Just like it says, I think people would be more motivated to go for world records if it said how many you had on your profile. Maybe on the info tab or maybe someplace else, it's up to you but I really think you should add it.
Think it just fuels the misconception that speedrunning is fully obsessed with WRs and not self-improvement and community efforts to bring the time of a game down. People can enjoy the grind and WRs can be impressive showcases of a community's work on a game but I think new runners or casual viewers get the wrong idea that there's no reason to even try or watch if getting the best time ever in a game/category isn't on the table right now.
I run a lot of obscure games but I'm much more proud of a third place time in a game like Lovely Planet where I've personally helped route and put a ton of effort into it as opposed 90% of those "WRs" where it was a lot lower effort. Pushing each other to improve and coming up with a good showcase of all the game has to offer is more important, whether that ends up being in the context of getting the best time or not.
If you want to know how many WRs someone has, you can do cmd+f and type in 1st.
I don't really think I can say much that other people haven't already said, but I run a lot of obscure games, and have like 50 wrs on my profile, many of which are barely even contested. Someone could look at my profile and say something like "wow this guy has so many world records" and then look at someone else who runs really popular games at a mid level and say "that guy sucks at speedrunning", when nothing could be further from the truth. It could give casual viewers the wrong idea and gives no information about the runner themselves. It would only give toxic people reason to brag and fuel unhealthy competition.
Just like @Merl_ said, I also run a lot of smaller games that have no contest. Just looking at my 1st trophies doesn't give any information about the runs themselves - did I put effort into my runs? Are my runs optimal based on the route I chose? Are there any better routes?
Usually I like to run my games (short 2d platformers) to the point I get almost near the best time that is shown on my Livesplit. But there is a limit to what just one runner can do. Alternatively, I could also do the worst run possible in the game and it will still be a "world record".
Uhm hello everyone? I think I would actually be cool if I had the number "1" behind "WR" on my profile instead of "0". Now I'm just some speedrunning loser wtf but .. imagine if I just had that magic "WR: 1" on my profile.. wow.. hot damn..
"I think people would be more motivated to go for world records if it said how many you had on your profile" That "motivation" could get out of hand, a user could create stupid categories in games they moderate just for the soul purpose of getting a "World Record" for them self, which is not a good thing for sr.c overall
Imagine if you moderated a small platformer and you created a category called "Die" for the only purpose of getting a increase in numbers on your info page.
This sounds like a good idea but when put into practice it would go to chaos.
[quote]If you want to know how many WRs someone has, you can do cmd+f and type in 1st.[/quote] That'll also grab 21st, 31st, etc. as well as a few games & categories that contain "1st" in the title. It'll do in a pinch, but doesn't make for easy comparisons across numerous profiles. Side note: since the OP was probably curious, I believe the player with the most WRs in full game runs is @plank with 285 1st places (including misc. categories).
I think the primary objections to this are somewhat overstated—plenty of games already have a bunch of random categories, and I doubt that many of the communities/moderators that refrain from doing that would suddenly change their minds if this were implemented. Moreover, it wouldn't simply encourage people to throw up notably suboptimal runs in empty categories, it would also encourage people to seek out and beat notably suboptimal runs in nearly empty categories. There's a certain limiting factor there over the long run, especially since it'd be easy to identify a player who just spams runs in empty categories. (e.g. Imagine someone creating 300 categories across various unpopular games to take over the total WRs from plank, then plank beats their times in ~90% of those categories. Your category spam might only make him stronger!)
On the other hand, I do think this would increase the risk of misbehavior by moderators (in the sense of rejecting valid runs that beat their time, putting up arbitrary rules to discourage other people from running, etc.), particularly for small games with a single mod. That, to me, is reason enough not to support this, as widespread moderator issues would be a risk to sr.c itself.
The real gripe I'd have with a WR counter is that when you implement such a thing, you are indirectly implying that any and all WR are equal, which is a statement I personally don't agree with. A WR in game is almost always not comparable/equal to a WR in another game, given the vast amount of game genres and styles, and that's without including the different categories each game has. For example:
- Getting a WR in a game with a lot of activity like say SM64 isn't the same as getting a WR in a game with almost no runners at all.
- Getting a WR in a 3 hour game with a lot of complex skips/techniques isn't the same as getting a WR in a 5 minute game where you just mash one button to progress.
- Getting a WR in the main category of a game isn't the same as getting a WR in a niche miscellanous category.
- Getting a WR in a FPS game isn't the same as getting a WR in a platformer.
- Hell, even getting a WR on a console isn't even the same as getting a WR on PC or another console even for the same game in some cases (e.g. due to extra skips being found on a certain version of the game).
So when you get down to it, what would this WR counter even represent? If you ask me, it would end up being a pointless metric that'd be indicative of neither skill, commitment to a game or anything remotely useful about the runner. So why bother?
PS: And mind you, I'm not trying to bash short games or games with no leaderboard competition, but I believe you should run those games for the fondness you might have for them rather than to add +1 to a counter.
World Records are not meaningless, arbitrary things.. What a silly thing to say.
Getting a World Record is a big achievement for a ton of people. The problem is that it's often being used a tool to measure success which ruins the achievement on it's own. Cool achievements, like speedrun World Records are not suddenly more important when you have more of them. They are only important because they are the fastest time ever achieved in a game.
Cue that "Fastest time on the site but not in reality because of runs on dark corners of the internet" copypasta
Well, without even much thinking about it I could name you several games where the WR is not or not anymore on the site. Stop thinking that everyone submit his runs here or cares about this site lol even small and unknown games like Super Metroid any% does not have the current WR on this site.
100% against this idea. It would just result in people creating useless meme categories for free records. Quality before quantity people.
Super Metroid is small and unknown. Right. And yes, I'm fully aware that there are people who aren't submitting their runs to the site anymore for various reasons.
Alright, I've read a little and I think I agree with you more now. Not all world records are equal and it is about self improvement. HYPERS Thank you, much love ❤️
[quote=Lieutenant_Boo]Cue that "Fastest time on the site but not in reality because of runs on dark corners of the internet" copypasta[/quote]
Can you PLEASE not use the term "world record'? It's very misleading and assumes that the video posted is the fastest time, where in fact someone else could have a faster, unrecorded version. Could you please use the term BKTWVEAAAVBMOFSRC (best known time with video evidence as approved and verified by members of the speed running community) in the future. This would help lower confusion in these types of videos in regard to the ever updating and evolving nature of the speedrunning community.