Virginia, USAThe Memory-Based Load Remover developed by FluffyCobra is now mandatory for PC submissions. It's been several weeks since it was rolled out and we have concluded that it is working well enough for everyone to go forward with it being the required timing method for PC runs.
Moving forward, anyone who submits a PC time using the Image Based Load Remover that's used for console runs will have their run rejected; this load remover is not as accurate as the memory based one, and the goal of the PC Load Remover is to be more accurate than what is possible on console. The difference in accuracy means that the two won't be completely comparable, hence why PC and Console leaderboards are split.
Any PC run that has already been accepted and used the console load remover will be grandfathered in, but from this point on we will not accept any more that do not use the PC Load Remover.
The download link to both load removers is located in the Resources Section of Crash 4's SRcom page. I have also posted a tutorial in the Guides section on how to setup and use both the PC Load Remover and the Autosplitter that is built into it.
Enjoy!
Just wanted to push out a little reminder for everyone submitting PC runs that having a visible FPS counter displayed is one of the rules of submission.
We've been very lenient on it because we only have a minimum FPS limit and not a maximum limit, and it's much easier to notice when someone is playing at higher FPS than when they're playing at a low FPS. It also has much less of an impact on this game compared to N. Sane Trilogy, where the FPS counter was basically necessary to make verification seamless. So we haven't felt the need to enforce this rule as strictly as we do with NST.
That being said, I do not want people to get complacent because I don't want to keep making exceptions. If we see people continuously not have a visible FPS counter for PC runs, we will start rejecting them.
If you've been having trouble finding an FPS counter that is easy to set up, I would personally recommend MSI Afterburner. FRAPS is also an easy to set up one, though it does require you stay tabbed into the game the entire time.
We've added a Time Trial Leaderboard for each individual level.
I personally want to apologize for how long it took for this to be added. When the game first released we planned on having a separate website developed that could better realize the capabilities we wanted out of a TT board. Five months in, and there has been no major progress made on this site, so for the time being it makes sense to just host the Time Trial Boards here instead.
Enjoy!
The load remover has been out for a bit now, and there have been no glaring issues we have noticed. So we have transitioned the leaderboard to now rank by Time Without Loads.
From now on, it will be required that you submit both a time without loads and a time with loads. Additionally LiveSplit with the load remover active must be visible in the video submission.
All previously submitted runs that had a loadless time visible already have been updated to have that time on the board. Any run submitted that did not have a loadless time is still there, but only with a "Time With Loads". By default, they are now ranked below all the runs with loadless times (which is due to how SRcom itself handles things).
If you would like to retime a current PB you have and add a loadless time to it, that is allowed. Just make sure you rerecord the video with a visible loadless timer. Otherwise, they will stay where they are; we may eventually retime some of the ones that we can, but we absolutely cannot guarantee being able to retime all of them.
Enjoy!
The embargo is over and the Crash 4 Leaderboard is now LIVE!
The categories that exist at the moment are Any%, All Clear Gems, and 106% as main categories, and All Timelines, 100%, and All Platinum Flashback Tapes as miscellaneous categories. These were the most commonly requested categories. We are willing to move around what is and isn't misc. depending on how things pan out, but we believe this is a good starting point.
The load remover is still in development, but a lot of progress has been made on it. We aren't quite ready to roll it out yet, so in the meantime the board will be timed RTA. After the load remover is released we will require LiveSplit with the load remover running be visible in your video submission, as is the case with both NST and CTRNF.
Until the load remover is out, we HIGHLY recommend that you do not cover or obscure your game feed with anything (such as webcam, transparent splits, etc.) Doing so runs the risk of your VoD not being able to be retimed.
With that said, please enjoy the leaderboard! If you want to stay up to date with the game and community I highly suggest joining the community Discord server, linked on the side.
If you've been paying attention to the leaderboard for the past two days, then you've probably noticed some pretty big changes to it, namely the addition of something called "Cross-Game" and Full Trilogy now being split between "File Fusion" and "No File Fusion".
To keep it simple, a pretty huge discovery was made, but to properly explain what it entails, I think it's best to explain basically how the entire past two days have gone, the decisions we have made, and why we made them. This discovery is very recent so we're still figuring much of it out ourselves, so there could be more developments in the future. But this is what has happened so far:
1. How we found "File Fusion"
Potty was doing Crash 3 108% runs, when he wasn't paying attention upon rebooting the game and accidentally managed to start Crash 1 and Crash 2 at the same time. The end result was him loading into Crash 1 at Nitrus Brio, but also with 42/25 Gems and 100% completion. The video for this can be found here:
Basically, Potty loaded Crash 1, but the game loaded his most recent Crash 2 save file instead of a Crash 1 file, as the most recent thing he did was hit Continue on Crash 2. The end result was him being in Crash 1, but with items and percent from Crash 2 instead. As for why he ended up at Brio, the game probably saw that this file was at Cortex, the 5th boss, in Crash 2, so it put him at the 5th boss in Crash 1, which is Nitrus Brio.
After Potty shared this in the Discord server, Crodi began to mess around with it and was able to do it from starting a New Game in Crash 1. With this, he was able to automatically go to Brio at the beginning of the run, therefore finishing Crash 1 in less than 5 minutes, seen here:
We immediately started discussing whether this should be allowed in Any%. After a while, we ultimately concluded that because it requires an already existing Crash 2 file (that has made it to Cortex), it is NG+ and therefore should not be allowed for Any%. However, it does have application in Full Trilogy because you can use a Crash 2 file that you make within the Full Trilogy run itself (by completing Crash 2 first), and is not considered NG+ there.
Thus, we split both Full Trilogy categories by adding a new variable called "File Fusion" (which is the name we decided on for this glitch). "Full Trilogy - File Fusion" is the category that uses this glitch, while "Full Trilogy - No File Fusion" is FT Any% and 315% as we already knew them. As for Crash 1, we decided to add NG+ Any% and NG+ All Gems to account for runs that would use a pre-existing Crash 2 file to set it up.
2. And then Crash 3 got involved
The next day, Crodi managed to do File Fusion using Crash 3 instead of Crash 2. With this, he started a New Game from both Crash 1 and Crash 3, then immediately went into Crash 3, did Gate Clip to enter Bug Lite, and then quit and went back into Crash 1. This loaded him at Castle Machinery (the 25th level in Crash 1), and he was then able to finish Crash 1 in less than 9 minutes:
This opened the discussion up again, because this was not NG+; it requires no pre-existing files and is possible the moment you start up the game for the first time. However, it does require leaving Crash 1 and playing Crash 3, and the discussion ultimately boiled down to should we allow "game jumping" in the single game categories.
We eventually decided that no, we should not. The single game categories are precisely that: single game. Even if NST can technically be seen as one game, it is also a collection of three, and the single game categories are intended for you to only play one of those three games. Switching to another game, even if you don't complete said other game, did not seem like it should be a thing.
With that in mind, JHobz proposed keeping the current categories as they are, but also introducing a new group of categories that do allow switching between games. Pretty much everyone involved in the discussion was onboard with this idea, so we decided to make the "Cross-Game" categories. This also rendered the Crash 1 NG+ categories created the day before redundant and unnecessary, so they were removed.
3. Alright cool. But what does this all mean? (i.e. a TL;DR)
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All of the categories as you knew them still exist. The single game categories all just now have rules that specify that you cannot 1) play any other game besides the one game in question, and 2) load a save file that was not created during the run itself (this was already implied to be a rule, but it's just specifically stated now). These two rules cover all the bases of File Fusion and essentially bans it from being used in single game runs in any impactful way.
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The classic Full Trilogy categories, Any% and 315%, still exist. They are just now known as "Full Trilogy - No File Fusion, Any%" and "Full Trilogy - No File Fusion, 315%" respectively now. Otherwise, they are exactly the same as they were before. File Fusion categories for Full Trilogy now exist as well.
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Cross-Game now exists, and will encompass any categories that require jumping between games for the sake of completing one (or more) faster. At the current moment the only ones that exist are Crash 1 Any% and Crash 1 All Gems, but it is likely more will be added as we figure more out about File Fusion in general.
If you made it this far, thank you for reading all of this! It's been a crazy few days in the NST community, but everything is still intact from before this huge discovery, and I'm sure many will appreciate this explanation as to just what these new categories popping up are.
~Riko
After discussing between the mods as well as some runners, we have decided to update the rules for Crash 1 105%; you now only have to collect 26 out of the 27 Relics in the game to finish the run (note: the ones you collect still all need to be Gold or Platinum).
In order to address some potential common questions:
1) Why is this changing? How come we suddenly need one less Relic?
The reason for this change is simple: we have never needed all 27 Relics in order to get 105%. The game has always awarded the extra percentage for Relics by simply having 26 of them, likely due to the game's programming not factoring in the existence of Stormy Ascent as a bonus level. The decision to require all 27 Relics anyway was made years ago, when Stormy Ascent was freshly released, partly because we were not sure whether this was a legitimate mistake that might be fixed later on in an update. Nearly three years into the game's life, I think it's pretty clear that Vicarious Visions has no intention of patching the game to fix this (or anything).
2) But why change it now?
For those who don't know, it was recently discovered that in Crash 3, you can acquire 108% with only 30 of the 31 Relics in the game being Gold or Platinum (i.e. one of them can be Sapphire). It was quickly decided that in 108%, finishing the run with one Sapphire Relic should be allowed, as not only does it allow for the possibility of new one cycles, you also still get 108%.
That last point is the most critical. The full completion categories in NST should be concerned with doing whatever it takes to get the maximum percentage. This is also the case with other games in the Crash series that skip things that don't contribute to percentage, but for the sake of keeping things simple, let's keep this focused on just NST. Crash 2 102% does what it takes to get 102%, which is the maximum percentage. Crash 3 108% does what it takes to get 108%, which is the maximum percentage. Crash 1 105% is the outlier here; not only does it require doing what it takes to get to 105%, it also requires going further by collecting a Relic that isn't even needed, which is an arbitrary restriction.
We want to be consistent between all three categories, and if we aren't putting an arbitrary restriction on 108%, it makes no sense to keep the restriction on 105%. All three categories should be solely concerned with doing what it takes to get the maximum percentage possible in each game.
This was less of a concern when the only game in question was Crash 1, but now that a similar situation is known to exist in Crash 3, it is better to keep things consistent between the two, instead of having one be treated one way and the other be treated another way.
3) Why not just make it so it's like 108%, where you have to collect every Relic but one of them can be Sapphire?
This sounds great in theory, but this argument falls apart when you realize that the way Crash 1 handles Relic percentage is completely different from how Crash 3 does it. In Crash 3, every single collectible item, including each individual Relic, provides 1%. This means that even if you don't need the 31st Relic to be Gold, you still have to collect it, otherwise you will end the game with 107%.
Crash 1 (and Crash 2) both handle this differently. These games only check if you have the total number of desired Relics (26 in the case of Crash 1, 27 in the case of Crash 2), and give you 1% if you do. You get an additional 1% if all of the required Relics are Gold or Platinum. Each individual Relic doesn't contribute any percentage by itself.
Because of this, while you need to at least collect the 31st Relic in Crash 3, regardless of what color you get, in Crash 1 you can skip the 27th Relic entirely. Requiring we collect the 27th Relic, but allowing it be Sapphire for the sake of being similar to 108%, puts a restriction on the category that is even more arbitrary than the "require all 27 Gold Relics" requirement that was already in place. It makes much more sense to just omit that Relic entirely.
4) I really liked having to collect all 27 Relics. Is there any way we can have a category that still does that (e.g. All Gold Relics, Gems, Bosses)?
Nothing is stopping you from running the game in whatever way you want. And we would not be against allowing a category like this to be Miscellaneous if it gained traction and popularity. Our primary concern with this suggestion, however, is that the category would be near identical to 105%, with the only difference being the addition of one Relic. However, we are open to the possibility, or any other potential ways to make it more distinct as a category (All Achievements/Platinum Trophy is a potential option).
If you would really like to continue doing the 27th Relic (which for most people will probably be Stormy Ascent's), you can always do it after the fight with Cortex; this would let you stop your submission time on the final hit of Cortex, but still collect the last Relic if you wanted to.
Thanks for reading! I hope you all continue to enjoy running NST!
https://www.speedrun.com/crashnstce
With the ability to mod NST since the PC release, there has long been demands for runs that use things like the PowerMod, uncapped FPS, and skin/music mods. We do not feel like these types of runs fit on the main leaderboard, but they do have a lot of potential regardless. So we have set up a Category Extensions board for these types of runs.
At the current moment, the two types or runs supported are PowerMod and Uncapped FPS. If more ideas pop up in the future we will add them as well. Additionally, given the nature of these runs, they are currently only known to be possible on the PC version of the game.
Enjoy!
Hey all,
Below is a permanent invite link to an NST-specific Discord Server that we have created. We are hoping that this server will be a great resource for all new and veteran runners to learn the games and grow the NST community. I hope to see you there!
Hey all,
As I stated in the New Rules Update post, LiveSplit running the loadless timer must now be visible in all submissions to be accepted.
There are a couple reasons we have done this:
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PS4 direct streaming; several runs that have been recorded with PS4 direct stream have been submitted that frequently are missing footage due to video skipping. This has ranged anywhere from a few seconds to minutes of footage missing. We have been lenient on this before but it has gotten out of hand. It is not necessarily the fault of the runners as much as it is the fault of PS4 streaming being terrible, but we simply cannot verify these runs in good faith when so much footage is missing. It is unfortunate that PS4 direct streamers suffer by their runs not being valid from a direct stream, but they likely would have been rejected anyway solely out of the footage that was missing.
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We have also had many instances of people submitting runs that have not had loadless timing accurately timed, and then requesting that we check the time is accurate for them. Again, we have been lenient on this, but it has also gotten out of hand. It is not the job of the moderators to time your runs for you. We are just here to make sure nothing goes out of order and to make sure submitted runs are valid and not cheated or spliced in any way. Making sure your times are accurate is the job of the submitter, not the moderators.
We understand that this will make submissions a little harder, but we have standards that we go by, and we want to make sure runs are of the proper quality when submitted. LiveSplit and the load remover are both very easy to set up, and any questions and problems that you have can be solved by asking on here or in the community Discord: many people are willing to help you get everything set up to make everything easier.
With that, I hope you all continue to do runs of NST! Hope to see submissions soon.
~Riko
Hey all. In light of the multiplatform release and update to NST, we have made a large number of changes to the rules that I will mention here:
-108% has been added to Crash 3 as the new full completion category. This category does include Future Tense.
-Crash 1 102% and 312% have been completely removed, and Crash 3 105% is currently archived. Crash 1 102% was a very unpopular category, and with Stormy Ascent now being free to download (or available from the start on non-PS4), the category was deemed unnecessary. Likewise, Crash 3 105% has actually been made impossible with the update including Future Tense, and as such can no longer be run. The category will remain as a reference point until a sufficient amount of 108% runs that properly show off the capabilities of the category have been submitted and verified, at which point the category will be removed. The elimination of 105% also made 312% impossible; however, because it is a misc. category comprised of three other categories, archiving 312% was deemed unnecessary.
-An FPS cap of 60 for PC runners has been implemented. This is because that’s how much the game is natively meant to support, and the game actually can run faster if FPS goes above 60. As such, exceeding the FPS cap is banned - this is enforced by having an FPS counter displayed at all times (for example the Steam internal one; for more information on that check the actual rules and the embedded links) for any PC runs.
-Expanding off of the above point, we have added Individual Level (IL) Leaderboards. The FPS thing has appeared to screw over the official Crash leaderboards, so for the sake of accuracy we have chosen to start up our own, as IL runs of NST have proven quite popular.
-And finally, all submitted full game runs must now have LiveSplit running the loadless timer visible on screen at all times. Failure to do this will result in the submission being rejected. I will create a separate forum post going into detail later about why we did this, but it is to address concerns involving PS4 direct streamed submissions missing video footage, as well as the laziness on part of some submitters who expected us to time their runs for them.
I know this is a lot to take in, but we believe all the changes will benefit NST as a whole, and none of these decisions were made lightly. Be sure to read up on everything before submitting runs, and I hope you all have fun with the new update and multiplatform release!
~Riko
Recently there have been a large amount of submission with videos that are not cropped to only include the run itself. The result is videos containing several failed attempts as well as the run in question.
We have been rather lenient on this, and simply have been giving out warnings to either timestamp the run start, or to simply crop it next time. But this has gotten out of hand. Several submissions have videos where the run doesn't start until over 20 minutes in!
This is ridiculous; both YouTube and Twitch have tools that let you edit videos to crop out unnecessary footage. There is no reason that videos with so much extra fluff are being submitted; it is a nuisance for both the mods verifying the runs and any viewers who wish to watch it.
From now on, if a submission does not have a properly cropped video (i.e. the run starts no more than a few minutes into the video, and there is no more than a few minutes of extra footage after the run completes), the run will be rejected. The rules have been updated to reflect this.
Crop your videos.
~Riko
EDIT: Here is a video tutorial on how to set up the load remover: https://www.speedrun.com/crashnst/guide/6lita (This does NOT include the "Remove Transitions"-step as it was made before the update; for more on this check below)
A load remover tool for LiveSplit has been developed by Thomadin. Using it allows the timer to freeze during Load Screens if you are comparing to Game Time as opposed to Real Time. It takes a bit of working with to get running, but it is completely functional and extremely accurate, so I would recommend all runners use it. It is also being continuously updated.
Link: https://github.com/thomasneff/LiveSplit.CrashNSTLoadRemoval/releases
Here are some instructions:
"How to use: Put the LiveSplit.CrashNSTLoadRemoval.dll inside your LiveSplit/Components folder. Add it by going into your Layout Editor -> Add -> Control -> CrashNSTLoadRemoval. In the component settings you can specify the capture source (either any full Display or specific windows) and capture region (by left/right clicking the preview). In order to work correctly, the capture region should not be changed a lot in aspect ratio - try to keep your Crash NST video footage in 16:9. It might work for stretched/distorted aspect ratios, but the tool was designed for 16:9 footage. Also enable the checkbox "Remove Transitions" above the preview window!
You can use the capture preview to make sure the Component is capturing correctly - if you are capturing off of a GPU window (e.g. DirectX/GL...) it'll probably not work and just show a black preview - there's nothing I can do about that. You can, however, just capture from the OBS preview (by setting the capture region to the Crash NST footage inside the OBS preview), PS4 remote play, or full display instead.
Since the loads are removed, you can now use "GameTime" in your Splits/Timer/whatever (Rightclick on Livesplit > Compare Against > Game Time), as the GameTime timer is simply stopped during loading.
I have not tested any language besides english, so it might work, it might also not. We can work on that, if necessary. Also the LiveSplit auto-updates are broken for this component and I don't know why, so if any updates are released you'll have to download them manually for now."
Enjoy, everyone! This will make loadless timing far more accurate!
NOTE: A load remover extension for LiveSplit has been created and can be found here. The load remover is far more accurate than these spreadsheets, so I would no longer recommend using these. They will also more than likely not be completed.
STANDARD PS4 | SLIM PS4 | PS4 PRO
Above are links to all load times in for both an original and slim PS4 with HDD, across all games. The times for original PS4 were found by averaging out the load times of several runs between myself, tocaloni1, and CDRomatron. Our data was very consistent so these load times are accurate for the most part. The slim times were found by Crodi.
Using these will save time over manually removing loads from your run, at least until we get a special timer developed. If someone could add this spreadsheet to the SR.com rules and/or sticky this thread that would be great.
Is there a good way to run the PAL version of Crash 2 on an NTSC PS2? I attempted the Gameshark exploit that lets you play burned copies of games, and used Breaker Pro to force the PAL version to run with NTSC video, but the end result went way too slow to be able to run.
Someone over at The ISO Zone recommended I use POPstarter with a softmodded PS2 to run the game off of USB, but since that would be a non-official emulation, it's illegal for runs, correct? From what I've heard running the game can reduce load times, but I haven't actually tried it so I can't say for sure. I do know on the CTR board someone asked about POPstarter and was advised not to do it.
I've tried sucking it up and just running the NTSC version of the game to take advantage of FDS, but I find that while FDS does somewhat make up for the NTSC version being slower, in the end I don't see a notable improvement on times, so I don't really get anywhere by using this setup over just emulating PAL.
I was thinking of picking up non-burned copies of Breaker Pro and the PAL version of Crash 2, as I think my CD burner may have been the issue, but I wanted to see what others who have also been in this situation (I know a good portion of runners are from PAL regions, but a select few like SuperBoomFan and Gpro are in NTSC regions iirc) have done to get around this.
Thanks
Not sure if this is the right place to ask, so sorry if it isn't.
I have a fat PS2 with FDS (I know some models don't apparently, but mine does, so I'm guessing it's not an original run model). I was wondering if there's any difference in load times between it and a slim PS2 also using FDS.
If I remember correctly, people tend to recommend a slim PS2 for FDS, but I don't know if this is because of a difference in load times or because not all fat PS2's have access to FDS.
Recently, (i.e. within the past month or two), I have submitted two runs (one for Crash 2 100% and one for Crash 3 Any% No Item Glitch). Both of these runs were done on the PSXfin emulator, as I was not aware until today that PSXfin was banned.
Since I ran on an illegal emulator, these runs should obviously be removed. Is there any way for my times on the leaderboards to revert back to my old records before each of these runs? My previous Crash 3 run was on PSP, and while my previous Crash 2 100% run was also on PSXfin, it was at a time before it was banned.
The Crash 2 Any% No GO run I currently have was done on PSP, so it should be fine.
Thanks.
Hello,
I've submitted a couple of Crash 2 runs here in the past. I just finished my first stream of an Any% No GO Abuse run of the game, and I beat my previous record of 52:03 and finished with a time of 49:56.
Unfortunately, the broadcast didn't get archived and a file of it wasn't saved. I do have the live splits for the run, but any video evidence I have doesn't seem to exist anymore.
Is there any way I can resolve this? I see someone else had this issue a year ago and it got resolved, but I'm not sure how they went about doing that. I did have people watching it, but I don't know if their word is enough to verify it.
Thank you.
