This was my mistake. I've been out of town for work the past few months and haven't been able to keep up with moderation duties. ThatSonicGamer, your run is now verified on the leaderboards.

We're also working on adding another mod for this game so this doesn't happen again. You'll see some changes in the near future.

Dreamcast emulators still have a ways to go in terms of console accuracy for speedruns unfortunately. Most of the library is playable, but there are still inaccuracies. From what I saw last time I checked, Sonic Shuffle had graphical glitches even on the best emulators and some minor frame rate drops. Since this game is also so reliant on manipulating the computer players and random factors like card drops, it's hard to see the current slate of emulators running comparably to console. That's not to say it couldn't be accepted in the future.

Great to see some new discussion on this game. As an aside, I created a community discord to hopefully make this game a bit more active and facilitate this discussion. I'd prefer to leave any rule changes to a vote if possible, so I'll create one for RTA vs IGT on the discord or this forum if enough people join and agree.

"I've been interested in speedrunning this game for a while, but there doesn't appear to be many rules that would make the game fair competition. No rules on start and stop times. No rules on what emulators can be used. All consoles and emulators are on the same leaderboards. Etc. I agree that IGT would be better than RTA."

This is on me. I was around when the game had a much smaller leaderboard and everyone had an understanding of the timing rules. For reference, I've updated the rule notes to reflect the current runs. Timing starts on the first frame of movement when you enter a level and the scene overlay appears. Timing ends on the last hit to the final boss, Caduceus. Preferably, people will also show the credits with their total in-game time. As I mentioned before though, I'm willing to hear out changes to the start time such as level or character select.

I mentioned it in another thread, but I'm no expert on emulator accuracy and wouldn't want to force that decision, but from my understanding the most accurate ones for Playstation are Bizhawk, Mednafen, and ePSXe. Regardless, I don't currently have the ability to determine what emulator someone is using, so that would be a formality anyway unless someone else here is willing to assist with verification.

In general the Playstation 1 version is the most accessible, but all versions are pretty much identical.

The PlayStation Network version (which is on PSP, Vita, and PS3) is essentially just emulating the PS1 version. I can't speak to the performance on PSP or Vita, but on PS3 there's no noticeable difference. I have not done a timing test, but if there is any loading difference between versions it's very minor.

We also give the option to list PS2, but that's really just running the PS1 disc on different hardware.

There's also the arcade version, but I'm not entirely sure of the differences on that one to be honest. It might be worth taking a look.

I'll keep this thread open since it is a more recent discussion, but FYI there was a thread on this topic already that never got any responses. Overall, I'm open to feedback about changing the preferred time method, but I would need more comments from other runners before committing to any changes.

To be honest, it has been this way since before I started running several years ago and the community was not very active for a while so the tradition stayed, but I'm happy to discuss it now since more people seem to be running the game again.

The main reason for using real time as the primary ranking method is because there are places for player input that the in-game timer doesn't count. These are:

-Level selection -Speeding up the cutscenes by holding down the attack button. -Mashing through level intro screens.

These are all required inputs from the player that impact your time to reach the credits so there is some argument for real time being important for ranking speedruns.

As a side note, I've questioned before whether where we start the real timer is the best place. Personally I think starting on character select or start game makes more sense than gaining control of the character, so that can also be up for discussion also.

Alternatively, the in-game timer does count deaths and removes loading so it's a fair comparison on its own. It can also remove any inconsistencies with load times, as that may be a concern since we have many runners who use emulator.

In general, I don't want to make any changes without hearing from other runners, so everyone should feel free to reply to this thread to determine if we make any changes to the timing method.

Glad to hear it! Always great to see more people interested in Strider 2.

The most accurate emulators would be the latest versions of the following: ePSXe Mednafen Bizhawk

Of those, ePSXe is the easiest to set up. I'm not too familiar with other PSX emulators, so if you wanted to use a different one it would need reviewed for accuracy.

I apologize for not looking in to this thread sooner, SubStylee. I personally dropped off this game for a while, but as I'm currently the main active moderator on this thread that's not really excusable and I'd like to make up for that. I'm reviving this thread and will gladly talk with anyone interested in changing the timing standards for all categories.

Currently timing starts when you gain control of Strider. The main reason I can see against using this start time is that you can freely choose your level before this, and we currently don't have any rules about the order required for completion of levels. For Any% and Hien% this doesn't matter with the current route because Level 1 is the fastest way to unlock level 4, then level 5 so you would always want to start on that one, but that could potentially change if a warp/zip/ACE/other glitch was found. Furthermore, in All Stages runners may want to start with Level 2 or 3 to practice those levels more.

If the start time were to change, it would make the most sense to have the timer start when you select Hiryu or Hien Mode on the main menu as that is where you really choose the category you are running. If you start the timer from pressing the start button on the main menu, then Hien Mode inherently has a few frames of extra time added over Hiryu Mode due to menu navigation, but this is an extremely minor point that I'm willing to admit doesn't really matter.

Alternatively, if we were to change to one of these new methods, it really only adds ~20 some seconds of real time. When comparing times for a leaderboard there isn't too much of a difference to me with either option, but we should define if the timer would start when the menu beings to transition, or when you first hear the confirmation sound effect.

Another thing to consider is ordering leaderboards by real or in-game time.

Currently leaderboards are organized by real time. I've kept this the status quo since before I became a mod, but I've always assumed it was because cutscenes do not count towards in-game time and can be skipped or sped up by holding down a button. I have not seen any issues with loading discrepancies between versions (PSX, PSP, PSN, emulator) that would give a reason for us to change to in-game time, but I also have not done an in depth analysis of this. I'd love to hear other arguments because it seems like some leaderboard positions are separated only by how fast you can skip cutscenes.

I'm also fine with keeping the current timing conventions and if I get no responses to this thread then they'll remain the same.

Both of these (and FrankieFrameSkip's leaderboard run) had the same issue with Twitch updating the URL for the VOD. Since Twitch doesn't make it well known whenever they update their VOD ID's it's important to check up on older runs periodically, so thanks for letting me know. I've updated the links to the record run and the guide, so they should be visible for you now.

Yeah, I think I am the only American seriously running the game. I guess I need to learn some French.

For seeds, yes it sets a certain order for the levels based on a number you choose or a random value (think Rogue-like or Binding of Issac). So it will be faster once a certain seed is found with the "best" level order for the current route. It is mainly designed around races and multiple playthroughs. Seeds might also affect the color filters as well I'm not sure.

I'll add the pearls fix to the list. For the Vapor (Steam) level, you can still do the skip by abusing the rotational physics of the spiral and roll onto the wall and jump up to the cutscene. It's even easier than before, but the developers may patch that as well in the future :/

Hey everyone, glad to see there is a growing Bound community. Version 1.01 of Bound is now available and with it are some major changes to the speedrun mode. Feel free to add to this list if you've noticed any other changes.

-In-game timer was updated to more accurately to reflect real world time. This supposedly adds a couple seconds per minute of gameplay over version 1.00

• Added Non-vital cutscene skips (any scene that doesn't influence the shortcuts in the levels) by pressing Up on the d-pad. From what I've noticed so far this saves between 3-4 minutes over the course of an Any% run.
• Removed the ability to jump onto steam platforms in the Pearls level
• Added a tree to the floating platform section of Planes, thus blocking that section from being skipped without the fear conquered -Changed the terrain in the hidden walled off section of Planes from being clipped into. -Added Random and Set Seeds for Races/Optimizing Routes -You can hide the Timer UI by pressing L3 -Made some platforms in Shout larger for easier movement.

Based on all of these changes, it doesn't necessarily have to be a new category, but I think the version number should be included when submitting a run.

Also, if people can search for a seed number that has the best level order for a route, that will also affect the time over the default settings. So an option in the rules for Default or Set Seed may need to be included as well.

Let me know what you think about these changes.

Oh wow, I took break from speedrunning for a couple months and just noticed this message now. Yeah it's a pretty fun run and it's good to see more people are picking this game up. I would be happy to get some races going sometime soon.

Thanks for answering SubStylee. Your answers were basically what I assumed, but it's good to hear some confirmation from the community.

Also, yeah I was confused about 100% as well, but I will definitely try out any% and all stages as soon as I get some more practice in. It's a shame I didn't find this game sooner as it seems like a great run.

Hey guys, I picked this game up on psn recently and decided it would be pretty fun to speedrun; however, I don't seem to see any rules set up for the categories listed for this game, so I was hoping someone here could clarify some things for me.

Obviously, Any% rules seem fairly self explanatory, but what options settings (vitality and difficulty) are normally used? I would assume to use the default, but I'm still new to the game so I don't know what all the difficulty adjusts in-game.

Does All Stages include Stage 0, or would that be a separate category?

Also the video posted in the guide section has been pretty helpful so far, but it is only listed as part 1 and I can't seem to find the rest of the guide. Does anyone know if part 2 exists?

Thanks for any info you might have.