Sonic Riders leaderboards changes suggestion
6 years ago

Hello, Blast here, as one of the mods of this leaderboard, has been brought to my attention that the current leaderboard has some flaws/irregularities noticed and it calls for "help", there not too much to be noted besides some, to speak, quality of life changes for the leaderboard in order to keep organized and trying to make clean and "enjoyable" experience for old and new runners for this game, so the following points has been brought up to be discussed with the community around of this game in order to reach a agreement before making any changes to the leaderboards without any notice of it.

1 - Starting point and changes for runs in each category. Heroes Story - Upon checking and verifying runs on the leaderboard, has been found out there is a mix of Heroes Story runs starting from a new save file and runs that starts from a "already beaten" Heroes Story, far as this is concerned to the Heroes category, there is not much difference from theses two ways to start, only a couple of dialogue boxes from unlockables when the run timing has been already ended, a solution for this it's to make a change in the rules for allowing both ways to be submitted to the leaderboard, but that comes with a problem for Babylon Story runs...

Babylon Story - Unlike "Riders:Zero Gravity" you can't easily reset a Babylon run, so the option it's to always have a backup save to start a "new" Babylon Story, which my guess it's not a easy and fast option for some people, so the to match the changes in the Heroes Story category, if applied, the option to start runs from a "completed" file to be allowed in order to lessen the "complications" for starting runs in this category.

All Stories - At this point, Heroes and Babylon category will be looking the same as "Sonic Riders:Zero Gravity" leaderboards, so for the sake of consistency between the two games, All Stories runs will be a MUST to still starting from a new file.

2 - Real Time Attack (RTA) vs. In-game Timing (IGT) This has been discussed sometimes, and I after a BIG thought and checking (Especially Sand Ruins... Which explanation comes late), IGT it's possible to be applied for the leaderboards, BUT, all leaderboards will be still "filtered" as RTA over IGT, the reason for that it's because most of the runs in leaderboard already don't have a video attached to it anymore hence Twitch VODs changes or deleted videos / youtube channels making impossible to get a IGT.

3 - Sand Ruins IGT From various suggestions as using "True second" as fade out in end or "estimate fade out time which a margin of error of 0.x seconds", another suggestion has been suggested which it's the timing for the "fade out" after the ballista launch, which from several runs in the leaderboard, has been noticed that at a full charge + boost, which has been common in every run checked, to be a 3.x~ seconds until the fade out, and a no charge + boost to be 4.x~ seconds, this has been a suggestion to make moderation "easier" if a verification with a "questionable" video quality happens... (Which it's common/rare case for some games... But that it's another story)

And this it's pretty much what needs to be sorted for now, grammar may not be the best but I hope it's enough to get things sorted for this leaderboard.My guess it's that will be some people agreeing and disagreeing with IGT reason, but I ask to not make more a "snowball" of this topic than it's already, not all racing games needs a IGT as a "standard" for timing, but that it's the best possible solution for moderation and for the runners suggested.

Edited by the author 6 years ago
Pockit, iden and 3 others like this
Chile

Players who dont have permanent video are DarkspinesSonic (x2), Blast_kun (x3), NFang, 2dos, tomijoker and fivavoa.

I agree with everything except with the order by RTA. Everyone should be responsible for giving a permanent run for any subsequent change. If it were not like that, I could upload a new WR and a week later delete the video to avoid being imitated. Different intention, same result: hide. This way you can hide the strategy. I could do 13:55 in Heroes (that I want) and then delete it. Obviously I'm not going to do it but it's for you to understand the need for a permanent run and not just a live one on Twitch without recording. The fault that problems like this arise are those players who dont record their runs. A run should not be just to prove a result. The player has to be responsible for his runs.

In any case, if it is ordered by IGT, the players will not be harmed because the times are NOT erased. They will only be in a deserved place into the leaderboards without position. And with all due respect, from the runs without videos the only valuable ones are those of DsS (old WR that hides his strategy because he didnt record the run) and those of Blast_kun (same, although I'm sure you can improve them). For the other runs, it does not affect them at all to have no exact position. I'm glad you finally talk about this issue. I hope you understand.

PS: The margin of error in Sand Ruins is less than 0.03 with a decent quality and 0.05 if it doesnt look good. Its not 0.X. PS2: In this game IGT is needed and I have given all the reasons in another post.

Pockit likes this
Portugal

I can't quite get this and i apologize if i missunderstood something.

I got a run rejected from not starting from a new save file a while ago. i was a bit sad but still went and re-made the run, even after being a bit salty from the rejection. But after reading this:

"there is a mix of Heroes Story runs starting from a new save file and runs that starts from a "already beaten" Heroes Story, far as this is concerned to the Heroes category, there is not much difference from theses two ways to start, only a couple of dialogue boxes from unlockables when the run timing has been already ended, a solution for this it's to make a change in the rules for allowing both ways to be submitted to the leaderboard"

Well... it is indeed true that, new or not, the run will be the same IF the save file starts from Metal City. Now i noticed that my previous run got rejected becuse it too didn't start from a new save file, so i thought that it slipped through and got accepted but the corrected afterwards. But, not triying to be mean here, i noticed a lot of other runs didn't start from a new save file.

This led me to be confused becuse now there isn't any stability over this rule. So in my opinion, so that the runs that already exist don't get deleted if you go for that rule, i think that Heroes Story shoudn't have to be starting from a new save file as long as it, ou course, starts from Metal City. and i makes it easier to not have to create new save files when wanting to make a run when you have a completed save file (for those interested it even helps to get rings for the Shop XD).

As for IGT, in my opinion, Sm4sh's reason is pretty understandable. this game has a lot of platforms to run on. And that makes loading times "kinda" inconsistent throughtout the diferent platforms (emulators too). A good example like the game dishonored as showed me is that loading if you count it. It gets very unfair. And even if Sonic Riders doen't have THAT much of a diference... it is still there! Giving or taking a tiny bit of a time diference. Thanks, i hope i didn't missunderstood something wrong. I'm glad that this game is still alive in places like this.

iden likes this

@Pockit - No runs will be deleted/modified (besides the addition of the IGT when it's possible) with the rules changes, rather, it's the solution to prevent that after the analyze that was done for the leaderboards, also this leaderboard has a objective to also act as a "database" because when transitioning all the times to this website, we ended up losing times from some old runs that can't be found anymore as it is.

As the RTA/IGT talk, console/versions difference will always exist no matter what the game, this haven't stopped speedruns of other games to be competitive, including racing genre games, the main reason to IGT to be added in the leaderboard it's to act as a "tool" for a "fair and fast" method of comparison between the runs, they being "valuable" or not.

If possible, changes are planned to be made by next week or so while I still need to get things done before making sure everything it's alright, and seeing how the IGT topic it's still "not" solved, if no agreement is made by then, that will be going go to the "drawing board" until another proposal from what already have been made shows up again.

SaimeZX and Pockit like this