If you’re a fan of speedruns, you most definitely noticed that all of them have the exact same timer on.
Here, we are going to show you how a speedrun timer works, where to download it, and how to set it up.
LiveSplit Timer
1. Download LiveSplit from the website;
2. Unzip LiveSplit to the desired location;
3. Open the folder and launch LiveSplit application;
4. Right-click on LiveSplit and choose Edit Splits;
5. Fill in the game name and category;
6. Add splits;
7. Edit hotkeys;
Installing in OBS
1. Connect LiveSplit with OBS through the Sources tab;
2. Add chroma key filter;
3. Change background color in LiveSplit app;
4. Remove the background color with these settings:
* Similarity to 75
* Smoothness to 10
* Spill reduction to 100
To learn about this topic in more detail, read further below!
Table of Contents
What Is a Speedrun Timer and Which One We’ll Be Using?
The speedrun timers are used by gamers to measure the exact in-game time they need to go through a certain level in the game.
Setting up timers is the easiest way to track and control your progress between milestones and throughout the whole game itself.
By doing that you will know exactly what your current run is, then you can also compare your time with other runners.
The name of the timer that we’ll be using is LiveSplit. I recommend this timer because it’s very easy to operate, there is no need for any type of log or password, and above all it’s free.
Setting up LiveSplit
First, we need to download this speedrun timer. To do that, you’ll go to your browser and then to the LiveSplit website to download it.
Once your download is finished, you’ll have a zip file that you’re going to load and extract to the location where you want to keep the program (the program itself doesn’t take up much space).
Below, I’m going to lay down a few steps for you to follow. So, that you can set up your LiveSplit timer without any hard times.
This speedrun timer works with windows as well as the mac os operating system.
Step one:
Now that you have your LiveSplit folder, open it up, find and load the LiveSplit application (ignore the other files).
Once loaded, on the top of your screen, a black window will appear with the timer. The first thing you want to do is set up splits.
Step two:
Right-click on LiveSplit and select the “edit splits” option. Once you have selected it, the splits editor will appear.
There, you can fill in the name of the game and the category you’ll be running.
Step three:
The next thing you are going to do is add splits. Splits are a way of breaking down the game into smaller segments in order to track your progress through the run.
For example, I’ll speedrun SuperMario Odyssey. So, I will be making individual splits for each level in the game by using the insert button on the left and then entering the names of the levels.
The names of your splits should be accurate so that you can remember them without any waiting.
Optional step:
An optional thing you can also add are icons to each split by double-clicking on the icon windows beside the names and activate the custom icons you want.
Once you complete filling in the game name, the category, and the splits you can select “ok” on the splits editor.
Now you can see that the LiveSplit timer window has changed and is displaying the splits.
Step four:
Now, you will choose your hotkeys, just right-click the LiveSplit window and select the “settings”.
The first five hotkey features are the ones you’ll be using the most during “races”.
The “start/split” hotkey features will start your timer and will advance to the next split for each subsequent press.
The “reset” hotkey will reset the timer and the “undo split” hotkey is for undoing a split.
The “skip split” hotkey features will skip the split that is currently active, which is used if you forget to split at the end of a segment and the “pause” button obviously pauses the timer.
Setting it up in OBS
The last thing I want to talk about is how to get a transparent background with a LiveSplit timer.
There isn’t an ability within Livesplit itself to have a transparent background, but using your streaming or recording software you can do this with a chroma key filter.
Nearly all runners use OBS to record and stream, so, I will be explaining how to use it to track your in-game time in OBS.
Step one:
First, have the LiveSplit timer open and start by ensuring that LiveSplit is a source that will connect within OBS by adding a window capture source and selecting LiveSplit in the drop-down menu (make sure to uncheck capture cursor).
Now you should see the LiveSplit timer in the preview window on your PC screen.
Step two:
Next, you will need to add a filter, right-click on the LiveSplit layout and click on filter.
Then go to the bottom left and click the “add chroma-key” filter.
What chroma does, is it takes color or a range of colors and makes them transparent in the OBS software layout.
Step three:
Thus, you will need to go over to LiveSplit, open the layout settings and change the background color.
Step four:
With the chroma-key added you will have to adjust the settings to remove the background from LiveSplit.
Set the key color type to custom, click on “select color” then pick the screen color and click on the background color of LiveSplit then click “ok”.
Customize the similarity to 75, smoothness to 10, and spill reduction to 100.
With everything set up the way you want it, make sure to save your split integration for the next time it loads.
Conclusion
Our main goal is to make it easy for you the user so that you can enjoy playing and streaming games on your PC without any hard time.
As always, best regards and good luck to all of you people out there.
