Not sure if anyone has brought up the possibility of this before, but I found a way to practice any level I want using Gecko codes and homebrew. It takes 80-90 seconds to switch the level, which isn't great but not unbearable. Ignore the bad gameplay by the way.

The other mods of New Super Mario Bros. and I are writing a comprehensive guide to RNG Manipulation in NSMB, and we are almost done. I would like to post this under the Guides section of our leaderboard: https://www.speedrun.com/nsmbds/guides

We are working on the guide in Google Docs, so we have different-sized text, bolded/italicized/underlined text, hyperlinks, and so on. I could not find information about how to do formatting like that on this website.

Here is an example of the formatting in a Guide: https://www.speedrun.com/smb1/guide/jdxw8

How would I format my guide as shown in the guide linked above?

Thanks, MyLittleWalrus

Hi,

I'm the head moderator for New Super Mario Bros. (https://www.speedrun.com/nsmbds). A few days ago, the world record was set at 23:03. Today, the same player set a new record with a lower 23:03. After verifying the run, I noticed that the older run was still shown on the leaderboard, and the new run was only shown as an obsoleted run since we only time to the second. Is there any way to easily change this?

I realize that the simplest solution would be to add milliseconds to his two runs. However, we as a community decided that it doesn't look good to have only one run (or only the top runs) be timed with milliseconds, so if one runs is, then all should be. We also decided that we didn't want to time every single run to the millisecond because that would be a lot of work for us moderators, and anyway there are runs without video that we would not be able to time.

Another solution would be to reject the old WR, verify the new one, then verify the old one again. The dates of the WRs could be changed too, if that's necessary to make the new one visible by default. I don't like that solution, especially if we have to change the dates, because it would cause the WR data to be inaccurate. However, if there is not any easy way to make the new WR show up by default, I will use this method or any other method that works.

Thanks, MyLittleWalrus

I've been talking with Andre and v1be, and we have come to the decision to require video for all runs, and to remove all current runs without video. Note that this will apply only to Any% and ILs because they are shorter and much more competitive.

This is a drastic change, but we believe it is a necessary one. We have our reasons and will be happy to explain them in detail.

The rule change and removal of no-video runs will take place in a few days.

I have been discussing with the other mods, and we think the video requirements should be as follows:

All sub-25 minute runs on DS should require video All sub-30 minute runs on VC should require video All runs on emulator should require video

Hi everyone,

There has been talk on the Discord server of banning the use of emulators. I would greatly appreciate it if everyone shared their opinions and provided reasoning here on what I should change the rules to.

Some things to think about: should we ban emulator use only for runs under a certain time? Should emulators be allowed for ILs but not full game runs? Should we ban emulator use only in the future, or should we remove all past emulator runs?

Again, I want everyone to share their opinions. Even if you are a lurker here, please leave your opinion.

First, some background:

NSMB can be played on DS, Wii U Virtual Console (VC), and emulator (emu). VC and emu have much faster loading times, giving them a significant advantage for speedruns. To combat this unfair advantage, we previously decided as a community to add 45 and 38 seconds to all Any% runs on VC and emu respectively.

Now on to the current issue:

We decided to only factor in the loading times to Any% because it was by far the most competitive category, and no issues had arisen with loading advantages in other categories. We decided that we would bring the discussion back up if/when there was an issue of loading advantages in another category.

That time has come. GregLvk just got a new personal best in Cannonless, with a time of 46:29 played on VC. This is faster than the current world record by 6 seconds. However, it would not be the world record if we factored in loading times for Cannonless, as discussed in previous threads.

I propose a rule change: factor in loading times to all categories, not just Any%, to keep things fair for everyone. I will calculate the loading time differences for both VC and emu for all categories. Below, I have linked a poll for deciding what to do with the rules. I would appreciate it greatly if everybody voted on the poll and responded to this thread explaining why they chose which answer. Thank you.

https://www.strawpoll.me/15706434

GregLvk found a way to get the blue shell every time for any%... but it involves using a save state. In my opinion, it shouldn't be allowed. What do you guys think?

http://www.strawpoll.me/11758295

We've been using the time without loads for a while, and it has a lot of problems- namely it being really confusing/annoying, and intimidating for new runners.

I think there's a better way to do it. There would be a second column called "DS timing" / "adjusted timing" / "adjusted loads" or something. VC would have 45 seconds added to the new column, emu would have 38 seconds added to the new column, and DS would be the same in both columns. The extra time is added because VC and emu loads are about 45 and 38 seconds faster than DS loads, respectively.

Pros:

• The main one: SO much easier and quicker than taking out load times
• I think the way we have it now is also kind of intimidating to people wanting to run this game, so it would be better for them, too
• Don't need to go back and count how many/which load zones you went through, which is annoying to do, and a problem for runs that don't have a recording
• Harder to mess up: since the way we have now is so complicated, I'm sure there have been/could be mistakes when calculating the load times. Adding a fixed amount of time is much less prone to error, and much easier for a mod to verify
• A simple solution is usually better than a really complicated one

Cons:

• Slight Inaccuracy. The difference between load times is 45 or 38 seconds if the runs go through the same exact load zones. As the number of load zones increases, the difference in load time increases too. HOWEVER: the change would only become significant in runs that go through a lot more load zones (a lot more load zones = have a lot of deaths = time doesn't need to be as accurate anyway)
• Somewhat arbitrary / not the usual way of dealing with load differences
• May look weird to have 2 columns with the same time in them for DS runs, then adjusted for vc and emu (we could change the formatting or something though)

It wouldn't have to be exactly as I said here; please make suggestions for improvement, tell me if/why you don't think we should change, etc.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19lJG_DfaEEtT9G-sS5hP9sAiwsen1s6CDj1h3ZrlQL8/edit?usp=sharing I think this should finally settle the issue with loading times. Seems like the best solution.

If you have any questions/think I should change something, please reply here.

Making a new thread because the other one is long, and I think this deserves its own thread.

The past few days, I've been going through a few videos frame by frame to count the exact loading times, and now I have an exact number that I am certain of. VC's loading time advantage over DS is 45.5 seconds. I have lots of data if anyone wants it.

Since we finally have a solid number for this, I propose we change the rules/timing so VC runs add the 45.5s timing difference on, and we can time it exactly if two runs are close. If anyone disagrees/has any questions, please reply here. Thanks.

More information:

45.5 seconds is for the route that koffing, ewaller, and I use with 75 loading zones (not 73- I forgot about the opening cutscene). The timing difference would change slightly for a different number of loading zones, but it's not enough to require a retiming unless it would be WR (I'm assuming any future WRs would use the same route we do with 75 loading zones though).

Something else I saw was that not every loading zone had the same timing difference: -entering a level: consistently .55 seconds faster -exiting a level: consistently 1 second faster -pipes: consistently .45 seconds faster -doors: inconsistent loading times. Sometimes faster, sometimes the same.

Some people on here have been talking about changing the rules/timing because of loading times, and I think it is necessary. In almost any other game, if emu/VC is faster than the original hardware, the loading times are added on, and there is no reason not to do that with this game.

My PB (23:52 on DS) is a better run than the current WR (23:37 on VC), but is slower due to the VC's much faster loading times. I've done a ton of in-depth timing analysis (including overworld RNG and the direction Mario faces on the flagpoles) using four different video sources, and I've found that VC is consistently ~48 seconds faster than DS.

I have extensive proof if anyone wants it, and I encourage anyone who doesn't believe me to do timing analysis on their own to confirm what I'm saying. Even if you think the difference is less than 48 seconds (I've seen other people say 35 seconds), compare my PB to the WR and you'll see that it is a better run.

I'll upload my run here after the timing/rules are changed.

Thanks, MyLittleWalrus