Florida, USABizHawk will say "Power Button Pressed" on a hard reset. It says "Reset Button Pressed" on a soft.
Based on the current runs, it should be held to the same restriction as Any% Pre-Creation. I'm sure it'll be re-written before to long. The speedruns are evolving fast these days. :)
HighScore% has been created! Score as much as possible in a single game! Submissions will have Milliseconds enabled. Input your score in BOTH the MS category under time and in the Points category. The category will sort by "highest time". If you score 90, your time should look like this. 0:00.090
Good Luck everyone! Looking forward to seeing what you all come up with for this new challenge!
I've had the time this morning to do a deep dive on this topic. These are my current thoughts.
All 4 current categories are effectively "Drain The Clock", and they do cover a really fun variety of ideas. But it wouldn't hurt for the game to have some alternative playstyle goals to attract other runners. As such, I am personally inclined to create both the Big 20's "Score 25 Points" and "10 Scoring Plays" because they both race real time with no consideration to the in game clock (as far as I'm aware).
Rest assured that the current 4 categories will NOT be touched in any way. I am very protective of runners achievements and I will not tear down categories people have put hard work in to unless the entire community is in support of it.
This is where I would like the discussion to restart, if possible. I am fully aware of the dangers of "overloading" a game with categories no one cares to run, which is why I don't want to make this choice without the input of the community at large.
I've given this a good deal of thought. I've come up with one potential answer.
10 Scores (or 10 Scoring Plays)
Touchdown counts as 1. Extra Point counts as 1. Field Goal counts as 1. Safety counts as 1.
Clock stops when you score ten times.
This would make it different enough to justify its own category. It would also require strategies different to what many of us have done in the other categories, namely shooting for safeties and power defense as a method to score. There could even be restrictions on the editing of playbooks, ect. that could prevent the category from becoming entirely "single strat or bust".
Most phone based emulators are banned by almost every NES game on the board. They are typically very inaccurate emulators by Speedrun standards.
These are the posted Emulator Rules for Galaga. After review, The Moderator in me would say, "Avoid the cell phone and try to get a PC recording if possible." But I am not a Moderator for this game, so my judgement means little against what the mods here feel. :O
Include Emulator and version used in submission notes.
- Mesen, Bizhawk/NEShawk, puNES, Nestopia and FCEUX are the most acceptable emulators, listed in order of accuracy, most other emulators are not accepted. Retroarch should not be used.
- It is preferred that the entire emulator window is captured, to help prove the emulator being used.
- Recommended to use input display, frame counter and have “No Movie” showing to help prove legitimacy.
- RAM and memory watch features are not allowed, as they provide an unfair advantage that is not possible on console.
- Remapping buttons during a run is not allowed.
- Mapping multiple buttons to one key is not allowed.
- Rewind features not allowed.
- Submitting a movie file or a recording of a movie file playing not allowed.
I finally dug out my old computers files. I actually went really deep on the Monsters/Powers back and forth on this one, because I do agree that the Monsters are the actual "better" overall team.
However, The Gauntlet was intended to be done with a "maxed" team, more or less. Against a maxed out team, all of the things that each team does well are pretty much negated entirely, just outright, by your better team. Except for one thing. The Powers can still randomly smash homers, no matter how good your team is.
In the end, we went with the Powers over the Monsters for this reason.
I apologize that it took me so long to dig this up fully. :O
I did indeed read this backwards. Oh boy. Anyway, yes, I agree that the Monsters are a better team and in my home notes they are in my gauntlet 5. It's been awhile since I looked at this, and when I have more time, I will deep dive it.
If you have any input for the spreadsheet, let us know! :)
Spreadsheet:
I've always felt like the 100% All Keys category was built and intended to be as glitch free as possible. But only in the sense of "massive and game breaking" glitches like Healer/Glitch Town. Almost every run on the leaderboard will have some kind of despawn glitch, or having a drop just cancel enemy spawns, ect. They have never been a problem within the rules and I doubt they ever will be. Especially for speedrunners as these despawns are always 100% RNG for us.
Manipulations can't be frowned upon anymore for 100AK. We manipulate everything we can within the games intended design. Rep Stabs to set up walks. Wall stabs to literally move spawns. We already do it, so it shouldn't be an issue.
Disclaimer: I'm not a mod, nor am I fully aware of any existing rulings, but I would imagine it to be okay. You aren't "breaking" the game or going "outside of the games intended play", in my opinion.
If you let the game run to the demo before starting, it will pretty much lock all of the RNG in the game, including the Spaceship Boss.
My input may not be worth a lot here, but this is my 2 cents:
As long as you could provide a recording that showed the reset/power cycle of the submitted run, as the rules intend, the number of setups you actually run live should not matter. The integrity of the submitted run is all that should matter to the moderator. So for me, I would only judge the single submitted run. Someone shouldn't be penalized for being able to run multiple legit setups if it suits them.
Cheers!
- Schmidtty (Mod For Other Stuff Sometimes)
There are some other "bypass" AC menus that can potentially be "useful" to the No Orb Run. They're all little helpful things (Holding Temple for Immediate HP Potion/Ancient Bow, for example), but none of them that I've tried to manipulate actually end up helping. Even if you hold the Temple sprite, you still have to go there during the run for donation, so you essentially save nothing overall. I wouldn't put it past someone else to find something new, but I feel like as long as the runner is operating in good faith and doesn't try to abuse the AC bypass, they still have to go through the same steps as the rest of us for the category. If you feel like something does abuse the AC bypass, then you can kick it to the open Any% category.
I will be posting my full routes for all 3 categories in the next day or so, once I have them ironed out and they are easier to read through for everyone else.
A friend of mine who is very familiar with this game has informed me that the menu glitch isn't even possible on the PC version, or if it is, has not been found. If this is true, they are already at a tremendous disadvantage to the Genesis Debug Menu, on top of already being clearly slower regarding combat speed. So I've come up with a proposal to offer the community.
- Separate Genesis from the other versions. The PC version, even with the AC Menu glitch, simply doesn't run at the same speed and could really never compete with it.
- Preserve the current Genesis Any% runs as "Any% No Orb Glitch"
- Add a new Any% category that allows the Element Orb Bypass
I'm also currently sitting on a 15:39 No Orb Glitch Any% run that I will submit when a decision is reached. :) Better to hold it if things are going to change, and if not, at least there won't be the added confusion.
Looking forward to hearing some feedback on this! Could potentially be exciting!
When I found this, I knew it was problematic. It was a total accident just tracking which sprites put what into which slots. It even took me a couple of days to track down where the Orb had even come from in my tests, because I thought it was the Sheltem/Devil King/Apparition sprite initially. I didn't realize how common they were (3 set spawns in Corik's Cave alone), and when I figured out it came from the WAFE screen, I initially didn't know how to approach it.
When I discovered it bypassed the Initialize/Reset rules, I was actually kind of bummed. As a mod in other games, I also am not fond of seeing the rules bypassed. But this is what I know of it, as is.
The Memory/Menu glitch is not effected by anything else you do, short of forcing the game to load up sprites. I've checked every text pop-up, visual graphics change (think setting off a trap on a box), and even map directionality trying to find other ways to manipulate the same area of memory effected in the current glitch. I have found nothing other than sprites that have any effect, but that doesn't mean there is nothing.
While we can use this glitch to write in the "WAFE Screen Sprite", it could also be used for other "A Side, or the first 7 pages" write-ins that are easier to access, like the HP Potion from the Temple. If the Element Orb didn't exist in this series, honestly, the best option for this "bypass" would end up being something like the Fe Farthing (to save castle entry battles). Everything else major, Key Item wise, is oddly on the "B Side" of the LAC's. The Cats have both on Page 10-11? (B). The Wizard writes the Earth Talon in to the final page, which is changed by everything. Even the Parts, sans the Orb, are on the "B" end. With that known, I understand why even the bypass wasn't noticed, because "why would you check that anyway?" Nothing of value sticks to the last 7-8 pages because it's always overwritten by the title sprite.
I'm okay with calling this an "Element Orb Bypass". I do also understand the problem this causes, and that's why I wanted to be as open about it as possible. Without a hard power cycle, these "bypass" values will always stick.
Leave Any% and Deathless alone. Their timing start/stops will remain the same. This will be reflected by it's category rules, as they will differ from the new timing rules
---Category Expansion---
-Victory% (School) - 4 new categories requiring the player to actually win the event, sorted by school, as each school has varying potential.
-Underdog% - Win the MVP award at the end of a full event with either Zach (Washington) or Milo (Jefferson). They are equally bad. This is a challenge category.
-Short% - Using the "Short" Mode only, pick any 3 stages in any order, and win the event.
-Individual Level Categories 5 stages broken into 2 categories: Practice and Event
This creates 10 level categories that we can further double by including "Victory/Defeat" seperations if we wanted.
Player MUST be victorious in either case. Practice runs are much shorter.
The division between Practice and Event is necessary, as you can't buy items in Practice Mode.
---New Timing Rules For New Categories---
- All new categories will have timing begin upon pressing "YES" when asked "IS THIS OKAY?" before starting any competition.
-Victory%/Short% - Timing ends the first frame of confirmation of your chosen school's victory (Podium)
-Underdog% - Timing ends the first frame of confimation that Milo/Zack has won the MVP award (Event Awards Screen)
-Event Category - Timing ends on first frame showing Winning School Logo of the final race/contest
-Practice Category - Timing ends upon loss of control of your character.
This is the proposal at current, and we're looking for your feedback! We would like your thoughts and feelings on expanding this wonderful game into a much larger variety of categories! Feel free to voice your opinions on this matter here!
I'll give this a spin this weekend between the Link to the Cure Marathon runs I have. See how it feels. I've always been a fan of having a "more difficult" challenge category, especially in sports games. Having to win each game won't be to difficult for most of us who love the game. The real challenge will be in how to do it quickly with teams we otherwise never have a reason to use. Being allowed to lose games would change bad situations from something to work through into something that's "fine as long as the clock is running."
Personally, I'd prefer to keep the winning bit, but I'll abide by the choices of the community :)
EDIT: I just realized that one of the Week 1 games is N.E vs IND. I could be persuaded to be allowed to lose that one. :P
I agree with it. Otherwise it's just 14 different versions of the "Fumble Playbook", as it is. That would be a little dull, in my opinion. I'm really interested to see what people come up with to drain clock when you can't just run faster than everyone else.
I could see "Comeback%" being infuriating, as it would rely on the CPU actually doing smart things in a Preseason game for a minute before you start to pulverize them.
I've always been a fan of the Division% and the Week 1 Challenge ideas for variety, though it's worth noting that Division% will pretty much roll down to 3 specific teams and one entire division as the only ones really worth using (S.F., Hou, K.C., any NFC Central Team you can win with as their divisions lack any real competition within the known simulator "attitudes").
I may already be doing a version of Pro Bowl% with my current Points% strats. I would offer that any real "Pro Bowl%" category be restricted to original selections only, including starters and playbooks. That restriction by itself would radically separate it from any other category where using Pro Bowl teams to manip rosters comes into play.
We've come up with another Level Category we'd like to have added to the list.
Basically "Any% Russia", where we have to have a team member die before finishing the stage. Since three core categories have to do this, it seems fair for it to have it's own board. I'd also, personally, like to see what people come up with for it!
I haven't actually tried intentionally losing, but on Easy that could take some time.
I've been completing otherwise "PB dead" runs much, much more frequently as a result of this, just for chances at the later stages. It's the only way to actually "grind" them, if you will. With the new leaderboards, no run is truly dead until you miss Shadow Sam the first time.
