NTR and MM3D Speedruns (Edit at the bottom)

Alright after doing a week of research and soul-searching I'm ready to talk about NTR and MM3D speedrunning.

First some important facts:

1) Despite being released specifically "for the N3DS" MM3D does not use the code that tells the console to use all of the available N3DS CPU cores.

This was a pretty big shock to me, what an easy way to decrease lag and loading times in the game that was supposed to sell the N3DS to the North American audiences. Grezzo was probably just too lazy to update the engine they made for OoT3D. As with all things, it's always Grezzo's fault. "For the N3DS" means works with the Circle Pad Pro, big whoop Nintendo.

2) MM3D is capped at 30 FPS.

No matter how much CPU power you throw at MM3D you're never going to get a higher framerate than this. Which means with all 4 cores enabled through "Clock + L2" settings the gameplay is going to be pretty much the same for everyone.

3) Lag exists for MM3D but it is rare.

If you pull out multiple bombs with 3D enabled in an already busy area (and you aren't using all of the available cores of the N3DS) you're going to get some lag. Snowhead is also a busy area and might generate lag without the need for 3D but this isn't extensively tested.

4) Loading times are shorter for Clock + L2 including with NTR streaming plugin active.

This is the big kicker. I tested the South Clock Town to West Clock Town loading time and there was AT LEAST a 0.5 second difference between Off and Clock + L2. If every loading zone is >0.5 seconds faster for Clock + L2 that means after 120 loadings NTR streamed runs will save a minute over their non NTR streamed counterparts.

5) NTR locks you into Clock + L2 to "improve" streaming quality.

My stream still has framerate drops that are 100% NTR and not related to OBS at all. But gameplay never lags, NTR is not a perfect, or even a good, streaming tool.

So what do we do about NTR and speedrunning? I don't know what but I'll throw in my two cents:

    Don't ban NTR runs, do distinguish them from non NTR runs with a label along the lines of "N3DS"

Why am I against banning NTR runs? Let's get this out of the way, although all of my runs have been recorded with NTR so far I ordered a capture kit from Katsukity months ago which will get here someday (I hope), so I'd like to think I don't have any particular bias towards keeping NTR runs because of my own standing in the community.

Playing while streaming with NTR provides a slight advantage. Which is almost entirely negated because of slow S&Q, but we can skip S&Q now, but we don't know if skipping it is ideal for WW timer so that could waste up to 80 seconds and be even slower than slow S&Q.

But it does still provide a POTENTIAL advantage so we shouldn't ignore it. And more than that, streaming with a capture card and using Luma3DS to lock your CPU at Clock + L2 will give you an undeniable advantage. And there's really no way to tell that someone is doing that besides looking for 0.5 second differences in loading times.

But NTR lets people record their runs without dropping $400-$600 USD on a 3DS with a capture kit. Instead just spending $100-$200 USD on a N3DS and an evening hacking it. I think this is a positive for the community that should be encouraged and not banned. It increases exposure so more people want to do runs and find glitches and play Bingo.

So why do I think we should label NTR runs and why do I think the label should be something along the lines of "N3DS"

NTR has the potential to give an advantage to the runner that O3DS runners don't have. It's like the difference between running OoT on Wii VC versus N64. The games are the same but the hardware means that Wii VC has less lag and faster loading times. So they label Wii VC runs Wii VC and N64 runs N64.

This is almost a perfectly analogous situation to our Clock + L2 one. Except the Wii VC is an "official" release and the Clock + L2 setting is a "hack" so I think we should likewise label our runs.

I think that the label should be something like "N3DS" and not NTR because it allows N3DS capture card streamers who use Clock + L2 to be honest about it. They will have just as much of an advantage as the NTR users but it will be even less obvious. NTR stream quality is easy to pick out, it washes out the colors and lags during pretty much every cutscene. But a N3DS user with a capture card who has softmodded and is using a CPU lock is much harder to find. So give them the opportunity to honestly label their run as "N3DS" or "Clock + L2" or something like that.

So those are my thoughts about this, I'm more than willing to hear dissenting opinions. Hit me up on Discord @megahirtz#8395 or message me on ZSR forum I'm megahirtz there or DM me on Twitter I'm @megahirtz there. Or post your own pastebin explaining why you think I'm wrong and send it to me.

IMPORTANT EDIT KEEP READING:

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You can change the Clock Speed back to 3DS default after you load the streaming plugin with NTR, but it means your capture FPS is 12 maximum.

Does this change my thoughts on this?

I'm not 100% sure.

Capturing at 12 FPS max doesn't sound reasonable to me. No one would want to watch that run. You can set the CPU to Clock instead of Clock + L2 and capture at 30 FPS maximum, 25 FPS average and the loading time difference without L2 is much smaller, quick tests put it at about 0.15 seconds faster than Off. This could be a good middle ground and is easily verifiable because you can stream yourself changing the CPU settings.

This still doesn't address the problem of capture card softmodders secretly using Clock + L2, but maybe we just need to be more vigilant when we verify runs.

Keep sending me your feedback!