After some scattered conversations here and there with different members of the community over several months I'd like to propose some changes to the leaderboard and possibly the timing method to help keep the competition fair to everyone.

First the rankings. As of right now every platforms are grouped together on a single board despite some significant differences in speed between platforms. Anyone wishing to compete for WR has to play on PSP/Vita/PSTV with PS2 in the middle and emulators trailing far behind.

I would like to propose a move to subcategories similar to what the Paper Mario leaderboard does. https://www.speedrun.com/pmario

Every platforms have their own separate rankings and all runs are regrouped together under the "All" category which is the default ranking shown.

This makes it easier to compare runs per platforms more directly, keep things fair for everyone and at the same time keeps the current leaderboard with all runs intact. I believe that given that almost every platforms are currently represented in the top times posted and as the community continues to grow now is the right moment to make these changes.

If we move in this direction I think we should consider removing the in game time from the leaderboard altogether.

Adding it was my idea as a way to compare runs on different hardware but it causes several issues. The biggest one is obviously in regards to safety saves and reloads which throws the validity of the in game timer out the window.

There's also the issue of inconsistencies with the in game timer itself which varies from run to run by a few seconds. The best example of that I can give was Professor Palmer getting 2 consecutive WRs, 3:00:05 followed by 2:59:59. Both runs had the same IGT of 2:22:07. Same runner, same console, same route, same IGT, different RTA.

If the boards are split with subcategories IGT comparisons become redundant.

Final point I'd like to bring up is where to actually end the timer. This only applies if we do remove the in game timer. If we do then I see little reasons to wait until after the credits and final save to split.

I think the best moment to end the run is upon escaping the cruiser. Once you exit the last corridor and the cutscene starts there is no more gameplay to speak of. There are a few scenes with text to mash but all of it is limited by animations that needs to play and doesn't require the runner to mash quickly in order to not lose time.

So here are the suggestions. Let's get the conversation going.

i also wanna point out that if we do make the change of the split time that save about 15 mins of nonsense, that being said i'm all for it, i think it's a good change

I am 100% on board with all of these changes.

Thoughts (literally a copy paste from Discord)

1. You aren't "saving time" splitting at the earlier point if you have to watch the ending as well. You are still sitting and mashing text to at least the credits.

2. The credits are reasonably easy to anticipate length and return with time to spare.

3. I have always run on an empty/1 safety save memory card. You should never lose appreciable time on the final save menu.

4. I get the feeling most runners are still probably going to track their final save split. Is there a point to this change then really? I suppose some were already tracking the boat escape.

5. It feels extremely silly to split a 12 run leaderboard to me, but if we maintain an overall board and it is considered a provision for the future, then I guess it is ok. I just really dislike creating leaderboards so that people can place higher on the list because the dominant players don't play on the suboptimal platform.

6. If we were to change the timing to reflect the last point of danger in the run, then escaping the battleship seems correct.

7. If we make this change to the boards, what would be suggested for NG+ Good Ending?

Summary: Although I think these changes are premature, I think the changes seem reasonable enough to the end game timing. We would need to consider our stance on Good Ending. I think play to the credits cutscene would be the next valid option for timing. Removal of IGT is a lateral change for me; it can always be put in the submission comment anyway.

Paper Mario just does the exact same thing the "filter" drop down menu does. It just makes it easier to click, really. You'll only have your fastest run on the main board and other runs won't appear until you click the console of choice.

If we're just doing what they're doing and making it easier to see them all, don't see a problem with it.

I'm not too concerned with last split time. I like the aesthetic that the game believes it's over at the point it does. Sucks that you wait a while to get there but at least it feels 'official'

When I submit to marathons, I usually will split post credits if run is timed fine or at the boat escape if I'm afraid of making estimate. So either way works well for me.

plus i also wanna point out it makes it feel more competitive between consoles that way. Like for example i'm running on ps2 but knowing PSN is way more competitive and if i ever want to go for WR or something i have to make the switch. But if we had it where we had consoles separate i know i won't have the WR from all but i can get the WR from PS2 cause it's what i run etc.

So if a person who has WR wants to compete/give more validity to their WR and skills as a runner, they would have to grind out runs on PS2, PSP, PSTV, and PSX. Can my time be the top time for PS2 77k Silver Colored systems since their is differences between that version and other PS2s?

Or I guess we can just give out gold stars to leaderboards with 2 runs on each.

We have had similar talks in the Symphony of the Night community regarding splitting versions. My question has always been "Who benefits from this?". The usual response is so people can compete against each other, but that is kinda bullshit if there are only 2-3 people running a version. The real question becomes "Are there runs on sub-optimal consoles that are strong enough to merit their acknowledgement on the leaderboard seperately?". So far, only 1 run has fit that criteria in SotN, and the runner agreed it was silly to split the boards at this time. I won't speak for Parasite Eve in this regard. The only other reason would be if there is a sizeable difference in the actual gameplay/routing. To my knowledge, the only thing that varies in the gameplay itself is analog access to save ~15 secs total.

The only way I support this would be to ease set up for the future, but let's be entirely realistic. Parasite Eve is NOT a Mario game. The probability that there will be even 100 runners is almost non-existent. I really don't even see the sorting mechanism as a great excuse since the community is still extremely small. Good runners will know what a good run is, so I don't see what being at the top of a limited list does for people other than stroke their ego.

I suppose there's no hurry for the rankings themselves. In the meantime we could simply remove the in game time and single segment checkbox.

I think the idea was good but in practice it doesn't work and clutters the board. Seems like everyone was ok with this change too from the discussion on discord.

I am more interested with what we want to decide about end of game timing. If we want to change that, it seems fine. I can say personally i will still be tracking IGT in comments and probably will have additional splits for the old timing methods.

If most people continue to track the final save split, and it seems to be the case, I think no change is needed.

I like the idea of changing RTA end to Carrier exit, but do not feel that it is necessary. Splitting up the boards seems excessive when filters already exist. If people want to complain about hardware differences, they probably should take a step back and realize this is true with most Playstation games. OR, just run the game and have fun with it. I don't think you can have it both ways with being competitive (I want to be competitive BUT I don't want to get the hardware required to actually be faster). At least IGT to a certain extent allows a level of comparison between runs.

Changing the end time doesn't seem altogether important, and I don't think this will convince people to run the game that were on the fence. It's a three hour run with A LOT of down time. The whole thing is overblown.

As an aside, this is why I advocate for an emulator mod category that anyone could run. This misc. category would have 2x Aya run speed, skippable cutscenes, and no dialog mashing. I don't have the technical knowhow to manipulate an .iso, but it'd be cool!

Please put psp pstv and psemu in a separate category from Ps1 Ps2 and Ps3

Doesn't seem right grouping consoles together with ones that have an unfair advantage

Unfortunately it's not that black and white.

PSP/TV saves, in a perfect vacuum, maybe 1:30-2 minutes in loads. The difference of PS2 90k vs the low end 30k is more than that. Where do you draw the line? You want every version of the PS2 to have it's own category?

The runners using PS2/PS3/etc runs aren't at a point where the only difference between them and the better consoles are the leaderboards is strictly PSP timesave.

Of course, then the discussion, that if you care enough about being competitive do you really want a PS2 category so that you can be second place in a category that's slower than the best way to play the game? WR on a PS3 would still be like the 10th fastest person to run Parasite Eve.

It is, as I said, unfortunately not that simple and the game isn't big enough/run enough on multiple consoles to really benefit much from a split.

Worthwhile noting as well, Palmer has the fastest PS2 time (2:44:34), which can be competed against with the filter tools https://www.speedrun.com/pe/run/z0elen4m

In general, I don't think platforms should be separated unless there is some significant difference in terms of gameplay that merits it. The only gameplay gap I can think of is the ease of switching to analog on PS1/PS2, but all that really improves is movement in certain rooms.

Fairness in speedrunning is developed through the ruleset, but if a certain platform the game is released on is faster than another (especially in RTA context), what are the merits of ignoring that? By and large, PS speedruns follow that formula (refer to the first paragraph of my previous post in this thread).

If you want to be recognized for your relative skill compared to others, those who run the game know how well you played based off your time on slower hardware. Placement isn't everything.

I'd love to split the leaderboards if we had enough runners in all the categories to not starve the categories of names. We just don't have the structure currently, unfortunately. I would love to run the game on the other platforms.

Hey , iam speedrunning this game but that hardware what i have is only a jap ps2 or emu on what i can play this game and how i already saw/read is that isnt competeble with emu or ps2 to psp/pstv or with emu to ps2 ... So my point is that the plattform i can use to play are to slow and so i dont will put a run on the board because of that until boards are seperated in a fair way. i guess a lot of more people would try to archive a wr or a good placement when they know they have a chance to compete and emu is for everybody on the world available. i mean that point that u havent enough runner shouldnt be the reason to make fair boards! there is a lot of games with only a couple of runners in the games way less than in PE1 and they seperate boards also because its fair ! So what do u think ?

Submit emu runs. There's nothing wrong with that and they're 100% accepted. As you mentioned, we're very open to emulators as they're generally more accessible.

Dont get me wrong . i dont want to compete against less people . if this would be the case i wouldnt grind the classic RE games with the most compatetive categorys in the hole RE franchise. i compete against people they grinded 5 years+ one single category. Come on ... i want only that my time should be compared against people with the same requirements! Thats it! its sad that this game hasnt more runner. its a realy nice game and derseve more love! but it is how it is ! And another Point is i dont waste my time with a grind of a slower version when i am know that it will compared against faster versions. Sorry thats Pointless. And also sad is that u guys will never find out what is possible in terms of times on other plattforms because nobody is grinding them out because its pointless when it getting compared against faster plattforms. And to that Point of competing against less people . i just checked your src profile and wonder in all other games exept PE, u are on boards with 5-10 people max and even in that games are seperated boards. So what makes the other games what u run so different to seperate boards there and here not. But allright i take it . so i will put the game beside until i decide to buy a psp/pstv in the future.