Hi!

After having a chat with @pmcTRILOGY I decided to do some tests about version differences between the NTSC-U/C and the NTSC-J version of the game, as I wanted to find out if there is really a need to get the NTSC-J version as well ;)

The write-up can be found on my GitHub: https://github.com/AmenAnthem/speedrun-notes-brahma-force/blob/master/others/version-differences.md

I also linked it as a game resource.

TLDR: Get the NTSC-J version ;) If you are really masochistic you are ofc free to run the NTSC-U/C version as well, be my guest ;)

Using a VM for runs is in my opinion totally legit, I wouldn't see any reason to not allow this. I won't explicitly state this in the rules, because I see no necessity to do so. If anyone in the community is against that please reach out in this thread so we cann discuss this if necessary.

@yeroc5311: Thanks for submitting your new PB, huge improvement! Just a heads up: Using the cake is faster, as summarized in this thread. Maybe that could be the next improvement you implement for an even faster PB, looking forward to it!

Hi everyone!

As I want the mod decisions to be transparent to the community I opened this thread to inform you about my decision made in the case of yeroc5311's run and it's verification, despite it containing the usage of an online emulator.

I looked into this case in detail and here are my findings: First of all, the page is extremely questionable, I do not recommend using it. Despite that it uses emulatorjs.com to emulate games, which uses the open source project EmulatorJS. The payloads to load EmulatorJS in this case requested the core "gb", which according to the documentation will use the Gambatte core. As Gambatte is an allowed emulator according to our rules I did look into if EmulatorJS runs it accuratly. It seems to be doing so (concluded by me after some simple verification steps I did with this video).

Conclusion: I will allow this run to be verified, but please abide by the rules and use standalone versions of one of the allowed emulators (when not using original hardware), my personal recommendation is Gambatte Speedrun. EmulatorJS contains the GPL-3.0 license which requires proper attribution, which is not the case here. As I'm a software engineer I do not condone using anything, which doesn't even properly comply with such a simple license. But obviously this is something where the @yeroc5311 would have needed in depth technical knowledge to even find that out, so I will tolerate it this time.

I hope this clears this up, I will leave this thread open for any questions or discussions regarding this decision.

@yeroc5311: I would love to see more PBs, so please keep submitting runs :) Just please as mentioned above use a standalone version of one of the allowed emulators.

I'd recommend Tamagotchi for Gameboy, the Death% category is extremely short (sub 2 minutes with a little bit of training) but quite timing intensive. This is one I mostly recommend to people interested in starting to speedrun, as it's easy to get into and shows some aspects of speedrunning in a straight forward way without any RNG at all (which might be deterring to some folks). Here's the page: https://www.speedrun.com/tamagotchi_gb#Death

Hi! My recommendation is to use the appropriate support channel on OBS's Discord, here is an anvite: https://discord.gg/obsproject Hope you get this sorted out!

Hi!

First of all I didn't use AmaRecTV at any time so far, because I use OBS. I had the same issue as you though, multiple times with different root causes.

The problem in this case may be your GV-USB2. Mine started having this after a Windows (10) update, which I rolled back and the problem was gone for some time. It happend multiple times though, the rollback fixed it for me everytime but the last time it happened. Suddenly this fix didn't work any more, the GV-USB2 had it permanently from then on. I bought a new one and the problem didn't occur any more.

I stopped using GV-USB2 a few months ago though, because I replaced it with a Retrotink 5X Pro and a Avermedia capture card. I can really recommend such a setup, despite it being more expensive. The leap in quality was worth it a lot.

Please let me know if this did help you.

Hi!

I completed my first run of MDK on the PS1 (using the PS2 model SCPH-90001), which I will submit as soon as the upload is finished. My run is far from being optimized, currently above one hour.

There are some differences in the PS1 version which make some parts of the game more difficult or outright not possible in the same way as on the PC version.

• Loading times differ vastly.
• Airvents don't seem to carry Kurt as high as in the PC version.
• Field of vision is extremely limited compared to the PC version, because of the pixelated graphics.
• Some bosses take more hits.
• The shuttle in world 5 is practically impossible to hit in sniper mode when it flies over the platform.
• The nuke save glitch is not possible.
• The item throw glitch seems to be impossible as well (could just be me sucking at it though ;))
• Performance of the game is sometimes terrible which makes some stuff extremely difficult to pull of consistently.
• The snowboarding sections in world 4 are extremely cut down compared to the PC version.

There are some other minor things as well which are different, but don't influence the run too much. Also I was not able to pull off any of the OOB tricks (mainly the world 1 ones) because the jump distance seems to be a bit different, but that's a guess on my site after trying them for an extended amount of time.

To have an incentive to run the PS1 version despite all these differences I'd like to propose to separate PC and PS1 into their own categories.

Have a great day, look forward to feedback :)

Hi!

I just did some 1P Battle runs and had another look at the leaderboards here.

Is there a reason for 1P Battle to use RTA instead of IGT? The score screen at the end shows IGT, which IMO should be the preferred timing method for this category so runners using an emulator are not getting this huge of a disadvantage.

Also 1P Battle and Time Attack both should measure milliseconds as well, because they are quite short, seconds are not enough here IMO. I recommend enabling milliseconds for those categories on the leaderboards.

Are there any news regarding the input in our last thread for the Story sub categories? I'm fine with them staying like they currently are, but if there are any updates for any decision please let us know :)

Have a great day!

Hi! Before doing runs I have a question regarding the short cut option on the PS1: Are we allowed to change this option to on, as it would speed up the transitions between fights? The rules don't state anything about that currently, but as noone is using it I wanted to make sure if changing it is actually prohibited.

Hi @petaQ! Welcome to the Tamagotchi speedrun community and congratulations on your new WR! I just verified your video and watching it with your comment about how you timed the run and can see where the confusion is coming from. It seems the rules are worded a bit confusing and aren't as clear as I thought they were. Timing ends, as you correctly stated in your submission, on the first frame of the death animation, so it seems to me that that needs no better description. Timing starts when the tamagotchi is fully visible (as in its face is visible) after the fade from black after the hatching animation is done. There is a short window in which the tamagotchi is fully black, as soon as it switches to its real color and its facial features (eyes and mouth) are visible timing starts. In the case of your video its frame 1535. Thanks for letting me know, I'm going to try to descripe it better in the rules. Please let me know if the rules aren't still clear enough after I updated them. Also please let me know if I should change the description text of your submission.

I get those arguments and I think it is valid to keep all cut scenes as its own dedicated category. The category with cut scenes skip should be the main category though imo.

Thanks @kyletx500 I get where you're coming from. What I don't get is why a new finding shouldn't make previous runs obsolete, that's what new findings are bound to do. If the consent is that two categories make sense, then so be it. I just don't see any added benefit of a category that has cut scenes as it doesn't change the playstyle, it just has the cut scenes. Also this is a game that very few people ran so far, I see it as an incentive for runners which did runs before this finding to do new runs.

If the decision is to split the categories my suggestion would be:

• Call the category which uses the cut scene skip 'Cut scene skip'
• Call the category which doesn't use the skip 'No cut scene skip'
• Make the cut scene skip category the main one, as it is the faster one without using something like ACE or similar game breaking things.

As you are a mod and the change to the leaderboards was already done prior: I'm just trying to give my opinion and input, ultimately it isn't my decision to make. I really don't want to decredit any previous runs, as they got me into running this game. My opinion is just that there is a new finding which skips something that doesn't add anything to the run itself and I personally think it is a good addition. Waiting through cut scenes and having little gameplay in a run that's over one hour was putting me off at first, that's why I'm glad there is the possibility to skip them.

Thanks @DBcade :)

My two cents: I think it is weird to split the leaderboards, as I don't see it as a NG+. NG+ woudl be indicated, this is a normal new game, just with the added benefit of being able to skip cut scenes. Nothing about the gameplay or difficulty itself changes. I see it the same way as in games like SOTN for example. SOTN has this same mechanic, which is also used without any restriction. This is a speedrun after all so I don't see the necessity for having cut scenes in a run, but that's just my opinion :)

Bug: The date references (e.g. last month) in the recent runs widget don't use the language setting of speedrun.com but of the browser itself.

Hi!

I'm getting into running this game but there seem to be differences in arcade mode, which the current leaderboards don't account for. I'm using version 2.6 of the game.

First of all a difficulty selection was added and the cpu AI was improved, which seems to make even easy more difficult than the standard difficulty previously was.

Edit : After playing arcade mode with other characters it seems that it depends on the character you choose, but I also tried using Goldar as main and didn't get the same fights as the current WR. Is there any documentation to the arcade mode fights each character gets?

Thanks for any answers in advance!

The list seems a bit outdated, could you please review it? Current accurate emulators are really close to playing on original hardware, ePSXe is one of the emulators where some PS1 speedrun communities don't allow its useage anymore, because of its dependency on plugins to be somewhat accurate. See https://emulation.gametechwiki.com/index.php/PlayStation_emulators for further details.

I think ePSXe should be disallowed for new runs, as its loading times differ from version to version. Mednafen imo should be allowed, as it is extremely accurate and also the base for the core which BizHawk uses.

Hi everyone!

The runner @Nozotakun made the discovery, that using cakes instead of ice creams in Death% can be faster, as the eating animation is faster. It requires solid inputs though, as an additional right input is necessary to choose the cake over the ice cream.

I just did some timing on this, as I was curious, as I didn't know the duration of the animations differ. But they really do! Accourding to my tests the cake eating animation is about 0.4 seconds afster, which is huge in this short run.

I hope this discovery brings some runners back to get some competition in this category again. I know it is a meme run, but one that is really great for getting people into speedrunning! Thanks to @Nozotakun for sharing this discovery with the community and congratulations on the new world record!

Looking forward to your discoveries! I'm currently dedicating my spare time on weekends to running another game, but I'm always glad when there is some new competition so I'm pressured into running a game again :)

I think @Legs changed the categories accourding to this, because Glitchless vs. OOB. In my opinion this glitch in this context isn't an OOB, as I never leave the boundary but just skip something that's in bounds.

Hi!

The rules for 100% state 'You need to get at least 992 points of 1000 (Never ever anyone got the 1000).' which isn't true, as it is easily possible to get the full 1000 points. My suggestion is to change the rules accordingly, so a 100% run needs to reach the full points possible.

Also I'm going to update my Any% guide in a bit and will add a 100% guide so everyone interested can have a look at my current routs.