Re: [Enigma-devel] Par times?

[Karen Pouelle]

On 9/19/05, Drake Wilson <address@hidden> wrote:
> Is there a specific place to submit new par times, and/or look up
> current par times?  I don't see one on the Enigma web site anywhere,
> but perhaps I didn't look hard enough.

"par times" doesn't properly describe the intention of the scoring.
In golf, players do not send scores to a central scoring authority when
they achieve a better score than the current par; the par is meant as
an average score for average players to achieve.

If Enigma par times are not intended to indicate the average finish
time that the level creator believes the average player could achieve,
then a phrase less misleading would be "Top Scores".

A central scoring authority accepting a text file of local top scores
by any player for inclusion in the next release seems impractical,
inconvenient, and insecure at this point in the game's development.

Perhaps if the true intentions of par times was as a world-wide
"best" or "top" score, then it might be best to maintain "par times"
as average completion times, then additionally develop a top score
board for player's personal best, machine-local top scores, and
online scores as does the game Porrasturvat, which at one time
allowed top scores to be submitted online by the game itself.