I got in an argument about the quality of a speedrunner. I have the opinion that a good speedrunner has very little to do with the difficulty of the game. To be good in an easy game like 'Super Mario Bros.' is as hard to accomplish than becoming good in hard games like 'Cuphead'. The biggest factor imo for the quality of a speedrunner is the amount of players in the game. Or in short, more players equals harder speedrun.

His opinion was that if you are good in a hard game, you have more accomplished than being good in an easy game. Or in short, hard game equals hard speedrun independent of other factors.

What do you think?

Well, you should maybe start with a definition of what you think exactly is "the quality of a speedrunner". Are you trying to come up with criteria for comparing two speedrunners, and say which one of them is the "better speedrunner"? And are you talking about speedrunners in general, or speedrunners in a specific game?

Let's start by a simple question - are you comparing speedrunners running the same game, or are they running completely different games (like super mario bros and cuphead in your example).

In the case of 2 runners running different games - if you don't provide any exact definition, I see no way to compare, and no way to even approach this. The length, difficulty, and types of the game have major roles in their respective speedruns. For example, one player could be excellent at FPS shooters, but suck on 2D platformers, and vice versa.

In the case of 2 speedrunners running the same game - the obvious metric would be the time of their runs. The runner with the better time will must be the "better speedrunner", right? But what if they run different categories? one player can have first place in Any%, while another have first place in 100%. Who is better? Different categories can differ in length and difficulty too.

About your claim that the biggest factor for a quality of speedrunner is the amount of runners in the game - I disagree. It is one aspect, but also depends on other factors. Having first place from 100 players sounds better than having first place from 5 players, sure, but you are probably assuming that having more runners equals to a harder competition on the TOP runners. This depends on how many runners are actually trying to reach top place. And why difficulty doesn't matter to you? one category might take 2 minutes to complete but is super popular, so the difficulty is getting top place, not finishing the run. Another category/game can be so hard that only one runner did it, because no other player wants to. Both cases can be impressive to watch, but for different reasons.

I do agree with you that a speedrun MIGHT have little to do with the difficulty of the GAME itself. One hypothetical game might be very short/easy casually, but a competitive speedrun of it might be very difficult to pull off because you need some precise tricks and timing, and another hypothetical game might be hard to complete casually, but the speedrunners found tricks to skip all the hard parts and thus the run is easy to do.

Difficulty is subjective.

That said, I do want to point out some key things when considering how "difficult" a speedgame is: • An easy casual experience does not mean an easy speedrun (and the reverse as well, a hard casual experience does not mean a hard speedrun). And even when both are easy or both are hard, it's often not for the same reasons. With this in mind, looking at something like Super Mario Bros as an "easy" game is a bit flawed (granted I don't know how difficult SMB speedruns are).

• There is a very important difference between "difficult to learn", "difficult to get a good/respectable time", and "difficult to get WR". Make sure you're on the same page about which of these you're talking about, because this completely changes the conversation and the relevant factors.

It's just video games, play them for fun.

What kinda speedrunning contest are you entering? Trying to pass the speedrunning exam? >:D

Sometimes boards don't tell the whole story. Take Kamilia 3. Completing the game within, let's say, one year, means you are extremely good at platformers. Completing it in one sitting is insane. So last place on Kamilia 3 Any% is still very good at what they're doing.

What the hell is "a speedrunner's quality" ?

It's how many WRs you have. Aight someone give me mod on a leaderboard so I can make 500 categories. I got some gold to farm.