I've been thinking a bunch about the categories in this game. I don't think they are organized particularly well. There are too many of them, and are too similar. In particular, I think the separation between premium / non-premium is so small that it should be removed altogether.

Let's look at the powerups:

Infinite Lives - This obviously doesn't save any time at all. It is extremely easy to not die 5 times in a row. On my second ever any% run, I managed 0 deaths. I feel like infinite lives should just be allowed. It's a small advantage for beginner runners, but it is super minor. Even when banned, it is sooo helpful while practicing that I can't imagine not buying it anyways.

Coin Doubler - This saves a small amount of time in full games runs. You could just ban it altogther or allow it. But the difference between coin doubler category and non-coin doubler category is so small that it is not worth having both. My current any% route would probably be around 5 seconds different if I was allowed the coin doubler.

Infinite Golden Cat - This upgrade doesn't actually let you use the golden cat in every level. All it does is make it so that when you die 3 times in a level, you don't have to actually watch an ad to pick up the golden cat token. So, it saves absolutely no time in a decent run (unless there is a level where it is faster to die 3 times and then pick it up, which I doubt). So again, I would just allow it, or just ban it in every category.

My second issue is the individual world runs. They are categorized under Any% or 100%, but it feels very strange to me that if you run any% full game, you can't actually submit your world subsegments to the individual world categories, since it is tremendously slower. In the full game, you need to collect some number of bells, wait for doors to unlock, levels to appear after finishing a level, etc. Also, in single worlds, you have (effectively) infinite money and can take any exit out of levels.

Individual worlds are actually more like a NG+ category, which is something a bit different. But there are actually runners (Godchueco) who are running NG+ full game. So, this should just be a category with individual world subcategories.

Last point, why are X-? levels required in individual world any%? They are completely trivial if you don't need the bell, and they aren't required for the world so it seems strange to include them.

So, my proposed structure is this:

Any% (Beat 6-8 from a new file. Coin doubler banned, Golden cat banned, Can't watch ads to unlock worlds)

• No Subcategories

All Bells (Beat 6-8 from a new file, with 92 bells. Coin doubler banned, Golden cat banned, Can't watch ads to unlock worlds)

• No Subcategories

NG+ (Beat all levels in order (any exit) excluding ? levels. Start with however many coins/helpers you want. Golden cat banned.) Subcategories

• All worlds
• World 1
• World 2
• World 3
• World 4
• World 5
• World 6

NG+ All Bells should (IMO) not be a category, it doesn't really make a lot of sense to exist.

Feel free to use any combination of things I've described here. ie: Allowing golden cat and/or coin doubler would be fine for any%/all bells. Banning infinite lives for any%/all bells would be OK as well (but should certainly be allowed for individual worlds).

If we do allow infinite lives, then timer should start when you start 1-1, not when you start the game, since you need to actually restore your in-app purchases every time you reset.

Good points all around! Organization of this page was tough and definitely needs work.

Post-competition, I'd like to reorganize leadership on this page. @cros107, @drgrumble, @Wuzi, and @Ishigami were all appointed to be verifiers for the comp. Since the comp is over, I'll be removing yall from the board. You can ask to be reappointed if you'd like to help out :D D.E.M.O will stay on to help reorganize the leaderboard and @MrUppercaseT will also be added in. Yall can change whatever you see fit. It might be useful to start a Discord for this process or down the line to get new players started quickly.

@Oxknifer I would like to keep being moderator as I will continue to run this game ;3

I've resigned my modship oxy, I might do some runs of this one eventually though - it's on my long long list!