as a valid choice, then yes, you can. The most commonly used emulators for each system include:

NES - FCEUX 2.2.0 GB - bgb SNES - SNES9x 1.53 GBA - VBA 1.7.2 Genesis/GameGear/SMS - Fusion N64 - Project64 v1.7 For reference, the following emulators are globally banned for use in racing:

SNES - ZSNES, snes9x 1.4x N64 - Project64 2.x GB/GBC - VBA, VBA-M GBA - VBA-M (use VBA instead. If VBA does not support your GBA game, please contact an op.)[/quote]

The rules now reflect the precise rule set being borrowed from SpeedRunsLive of what emulators are allowed for submissions. Admittedly, they are a placeholder until we develop our own rules. Now that we are running an annual Tetris Attack tournament every March, we should get together sooner rather than later to decide on our own rules.

As for save states, technically we have no rule on them. I know multiple people that have started runs from save states and have never had a problem with their runs. I have proven the potential for their abuse, however.

I will advise now that runs starting from save states will be subject to greater scrutiny going forward. I do not recommend doing it.

We don't have any intention on excluding anyone from the conversation, and honestly, it is really likely that the conversation will be geared more toward what we do moving forward.

But either way, without you bringing it up, the conversation would likely have never been had unless someone abused them in the ways we talked about above.

I would like to know when we can expect some resolution output about emulator specific rules.

Or alternatively, when that conversation with the community will be taking place.

Seeing as a month has now passed and no mod response is here do I just start save stating before selecting VS COM now? Does this carry onto other panel games such as PDP, NPC PDP, PPL, PPC? This is why we needed (and still need) Clarification on this topic and its saddening to see that this post died out like it did.

I would very much like to know the reason as to why emulator specific functions (like save stating) are acceptable.

As stated here https://www.speedrunslive.com/faq/#caniemulate Under the save states line. Savestates and any emulator-exclusive functions are completely banned.

I don't understand why runs breaking the rules of posting are being accepted by the mods just because they aren't hitting the top of the leaderboards. And if they are going to continue accepting these runs some clear indication of the supposed rules are then long over due.

As of right now, savestates are BANNED across the entire Puzzle League series.