@sasquatchbill Hi, I briefly ran this game back in 2016, I have a 22:34 using the timing method @Niss3 described.

I'm not active on here because I don't speedrun as much these days, and the site is a pain in the ass - as evident by witnessing an exchange such as this one, where some 'game series moderator' is able to dictate rules for a game they don't even run.

There are varying levels of community across speedgames. There tends to be a tight-knit group at the lowest level - a single category for a game, where the community competes and collaborates on that one category. On the next level up, the community spans all categories for a single game - for example, Mega Man X1 runners for both any% and 100% all get along because they love the same game. The next level up would be the entire Mega Man X series, where everyone shares some comradery. At this level the standards between games starts to vary quite a bit more, and perhaps there's even a tier in between that separates the SNES game community from the PS1 game community. The next level up would be the entire Mega Man franchise of speedgames, classic, X, battle network, and so forth. The community is much more sparse at this level, with little crossover between runners of the different series of Mega Man games, but still a loose mutual appreciation and respect. You don't, however, see runners exclusive to the X games impose their rules onto runners of the classic games. Similar situation here. In this case, NES Rod Land is different and distinct enough as a speedgame from the others ports to allow runners of the game itself to determine the rules. The Super Mario Bros leaderboard, one of the largest leaderboards on this site, has rules absolutely specific to Super Mario Bros. If you want a comparison of "ports" like Rod Land, the Super Mario All-Stars versions of the Mario games have separate leaderboards and distinct rulesets as well - and those ports are more similar to each other than NES Rod Land is compared to ITS ports!

I wasn't too upset about this because I don't really care that much these days, but reading your childish and defensive reply here brought me back. Niss3 is a very experienced speedrunner and basically the definitive NES Rod Land runner at this point in time, so it makes sense to listen to his opinion about this game. Stop with the power trip. In fact, step down from your position as moderator, this is just embarrassing, you don't even run the game, or hardly anything for that matter. At the very least, change the rules to actually make sense, or people are going to have to reset before the run even starts because they didn't get the right title screen framerule or whatever this dumb timing delay is.

Thanks for the clarification, y'all. It's the first time I had a run disappear so felt I had to reach out. Keep up the good work!

Hi, my old NG+ run from 2014 was removed due to the broken video link. It seems like every other year Twitch updates the link format for highlights, occasionally breaking the previous link. I've since submitted it again. I just want a simple archive of the speedgames that I've worked on, I don't care about rank or world records or what not. So, it's a little disappointing to see this run disappear without some reasonable notification mechanism. It took me 30s to fix the link - although I'd prefer if speedrun.com could have auto-converted it, or Twitch not break it in the first place.

I'd just like y'all's comment on the enforcement of this action, and perhaps also comment on the acceptability of my legacy run in the light of all these other options, like skipping map encounters via cheat code, and huge influx of new categories/DLC. Is it going to be bumped over to yet another side-leaderboard?

Thanks for your time.

I recommend this thread for some recent discussion on it: http://www.speedrun.com/mega_man/thread/dtpsq

Unfortunately 1) doesn't seem to be an option. While the DKC1/2/3 boards have this feature, it is an exception, as the site admins don't allow it in general. Also, the admins disagree with this principle and have a different vision for the site more in line with 3).

An issue I see with 2) and 3) is that it isn't quite clear where runs should be submitted to if you want to be a part of a competitive ranking. If you just want a central place for PBs, there's no issue. But this raises confusion between using speedrun.com as a PB Tracker and using its leaderboards for accurate times and rankings - the site isn't really compatible with having both at once.

I'm available the whole time.

Well, I'm personally against turbo in all speedruns as I consider it tool assistance. Also, this manner of turbo is pretty much exclusive to emulators - Not only is it hard to find decent controllers with 30Hz turbo, but I've never heard of a turbo controller that assigns to d-pad directions. Along with all of the ridiculous advantages people get from playing on an emulator, it's pretty disheartening to me and separates my point of view even more. Playing the game in this manner, along with the use of savestates for pre-run manipulation, the potential to cheat undetected, and glitching the game into oblivion, the gameplay experience for the runner doesn't even remotely represent sitting down to play FF3 on a Famicom.

All that said, the conclusion is, as usual: If people want to do it, then go for it. Turbo and emulators are already used, so there's no stopping this, really.

Gaël: I wasn't familiar with that regarding any% J. I agree to keep it a separate category.

Also, I've thought about something with respect to turbo, but I'm not sure if anyone has tried it. If you could assign turbo to a d-pad direction, you should be able to reliably buffer through a text box immediately into movement as early as possible, or maybe up to a 1-frame variability. You could, for example, reliably manipulate an Eyedrop from skeletons in the Mythril Mine this way, or drops from enemies in other non-World Map areas. Any thoughts about this?

My thoughts:

1. With/without prior manipulation: I don't run any% so ignore this. But I personally don't agree with any sort of "prior manipulation" in any speedrun, and will never do it in runs myself. If it's a game where you time pressing the start button to begin on a certain seed (i.e. TMNT NES, FF4, etc.), then I don't mind as much. But racking up a bunch of steps, soft resetting the game, and then making a savestate is extremely dumb and gives emulator runs a massive advantage and isn't fun or interesting to me. But like I said, ignore this. Most people somehow actually seem to enjoy any% and do it this way.

2. If you're going to copypaste Japanese categories, at least be thorough about it. Rename "any% Glitchless" to "any% glitchless with EC skip" like the Japanese do, and add the "any% glitchless no EC skip category". Or remove this entirely until somebody actually submits a run of it or a variant of the category here.

3. "No Job Glitch". I prefer the category name to be "No Glitched Jobs", since people kept misunderstanding it to be a category where you used a glitch to obtain "no job". I actually started calling it "No Glitched Jobs" for my last few runs and before anyone else picked up the category, but I think the old name caught on instead because people saw the title of my GDQ bonus stream run. Just a minor gripe I have. Also, allow the translation patch in this category and don't segregate it.

4. "No Credits Warp". I'm down for this being a Misc category, along with "No Glitched Jobs". I basically invented both of these categories because the TAS came out while I was in the middle of routing, and I didn't want to do some 7 minute cop out of a game that has a lot of good content elsewhere. I didn't think these would catch on with anybody. I don't mind if both of these cats are moved to a "misc" section, but I think they should both stay up in some form or another at the very least. I also might work on this again some day to find a setup that could be used on console.

5. any% "rulesets": Again, I'm not even close to an authority on any%, but I do think it's silly to have a "Japanese ruleset" category without any Japanese runners on the board. Where did this thing even come from and why is it called Japanese? If the only difference is to use turbo, then just call it "any% with Turbo". If the other only difference is to stop the timer after the credits, then, well that's silly. Just convert the times so there can be a similar start/stop time across all categories. This one is a really strange addition to the leaderboard.

6. I agree with simplifying the last category to "DS any%". Since there's a DS-exclusive strategy and the only times on the board are DS, it makes sense. If someone does a remotely serious run on a different platform, then a new category can be added at that point.

So there it is. Sorry for being controversial.

For No Glitched Jobs: "English translation runs will be removed when someone complete a run on the japanese version, there is a misc. category for english patch"

Don't do this.

I'd like to cover some of the different timings people may use when playing these two games.

Ninja Gaiden 1

Traditionally, English speaking runners have used "SDA timing" for Ninja Gaiden, where the timer begins as soon as you gain control of Ryu, and it ends when you lose control after defeating the final boss (which is the same time as the "ding" sound, when your time and Ninpo count hits 0). I believe Japanese runners have traditionally timed it from pressing Start on the title screen. Note that you have to press start again a few frames later to skip the "Act 1" intro animation as well.

Assuming you have perfect timing in pressing Start on the Act 1 intro animation (3 frames after pressing start on the title screen), then the timing difference between Press Start and Gain Control of Ryu is: 162 frames, or 2.7 seconds.

Ninja Gaiden 2: The Dark Sword of Chaos

Again, English speaking runners have traditionally used SDA timing. Note that you can hold the Start button from the title screen to instantly skip the Act 1 intro animation, too. Japanese runners have traditionally started the timer from the title screen, I believe. The timing difference between Press Start and Gain Control of Ryu is: 106 frames, or 1.77 seconds.

The main discrepancy I've seen is that people use different timing for when to stop the timer. After the timer/Ninpo countdown and "ding" sound at the end, you still have control of Ryu for a brief time period. I'm not sure what the SDA runs have traditionally done, but when Sinister1 and I started playing, we used the "ding" sound - I believe Ohon does the same thing. But, some recent runners have been ending the timer on losing control of Ryu (on this frame, the graphics begin to fade to black as well). The timing difference between timer/Ninpo reaching 0 ("ding" sound) and losing control of Ryu is: 50 frames, or 0.83 seconds.

Also, under certain conditions (and correct me if I'm wrong), I believe you can lose control of Ryu even faster - although, I think it only happens when you beat the boss with a low timer, so on almost every good speedrun I've seen, it looks about the same. Still, it's worth mentioning.

I'd like consistent times posted here, especially since the top times are extremely close. Is there a community consensus on what to use? I'd personally prefer SDA timing for timer start, and "ding" sound in both games for timer end. Thoughts?

http://ninjagaidenrta.wikia.com/

I created a wiki way back in the day with lots of information on NG1 and 2 (never got around to 3), as well as some leaderboards. I'd like to move them over here.

http://ninjagaidenrta.wikia.com/wiki/NG1_Leaderboard http://ninjagaidenrta.wikia.com/wiki/NG2_Leaderboard

Commenting on S's third point there, is the purpose for the games list necessarily to provide a leaderboard if there is a "demand" for one? I'd personally like to just unload all of my best RTA times on here whether or not there is already a leaderboard or a demand for one.

Stepping back a bit, what exactly is the purpose of the site? Is there a mission statement somewhere?