Speedrunning

[Mr EliteL]

Ah, TAS. I spent time enjoying watching Super Smash Bros Melee with TAS, sometimes Brawl (or Project M but only for TAS) and see what insane stuff a character can do with no limitations. Fox snipes with his laser any opportunity is cool, I know top players can do that but not the amount of what TAS can do.

A TAS with Sonic Heroes? Watched a bit of that video, didn't know you could speed through the stages that quickly.

[Moonface]

This came onto my YouTube feed today and I decided to watch it due to boredom, and this is currently my favourite speedrun documentary video for a specific game just because of the story behind it. The video is focused on the speedrun of Ratchet & Clank 3 and its NG+ category, and as the title indicates, about how someone managed to completely break the run in half. However, it's not the tech that I love the most here, but the fact that a small number of people were putting out runs in that category, and without their knowledge a player in Japan had put out a run that was over an hour faster than the best Western run. Speedrunning has never been a thing that's gotten me super excited, since I'm not a speedrunner and any time I do watch one the tech is all known and so I'm basically watching the runner going through the motions rather than seeing a step in the evolution of a run, but the way this video presents the scenario of a community randomly discovering someone who has blown them all out of the water and trying to figure out what they did really gripped me here.

I also don't know of any other stories where a speedrunning community got completely flipped on its head by a single person quietly doing their thing and neither party being aware of the others existence. Most stories tend to be someone locates tech and shares it as they find it, but this was a fated meeting of pure chance that turned what everyone in the RC3 community thought was a tapped out and dull category into what is claimed to be one of the hardest and most complex runs in any Ratchet game.

Don't Read If You Want To Watch The Video Blind

I also love that they asked the guy if the run was segmented, he said it was, but then proceeded to do the entire thing in a single run and beat his segmented time after that discussion. He eventually got beaten by other runners, but I felt something special watching the story unfold of a guy doing their own thing, being discovered, and then using that as motivation to go even further than before.

[Maniakkid25]

Sounds like what happened to Contra, Ninja Gaiden, Super Mario Bros, and other games: Westerners set times, only to suddenly find out that the Easterners have a run that blows everyone out of the water. Hotarubi is a name to watch for in cases like this: that person is a speedrun GOD from Japan, casually slapping silly times in games like Super Metroid. Hell, his run in Super Metroid was so legendary, it changed the timing system used by runners.

As well, this is unrelated, but I'm reminded of the fact that there are plenty of skips that have been found and used that were just accidents. In fact, one of them was a Ratchet and Clank skip (though, in the first game), hence why I was reminded of the subject. It's neat!

[ShiraNoMai]

Speaking of accidental finds, this one happened just yesterday by someone casually playing through MGS for the first time:

[Moonface]

@ShiraNoMai: So my impression from the video and replies is that the player managed to get pushed through the door and skip some content as a result?

Just watched this video about whether GDQ is still the best marathon for speedrunning, and it makes a lot of very good points: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vjyy-Uk...l=ThaRixer
The biggest one for me is just how corporate GDQ feels. I haven't felt that GDQ is fun in years, and that commentary on the couch feels awkward; it makes sense now knowing that everyone is likely filtering themselves to avoid breaking a rule. The video also covered another aspect of GDQ I've come to dislike, which is the game selection. It always feels very samey, and seeing that 7 Zelda games took up more time than every PlayStation game in a three day marathon explains that feeling. This video is almost three years old though and as far as I can tell GDQ hasn't changed since then and now, so I doubt GDQ will ever address the problems that are fairly brought up in this video.

[Moonface]

Yesterday I decided to pick up Uncharted 1 again because I just had an urge to replay it and grab the trophies I never got for it on PS4, and some of the trophies involved speed running either particular chapters or the entire game. It got me thinking, would anyone here like to see such trophies become more common for games, or would you rather games not include anything like that that pushes a player to do it?

[ShiraNoMai]

I think the inclusion of speedrun-type stuff is really neat, though I can't say I'm not a little weirded out by its inclusion on main screens in newly loaded games. "Hey here's this new game! Press New Game, or Play The Speedrun Mode!" like, okay, can I play your game vanilla first? Kinda makes you feel rushed or competitive out of the gate in a subconscious way.

Preferrably, these things should be unlocked post-game. Like, hey now that you beat it, try it again but faster! Or do it Hitman still where you can turn on the in-game timer as a toggle (not on by default) to pace yourself.

[Dragon Lord]

I'm fine with speedrun trophies as long as the time limit is lax. You can't expect casual players to sit there and beat a 30 hour game in an hour and a half. While I do enjoy abusing mechanics in games to break the games at times, if someone were to lock a trophy behind being able to do that in a game effectively, it'd just be stupid.

Kingdom Hearts Final Mix had a speedrun trophy, and while I can't remember how long it gave you off the top of my head, it was still more than fair. I paired it up with the trophies for beating the game on Beginner and for never changing equipment and it made for a decently fun time while still being more than doable.

So yeah, as long as they're not expecting players to be world record breakers for a speedrun trophy, then it's fine.

[WR91]

I never found a need to either speedrun a game myself or watch someone do one. I think games are to be explored and taken in and speedrunning a game (to me) is just trying to do everything perfect and as quickly as possible. Meh. It's just not for me.

[Moonface]

I think games are to be explored and taken in and speedrunning a game (to me) is just trying to do everything perfect and as quickly as possible. Meh. It's just not for me.

Well anyone who does speedrun a game has already explored it to a degree far beyond any regular player, due to needing to find techniques and memorising routes and such. I'm not sure if you were implying speedrunners don't play a game fully like any non-speedrunner does, but just in case I wanted to clarify they absolutely do do that before they ever begin learning how to speedrun it.

[queenzelda]

Apparently I'm to blame for their being a speedrun of The Quiet Man video game. xD

[Kyng]

I think games are to be explored and taken in and speedrunning a game (to me) is just trying to do everything perfect and as quickly as possible. Meh. It's just not for me.

Well anyone who does speedrun a game has already explored it to a degree far beyond any regular player, due to needing to find techniques and memorising routes and such. I'm not sure if you were implying speedrunners don't play a game fully like any non-speedrunner does, but just in case I wanted to clarify they absolutely do do that before they ever begin learning how to speedrun it.

That's certainly true - although, as someone who feels the same way about 'exploring and taking in' the game, I would rather get a new game and start exploring that instead, than speedrun a game I've already explored. 

(Of course, other gamers are entirely free to speedrun games that they've already beaten normally... it's just not my preferred style of gaming personally  )

[Moonface]

That's certainly true - although, as someone who feels the same way about 'exploring and taking in' the game, I would rather get a new game and start exploring that instead, than speedrun a game I've already explored.

Ah, I see. Yeah, even when I've been vaguely interested in trying to run a game, what turns me off is the prospect of playing that one game over and over again. Even if I'm interspersing other new games in to play alongside learning the run, I don't think I could love any game enough to keep repeating the same parts of it over and over. Normally the games I dump hundreds of hours into are those that always offer up something new or different, like Minecraft, Binding of Isaac, Terraria, LBP2, etc. LBP2 is one of my favourite games of all time but I poured hundreds of hours into it because of user created levels; I couldn't do that by just playing the story mode over and over again. Beyond the stuff runners have to learn about their game, I have just as much respect for that as I do the fact they've managed to spend so much time on one game and not grow tired of it at all.

[ShiraNoMai]

As someone that has dedicated a little bit of time to learning a speedrun, it is quite fulfilling when you do get things nailed and done. If not for pursuing a career and the like, I'd have happily continued trying to learn more of the run with more time.

Once you find a game you'd happily return back to to try and get more of a challenge out of it (in probably a similar vein to trophies, I imagine), it's a no-brainer to want to try and attempt learning a speedrun route.

[ShiraNoMai]

Speedrunning has such a long and tenured history and it's honestly one of the coolest things in gaming. I've been meaning to watch this documentary Good Deed Films put out on the subject, featuring narration by famed YouTuber SummoningSalt: