So I'm a beginner and I did a few 16 star runs until now. My Recent PB was rejected because I was using Project 64 2.1. Now, I'll probably switch to Project 64 1.6 for my future runs, but I was just wondering: why aren't the other project 64 versions allowed?

there's a lot of variance in how n64 emulators run, pj64 1.6 is the most commonly used version so for sake of fair comparison among emu runners we made that standard (although people with Macs can run openemu which is slightly slower). pj64 2.x versions in particular run way faster than pj64 1.x

Ooh, got it. thanks for the answer

Do you think there will ever be a time that the community will change this? I don't see an immediate change for it now, but it would be interesting to look at 3.x or even 4.x.

I hope the community will change their mind about it. I mean, 1.6 is like from the 2004, it's a version so obsolete that keeps crashing and in general has issues (as the weird support for dualmonitor setups). I stopped running SM64 because of it crashing every 20 minutes on average (sometimes it's 1 minute, sometimes 1 hour, making it almost unpredictable), and being an obsolete version, it doesn't make any log file. The best thing to do would be to make a fork where the code that manages emulation is the same, but everything else is made from scratch or taken from the last version. It's so unreliable right now

I've personally done comparisons between 1.6 and 2.3 and through my research my conclusion is 2.3 is in no way faster than 1.6. However 2.3 is alot more stable and runs better. I've done runs at a high level on both emulators and there is no significant difference in split times or xcam times. Runs on 1.6 or 2.3 have the exact same split times. No difference at all. So 1.6 being the only emu allowed is super obsolete and needs to be changed to support newer and more stable versions of PJ64. As mentioned 1.6 is literally like 15 years old and is far from being perfect. Actually runs like complete shit, Every "top" emu runner will tell you this. Your only other option is to spend hundreds of dollars on an actual n64 set up

As far as I'm aware the rules have changed for this. I've been using Mupen64Plus for all my runs and they have been allowed for submission. It states in the rules that Mupen64Plus is allowed for any operating system, but that PJ64 1.6 is the preferred emu of choice. So as long as you're using Mupen64Plus and not Mupen64 you should be fine here. I assume people are wanting to use newer versions of PJ64, but what I don't understand is why not many emu runners play on mupen - is there a disadvantage to this that I am not aware of? Does Mupen64Plus somehow run slower than PJ64 v1.6?

Mupen64Plus is hard for most people to use and PJ64 is relatively simple to use. As simple as PJ64 is to use people still struggle with it.

One thing that is nice about PJ64 1.6 from a moderation perspective is that it is very easy to distinguish 1.6 from later versions. If we know that everyone is on 1.6 then we can be reasonably sure that everything is running the same. It's not easy to distinguish later versions from one another, if they're the exact same (in terms of loading) that's fine but if one later version differs from another we'd have to resort to timing loads for each run, which would make verifying runs more of a pain than it already is.

On top of that were pretty lacking on knowledgeable and willing people to sit around and help others set up and fix their emulators when they have issues (and no matter what we use there will be issues). All our resources and troubleshooting knowledge are built around using 1.6 and largely written by one person (who is no longer active). We'd have to build that knowledge up from scratch again.

So basically, the convenience of not changing outweighs the will to change currently but i'm not against the idea necessarily, it's just not high priority at the moment. Sorry if this response is a mess, writing this on very little sleep.

With Mupen 64 it can also simply be a TAS, so this is not allowed. Project 64 2.xx has lag reductions so it is not allowed. therefore on Windows simply Project 64 1.6 or Project 64 1.6.1

yeah. an on top of that, when I first started, I used pj3.2, and asked one of the mods about it, and he said that it's because some computers have faster load times with it, so it's not allowed cause it's slightly faster. but the thing is, I have always used a 10 y/o crappy workstation, and my computer could barely run it. so with pj1.6 running crappier, I ended up saving up for a cheap japanese n64 with a region slot so I can both play games casually, and speedrun.

in any case, I couldn't see any difference at all. but then again I'm not a moderator, so I don't look out for that stuff. I would love to be a mod though.

@Apianbelle I would also like to be a mod I think everyone wants to be a mod.

Interesting, would you be opposed to someone if they wrote up a guide to the same knowledge level of 1.6 for the recent emulators? @alaris

Depending on what sort of bug related issues, questions and concerns it may have I could look into the research half of it. I'm aware GlideN64 4.0 has made a significant amount of changes so if ultimately the stance is to remain on 1.6 then that's understandable. I don't see the time going into the research as a waste, especially considering 1.6 has it's fair share of compatibility issues while as recent versions do not. (At least from personal experience and from friends who had trouble with PJ64 back in the day.)

It can't hurt to have even if it ultimately doesn't get used for sm64 speedrunning. We don't have any real resources for OpenEMU or Mupen64Plus which are both allowed on the current leaderboards. I've been meaning to set the game up on m64p just to see how it is but haven't gotten around to it.

I see, I'll consider looking into the matter then. Since a lot of components can change scenarios pretty quickly. Having a proper setup tutorial and guide with all this in mind would probably do wonders then. Thanks @alaris :)

Thanks for the response Alaris, you're dope