Speedruns

How to Start Speedrunning – Guide, Tips, Timers, Hardware
20Apr By SpeedGamingNews2 Comments
Guides, Speedruns

How to Start Speedrunning – Guide, Tips, Timers, Hardware

At some point, in 2015, after years of watching speedruns, I found a game that I truly wanted to speedrun. I went through a lot of headaches and confusion when getting started up, so I figure I'll save you some trouble. I'll first start off covering the details on a surface level, and then if you need any extra details of how to speedrun, you can keep reading. I hope this guide works as both a quick speedrun checklist, and a thorough enough guide that you'll be able to refer back to it when you're looking into more advanced approaches. I personally believe the best way to start speedrunning is to not overthink it. As a quick guide for beginners to jump in and get started, here's the general overview of the steps you will need to take. How to Start Speedrunning 1. Choose a game 2. Watch ...
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What is Speedrunning? Speedrunning Explained
13Apr By Adrian GonzalezNo Comments
Community, Guides, Speedruns

What is Speedrunning? Speedrunning Explained

Speedrunning has been around for decades now, but gamers have given it a recent surge in popularity. Lots of people who aren't familiar with video games are asking, "What is speedrunning? What's a speedrun? Why is it so, so popular?" At face value, speedrunning can be summed up quite easily. This is what speedrunning is: Speedrunning is the act of beating a video game, or segment of a game, as quickly as possible while adhering to a set of rules which have been established by the game's individual community. Speedruns makes use of leaderboards to track who holds the fastest times for different categories such as Any%, 100%, and other various rulesets. But it's more than that. It's hard work, practice, grit, consistency, strategy, technique, technical knowledge, risk, luck, com...
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How to Grow a Following in an Obscure Speedrun: The iCarly Blow Up – A Case Study
2Apr By Naomi NorbezNo Comments
Guides, Speedruns, World Records

How to Grow a Following in an Obscure Speedrun: The iCarly Blow Up – A Case Study

Okay, maybe "blow up" is a bit strong. But when you consider that most obscure games will have just one or two speedruns on the leaderboards if any, I'd say this one constitutes as a blow up. So, what’s a speedgame that’s obscure? A game that no reasonable person would think to speedrun? Well, probably iCarly for the Nintendo Wii. Let's take a quick look at where the boost in popularity came from and how this applies to building up a following for any speedrun. This game used to be a title with a mostly empty leaderboard, lost to time and history -- a shovelware product that faded into the background of everyone’s collective memories. But thanks to the actions of one person, that has changed. Meet Saltydkdan, a YouTuber (retired from this project) who previously dedicated themsel...
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Can You Beat Minecraft in Under 10 Minutes?
23Mar By Adrian GonzalezNo Comments
Personal Bests, Routing, Speedruns, World Records

Can You Beat Minecraft in Under 10 Minutes?

Wow, it has been an INSANE month for Minecraft speedrunning. The community managed to break sub-14 minutes. Not only that, but sub-12 was achieved. Can you imagine beating Minecraft in under 14 or even 12 minutes? If beating the game in under 12 minutes is possible, then is beating Minecraft in under 10 minutes possible? Let's take a look at the past four world records (all in the same month) to see if it is. Please note that speedrun.com looks at the in-game time rather than real-time. Illumina's 13:53 YouTuber and speedrunner Illumina managed to pull off a sub-14 right at the beginning of the month. This was the first sub-14 run of Minecraft ever. How did he do it? Illumina started out about a hundred or so blocks away from a village. He ran his way over to the village and...
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How to get the Secret Ending in Hollow Knight (Spoiler Free)
18Mar By Pluma de ÍcaroNo Comments
Challenges, Gaming, Guides

How to get the Secret Ending in Hollow Knight (Spoiler Free)

If you’ve completed Hollow Knight’s story, whether recently or long ago, it might have left you a bit… hollow. It is not new having “bad endings” in video games for our main characters, and sometimes those are there for the best. However, despite how tragic Hallownest’s story is, some of us just waited for the credits to stop rolling and show us a better resolution to the conflict presented. If this is your case, fear not, because instead of a post-credit scene, there is a secret, more complex ending, which has a better outcome for our protagonist. It requires some extra work, and that is what we will be explaining in today’s article while keeping out any major spoilers as best as possible. What you will first need to have is an item from the Ancient Basic. Though you may already kno...
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The Mexican Runner Takes on The God Run Challenge in Cuphead
7Feb By Lydia MockensturmNo Comments
Challenges, Gaming, Speedruns

The Mexican Runner Takes on The God Run Challenge in Cuphead

The Mexican Runner, the absolute gaming legend, is working on his latest Cuphead challenge: The God Run! The Mexican Runner, also known as TMR, is a speedrunner who usually plays retro games, particularly NES. At the time of this article, TMR holds 30 speedrun world records, with times on leaderboards of 40 different games. Despite his many speedrunning accomplishments, he's most known for something else. He was also the first-ever player to complete the entire NES catalog. And he did it all live on Twitch, with most games being completed blind. Despite this being an insanely massive challenge to take on, it only took him 3 years. In just 3 years TMR completed all 714 officially licensed titles in a project he dubbed NESMania. You can find more details on this project, including TMR’s r...
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AdamFerrari64 Takes on More Super Mario World Records
30Nov By SpeedGamingNewsNo Comments
Speedruns, World Records

AdamFerrari64 Takes on More Super Mario World Records

AdamFerrari64 has quickly risen up the leaderboards on multiple games, attaining multiple Super Mario world records. Inspired by Darbian, Adam picked up Super Mario Land 2 as a speedrun in June 2020 and blasted his way through incredible times on the leaderboard. I personally have been watching Super Mario Land 2 speedruns since 2013, and seeing someone move up so quickly on the leaderboards is practically unheard of. In the main category, Any% Glitchless, AdamFerrari64 stands in first place with a 26:14, right above IluvMario (26:18), Darbian (26:19), Oh_DeeR (26:20), EiP25 (26:21), along with many other talented and incredible runners holding ranks nearby. With those on the leaderboard between 2nd and 5th place spanning a mere 1 second apart each, Adam's more than 4 second lead shows you...
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The Journey from Casual to WR Holder – New Super Mario Bros. Wii Low% by BMAN_03
7Oct By SpeedGamingNewsNo Comments
Speedruns, World Records

The Journey from Casual to WR Holder – New Super Mario Bros. Wii Low% by BMAN_03

New Super Mario Bros. Wii was one of my (BMAN_03) favorite childhood games. I was originally a Nintendo DS kid around the mid to late 2000's, until I received the Wii for Christmas of 2009. Playing games like Mario Kart Wii, New Super Mario Bros. Wii (NSMB Wii), Super Smash Bros Brawl, Skylanders, Super Mario Galaxy, and many more. I just really loved Wii games. Eventually I got into Minecraft and such, so I started to drift away from the Wii. I got a bit older and it wasn't until 2018 that I felt the urge to play some childhood classics. At the time, I was also aware that speedrunning exists. My ideas clashed. I thought I was good enough at these Wii games to give speedrunning a try, so with very little practice, I jumped right into it. On the 23rd of September of 2018, I attempted my ...
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Grand Poo World 2 Any% – New World Record in 46:53
28Sep By SpeedGamingNewsNo Comments
Personal Bests, Speedruns, World Records

Grand Poo World 2 Any% – New World Record in 46:53

 Grand Poo World 2 is a Kaizo Super Mario World made by the incredibly entertaining BarbarousKing and is considered one of the most difficult non-TAS Kaizos out there. It is also one of the most popular. Every single jump of every single level of the game is very hard and can kill the player multiple times, so some serious grinding is required to beat the game by the first time. Despite the steep difficulty, the game and level design is truly incredible -- and the whole game is extremely fun to play. The setups in each level seem to work perfectly, which is hard to accomplish while making a Super Mario World rom hack. This makes each death only the player's fault and not the game itself. Quick note from SpeedGamingNews: This article was written by Rotciv__. Please go check o...
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5 Favorite Speedruns of SGDQ 2020 – A Look Back
27Sep By KonceptioN2No Comments
Events, Speedruns, Tournaments & Races

5 Favorite Speedruns of SGDQ 2020 – A Look Back

Summer Games Done Quick 2020 Online (SGDQ 2020) has come and gone, but it isn’t time to say goodbye just yet! The event, which raised approximately 2.3 million dollars for Doctors Without Borders from August 16th to the wee hours of August 23rd, was full of incredible displays of gaming from runners across the globe. While it is always hard to select just a few favorite speedruns, here are five which had really stuck out to us over the course of the event -- in no particular order. 1. Pokémon FireRed/LeafGreen - Any% Glitchless Race by JP_Xinnam and PulseEffects Pokémon runs always have a lot of twists and turns, and this run was no exception. One of the main features of this race was that each of the runners utilized a different starter through the entirety of the run. JP_Xinnam ran...
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