Darkwing Duck has a time delay on his start for running this game. It is generally more accepted among speedrunners to do so. By doing so however, we alter the currently submitted runs.
I say we put it to a vote. We will re-examine this after 2 weeks time, plenty of time for anyone interested and active to vote.
I vote in favor of adding the delay, with the idea being that the run begins on gaining control rather than pressing start.
Also, I wish Darkwing submitted that run!
Referring to the negative timer? It should not be added as an enforced rule, but you could add to rules "timer starts upon pushing play select (-13.72). Alot of runners will still time it manually from old SDA days (character control) without negative timer. Either way, mods should be able to framecount so it shouldn't be an issue.
Edit: Ahh, you're referring to wanna start timing the run upon character control instead from menu select. Yes, I'd vote for that change as well, just re-timing previous runs to meet the potential new standard. Starting timer from character control is what most games do on NES anyway.
I asked Darkwing about this before, and he's fine with his runs being submitted on his behalf but he just doesn't want to use this site for whatever reason (probably something something SDA). I wouldn't have ever bothered you about it except it looks like you found it on your own :)
"Official SDA Timing" makes sense for some games, but I think it's easier to simply start timer when you hit the start button. It's probably why that sort of timing has went out of vogue. But I don't do the NES run (yet?) so it's not terribly relevant to me. The Colecovision version doesn't have any sort of load screen so there's no reason for a timer offset there.
It has been long enough now and those who have stated their thoughts have spoken. We have two in favor of yes and one in favor of leaving it as is. In the next week I will add a revision to the rule, stating the digits of the timer offset, and will adjust the timing of the currently submitted runs to reflect this change.
