Glitchless Section and Individual Zones
7 years ago
Indiana, USA

Since I just can't get a few glitches right, I've started a glitchless run. Since it clearly can't come to par with the runs that do have glitches (level wraps, etc), I would like a separate category for it.

Also, I've seen that other games have separate stages. Since it isn't reasonable to put separate acts, separate zones are reasonable.

MetalVolt, Saikyoh, and Junky like this
England

Glitchless is not going to happen in this game, purely because of how difficult that would be to define. If you were to make a case for "No Level Wraps", then you might have more of a case, but it's still probably not going to get implemented.

Indiana, USA

I understand now, and I also realize the separate zone concept.

Upon research, the zones seem to take about the same amount of time, so it wouldn't be measurable. That, and I'm just a complete noob right now. :P

Thanks!

Uruguay
Twintail_Nami
She/Her, They/Them
7 years ago

I second the glitchless part, myself I'm running the game wrapless and zipless, and I'm not happy with the glitch fiesta we see in the speedruns. I think it's not that hard to define it... they've done it at SRL, why can't we? This is the definition they have for the glitchless races:

"The following are defined as glitches, to be omitted during glitchless runs: Wheel glitch Slope glitch Screen wrap Level wrap Zips Clipping through surfaces"

I'd really love to have that glitchless, and all emeralds runs too. If that's not possible, I'll have to keep them for myself.

Michigan, USA

A lot of us would like to see glitchless or no glitch abuse as a category, myself included. We've tried to define it more than once, but the lines are actually quite hard to draw.

Queensland, Australia

Glitchless with this game has always had real problems, and I don't think there's a solution that would properly satisfy everyone (I have glitchless runs that I've done with my own definition, but others contest using the space above the screen, as just one example), but I think it's important to note that there's nothing to stop you submitting a glitchless run to the existing leaderboard. You can still set a time under your own conditions and submit it and we'll be happy to have it (none more so than me, who is constantly bemused by the lack of attention this game gets).

As for all emeralds, that's just a case of lack of demand. The best way to make a case for there being a leaderboard for all emeralds is to do some runs yourself and see just how far you can push it - and ideally, get others involved too.

Languedoc-Roussillon, France

why don't we creat the category glitchless with strictly rules?:

(#virusreturns citation)

No Wheel glitch No Slope glitch No Screen wrap No Level wrap No Zips No Clipping through surfaces

if accidental glitch coming = reset run

Ohio, USA

That could possibly work

Languedoc-Roussillon, France

could we prupose this to the moderators? If yes, how? who?

(Sorry for my poor english)

United States

Glitchless leaderboards have a very low likelihood of happening in this game.

Firstly, defining things such as "No Zips" and "No Clipping through surfaces" isn't as easy as it sounds. For instance, if you press against a wall, the collision detection is technically zipping you away from the wall, which means that "No Zips" wouldn't allow you to even push against walls. "No Clipping through surfaces" as you put it causes issue in specific situations, as well. If you were to go above the screen and fall into a wall that simply wasn't given a solid top, are you following or breaking that rule? There are people that argue both ways in this instance.

As I said in another thread, we've had the glitchless discussion many times and it's far more confusing than it appears to be. The issues I brought up are just a small sample of issues that have arisen when discussing how to execute a glitchless board. We've already gone over all the possibilities mentioned in this thread and it's simply too difficult to define what is and isn't a glitch in this game.

Punii likes this
Languedoc-Roussillon, France

Thanks for reply, i understand what you said at all,

But... I am convinced that we can find common ground with all (moderator + speedrunners)

For exemple: i think everyone who's concerned will be okay if we prupose sepcificical rules (like this):

No cllipping trough surface: speedrun is not valid if sonic pass trought texture while it doesn't planned by the game

Or

No skip level with "Out Of Bounds (OoB)"

You see what i mean?

I agree that there is no category for us (glitchless), but I find it a shame to be mixed in the same category...

i'm so sorry to insist again & again, but i 'm sure we are able to find solution

Ohio, USA

Another point we must consider is: this game is VERY "special". Accidentally clipping through objects intended to be solid is a very real possibility, even while trying to avoid it. By the proposed rules, this would void the run. doing a 100% "glitchless" play-through of this game can be quite improbable considering the higher the speed sonic moves, the funkier things tend to behave. I am not against a glitchless category myself, but throughout the extensive community discussions already on this topic, I do not see it happening.

A.K.N likes this
Languedoc-Roussillon, France

@uematsufreak and other moderators: please create glitchless category

England

Sorry, but the short answer is that it's not gonna be created. When it's near-enough impossible to define and standardise and there's a single runner who wants it, there's just no reason to create it. We've laid out the reasons this won't happen as clearly as we can, and this topic has come up many times before but the answer is always the same.

New York, USA

You can always submit a "glitchless" time to the main leaderboard. Not everyone on there does the same set of glitches, and some people do race without using them intentionally at all. There is no reason not to submit those times to the board.

United States

Why don’t the people who want a glitchless leaderboard submit the runs on another site. We could use something like reddit for this.

Greater Manchester, England

Just to throw my hat in the ring as it were, given I've just submitted a new run... I understand that the game is buggy as all heck, and there seems to be no consensus on what constitutes a glitch. However, it seems odd that there isn't a distinction between runs that are being played through as the game intends, and runs that are intentionally going for glitches/OOB. Let's look at the Sonic All Emeralds for a moment: For all intents and purposes, the runs in 1st and 2nd are different to those below it - both deliberately utilise the Hydrocity wall skip, and more tricks besides, whereas the rest appear to be playing through the game "normally". Whilst neither way of playing the game can be deemed better or worse, surely we can collectively work on the basis that these are different things, otherwise what's the point in learning to run the game at all if there's a "false" ceiling/division at this point? Aside from that, I understand the position of the moderators; the game is indeed quite broken/breakable, even more so at higher speeds, so a definition of an all-encompassing glitchless category is nigh on impossible. I just feel there needs to be some sort of differentiation between the two types of run.

SkĂĄne, Sweden

There is perfect consensus on what constitutes a glitch, the source code is public information and most of it has comments from hackers now. The issue is that there's dozens of things you can do that are not glitches, such as spindashing through doors or jumping through stairs. If you want to ban those, you have to be very specific about what you mean since there's instances where it's completely intentional. To use your example of Hydrocity we can conclude that jumping through some solid objects are completely intentional as evidenced by a spring that cannot be reached in any other way other than jumping through the blue dry waterslides. Doing that works exactly in the same way as jumping through stairs in other places.

Also speaking of hydrocity there's a handful of places where subpixels make you clip through quarterpipes unintentionally (which technically is not a glitch either btw), so how should a glitchless category handle that happening?

As it stands, if we were to add a glitchless category it most likely wouldn't be like anything you currently have in mind.

Edited by the author 5 years ago
Jaypin88 likes this
Greater Manchester, England

Perhaps the argument should be taken away from the idea of "glitchless" and more geared towards "intentional manipulation". Some runners intentionally make use of shortcuts not part of the level design (again, going to throw to the Hydrocity wall skip as an example), whereas other runners are playing the game as close to what the dev team intended as they can. I guess you could say that's hardcore speedrunning vs. casual speedrunning or something, I dunno... not that I'm suggesting that's a category name!

I'm intrigued by this subpixel in quarterpipes issue btw, is that a similar issue to the pipes in Angel Island where you can suddenly just lose all speed and go backwards again?

England

In that case the focus shifts towards proving that any usage of glitches in a glitchless run was unintentional. The standard methods that you see in runs to achieve tricks and skips are not the only methods, so on what basis could you say someone "Didn't intend" to trigger a zip or level wrap if it were achieved by other means?

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