California, USAcan confirm that both threecreepio and I have used the spreadsheet during runs.
he even made this nifty web app, but i never used it.
Hello all!
I'm pleased to announce the addition of two new categories!
DEATHLESS Now that there are more runners on the leaderboard using the "Death Route" for top times in any%, a Deathless category is justified. I have copied over all the Deathless WRs from the past, but kept them in any% as well since they are the any% WRs of their time. If you are one of those runners, PLEASE keep those runs in both categories. Anyone else is free to move their eligible runs to the new category using the "edit run" option, leave them in any% where they are, or make a duplicate submission.
POWER 1 Power 9 requires that you to complete the game at the maximum power level. Now, those looking for a challenge can try killing Jaws at the MINIMUM power level. This IS possible, as demonstrated in a youtube video by kareshi (not yet submitted at the time of this post). At this time there are no other restrictions on the category with regards to getting a submarine or collecting crabs for the speed boost, so it's not a true "low%". This may change in the future as the category's potential gets realized. I look forward to seeing what strategies develop!
OTHER CHANGES I removed the "minisub/subless" variable. The original purpose was to help distinguish runs using the newer subless death routes from runs using traditional strategies. But now that we have a separate Deathless category it is mostly redundant and was making the rules and submission process more complicated.
indeed, only using runahead to a small degree would bring emulators runs closer to original hardware performance, and shouldn't be a problem if the only thing we're worried about is maintaining a fair playing field. it's my belief that some of the motivations for banning run-ahead (or worse, banning emulators simply for having the feature available) were made from a place of ignorance and confusion over how the feature actually works. However, as a moderator myself, i think maintaining a ban on the feature has merit.
WHY PEOPLE FREAKED OUT ABOUT RUNAHEAD IN THE FIRST PLACE As far as I can tell, the original concerns with runahead is because people thought it did something it doesn't. Even in your post you refer to it as "lag reduction". it's really "input latency reduction". calling it lag reduction makes people think it reduces lag... obviously. some games have parts that lag. metroid gets laggy when there are too many sprites on screen, for example. these are conditions of the games that hardware users experience and therefore emu users should also have to deal with for fair play. when people think the feature "reduces lag", they think it effects those types of things. time and time again i see games with rules that say "mesen is banned because it has lag reduction features". also there was a lot of confusion over whether or not run ahead can be detected (i have a youtube video explaining how to detect it, so long as the input display is turned on), and some people even thought that there was a default amount of run ahead even when it was set to 0. Due to these misunderstandings, SMB banned Mesen after the feature was added, and a lot of other games followed suit. I've tried to get some of these bans reversed by educating moderators with my youtube video.
WHY A RUNAHEAD BAN MIGHT STILL BE A GOOD IDEA Moderating a game, especially a popular one like NInja Gaiden, can be time consuming. And this isn't a paying gig. It's feels like it would be a pain in the butt to have to prove that someone used the "right amount" of runahead. never have i seen a rule that says "it's ok for you to use this feature, but only if you use it a little bit!" it's so much simpler to say NO, and then only check high level runs or runs that look fishy. And frankly, the input latency is not that big a deal. the only game i've ever run were i felt like the latency was a problem was MTPO. most of the time you can just compensate for it.
thanks for the demo video winter! hope some people give it a try!
LOL. i know dr bizz on real life! but yeah i asked CHX42 about this glitch a while back and he said it was known but no applications for speedrunning.
Hey all! After a long period of "learning" (mostly offline), I finally did my first weekend of Individual Level runs. I didn't do Single Segment yet because I didn't even finally beat Mike Tyson for the first time until this afternoon. I would like to submit my times to the SRC leaderboard, but there's an issue...
The emulator I used is MesenRTA. Neither MesenRTA nor the vanilla version of Mesen are on your approved emulator list. Why is that? Mesen is a high accuracy emulator. There were some boards that banned Mesen a while back due to some confusion over the "Run Ahead" feature added in the last version update, but some have now reversed that ban (i.e. Ninja Gaiden). But I don't see any forum post here announcing the emulator being removed, which makes me think it was never on the list in the first place?
I'd like to request that Mesen/MesenRTA be added to the approved list. Bizhawk has a tendency to lag, and other emulators are lower accuracy.
Below are videos I made a few months ago. The first demonstrates how to detect use of the run-ahead feature (the bans were motivated by the false belief that use of run-ahead couldn't be detected.). The second is an infomercial for MesenRTA, developed by ThreeCreepio, explaining the new features that make is better from a moderation standpoint, including the removal of the Run Ahead feature.
A new version of Mesen, known as MesenRTA, is approved for Legend Of Kage submissions. It has enhancements designed to give speedrun moderators greater confidence when approving a run. The standard version of Mesen is also still allowed, but if you are a Mesen user, consider this alternative.
It can be downloaded here: https://github.com/threecreepio/mesenrta/releases
And here is an infomercial I made to explain and promote it:
A new version of Mesen, known as MesenRTA, is approved for Jaws submissions. It has enhancements designed to give speedrun moderators greater confidence when approving a run. The standard version of Mesen is also still allowed, but if you are a Mesen user, consider this alternative.
It can be downloaded here: https://github.com/threecreepio/mesenrta/releases
And here is an infomercial I made to explain and promote it:
Made this short infomercial to explain and promote MesenRTA, the version of Mesen created by ThreeCreepio that Kosmic mentioned in the original post.
the "NMG Deathless" categories are now referred to as "Classic" and can be found on the main game page.
don't know much about history viewer and the rewind feature. just played around with it for a bit and couldn't get it to work in a way that would be useful for a cheater, but again i don't know much about it. looks like rewind has been available since version 0.9.0 and this is the first i've ever heard anyone pointing it out as a concern. the Mesen bans have been motivated by run ahead.
in terms of how to detect history viewer, i could look more in to it, but i found one way. Whenever you open Mesen, there is a game selection screen letting you choose from the last four ROMs you ran. that screen isn't captured by the history viewer. if moderators were to become seriously concerned about it, they could require every submission to start from the game selection screen (added bonus, the game selection screen confirms which version of Mesen you're using). this would require a runner to close and reopen the emulator for every attempt. alternatively, the submission need not include the screen, so long as there's a VOD showing that your series of attempts started from that screen.
And as i pointed out in the video, there are many undetectable things that a player could do (ram/memory watch, available on many EMUs) if they wanted to cheat. We ban the use of the features, not the entire emulator. ultimately the only real defense against such things is a history of attempts proving you have the appropriate skill level, and good will with the community. And even those don't guarantee anything.
there's no limits to what people "could" do, if they wanted to cheat. That would be true even if we banned all the emulators. even an "unscrupulous actor" playing on console could splice captured footage, or use a TAS chip. https://www.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/kewjhd/tas_replay_device_hidden_in_nes_controller/
Hello all! I just finished making a video in reaction to the growing trend to ban Mesen as a legal emulator for NES speedruns. This trend is motivated by the FALSE belief that the "run ahead" feature is undetectable. In the video I show how to detect it and make the case for banning the feature, not the emulator. Mesen is a high accuracy emulator, and I believe it's worth fighting for against this misinformation. Please watch the video and consider sharing it with your moderators. #SaveMesen
for the record. just got my first completion, but was on FCEUX. not going to submit until we get a ruling on this.
Hey. Starting to learn the game. It was brought to my attention today that the "Race Edition" romhack is permitted for the NOoB category(which is what I'm running), and that raised a question. If we're allowed to use a romhack that guarantees cave 1 technodrome, what reason is there to restrict emulator?
My understanding was that the FCEUX ban was because the consistent ppu/cpu alignment made frame targeting foe the cave 1 technodrome easier and therefore provided an advantage on the RNG grind. Is there some other reason FCEUX is banned that would still apply to categories that allow Race Edition?
FCEUX runs smoother (uses less CPU) on my computer, where as with Bizhawk and Mesen I'm more likely to get emulator lag (not the same as game lag). If I CAN use FCEUX, I would prefer to.
Hello! Thank you for starting this topic of discussion. I was considering reaching out to you to discuss exactly these issues. As such, I already have some things to say. Apologies for the "wall of text" that follows.
SEED USAGE VS "TRUE" RNG For those that wish to have longer/less predictable runs, it would seem that requiring a "random" seed is a good solution. But this solution presents 2 problems. The first is that even with a "random" seed, the ideal run would still look similar to what I've already done by design in my current WR (I did find the seed by accident in the first place). Someone interested in grinding such a category would just keep "resetting" until they got a wormhole close by, send scouts through that wormhole while building their fleet, and hopefully find the other race near the other side. It would be longer... but I bet a sub 5 minute time wouldn't be too hard to get. Would that really be a better speed run? The other issue with that kind of rule is... how do you enforce it? I'm mean, sure... you can't type in a seed manually, but what's stopping someone from resetting as soon as they've seen the seed and waiting until they see one they're familiar with. A clever player working within those limits could pretend that they don't know what to expect, but still have a competitive advantage over someone who is working with a mystery seed. I just don't see what value would be added to the leaderboard by having categories with that restriction. The rest of what I have to say assumes that seed setting remains allowed.
CATEGORIES BASED ON GALAXY TYPE This could potentially be interesting. With either Cluster or Spiral types, the game is forced to continue until you can travel through unstable wormholes. You would be forced to colonize within your area a little and attack the other race's sector before they can leave their own. Even if an ideal seed is possible, finding it would be a lot harder. You'd want one that gave you good systems in your area, and hope they have bad systems in theirs. And figuring out a good custom race would be interesting (less easy penalties). The game might last long enough that I imagine there would be some variety in the AI's behavior. The focus would be on speedy micro-management in the early game, and speedy conquest in the late game.
CATEGORIES BASED ON GALAXY SIZE This doesn't change much by itself, honestly. With wormholes in the right locations, the size of the galaxy is irrelevant.
CATEGORIES BASED ON STARTING AGE Pre-Warp would just force some research at the front end. A custom Lithovore race can focus on science early and switch to full blown production when necessary while the other race it forced to balance with farming. You might be able to get to the enemy before they colonize a second planet. Advanced would give the enemy some extra planets to conquer. Would take some more work, would be harder to optimize, but with a good seed it's a solvable run.
CATEGORIES BASED ON DIFFICULTY Not sure what this would change honestly. I think the higher difficulties mostly gives the enemy more starting money. They'd probably buy more ships to defend themself before you got there. Not a major difference in how the game is run I would imagine.
CATEGORIES BASED ON NUMBER OF OPPONENTS This changes how the galaxy gets seeded. Each amount of opponents would have a different optimal seed. And at higher numbers, the RNG might become unpredictable by the time you get to the last races. Also higher numbers require bigger galaxies (1-4 is small, 5-6 is medium, 7-8 is large).
CATEGORIES BASED ON GAME PACE Regardless of whether we use a prefabricated paces or customize the "speeds", this wouldn't change much. In my WR I used very slow research so that the enemy wouldn't develop better defenses, very slow population so they would have less things to bomb, and very fast production so I could build my fleet in fewer turns. If I were forced to have the opposite setting, it would take a little longer... but would probably be just about the same run.
CATEGORIES BASED ON MISC. ADVANCED SETTING I mean... what would be the point? pirate%? I'm not even going to entertain these.
CATEGORIES BASED ON VICTORY CONDITIONS These are the logical categories to go with, but it would still be a matter of finding/grinding seeds. I actually already toyed around with this (didn't record any of it yet though). Diplomatic victory requires two other races, I had to find a new seed, but pretty quickly I found a pretty good one. I built as big a fleet as my one star base would allow, split it up to the two homeworlds, bombed them down to 1 population each, then voted myself ruler of the galaxy. Took less than 5 minutes. For Technology, I did that same as my Conquest victory, but didn't finish the enemy and did colonize a second planet. Thanks to auto-turn, I didn't see the point of exploring for more planets to colonize, just sail though the tech tree. Was less than 15 minutes, I think. Economic victory was like a mix of Diplomatic and Technology. Two enemy races(I used same seed as I did for Tech), bomb them down to one pop, grind research until you get the stock exchange, build it, buy stock, wait 10 turns. Took less than 10 minutes. Antaran Victory is a tricky one. I did the one race seed, bombed them down, but I needed a big fleet so I needed colonies for star bases. It ending up feeling like a real long play of the game(might have been a few hours, but I didn't play optimally). I don't think I'd want to compete for that category AND watching/approving the submissions would be a pain in the butt. Same would be true, I imagine, for an Orion%.
RACE RESTRICTIONS Is there anything else that can be restricted to make the game different? Would it make sense to restrict the use of custom or DLC races? Wouldn't change much honestly... my original submission used the Bulrathi. Requiring random opponents would just mean more resetting.
CATEGORY/SUB-CATEGORY COMBOS A good way of doing things might be to pick just two ways of splitting up the categories, using one as main categories and one as sub-categories. For example, Galaxy Type as main, and Victory Condition as subs. With Galaxy type we could mix in some other requirement, since Spiral and Cluster are pretty similar to begin with. Maybe Spiral has a minimum of 3 races (one per quadrant, neutral quadrant in the middle, I think is how that would normally shake out), and maybe cluster has a minimum 7 (one per cluster). Diplomatic Victory would be a pain in the butt in a cluster galaxy because all races have to meet all other races. I would probably invade all but two neighboring empires and wait for them to meet so I can out vote them.
THEMED CATEGORIES We could make categories with a collection of setting restriction to fit certain themes, like Pacifist. This would make the quick strategy I used fir Diplomacy not work. It might become advantageous to turn on 'minor civilizations' and purposely seeking out those systems to add their population to our votes.
CONCLUSION I honestly don't know what the best course of action would be. And lets be real... only two people "follow" this game right now... you and me @Krayzar. If we think more people will come along, what would be best for them. Too many categories and convoluted rules might scare some people away. But if we just do some straight forward categories(just Victory conditions for example), then pretty quickly we'll post up some runs with good seeds/strats and new players might feel forced to play established routes, which isn't always fun. It's quite the dilemma.
well, i WAS planning on running no cpu version of this in the near future.
So for a while now I've been doing something on my stream called "All Prizes". The rules have been that you must win the game 6 times, winning the 6 prizes available in the game. If you lose a game, you must try to win that prize again. Time starts after completing your name entry on the first game (as usual), and ends when the "You Have Won This Fabulous Prize" screen pops up for the 6th unique prize you've won. You don't have to win the prizes in any particular order.
A lot of people have been saying that it should be added as a category, so I decided to open this thread to get that conversation started.
I've been running it as "vs CPU" but there's no reason for it to be limited to that. I think it would be best if the leaderboard was arranged as 2 main categories with two sub-categories each. Either "Single Game" and "All Prizes" as the mains, with "Any%" and "vs CPU" as the subs, or the other way around. (my vote would be for the former)
And even though I've only been doing this for the standard WoF, there's no reason Junior and Family Edition can't have the same categories. (I'm not very familiar with "featuring Vanna White", so don't know what the Prize situation is)
So what do people think? Anyone else like the idea of "All Prizes"?
Below is my current 'All Prizes vs CPU' PB, a 35:06. My splits are set-up so that each individual prize can be measured as a single game run.
