IV/V/VI relay submission

Game Information

Final Fantasy IV
Game Name *

SNES
Console *
What you'll be playing on - official releases only

The Final Fantasy IV-V-VI Relay is one of the oldest events in RPGLB history -- in fact, the oldest ones even predate RPGLB as a channel. They were a gateway for several gamers to RPG speedrunning, and were a staple of the landscape of RPG speedrunning for several years. They were formative for a number of newer runners. They were also incredibly hard to put together because of the demands of finding four runners of each game.

This submission aims to go back to that time -- with two runners per game -- for a FF4-FF5-FF6 relay race. We'll pick the longest category for each game: No64 for FF4 and Glitchless for FF6.  We've got a stable of great runners for each game: riversmccown and penguin8r for FF4, bichphuongballz and takaze for FF5, and puwexil and couch_23 for FF6. Backups are Aexoden (FF4), Tojju (FF5), and Liin1 (FF6).

This race has not been put on the RPGLB channel since 2016 and it would be amazing to bring it back live for the first time and honor the history of RPG speedrunning while we bring these categories to RPGLB for the first time since 2015 (FF4), 2016 (FF5), and 2016 (FF6).
Description *
1112/1120

(FF4 only)
Character names -- Name all characters (5 minutes)
Pick the endgame route -- Rosa (+0 minutes), Edge (+5 minutes), Rydia/Rosa (+12 minutes)
Donation Incentives
Please include time costs and whether the incentive is during or after the run
150/560

FF4 and FF6 have enormous nostalgia factors for generations of RPG players, while FF5 is one of the most careful and skillfully routed speedgames of the SNES era. All runners are proficient enough to keep step routes and for the most part we've got top-5 leaderboard-quality runners on every slot. There's a history of successful long speedruns at RPGLB and, given the game turnover, this wouldn't necessarily need an overnight spot to keep interest.
Pros
Describe the positives of your game as a speedrun
451/560

Well, obviously, this is long. Like, really, really long. I'm guessing after we combine all these together and hit incentives we'd probably be looking at a 13-hour estimate. There's also a lot of unskippable cutscenes, as most Square games of this era went heavily into that arena. There's definitely parts of each game that haven't aged gracefully. For a 13-hour estimate, you'd probably expect to do all of each game and that's really not entirely what's happening here -- we do still skip a few things here or there.
Cons
Describe the downsides of your game as a speedrun (be honest!)
520/560

Categories for Final Fantasy IV

no64
Category Name *
03:20
Estimate *
Round to the whole minute
Final Fantasy IV no64 is the longer of the two major categories for FF4 SNES, one that does not use either the 64-floor glitch nor the ACE warp to the credits. It does everything major in the story except the sealed cave. There's a lot of new tech in this run that hasn't been properly shown off to a major audience. The only run of this category that's been at a major event since routing changes was at Harvey Relief Done Quick.

Description
Pitch/describe this category in 2 tweets or less
431/560

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uv7k8AQ_Omg&t=114s
Video link *