Going forward, rog_pf will be permabanned from submitting runs to the Double Dragon leaderboards unless they accept to be proofcalled based on our standards.
I have been informed by several moderators of other arcade runs they plays that their runs were very suspicious. First of, their twitch account is fairly new, and then they claimed several world records in several well-known arcade games. Which would raise eyebrows, but by itself would be plausible, while still being improbable. Second, it appears that their YouTube channel is just as old as their twitch channel, with several runs being uploaded in a short amount of time. Typically, when something like this happens, we are dealing with a cheater.
Notwithstanding the above, several mods reported that Rog's runs are TAS-level perfect, which I tend to agree with. In their DD run, they seems to be able to consistently pull the punch-uppercut strat on Abobos, which requires amazing timing, and which is bound to fail quite a few times in a run. However, all of their twitch streams consist of him leaving attract mode on for a while, talk, then "run" the game perfectly and end the stream there. Which is definitely NOT how speedrunners play. Normally, you'd see quite a few failed runs, and more importantly, you wouldn't see the stream end 18 minutes in because the runner would get a WR. The fact that this patterns occurs exactly as described on all the games they ran not only indicates a pattern, but a modus operandi.
I am highly suspicious of these runs being rough TASes being played back. Done with just enough "skill" to beat current WRs while not looking all TAS-like. However, given how ridiculously lucky and/or precise one has to be for the Abobo punch setups, I am convinced that their runs are TASes being played back.
Furthermore, if I can be blunt, the reactions seen on the videos and their acting skills are... subpar at best? Plus, the presses and controller movements don't match what we see. Nor do the button press sounds.
Finally, when I asked him for further info, he would not respond. I bet they will now that this decision is enacted, but the terms will remain the same, and will not be negotiable.
As such, after discussing with the other mods, rog_pf is banned from submitting runs until they are WILLING and CAPABLE of demonstrating they possess the skill level required to match the performance they submit on a livestream to which one of our moderators WILL assist. This proofcall WILL include Rog having to perform arbitrary actions during his proofcall runs in order to demonstrate that this is not a TAS being played back. And the execution will have to be on par with what his runs show. Should he choose to accept this proofcall, we will of course grant him a reasonable number of runs as we all know that several circumstances could make it so that we don't get it right the first time. While we will be understanding on that front, we will also be strict on anything we find suspicious.
We will give rog_pf 7 days to decide whether or not they want to go through with this. Should they not respond or refuse to go through with this, the ban will remain, and no further chance for appeal will be granted.
In summary, unless rog_pf agrees to prove his skill level in accordance to our standards, he will remain permabanned from submitting to the Double Dragon leaderboards. Given his other run-ins with other arcade game moderators, we are confident that his submissions cannot be trusted, and that said submissions are a detriment to the integrity of this game's leaderboard.
