I've made a few improvements to the rankings, most noticeably to the header of the page. If you're logged in, you can hover your name in the top right to reveal a menu. You can now set your timezone and your preferred date format (mm/dd/yyyy or dd/mm/yyyy). If you notice anything broken or something displaying incorrectly please let me know.

Today marks 1 month of new rankings! To celebrate, here are some statistics about our usage.

Times

There are 54,054 times in the database. 50,481 (93.39%) are current PRs. 3,451(6.38%) are old PRs. 122 (0.26%) are deleted but still remain in the database. (percentages don't add to 100% due to rounding) 2,318 times (4.28%) have videos. 436 times (0.80%) have comments. 6,172 times (11.42%) have a date achieved. 49,683 times (91.91%) have the system field not set (ie. Unknown). 2,771 times (5.13%) are NTSC. 1,600 times (2.96%) are PAL. Axel Zakrisson has the most times with 737 (most are old PRs). Bryan Bosshardt is second with 388. Wouter Jansen is third with 351. Axel Zakrisson has the most videos with 333. Bryan Bosshardt is second with 126. Ryan Dwyer is third with 107. Bryan Bosshardt has commented on 126 of his times. Henning Blom has commented on 95. Alex Anderson has commented on 60.

Users

There are 652 users. 49 users have logged in since launch. 26 use 1.2. 7 use 1.1. 619 haven't set their control style in their profile. 351 play GoldenEye. 467 play Perfect Dark. 166 play both games.

Traffic

The rankings subdomain had 4,901 visits in the last 30 days. The rankings subdomain had 54,162 page views in the last 30 days. In comparison, the whole of the-elite.net (including rankings subdomain) had 21,054 visits and 74,074 page views. For every 3 visits the main site receives, one person visits the rankings. However, the rankings dominate in number of page views. In the month of November, using the old rankings, t-e.n had 18,752 visits and 24,854 page views. The new rankings have tripled the number of page views that t-e.n receives. The GE rankings have had 6,226 page views, which is 11.50% of our total. The PD rankings have had 3,917 page views (7.23%). The rankings homepage has had 2,741 page views (5.06%). Jimmy Bauer's GE times page was the most visited, with 624 views. Axel Zakrisson's GE times page scored 532 views. Luke Pettit's GE times page scored 384 views. 3,241 visits (66.13%) came from a referring site: - 2,116 came from the-elite.net. - 384 came from our forums. - 114 came from Facebook (through likes). 1,512 visits (30.85%) were direct traffic (bookmarked or typed URL manually). 148 visits (3.02%) came from search engines. The most searched term on Google that led people to our rankings was... "ryan honkonen". This search term was used 15 times. Second was "axel zakrisson" which was used 8 times. Third was "goldeneye world recordes" (sic) which was used 7 times. 2,045 (41.73%) of our visits used Firefox. 1,189 (24.26%) of our visits used Chrome. 959 (19.57%) of our visits used Internet Explorer. 383 (7.81%) of our visits used Safari. 205 (4.18%) of our visits used Opera. Of our IE users: 99 visits were using IE9. 834 visits were using IE8. 23 visits were using IE7. 3 visits were using IE6, which we don't support. 4,068 (83.00%) of our visits were using Windows. 281 (5.73%) of our visits were using Mac. 225 (4.59%) of our visits were using Linux*. 186 (3.80%) of our visits were using iPhone. 87 (1.78%) of our visits were using Android. * I probably contributed to the majority of the Linux share, but disabled Google Analytics for myself around Christmas time. That's all, folks!

It was a few weeks before Christmas. A little boy was on his way to the mall with his mother. The boy was excited because this was the first time he would meet Santa. He was looking forward to telling Santa what he wanted for Christmas, but he couldn't decide. "Mom, what should I ask Santa for?" The boy's mother didn't want to answer his question. After all, part of the fun of visiting Santa is seeing what your child wishes for. She replied, "Think about what you want more than anything else, but don't tell anyone except Santa." The boy stared out the car window in deep thought as his mind ran wild with ideas. Before long, the boy was waiting in line to sit on Santa's lap. He overheard the kids in front of him wishing for video games and various technology. The boy suspected his wish was going to be unlike any other wish that Santa had received. He briefly considering changing his wish, but he decided not to. He had already made up his mind.

The boy and his mother were called over to Santa. The boy sat on Santa's knee and divulged his wish. He whispered in Santa's ear, "I want new rankings for the-elite.net." Santa smiled and nodded politely. The boy continued, "I want players to be able to update their times and have the rankings updated immediately... I want the rankings to always be up to date..." The boy stared into space as his mind raced with ideas. "I want each player to have their own single profile, even if they play both games... I want to be able to look at any player and see all their times, points and ranks in one place..." The boy's requests started becoming more and more outragous, but Santa still patiently listened. "I want streaming videos that play straight from the world record table... I want an achievement system..." The boy's mother was standing nearby and was starting to feel rather embarassed about her son's ridiculous requests. "That's enough," she said, but the boy was not finished. "I want to be able to compare times between players... I want to be able to search a player's complete PR history... I want all times stored eternally with the date they were achieved and their videos." The boy's mother apologized to Santa, picked up the boy from his knee and started carrying him away. The boy struggled futily to escape his mother's grasp while calling out, "I want the in-game stage thumbnails to show on the rankings and stage pages! I want an interactive worldwide map of where all the players live! I want NTSC/PAL rankings and Rare rankings all handled by the one system!" By now the boy's mother had carried him out of view of Santa. There was no point continuing. During the trip home, the boy couldn't think of anything else. Would his wishes be granted? Would Santa deliver? Were his requests reasonable or even possible? Immediately after arriving home, the boy went straight to the computer and searched for statistics on how many Santa wishes were granted. His heart sank as he read story after story of children who had wished for one thing and gotten something completely different. It was as if the Santa they revealed their wishes to was a completely different Santa to the one who gave them their presents. The boy was almost certain his wishes were not going to be granted. He wanted to erase the day's events from his memory and pretend it didn't happen, but he couldn't. Finally, Christmas Day arrived. Beep beep! Beep beep! Like every Christmas, the boy's alarm woke him at some ungodly hour of the morning. The boy raced to his computer and logged on to the-elite.net to check the rankings. This was it, the moment he'd been waiting for. Had Santa delivered? The boy loaded the rankings and... frowned as the same old rankings appeared on his screen. Oh well. Disappointed, he stumbled out of his room to wake the rest of his family so they could open their presents. The present opening went just like any other Christmas. He'd open a present, find it's something he didn't particularly want, thank the person who gave it to him and put it aside. Repeat until all the presents have been opened. Eventually the living room was a mess of wrapping paper. All the presents had been opened. The boy hadn't received anything worth noting. He was about to leave the room when he noticed a small envelope behind the Christmas tree. It must have been missed earlier. The boy picked up the envelope and found it was addressed to him. He turned it over. On the back were the words "From Santa". Curiously, the boy opened the envelope and pulled out the contents. It was a card. The boy opened the card. The inside of the card was void of any writing except for a short phrase written in the center:

rankings.the-elite.net

HO HO HO! Merry (early) Christmas, Elite! That's right, gone is the need for your times pages! Gone are the 3 day waits for the rankings to be updated! The Elite has leapt forward into the modern age with what is quite possibly the most awesome software ever written! Here's a rundown of the new system: * Each player has their own login. You only have and need one login even if you play both games. * Once logged in, players can post new times and they will be immediately reflected throughout the site, including the rankings. * Players can set videos (eg. YouTube or Thengamer) for their times and it will be displayed along with their time - maybe even on the record table itself! * Players can write comments about their times. * Players can set whether their times are NTSC or PAL and they will be displayed on the NTSC and PAL record table if they're records. * Players who play both games will be automatically included in the Rare Ranks. * Players can post old times, set the date they were achieved and assign videos to them. * Players have their own profiles with heaps of info such as contact details and latest times. * Players can specify their location and they'll appear on our worldwide gamer map. * Each player's times page shows times, points and ranks all in one table. You can click buttons to highlight WRs or shade your times depending on how good or bad they are. * Players can compare their times with other players. You can select the other player by name or by rank. * There's an achievements/rewards system to encourage people to reach milestones. * RSS feeds are available by game and by type (PRs/WRs/untieds) so you can easily see when someone has posted a new time.

Accounts and logging in

Everyone who is on the rankings currently will already have a login for the new system. Players log in using an email address and password. Your email address is the same one you see on the old GE and PD roster pages. You'll need to use your email address to create a password. If you don't have an email address on the old rankings, can't access your email or have any other problems you can contact any of the following people and we'll sort you out: * Me (AIM: YourElitenessPD or youreliteness at gmail.com) * Ngamer (AIM: Im Ngamer or ngamer at gmail.com) * Derek Clark (derekclark at gmail.com) * Thiradell (AIM: Thiradell or taupefish at yahoo.com) Your passwords are stored encrypted using a method which cannot be reversed. No one can tell you what your password is, not even me, but the above people can reset it if needed. Please note that under no circumstances should you should ever create a second account. This is never needed and it would be unfair to the other players.

Document your times

The system is capable of recording old PRs. It it will automatically determine which PRs are current and which are old. Only current PRs will be included in the main rankings, whereas old PRs will only be shown on the Past Records page and player PR history. We would appreciate it if you could go back through your past PRs and fill in any missing info if you know it. Specifically: * Add any old WRs or notable PRs which aren't in the system already. * Set videos for your times, especially your current PRs. If your video isn't online, upload it! * Set the date you achieved your times if known. These can be gotten from the WR and PR topics on the forums. All the date information from Silver Angel's WR databases has been imported already. * Set whether each time was achieved on NTSC or PAL. Note that if you contact me I can batch update all your times to one system. If you're a dual-system player (ie. both NTSC and PAL), don't forget to add your other system's time for each stage and difficulty. You might hold a PAL or NTSC record! Remember, this is more than just a rankings system. It's documentation of the Elite's history. So please add every past PR you can find, including old strats.

Optional: Become a historian

If you would really like to be awesome, you can apply to be a historian. Historians can edit the video/date/system/comments for any players' times. Historians can also add times for another player provided it wouldn't be a new PR. If you're interested in becoming a historian, talk to Ngamer or myself.

Show your appreciation

The new rankings have been created entirely by me with ideas from a few others. I started the project on my own initiative and spent countless hours most nights for the last two months working on it (and I hope it shows!). I'm not charging anyone for my efforts. If you'd like to show your appreciation you can make a donation. Have fun with your new rankings, Elite!

If you take a look at the Goldeneye World Record page and browse your way over to the untied section, you'll note one very unique and very important thing - the top 3 longest standing untieds in the history of the game are ACTIVE RECORDS! Surface 2 00 Agent 1:26 (David Clemens), Statue 00 Agent 2:18 (Bryan Bosshardt), and Jungle Secret Agent 0:53 (Rayan Isran) have risen to the very top of the durability rankings and could continue to stand for a very long time. After researching the last 10 years of Goldeneye records, this is only the 2nd time something like this has ever happened, and it is especially impressive noting the quality of players who have been active to tie or beat these times since the first record was set in January 2008. It's very fitting that each record is held by a different person and legend to the Goldeneye speedrunning annals of history. Congratulations to all 3 of you and good riddance to the rest of us for never coming close to tying these records! Another special mention goes out to Marc Rutzou, whom after given a set of guidelines and rewards for his time, accomplished Train Agent 0:58! Lets just say there was a prize on the line for achieving this time, which sweetened the deal! (It was actually a very rare controller, but Marc elected to take a cash-prize equivalent instead!)

Congratulations to Elizabeth Mimms and Ryan Hutcherson for formally announcing their engagement to be married! They started dating shortly after the 2009 Virginia meet and have been Mario Kart's flagship couple ever since. Liz should thank Nathan Stinson for reaching deep into the history of Mario Kart 64 and digging Hutch out from under that rock!

An absolutely unheard-of milestone has been breached in Goldeneye's total time. With contributions from Marc Rutzou and David Clemens on Surface 1 and Silo, the total time has now been lowered to 1:12:59! This is the first time since Spring 2010 that a minute barrier has been broken, and possibly the last one for quite some time! Our champ is now roughly 50 points ahead of 2nd place Rayan "Ace" Isran.

A short but quick update, you can find the official topic here. Please read through everything and post your thoughts!

On July 11, 2002, Randy Buikema set an untied record on Chicago Agent that was considered to be maxed. 0:16 was a record that had stood for 2 years with ties from many players. Randy set his sights on a perfect run which included pausing at the case, and eventually completed a 0:15.9, sending the elite into a frenzy and etching his name into the record books forever. 25 additional eliters have since achieved 0:15 in the last 9 years, most being certain that 0:15 would stand as a record for all time and rightfully so. Fast forward to June 25, 2011. Speedrunning as a whole has evolved into a precise science. The gamers since the days of Randy Buikema are more educated on the games, and significantly more determined to outpace those who have come before them. First it was Defection Agent 0:05 by Ilari Pekkala, and now... Chicago Agent 0:14, accomplished by David Clemens! David has made himself a legend in both games in a very short time. The Goldeneye champion and seemingly untouchable speedrunner overall set his sights on 0:14 using a slightly modified strategy of no-case-pausing. Raw skill and determination and 11 straight days of playing has brought the Perfect Dark elite into yet another truly maxed record. Without guys like David and Ilari, who knows if we would have ever seen the days where 0:05 and 0:14 would have happened. Not to be outdone in the world of speedrunning, Marc Rützou deserves a mention for his incredible trio of untied world records achieved earlier in the year. On New Year's Eve 2010, Marc executed a flawless Train Agent 0:59 in a final blow in a fight of who would be crowned king of Train Agent. Rayan Isran was the first to set the bar high with 1:01, which was then beaten by David Clemens over 3 years later. Marc would tie 1:00 on his way to establishing one of the greatest Agent world records of all time, 0:59. After achieving a ridiculous 1:55 on Dam 00 Agent, Marc would then execute one of the most brilliant times on the Secret Agent difficulty with Dam SA 1:16, recorded on January 28, 2011. 1:17 stood as the record since June 2006 by Ilari Pekkala and was then considered to be maxed and incredibly difficult to even tie. Marc's talent and sheer wisdom of the game along with a slightly modified strat of approaching the first gates allowed him to execute perfection of the alarms, lockshot, and blind finish to the stairs. 14 years of Goldeneye activity and 10 years of Perfect Dark activity and the elite is still going strong thanks to the priceless efforts of some of the greatest N64 gamers to ever touch a controller; they have put the community on their backs in an effort to completely max out games that Rareware probably never intended to live past a couple of years. It is times like these, the talents of those who still play, and the communities in which we all participate that insure that the elite will always draw new players and live on forever.

If you don't check General Chat very much, now is the time because the 2011 Summer Contest is going to start up very soon! Please check the topic for further details and be sure to get in your nominations!

Is your bracket dead like the rest of the world's? Check out the Elite Prediction Madness topic in General Chat to discuss this historic final four and vent about your favorite team's woes! We have another meet on the horizon! David Clemens and Alex Anderson will be flying to SWEDEN to join the Euros in another big-time international meet! Details in General Chat. In the "deal of 2011", godfather Jon Barber managed to land himself a brand new 1st-party Nintendo controller, upgrading from the one he's had since 1999. Be on the lookout for Ngamer to score some new Goldeneye PRs and to compete in the Mario Kart 64 tournament in Virginia! Did your team win the Super Bowl? Mine did! Congratulations to the Green Bay Packers for being the first #6 NFC seed to bring the Lombardi Trophy home! Opening day for Major League Baseball is April 4, are you ready?! You'll find Bryan Youse, QB, and Ngamer arguing about who's pitching rotation is better in General chat (while everyone forgets that San Francisco owned in the playoffs last year). On a random side note, board admin Scott Abbey bought himself one of the most sought-after pieces of Nintendo merchandise available. The price will not be disclosed, but have a look!