Alright, so this suggestion has been going around the discord already, but I'm posting it here as well for others that might not be in there.

My suggestion was that we got rid of the intro chapter: "Records of Time - The End". I don't mean that we should bring the old timer offset back, either. The suggestion is that it's cut from the run completely, and that the timing for the run begins on pressing start on the prologue. However, should it go like this, then there are a few parameters that the file that's run should follow, and must be shown in the video of said run. (These are the ones I came up with)

1. The In game time of the file must not exceed 4 minutes
2. The halo count on the file must be 0
3. The file must have the image/ title of the intro chapter (Records of Time - The End) on it.
4. The prologue's chapter card has to appear into existence.

Now, there's been valid reasoning both for removing and keeping the intro chapter, of which I will name a few.

In favor of keeping:

1. While the intro chapter can sometimes be tedious, mostly if you are a heavy resetter. The intro chapter is still part of the game and should be in its full run
2. There are other games that do not get the luxury of just cutting off part of their run just bacause the intro might be tedious for those runs.

In favor of removing:

1. While you are indeed in control during the chapter, the fact that it will always play out the same means this is a glorified cutscene, that will also lose you time depending on which version you run. (however, this counts for the entire run)
2. It basically means it takes nearly 4 minutes to actually start up a run, and while you can save maybe a few seconds, leaving such a timesave on the bulk of a "cutscene" in a 2 hour run, feels a bit mundane.

The gist of this post, though, is to gauge how others feel about this new rule. If you are for or against it, please also respond with the reason why.

(As an added note, after a bit of time to think about this. Even though I was the one to propose this, I've become neutral to this rule, myself.)

In favor of removing. Reset-heavy categories like Rosa Infinite Climax become tedious with the 4 minute intro every reset. And tedious categories often become dead categories.

Regarding this:

4. The prologue's chapter card has to appear into existence.

What do you mean?

When on a new game, not all the cards are there yet. It appearing into existence means, that it has to appear in that flash of light that plays before you can select the chapter card

Some of you may know but I am neutral on this proposed change and can see changing it or leaving the rules the way they are.

I understand quite well the pain of restarting a run and having to do the intro level again, usually before I had a good run going I would have to restart 3-5 times within the first two chapters of the game and I am pretty sure that I could play the into blindfolded and not get hit. Dropping the level would save time and tedium and restarts would be much faster by loading a save file that met the requirements AceKrana has proposed.

On the other hand it is part of the game and is playable, it is also not a set time and can be manipulated; the ending time for the level on the Switch can vary up to 5 seconds and on the Wii U (which I don't think anyone plays anymore) can vary up to 20.

The other point of contention is that there are other games being speedrun that have unskippable intros that the runners are forced to see every single reset. A good friend of mine was running Super Mario Sunshine and when she reset the run she was looking at 6 minutes of doing nothing and would go grab a snack. The other night I streamed Mischief Makers and in the back of my head I was thinking "This may be interesting to run someday" and then I got hit with the unskippable intro part. I love the game but I don't think I will be doing that :)

What is everyone else's thoughts on the subject?