While I agree that the Console SRC board is indeed way too cluttered at this point, I don't like the proposed solution at all for many reasons:

About the difficulties:

I see no reason to remove any of the difficulties for either NG or NG+, on any version. The difficulties themselves are very different from one another, and offer great flexibility.

For example, if somebody wants to run New Game, they could choose Pro if they’re looking for the most competitive one and/or they don’t like DA strats; they could choose Normal if maybe they’re burnt out on Pro and don’t mind DA strats (my case for example as I have switched from Pro to Normal and the other difficulties as a nice little break countless times); they could choose Easy if they wanna skip boring sections like maze, key room, knights, etc, (thus making the run much shorter which many people prefer given that this game is so lengthy); or they could choose Amateur if the former is true and the runner is also looking for the least RNG difficulty.

Then for NG+, it’s a similar story. Runners that don’t like/can’t be bothered to learn DA strats can do Pro; runners that want the most competition can do Normal; runners that want a faster and less RNG type of Normal can choose Easy; and finally runners that want the fastest and least RNG category in Main Game can choose Amateur.

Just because New Game has traditionally been done on Pro and New Game+ has traditionally been done on Normal doesn’t mean the other difficulties are “a meme” or are not worth considering. I think they are more than different enough to keep them for flexibility reasons, as well as to provide people with alternatives to switch to if they get burnt out on the main ones, which is very likely to happen sooner or later if they are competitive.

About No Merchant:

No Merchant isn’t mentioned at all in the document so I think it’s safe to assume that the doc proposes to simply delete the category forever as if it never existed. I think this is terrible and very disrespectful towards the runners of that category. Despite many people shitting on NM, (on Steam at least) this category has been worked on and optimized an insane amount and there’s a lot of runners that care about it, like running it, and have spent a ton of time on it. There’s no reason to forbid them from running it.

About all versions of the game in general:

Even though the amount of versions/platforms this game is on has become a bit of a joke among the community, I think the vast majority of versions are good, are different enough to each other, and should be on the board (keep in mind we could expand quite a lot on what I’m about to list as I definitely lack in-depth game knowledge compared to other older runners):

1. GameCube is the oldest version of the game, possibly the most liked/has the most nostalgia, is still actively ran by people to this day, does not have Special 2 and does not have PRL introducing an interesting extra challenge, and is the only one that has the TMP glitch. Even if GC USB is a “better GC” I still see no reason to get rid of it.
2. PS2 is the second oldest version of the game, has some very unique strats due the long loadings and inventory blackscreens, and different enemy behavior to the other 30FPS versions (except PC’07). As if that wasn’t enough, runners like Luis have worked tremendously on this version getting some extremely good times, and lastly PS2 was and still is one of the most beloved consoles and the most widely sold console in history. Many people run or have ran PS2 not only because they like it but because the nostalgia factor is huge, and also the fact that (since it was the most sold console) many people still own this console. I see no reason to get rid of it either.
3. PC’07 makes sense to keep as it has a unique and extremely broken glitch not seen in any other version and can be ran on really bad PCs (so very very accessible).
4. Wii is also a very popular console in general and can be played with the Wiimote which even though I’m sure most people don’t use it, it still introduces a different and unique aspect as a version.
5. PS3 was quite popular at some point, and similarly to what I said above, it is still receiving submissions to this day.
6. Xbox 360 has a very different controller (similar concept as what I said about the Wiimote if you will) and is the fastest console 30FPS version if we go by loading times. This makes it a very good candidate for somebody that, for example, wants to run a console 30FPS version, but doesn’t feel like sitting through long loading times.
7. PS4 is by far the most popular console version of this game, has quite a different controller to PS2 and PS3, and it is still very active currently. It was also the first ever 60FPS console version and is, in general, an extremely popular console that many people own.
8. Xbox One offers an alternative to PS4 with a different controller, faster loading times, and locked NTSC, making the enemies more aggressive and thus (in theory) is harder.

About the 3 proposed versions:

It makes no sense to me to force people to run either Wii USB, GC USB or Steam. What if I don’t have a Wii or a GameCube? What if I only have a PS2, or only a 360, or only a PS3, etc. What if I have a Wii or a GameCube but I don’t like either of them for whatever reason? I think in general people decide what version to run based on some factors, in this order:

1. Availability: what console they actually already own, most people are just gonna run on that and won’t bother buying a different console just to run the game.
2. Appeal: if they have multiple consoles they’re gonna choose the console that they like the most, whether that is because it has the faster loading times, or a controller they like more, or because they feel more nostalgic towards it, etc.
3. Popularity: how many people actually run on the console they’re thinking of.
4. Resources: how accessible it is to learn the route for the version in whichever category they chose.

Having only 3 versions does not guarantee that the competition will be more closed together instead of so spread out, and in fact doesn’t guarantee there will be competition at all. It’s entirely possible that many of the runners that run or have ran PS2, PS3, PS4, 360, Xbox One, etc, would not wanna run on either of the 3 options proposed, and maybe some would just for the sake of running, but would actively not enjoy it as they could be running “forced” on a version they don’t even like. By reducing the pool of options to just 3 you’re removing comfort and options from the runners.

Even if we imagine the best case scenario where the 3 versions work and Wii USB and GC USB become super popular (I don't think it would happen though), you'd still run into issues. Because that means these categories would become very optimized faster and faster, which even though leads to more competition, it also leads to more frustration and burnout as I explained earlier. But because you'd no longer have options or alternatives when you burn out, you'd have no option but to quit running altogether, as you no longer have NG Normal or NG+ Easy for example to switch to, as these would naturally be less optimized and thus more relaxing to run. Still though, even if there's no burnout, many people naturally just get bored of running the same category over and over and over again. That's one of the reasons why I don't like this massive lack of options this solution proposes.

Deleting thousands of runs and close to 2 decades of history from the board for something that isn’t guaranteed to work isn’t the way to go. Even if you didn’t delete anything and moved everything that isn’t Wii USB, GC USB or Steam 60 to a new “Misc” category, you’re essentially achieving the same result. Burying tons of historical data to achieve something that might not even come to be. And telling these people to just check the spreadsheet if they still wanna run on something that is not these 3 versions is futile. We know for a fact most people have never cared and don’t care about what the sheet says.

The doc isn’t clear about this, but from what I understood, it proposes having only one board, no Steam vs Console separation. I believe this wouldn’t work due to these 2 being timed differently (LRT vs IGT) but even if it worked it would look ugly as I’m pretty sure LRT would be an empty column on the Console runs. Not a good idea.

I think we have to accept the fact that this game will never be like other games where all the competition is centralized in one place, whether that be a category or a version, and I think we should appreciate the variety and flexibility that all the versions and difficulties of this game offer. I personally think it is far more impressive to see a runner that has “good” times on many different versions of the game compared to a runner that has only one or a few “great” runs on a single version. The former shows great adaptability and game knowledge. The latter could just mean the runner grinded for years. As an example, I currently have WR for the most popular category on Steam, but I don’t consider myself nearly as good at the game as a whole as somebody like Luis Auddy or Derek who have gotten good times on a myriad of different versions and categories across so many years.

What I propose

Overall I see way more negatives than positives with what the document suggests as a fix. Notice how in my 3rd paragraph I don’t mention Wii U, Switch, PS5, Xbox Series S nor Xbox Series X. That’s because the alternative solution I would personally propose is:

1. Delete Wii U: it has never ever been a popular version of the game and only 7 runs have ever been done of it.
2. Merge Switch with PS4: these two have very similar loading times and Switch is the second most unpopular version after Wii U.
3. Merge PS5 with XSS/XSX: these 3 versions are quite unpopular, are essentially the exact same in terms of routing and strats, and fortunately have very similar loading times. Could just merge them together with no problem.
4. If the game were to be ported to PS6 or any other future console: simply don’t add these to the board unless it is requested by many different people, or alternatively add it merged to what I said on point 3.
5. Change the version sorting on the Console board from either most active to least active version, or most popular (historically) to least popular. The current sorting is from fastest to slowest version which isn’t a good way to go about it imo.
6. Make the currently most active version the default on the Console board (we know which version it would be as we actively verify these runs), instead of it always being PS4.
7. Keep the difficulties as is.
8. Keep No Merchant.

This way we achieve the initial goal of less board clutter while also not alienating anybody from running the game, not deleting any history, and not doing anything drastic that isn’t guaranteed to be successful.