A Proposal for Updating How We Record Scores On the Site

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Shepardus
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Re: A Proposal for Updating How We Record Scores On the Site

Post by Shepardus »

Again, I don't see what this would solve that online leaderboards within games don't already. With many of those you've got access to the scores of everybody who's ever played the game and their replays since it takes zero effort to submit them, yet I don't see any more interest in them or "rivalries" developed than in other games without such a database.
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NTSC-J: You know STGs are in trouble when you have threads on how to introduce them to a wider audience and get more people playing followed by threads on how to get its hardcore fan base to play them, too.
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shoryusatsu999
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Re: A Proposal for Updating How We Record Scores On the Site

Post by shoryusatsu999 »

Shepardus wrote:Again, I don't see what this would solve that online leaderboards within games don't already. With many of those you've got access to the scores of everybody who's ever played the game and their replays since it takes zero effort to submit them, yet I don't see any more interest in them or "rivalries" developed than in other games without such a database.
That won't really solve anything either. For one thing, not all games have online leaderboards and/or replay sharing to begin with, and we can't just assume that every game that will be released in the future will have online leaderboards and replays.

Also, online leaderboards have their own issues: they differ from platform to platform, can't be viewed without either buying the game, getting screenshots like offline leaderboards or (rarely) going to an official website that may or may not be taken down once it's served its purpose, and don't take into account runs done without an active internet connection.

But here's the worst part of focusing solely on online leaderboards: if/when the online service that powers those games gets shut down, all of the amazing scores on the online leaderboards will be lost, and we'll have to find a different way to record scores anyway.
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Shepardus
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Re: A Proposal for Updating How We Record Scores On the Site

Post by Shepardus »

shoryusatsu999 wrote:That won't really solve anything either.
That's the point I was trying to make - it wouldn't solve any of the problems OP wants to solve, and we know this because we already have online leaderboards for games, but they're hardly any better off than those that don't. OP expressed dissatisfaction with the availability of videos/replays and the friction in sharing a score and getting the scoreboard updated. Online leaderboards have made it so easy to find and share scores that it's actually harder not to share. The result, however, isn't an active community regularly striving to beat each other's scores and discussing strategies. What you get is dead leaderboards with a handful of people dominating the top positions and a gazillion other scores from people who played the game once and never even noticed the score counter. Sometimes you don't even get the gazillion other scores because hardly anyone played the game even once, and the leaderboard is only there to confirm your suspicion that really, nobody plays the game. If people can't be bothered to work on and share their scores when they don't even have to leave the game to do so, I don't see them being compelled to log onto an external website and take a screenshot or, god forbid, a video, to share. Even if everybody's runs were all automagically submitted, you're still not going to get submissions for games nobody plays, and still most people aren't going to be playing "for score" in a competitive sense.

I agree with Despatche here - this isn't a problem that's going to be solved by throwing more technology at it.
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linko9
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Re: A Proposal for Updating How We Record Scores On the Site

Post by linko9 »

The speedrunning community has been discussing adding high score support to speedrun.com, which to me seems like the most likely way that a more modern high score system will actually get used. Obviously a lot of people here would skip out on posting their scores there, and many older scores will be left by the wayside. However for younger players who are already used to that style of leaderboard, the extension of the speedrun record-keeping system to high scores will be natural. It also has the benefit of being international (for all but a few games, Japanese players do submit their times to sr.com), and not limited to a specific community, so you know you're looking at the actual best performances from around the world.

Now, I'm not particularly optimistic that this will ever happen for a number of reasons. First, the community for shmups is smaller, and thus there's less of a need and desire for a speedrun.com-style database. Also, while speedrunning is popular in many different regions, Japan is second fiddle to the US and Europe. For shmups, its obviously the other way around, so its less likely that Japanese players are going to jump on a western-hosted platform. Then as other people have mentioned, recording video for arcade boards is much less straightforward than for consoles or PC, and the access to video is one of the major benefits of the speedrun database. Of course videos aren't required (for most games anyway), so that's not a huge hurdle, and games are moderated by individual community members, without any real "global rules."

Personally I think it would be great if high scores for all sorts of games (not just shmups) could be found in a single, easy to access place, and I think keeping those together with the speedrunning records would be fine (though by no means inherently desirable). Again, if a modern leaderboard is going to happen, I would guess that some initiative by the speedrun crowd is the most likely way that it will happen, since I think that's going to be a natural spot for younger players to go.
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Re: A Proposal for Updating How We Record Scores On the Site

Post by Mark_MSX »

linko9 wrote:The speedrunning community has been discussing adding high score support to speedrun.com, which to me seems like the most likely way that a more modern high score system will actually get used. Obviously a lot of people here would skip out on posting their scores there, and many older scores will be left by the wayside. However for younger players who are already used to that style of leaderboard, the extension of the speedrun record-keeping system to high scores will be natural. It also has the benefit of being international (for all but a few games, Japanese players do submit their times to sr.com), and not limited to a specific community, so you know you're looking at the actual best performances from around the world.

Now, I'm not particularly optimistic that this will ever happen for a number of reasons. First, the community for shmups is smaller, and thus there's less of a need and desire for a speedrun.com-style database. Also, while speedrunning is popular in many different regions, Japan is second fiddle to the US and Europe. For shmups, its obviously the other way around, so its less likely that Japanese players are going to jump on a western-hosted platform. Then as other people have mentioned, recording video for arcade boards is much less straightforward than for consoles or PC, and the access to video is one of the major benefits of the speedrun database. Of course videos aren't required (for most games anyway), so that's not a huge hurdle, and games are moderated by individual community members, without any real "global rules."

Personally I think it would be great if high scores for all sorts of games (not just shmups) could be found in a single, easy to access place, and I think keeping those together with the speedrunning records would be fine (though by no means inherently desirable). Again, if a modern leaderboard is going to happen, I would guess that some initiative by the speedrun crowd is the most likely way that it will happen, since I think that's going to be a natural spot for younger players to go.
Thanks for the reply man!

That is an interesting idea about having more involvement with the speedrunning community. I have always been surprised that a new shmup crowd hasn't formed within the speedrunning community, especially considering how huge it has become. I've talked to some of the mods at Speedrun.com about my idea, and they said they went through a similar transition when they moved from SDA to Speedrun.com. Personally, for the shmup community, I don't think such a massive transition is necessary, I honestly just was hoping to talk about why I think updating how we record scores on this forum could be beneficial.

As far as attracting younger players goes, what I've found interesting is that, among all the speedrunners and fighting game players I have talked to, many of them don't have much of an interest in Cave or Raizing shmups. Honestly, many of them don't even know about these games. However, the majority of these same people are familiar with, and do like, Touhou games. Who knows, with the rise in popularity of anime fighting games and stuff, Touhou could become a massive hook for attracting younger players.
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Despatche
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Re: A Proposal for Updating How We Record Scores On the Site

Post by Despatche »

linko9 wrote:The speedrunning community has been discussing adding high score support to speedrun.com, which to me seems like the most likely way that a more modern high score system will actually get used.
I'd like this because "scorerunning" needs to be a term, and speedrunners and scorerunners need to have more overlap; weirdos speedrunning Touhou photo games aren't good enough. I also like this because it would actually encourage things that aren't just shmups; I'm also tired of hearing the politics over what's a "borderliner" or not.

I wouldn't like this because I'm not a giant fan of the speedrun.com "regime", I guess. But it seems everyone's going in that direction, so I'm not sure what to do. Then again, that's what I thought about GDQ until people got sick of them and started things like ESA. speedrun.com isn't nearly as bad as GDQ or anything like that... yet, anyway.

I would like to point out that we would occasionally get Japanese posters, but there are other factors that keep them from coming around much, not just that this is an English language forum.
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Re: A Proposal for Updating How We Record Scores On the Site

Post by BareKnuckleRoo »

1. It is fragmented. There is no unified database. There is no way to quickly compile statistical data.
7. It is cumbersome and confusing to track how a game’s scores have evolved over time.
The forum exists first for engagement, discussion, and encouragement. We're players, not statisticians. And there is some seriously good discussion that takes place in the scoring threads as well as the strategy threads for games. There does exist a 1CC thread list that many people mention scores for games where they feel the score is noteworthy, and RestartSyndrome exists as a good supplement to the forum to do exactly what you want done, being not a community engagement tool but simply a place to record a list of games and scores. However, the discussion of how those scores were achieved are an important part of the forum.
8. Aesthetically, forum posts appear outdated, like we are a community stuck in the past.
I don't know what Point 8 is supposed to be saying other than "it looks old, therefore it's bad"? Forums exist and continue to exist in the form that they do because they're practical for discussions, especially for games that don't get much attention and where scores or strategy posts may be as infrequent as months between posts.
2. None of our scores (that I found) have video links attached to them. Our scores are just recorded names and numbers.(Replay links don’t count, I’ll explain why soon).
Not every score needs a video attached. Players who are practicing and are aware that there is room for improvement on a score may not bother to record until they manage to achieve a decent score. Also, not everyone is playing on a setup that allows for convenient recording (such as at an arcade or on a cabinet at home). Of course, if you suddenly post a top score for a thread it is generally good etiquette to post a video recording of it, but it may not always be doable.
3. Many of our score threads are too small and intimate. The people in charge of the scores are often high scoring players. This discourages newer players with lower scores from posting out of fear of being judged or other social reasons
5. The majority of our score threads are top-heavy, meaning that the majority of the recorded scores are being submitted by expert players. The number of recorded scores is often extremely small, which further discourages newer players, as a low score would really stand out and look ridiculous.
Correlation does not imply causation. The reason score threads for small doujins are often run by high scoring playing is because the players who enjoy a less popular game enough to get good scores often want to create a score thread to encourage further play. Also, low scores do get posted, but very frequently competent players don't post super low "I'm just starting" scores because they know they can achieve something higher and will wait until they get into the late game and are able too get a game clear score. It's not necessarily a result of newbies being scared.
4. Many of our score threads appear abandoned and haven’t been updated in years. Take this one for example: viewtopic.php?t=36854

And obviously, it sucks if your score doesn’t ever get posted because the thread owner left the scene and the thread has been abandoned.
Some old games or certain modes don't see much attention. Sometimes, someone running a thread misses a score update from a player, and it's just a matter of sending them a reminder. Skykid is still a current active member, and Dodonpachi Daioujou X-Mode is not a particularly popular scoring mode. There are more popular threads where a players actively post scores but the person running the thread is not as active or is dealing with health issues, in which case it's really not difficult to go to the end of a thread and skim through recent posts. And, if it's been a while, it's not unusual for someone else to take over a thread.
6. There is no standardized system of deciding what we do with arrangements and variations of games.
What games specifically are you referring to, and what do you mean by "what we do"? Arrangements and alternative modes generally are handled in the score section for the main game but around these parts arrange modes don't tend to be as popular as the main games.

A number of your complaints appear to stem from a misunderstanding of what purpose this particular forum's score section serves, and a misunderstanding of why scores get posted the way they do. This is as much a community engagement forum as is simply a place to post scores, and scores being updated manually is often a good source of player interaction and encouragement within the score threads (and for a more database-style, less interactive place to record scores Restart Syndrome exists as a perfectly good supplement to upload scores). Community engagement is arguably the most important thing for keeping the games and their interest alive as many people are interested in playing the games but less so in playing for score, and places such as the strategy section or the "I DID IT!" 1CC accomplishments thread really are great for community engagement.
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