New Category: Canon or Canonized
3 years ago

I think that there should be a new category for speed running.

This category called Canon or Canonized will simply be a play through of the game with any percent completion of the game or 100%+ completion of the game but the run is done completely as the developers intended.

This means no glitches of any kind except maybe controller based glitches that allow for better skilled handling. Each game should clearly define what is allowed for maneuverability in the Canon category.

This means that no skips of any kind are allowed that are not implemented by the developer in the game as is clear by the way the game was made originally.

Maybe this is equivalent to the Glitchless category but I think that it is more specific to the heart of what speed running is all about.

When you want to do a race, you don't want to do it by cutting corners since that would be cheating. It would be comparing how well one person can cheat versus the other instead of actually being able to do the game quickly, which requires more skill.

A lot of speed running is surrounded with so much RNG grinding and with so much glitch searching that it takes away from what speed running has really been all about this whole time, which is just a race.

And if we want to race to the finish then I think there ought to be a category that expresses the most familiar human level competition as possible and this would be the Canon category.

Instead of competing against the TAS or using the TAS so heavily, we would be literally seeing who can complete the actual game in the least time, using the game in the same spirit as the developers intended but in the fastest way possible.

Canada

Sounds boring. Skips and glitches are fun.

Also good luck figuring out what is or isn't developer intended, EZScape has a video that talks about this stuff:

You're welcome to run whatever you want however you want, but there are very good reasons for why this isn't already a widespread thing.

Edited by the author 3 years ago
koma likes this

To you it sounds boring. But I think people should do it and use the category if that's what they would rather compete in. All this TAS, glitch searching is just a competition at who can cheat the most. While it may seem fun, it changes the original spirit of what we were doing in the first place. Canonized speed runs will be sure that you will see who is truly the best speed runner of all time.

United States

I'm curious as to why you think of glitches as "cheating". As far as I'm aware, glitches have been a part of speedrunning ever since its inception.

koma and ShikenNuggets like this
Canada

[quote=ketenks]All this TAS, glitch searching is just a competition at who can cheat the most[/quote]

Do you... know what a TAS is, or why they exist? I don't think you do, since I have no idea what any of this has to do with tool-assisted speedruns.

Calling glitches cheating is also incredibly close-minded, please learn more about speedrunning and why categories that allow glitches are really interesting and tend to be significantly more popular.

[quote=ketenks]it changes the original spirit of what we were doing in the first place[/quote]

Not sure who "we" is supposed to be in this sentence, but the "original spirit" was always to beat the game as fast as possible, wasn't it? Just because you seem to have a different interpretation of that doesn't mean all speedrunning that isn't this apparently perfect "canon" category (which, spoiler alert, is really not as great and "pure" as you think it is) is somehow wrong or invalid.

Edited by the author 3 years ago
koma likes this

Of course you will all say these things. But a new category does in no way impede the others. There is no basis to delegitimize one category on the merits of others.

This category can be used by speed runners to ensure that the best speed runner will win and not the best glitcher. And that's up to the community if they want to do a Canon speed run, one that completes the game from A to B according to the challenges presented by the developers of the game.

That's it. No need to get argumentative.

Canada

[quote=ketenks]There is no basis to delegitimize one category on the merits of others.[/quote]

Funny you should say this shortly after trying (and failing) to delegitimize glitched runs by calling it "a competition at who can cheat the most".

Anyway like I said before, there's plenty of reasons why DeveloperIntended% isn't already a widespread thing, and defining "developer intended" is damn near impossible unless you happen to personally know the lead game designer and/or have a copy of the Game Design Document (and even then, still not as simple as you'd think). But again, you're welcome to run whatever you want however you want and push for categories to be added to leaderboards of games you run, just don't be surprised if nobody follows your lead on this one.

Edited by the author 3 years ago

It's not as difficult as you think if you think about it.

But I never delegitimized the glitched runs. I only said it was cheating. If you want to do TAS, grind RNG, glitch combed "speed" running then by all means, that is a category. But what it proves, more or less is who does the glitch the best/fastest, not who does the game the best/fastest.

So the Canon category fits the bill to determine precisely who runs the game in the fastest time.

It's obvious that skipping any portion of the game would not be legal in this category since the developers intended for you to play it. So playing less of the game by running out of the bounds of the game is obviously not allowed.

The only other aspect of glitches is simply maneuvering based glitches. How the actual player is allowed to move. And I think there is some room depending on the game on what sort of movement glitches are allowed.

Some movements don't really change the way the player is able to get around, but it just allows them to get around better using the original game's mechanics. However some movement's take advantage of mechanics that were never intended by the developer that may or may not be "inhuman" even in their implementation. And those maneuvers should obviously be not allowed.

But again, in each game, those maneuvers should be explicitly noted as legal or illegal as appropriate.

Canada

[quote=ketenks]It's not as difficult as you think if you think about it.[/quote]

I thought about applying this to a game I run for about 15 seconds and determined that it's impossible. Feel free to try applying this category to a real game and talking with the community to determine what exactly is or isn't developer intended and see how quickly it falls apart. People can't even agree on whether or not something is a glitch (which if you actually watch that EZScape video I linked above you'll learn all about), nevermind whether the developers willed it into existence on purpose or not.

[quote=ketenks]I never delegitimized the glitched runs. I only said it was cheating[/quote]

do you really not see the problem here

Anyway this conversation is a dead-end. Do some runs if you think this is such a great idea.

Edited by the author 3 years ago
New Jersey, USA

Some games have categories that prevent the use of glitches. It's entirely up to the community whether or not they want to implement said category.

Also, there are no TAS categories. TAS is the use of a computer to plan and do the gameplay for you in ways that wouldn't be possible for a human. TASes are normally not allowed on the site, unless someone has a TAS only category (which I've yet to see but have seen some discussion on).

I'm really not sure where you're getting all of this misinformation from.

Edited by the author 3 years ago

Glitched runs is a category. But it's cheating the original game. I see no problem with those two statements but am wondering why you do.

Again, it's not hard to apply. There are literally only two categories of glitches: skips through out of bounds or some other mechanic that allows you to skip portions of the game - which is an obvious thing to be removed - and maneuvering glitches.

Maneuvering glitches are case by case. All you need to do is state for your run what maneuvers are illegal, that you are not using and as long as everyone else does the same then it is the community based definition of the Canon category for that game.

You don't need to completely define what it is for all games but as long as everyone does the same thing within any single game then it is comparing apples to apples and is a legitimate race.

Watch the cookie crumble and go from there. The community will adapt the maneuvering glitch definition for each game as they go along, as necessary and naturally.

Connecticut, USA

So to the point of the category: This is equivalent to Glitchless, No Skips, etc. depending on the game. This would be impossible to define for almost every game out there, as well as being god-awful boring. Let's take a game with really refined movement, such as Super Mario Odyssey. There are these things called roll cancels, where you cancel a roll (fastest movement in the game) to gain very high running speed. Is it dev-intended? Probably not. But is it a glitch? I wouldn't say so, it's using the basics of the games movement mechanics in a way to go fast. That's what speedrunning is all about. Perhaps this category would just be a "CBA to learn real strats" thing. I'm all for Glitchless runs, but doing everything "dev-intended" is detracting from what makes a speedrun a speedrun. There are reasons why games without really good movement or skips aren't as popular as Nintendo games, Source games, the list goes on and on. Taking out optimization from a speedgame is lazy at best, and a crappy thing for the community at worst.

Canada

[quote=ketenks]There are literally only two categories of glitches: skips through out of bounds or some other mechanic that allows you to skip portions of the game... and maneuvering glitches[/quote]

This is so unbelievably far from the truth I'm not even going to acknowledge the rest of your post.

Please learn more about this hobby before sharing your half-baked opinions on what categories people should run.

Edited by the author 3 years ago
drybloxman likes this
Aberdeen, Scotland

What about cutscenes!?!? does the developer intend you to watch all the cutscenes without skipping them? Or would skipping them go against what the developer intended?

drybloxman likes this
Connecticut, USA

"Only two categories of glitches" Let's take a look at the Zelda series. OoT (fairly widely considered one of the best games/speedgames of all time) Any% (uses ACE) No ACE (allows all glitches except ACE) 100%, All Dungeons, and No Wrong Warp (all have subcategories for SRM or No SRM) Glitchless (has restricted, and unrestricted varieties) LttP (also very popular) No Major Glitches Restricted Major Glitches Major Glitches Any% (S+Q) Any% No OOB

This is just the beginning, and there are further restrictions even within the stuff I mentioned.

So in the case of roll-cancels that is an actual accepted maneuver that the developers made. It's just how you are applying them and you said it, it's not a glitch. So then, we do know what is a glitch and what is not. Roll canceling and general maneuvering tricks are totally acceptable as Canon from the developers toolbox they gave the players.

However, a hack would be maybe, roll canceling and stacking it somehow to gain otherworldly speed to skip through the whole level and get to the finish. In simple terms, maybe it should be linear types of maneuvering gains rather than exponential types of maneuvering gains. It's usually the exponentiated effects that are "inhuman" in nature.

As long as you go along with the spirit of the game then it becomes much more understandable. You can define your maneuvering illegal moves and set that as your Canon run. Then others just have to do the same and its a race.

But, we can't take things personally. To cheat a race is to go a different route than the route was made to be. If I set points A to B along a path and you cut the path, then you cheated. This is not an emotional thing. Skipping any portion of the game is just getting to point B through the unmarked path which is going out of bounds. Very easy to see and is an unemotional reality. I hope you can see that.

If cut scenes can be skipped by the developer's toolbox then you skip it. If they can't then they shouldn't be skipped by other less known mechanics. The developer needs to give you a working button that will skip the cut scene to skip it. Otherwise skipping it would not be Canon.

Lastly, please indicate another category of glitches.

New Jersey, USA

I don't understand, you're asking for implementations that already exist. Games have Glitched & Glitchless categories, as long as the community wants them. It can't be forced on the site as a whole, as it outright doesn't apply to some games on here. What's the point you're trying to make?

ShikenNuggets likes this
Aberdeen, Scotland

Sure a developer might give you a skip button, but does the developer intend you to use the skip button or do the developers intend you watching the cutscenes instead of using the skip button?

If the developer gives you a tool and you don't use it then you lose time. That is fairly missing the point of speed running. The developer intends for you to play through the game that they made, the challenges they present with the tools they gave you. This is not hard. You are playing devil's advocate but not really making good questions from it. Honestly this is not hard.

North Carolina, USA

Just like @starsmiley says you're basically requesting what already exists. And btw, glitched runs aren't cheating. If doing glitches is part of a game's category, then it's not cheating. If you have such problems with glitches, then don't do them and just do glitchless categories. Speedrun however you want. But don't go making public posts and automatically assume that glitches in general are cheating. But honestly I feel it's unnecessary for you to make a public post about something so nonsensical. Also it sounds like to me you have little to no understanding what speedrunning is really about

Edited by the author 3 years ago