November 10, 2021 • 28 mins
One popular thing that gamers do is finish a good game.. as fast as they can. In this short episode, we cover the general aspects of what a speedrun is, throw in the gamertags of some of the best speedrunners out there on twitch and Perf offers himself to you if you happen to be a Resident Evil fan
Speedrunners :
Zfg1 : Zelda Ocarina of Time
Firedragon764 : games for kids
Calebhart42 : Megaman and Final Fantasy VII
gettinggamers.com
@GettingGamers (Twitter and Facebook)
@Juke_ish (Instagram, Twitch, Twitter)
Perf: twitch.tv/perfectedl
Art by Arielle:
twitter @ProphetPossum
instagram @ProphetOPossum
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Juke (00:10):
Hello humans and welcome to getting gamers your guide to
understanding the gamers in yourlife. I am Duke My pronouns are
they them?
Perf (00:19):
And I am Perf. My pronouns are he him. And today we're
gonna talk about speedrunning.
Juke (00:24):
Yeah, so it's been a few episodes that we mentioned that
whenever the rare times and thatPerf is on Twitch, he is likely
doing speed runs of ResidentEvil and we thought why not
explain that? Because I feellike it's probably a common
thing that kids watch too. Likethe kid the parents are passing
by. And like, not only is my kidnot gaming, he's watching
(00:47):
someone else game. And they theydon't understand that already.
So
Perf (00:52):
I know for a fact that it's a very popular thing.
Probably amongst kids too,because I know that a lot of
speed runners are doing Nintendogames speedruns such as we just
mentioned Super Mario Bros.
Games on the SNES. It's a SuperNintendo. So
Juke (01:17):
Is that the one that's like handheld?
Perf (01:22):
I don't think so.
Juke (01:24):
Nevermind. I don't know this stuff.
Perf (01:26):
Talking about Game Boys?
Juke (01:27):
No, there's like a Nintendo Switch.
Perf (01:31):
No c'est ca, it's a more retro game.
Juke (01:34):
Okay. So like the the games everyone grew up with?
Like our generation grew upwith?
Perf (01:41):
Yeah, pretty much.
Juke (01:43):
So people now are still playing those games, but like
speed running them?
Perf (01:47):
Yeah. So the kids from our time, are speed running, the
retro games.
Juke (01:52):
And then they like teams now are like, wow, those guys
are so cool. But it's becausethey've played it their whole
life.
Perf (01:57):
Yeah, it must have been doing the game for a 100 times,
Juke (02:02):
Damn.
Perf (02:02):
And more.
Juke (02:03):
All right. So before we talk about people who do
speedrun, can you define kind ofwhat speed running is?
Perf (02:11):
Well, it's what like the name suggests is doing the game
as fast as you can. And thisincludes using exploits in the
game. There's some times bugsor, or, how can we do this, but
(02:32):
it is exploits from the gamedesign, let's say..
Juke (02:36):
Like flaws or..
Perf (02:37):
Yeah exactly.
Juke (02:38):
Things you normally not able to do. But now because
there was an in the programmingof the game, a glitch or
whatever, you can do this thingfaster.
Exactly. It's it's discovered bydoing the games over and over
again, or, just by chance, purechance you you're stuck in a
corner and you realize that bypressing a certain a sequence of
(03:01):
buttons on your controller thatyou go through a wall, for
example, or you jump, you gainaccess to a zone that you're not
supposed to access at a certaingiving time in the game.
Okay, but this would be, becausethat sounds a lot to me like
(03:25):
when like I don't have a lot ofexperience with this. But my
stepbrother used to play GrandTheft Auto, and you can like you
could find cheats, and you do asequence of like a b x x x x Z,
blah, blah, blah, and then youlike helicopter view or
something. But this would not beachieved.
Perf (03:45):
It's a completely different, well, it could be
still considered to be likecheating, but it's not, it's not
a cheat code.
Juke (03:53):
Okay.
Perf (03:55):
It's just a way of exploiting the game in your
favor for just for timeactually.
Juke (04:02):
So you were talking to me about a game that you play with
Zik where if you like hug thewall and you you could like
shoot through the wall eventhough you're not supposed to
because of how the game isprogrammed walls there it made
it kind of like accidentallyshoot through it or something.
Perf (04:25):
Well, that that's the case in many of these game exploits
that you get.
Juke (04:30):
Okay.
Perf (04:32):
Let's say you're hugging the wall, pressing a few buttons
and you end up being outside ofthe of the map of the program
that's been designed for thisparticular level, a particular
time in the game. And dependingon the game, you can end up
seeing, see the actualprogramming of the map design.
(04:55):
So it allows you to go throughwalls, to, through enemies..
Skip entire zones of the game.
So So speedrunning is not alwaysfun. It's not... Because you you
see all the flaws in the game,you see how it's made. But you
skip some fun parts toosometimes. And..
Juke (05:20):
So the goal of speedrunning is to get to the
end of the game...
Perf (05:28):
As fast as possible.
Juke (05:29):
As fast as possible. Is there so? Like, is the goal of
speed reading to find as many ofthese loopholes as possible? Or
is it really just to get to theend? Because in my mind, if
you're doing these loopholes,then are you really finishing
the game? If you end up skippinga whole part? Because you found
(05:50):
this loophole, then did youfinish the game if you didn't do
that part?
Perf (05:55):
Clearly not. It's a, let's say a speedrun. Is as opposed as
Juke (05:55):
It's the opposite you mean.
a completionist. Acompletionist.
Perf (06:03):
Yeah.
Juke (06:03):
Okay.
Perf (06:04):
Yeah, it's the complete opposite.
Juke (06:05):
Okay.
Perf (06:20):
Every file, every upgrades, every everything that
the game designer puts insidethe game. And as a speed runner,
you're going to skip as muchstuff as you can, and still be
able to defeat let's say, theend boss.
Juke (06:34):
So no side quests, unless you need that specific reward to
beat the boss.
(07:19):
there's a lot of Nintendo gamesthat are, let's say spin offs
from the real story.
Because I was watchinggame. It's a game show called
Hmm actually done by CollegeHumor. You probably don't know,
but probably a lot of listenersknow it because College Humor is
pretty big. And I'm actually islike a fun game show where the
(07:39):
host says fact there's somethingwrong. In fact, first one to
buzz in and say what's wrongwith the fact that he said, he
has to preface like after hebuzzes he has to say Hmm
actually and then say hiscorrection, if he doesn't say
Hmm actually..
Perf (07:56):
I think you showed me that.
Juke (07:57):
Yeah, so in that in that show. I found out that while we
like in the whole Mario brosuniverse, Waluigi is not related
to Mario, he is Mario'schildhood friend, that ends up
turning against them. So thatepisode of Hmm actually actually
(08:18):
taught me that there was more tothe lore of Mario Bros, than I
thought, because I was like,Waluigi? I mean, Wario? I meant
Wario. Did I say Waluigi,whatever I meant Wario, Mario
with a W. Like, I thought, youknow, they were related. That's
why their names are so but no.
Perf (08:37):
For some reason, I thought they were the evil cousin pair.
Juke (08:42):
Yeah, something like that.
Like I thought they were likethe evil parallel universe or
something or evil twin that wasuglier. I don't know. But no
he's a childhood friend orsomething. It's, it's, there's
more story to it than I thought.
But in the games, it's not thatstory focused.
Perf (09:00):
No, sure enough.
Juke (09:01):
And so do you find that in speed running? It's mostly games
that don't have a story or ismostly games that do or speed
runners don't give a fuck theyjust want to speed run,
Perf (09:12):
I think is the third option. Okay, be honest. As long
as the they can find all theexperts needed, and they can
speed run it. They don't caremuch about anything else. Okay,
the only thing they care aboutis how to optimize their run to
have the lowest time possible.
Because for many of speedrunners I think the the the end
(09:32):
goal for them is not the loreit's not the completion of the
game. It's world records.
Juke (09:41):
So a bit like people who like to sprint you want to be
the fastest sprinter Yeah,pretty much it's the same thing.
Yeah, versus someone who wantsto through hike they want to see
the best views. Like a slowhiker wants to see all the views
a sprinter wants, the best time.
Perf (09:57):
I guess we could say it's the sprint version of a video
games?
Juke (10:02):
Yeah, that's, that's interesting. But so you were
showing me I don't know, if youwere leading up to that, but you
were showing me kind of on thescreen earlier, what a speed run
stats look like?
Perf (10:13):
Yeah, they stream it on, let's say on Twitch. For the
viewers they're gonna the speedrunner are going to show you the
average time for which theyshould acquire certain items or
attain certain place in theirlevel or in the game. And right,
(10:36):
besides this average time,you're going to have their own
time, it's going to be green ifthey're ahead for, let's say, 15
seconds ahead or in red, or ifthey're behind. And all of this
is in real time.
Juke (10:51):
Yeah, so what what I'm getting from that is that the
goal isn't only to get to theend of the game as fast as
possible, but also to hitcertain milestones before
certain time. there's this, butI'm guessing there's a certain
order anyways, that you have todo it to get to the end, as fast
(11:11):
as possible.
Perf (11:12):
Exactly these milestones are, are there to give them a
certain reference so they canevaluate if this speedrun is
actually worth finishing, to bethere on time. Or just to start
all over again.
Juke (11:33):
So like, halfway through the they realize like, they hit
too many milestones late, sothey know they're not going to
beat their time. So they mightas well start over.
Perf (11:41):
Exactly.
Juke (11:41):
Aha. I see.
Perf (11:43):
I've seen that happen only for Resident Evil 2. Because
it's the only game I have beentrying to speed run a few times.
But I'm not even close from therecord world records.
Juke (11:56):
But Resident Evil also gives you a grade at the end of
your game.
Perf (12:01):
Exactly.
Juke (12:02):
Which I, the games I've played, which are very few, like
Borderlands, you don't reallyhave a you don't you don't get
graded at the end of your run.
Perf (12:11):
Borderlands is considered to casual I think to have a
grade after.
Juke (12:16):
Me, it was the first time I had ever seen a grade, at the
end of a video game was ResidentEvil and I was very surprised. I
think from what I saw, it'sconsistent through all of the
Resident Evil?
Perf (12:28):
Pretty much yeah. It's graded from S to D or E I think.
Juke (12:35):
And so on Resident Evil is your grade related to how fast
you do it or related to how welllike someone who does a speed
run the fastest speed runner, ishe gonna have an A plus? Or is
he gonna have like a, b becausehe doesn't care about the grade
only cares about the time
Perf (12:55):
He's most likely gonna have S tier still, which is the
highest because the main factorsthat determine your grade is the
time you take for the run. So bydefinition, you will most likely
have the best time you can. Andthe other one is the amount of
(13:15):
time you save in the game.
Juke (13:18):
Meaning doing the action of saving so as to not lose your
progress?
Perf (13:22):
As acheckpoint, exactly.
Juke (13:24):
Okay, so it's important to..
Perf (13:27):
Save less.
Juke (13:28):
Okay, so the less you save your progress, the better you.
Perf (13:32):
Yeah, cuz it's, it's harder if you save less, because
if you die, you're gonna have tostart over from a longer period
of time.
Juke (13:44):
So you're more badass if you did less save, so you get a
better grade. And there's a inthat in Resident Evil, it takes
time, you have to go somewhereto save. That's why it takes
more time.
Perf (13:56):
Exact Yeah. There are different predetermined places
that you have to go physicallygo in the game, to save.
Juke (14:03):
Okay . See, that's an interesting thing. Because if
your kid or your boyfriend is aspeed runner, it's obviously not
an online game. So you mightthink, oh well, he should be
Yeah because technically. Well,speedruns are made offline.
able to pause. If I'm going totalk to him, you know, he should
be able to stop his game,whatever. It's not an online
(14:24):
game, so I'm not bothering hisfriends. But if your partner is
into that type of stuff, and istrying to get a good grade, then
then that might be a huge thingif you ask him to like stop his
game and save so that he can goI don't know, do whatever chore
you need him to do. He it mighthinder the result of the of the
(14:47):
game so they're in anotherreason as to not being able to
necessarily pause or end or savethe game.
Yeah. It can be done offline.
But if you pause to go dosomething else, you're gonna
it's gonna kill your momentumand your focus for sure.
(15:10):
Yeah. That's interesting.
Perf (15:14):
Because these guys aside from exploits, they can still do
pretty impressive skill basefeats, if I can say.
Juke (15:25):
That's cool, is there, like competitions that are for
speed runners?
Perf (15:30):
Yeah, I can't say I know them very well. But I know that
there's world records andcompetition, I think that was
from LAN ETS. I know there wassome competition for speed
runners.
Juke (15:37):
Ah yeah? There was like a speed running section?
Perf (15:44):
Yeah. Pretty sure there was.
Juke (15:48):
Interesting.
Perf (15:50):
Just to give you like as somewhat of a reference, let's
say Resident Evil 2, of course.
A normal run would take youabout, let's say, 8 to 12 hours
depending on your level ofcompletionism. But as far as I
know, that best time and I don'tremember the name of the person,
(16:12):
but it was 53 minutes.
Juke (16:15):
Oh, okay. That's...
Perf (16:17):
So it requires you to know every weakness of every single
enemies their pathing. The mapsby heart, the timing of the
enemies, when they're when andwhere they're going to come out.
There's a few random elementsyou can't control because
depending on how the game isprogrammed, the the enemies are
(16:40):
going to spawn at some differentspawn points. And this is
randomly generated. Sospeedrunners have to do with
that, it's generally the, themain obstacle they're going to
go through. Because otherwise,they, they just remember
(17:00):
everything else perfectly.
Juke (17:03):
That's interesting, because if I think back on the
times that you showed me,Resident Evil, which is a game
you speed ran, as a beginner, itwas interesting to see because
we would walk by a dead bodythat was just laying there that
wasn't necessarily I wasn't ableto interact with at that moment.
(17:26):
But you were like, but you youwere telling me on your way
back, this guy's gonna reanimatewhich was interesting for a
beginner, especially a beginnerwho doesn't like horror games.
Because then that had, I had asense of preparedness.
Perf (17:42):
It's taking out the effect of jumpscares.
Juke (17:45):
Yeah, so I think that that, if a last, not last
episode, sorry about that. Inone of our previous episodes, we
talked about how you got me intogaming and stuff like that, I
would say, for a gamer who mightwant to get the partner into
gaming, maybe a game that youknow, as, like, if you're a
(18:09):
speed runner, maybe that's agood game, to show your beginner
because you can give them allthese cues that are going to
make it easier for like a firstgame depending on the game, of
course, but if you know a gameto that level that deep where
you know, the maps by heart andthe timings by heart, it might
be a great game to explain sinceyou know, know it, so well, you
(18:34):
know.
Perf (18:35):
To a, to a noob?
Juke (18:36):
Yeah, not in the speed run manner, but in the sense of
like, since you know, all thetimings and you have your noob
playing, you'll be like, Okay,so like that, see that guy over
there, he's gonna get he's gonnawalk all the way to that point.
And he won't go further. So youcan do this or that, or this,
you know, stuff like that, whichis really useful when you know,
a game so intensely.
Perf (18:59):
We could certainly do that together. But it takes out the
the element of surprise, and ittakes all this.. It's clearly
spoiling the game.
Juke (19:08):
Yeah. But I mean, in the in the sense, not necessarily
for me, like you've shown meResident Evil. It's not
necessarily my vibe. But ifwe're thinking about a gamer
trying to get a non gamer intogaming, maybe someone who's more
reluctant, and who doesn't. Whojust focuses on the fact that
it's hard, which I think a lotof non gamers who don't want a
(19:29):
game, just focus on the factthat it's hard, and they don't
get past that, then that couldbe an option. I don't know we
don't have to..
Perf (19:37):
It is but you'd have to take the person by the hand and
show them exactly what's gonnahappen. But it's certainly
doable for sure. Yeah, if youguys want to just check out a
few of the best speed runnersthere's out there. And there's a
on Twitch Of course, yes,there's a Zfg1, which is the
(20:04):
most reknown speedrunner forZelda Ocarina of Time. I know
there's a lot of people thatknow this particular game. Even
if you're not a gamer, you havesurely heard of this before. So
he's got like, 77,000 followers.
So that's quite a lot. If youwant some more kids, kids like
(20:29):
game, you can go withfiredragon764. He's got a lot of
Nintendo game speed runs andthere's also Caleb Hart. 42.
With streams, Megaman speedruns.
For the more retro gamers outthere.
Juke (20:49):
I think we'll try to remember to link them because
Twitch, fight names are never
Perf (20:54):
Yeah, I'm gonna put them in the description of course.
Juke (20:58):
Yeah. So what's the appeal? Like when people watch
speed runs? Are they watching?
Are they watching to learn,like, in your opinion, because I
know you don't watch that muchspeed runs. But in your opinion,
when people watch speed runs, isit more because they're trying
to learn how to speed run? Or isit more like when you're
watching people sprint at theOlympics? You're just like, wow,
they're fast?
Perf (21:18):
I think it's a mix. It's both. You can clearly watch some
speed runners to try and speedrun yourself. But it's not it's
not the other than theentertainment. I don't think
there's much else to speedrunning.
Juke (21:38):
Yeah, it's more of a watching a sport. Like a fast.
Perf (21:42):
Yeah, exactly.
Juke (21:43):
All right.
Perf (21:44):
It's only for good sports.
Juke (21:46):
So let's say someone at home, like one of our listeners
has a speed has a speed runnerat home. Is there anything that
like they can do? For you know,that can help your speed runner
out? Other than leaving themalone? I guess not right.
Perf (22:06):
Good question. Maybe just trying to help him find some
other speedrunners that arebetter than him.
Juke (22:13):
Yeah, I would not go with that. Generally, people don't
like your mom. You definitelydon't want your mom to say, I
know you like that game. I foundsomeone who's better than you.
That's like the most annoyingmom thing you will hear. But no,
I don't think there's reallyanything that that like a home
(22:35):
can be done to improve that, butI'll definitely say.
Perf (22:41):
But I mean, watching other speed runners is sure surely a
good thing to do because you'regonna have more chance to
discover and learn about newexploits on the game that you
might not have thought before.
Juke (22:55):
Yeah, but I meant more like as a partner or parent of
someone who likes speedrunningbecause if I think of the games
that you are not in like thatyou don't speed round but that
you just play I I would say thislike a parent or partner to just
like, like I checked off on myphone for the news, gaming
(23:15):
stuff. So like, since you wereinto Hearthstone, I wanted to
get like Hearthstone news andBlizzard news, since you're you
you play a lot of Blizzardgames. But if you're if
someone's up to speed running,then you're not really
interested in necessarily goingdeep into the lore of the game.
So there's not really anythingthat you can do as like a
(23:37):
partner or parent of a speedrunner to like really get into
that vibe especially if speedrunning isn't your thing you
kind of just have to let them dotheir own thing and and maybe
just ask them their scores andbe like oh, did you beat your
record?
Perf (23:54):
Yeah, but whether we pretty much it because it's very
specific and you can't reallyhave.. is that would be very
surprised you're getting a lotof those Oh, I've tried trying
these, this sequence of buttonsin that specific corner and this
specific level ..
Juke (24:11):
It's like asking your speed runner his his score at
the end. If he beat his level orasked your speed runner what's
the hardest part? What's What'sthe part that like slows them
down every time in the game andlike make him explain that to
you that that's a fun..
Perf (24:28):
Yeah, exactly. Maybe just do something in a casual
conversation about it and youmaybe first he's gonna like the
attention and second and maybehe's just while he's talking to
you maybe he's gonna find orthink about another way of
speedrunning this thisparticular part of the game.
Juke (24:47):
Yeah, cuz if I think not a game that your speed running,
but the game that you play wouldsay critical Gears of War. Yeah,
yeah. Is that the game where youcan accidentally shoot through
walls?
Perf (24:59):
Yeah, it's one of them.
It's like a loophole. Right?
If we want, we can say that.
Juke (25:04):
That for me, because get your Gears of War is a game that
doesn't really interest me. Likeevery time I see you play, I'm
like, oh, cool, you're playingbut I'm never like, Oh, I'm
gonna play, you know?
Perf (25:14):
Yeah, well, it's a very high skill cap. .
Juke (25:18):
High skill cap?
Perf (25:19):
Yeah. Third Person Shooter.
Juke (25:20):
And it's online too. So, but but it was interesting even
though it's a game that I'm notinterested in it was interesting
to find out about this littleloophole because it's, it's
like, oh, like, that's weirdthat you can shoot through walls
and do this random stuff. Likethere.. there is stuff that can
be interesting if you're even ifyou're not interested in the
(25:41):
game. So if you want to start aconversation, and you're clearly
noticing that your gamer is moreof a speed runner type, then
having those types ofconversations like Oh, what,
what's the cool loopholes inthis game? You know, and stuff
like that?
Perf (25:53):
Yeah, it can take all their imagination. Maybe they're
just gonna talk to you aboutthat with all their heart. You
can also buy them drugs so theycan go faster. No don't do that.
Juke (26:06):
Don't do that.
we're not giving such advice onthis podcast.
Perf (26:11):
No. Clearly, not giving advice and telling people to go
buy drugs.
Juke (26:17):
No.
Perf (26:19):
That would be evil. And fun, but mainly evil.
Juke (26:26):
Alright, so this episode's gonna have been on the shorter
side of things appropriate for aepisode about speed running for
it to not be too long.
Perf (26:36):
Yeah, is a speed speed episode.
Juke (26:39):
Can go to getting gamers.com We have a glossary
there that gives great littledefinitions of gamer terms. And
you can find us at gettinggamers on Twitter and Facebook
mainly. And you can find me atJuke underscore ish on Twitch
(26:59):
Twitter, Instagram. That'spretty much it. And Perf is
Perfectedl notwitch.tv/perfectedl.
Perf (27:08):
Perfected with an L at the end. And if if there's even only
one person asking for it, I cando a personal speedrun well try
a personal speedrun fromResident Evil 2 remake. Yeah,
there's gonna be my very owneaster egg from these episodes.
Juke (27:27):
To be honest, I think even if people don't ask for it, he
might do it.
Perf (27:31):
Yes but I'm just gonna make it twice.
Juke (27:35):
Alright, then. GG!
Perf (27:36):
GG!
Juke (27:38):
The artwork for this podcast was made by my dear
friend Arielle you can find heron Twitter at @profitpossum. And
you can find her on Instagram at@profitOpossum. Our intro and
outro song is made by David.
Perf (28:00):
Job's done.
Hello humans and welcome to getting gamers your guide to
understanding the gamers in yourlife. I am Duke My pronouns are
they them?
Perf (00:19):
And I am Perf. My pronouns are he him. And today we're
gonna talk about speedrunning.
Juke (00:24):
Yeah, so it's been a few episodes that we mentioned that
whenever the rare times and thatPerf is on Twitch, he is likely
doing speed runs of ResidentEvil and we thought why not
explain that? Because I feellike it's probably a common
thing that kids watch too. Likethe kid the parents are passing
by. And like, not only is my kidnot gaming, he's watching
(00:47):
someone else game. And they theydon't understand that already.
So
Perf (00:52):
I know for a fact that it's a very popular thing.
Probably amongst kids too,because I know that a lot of
speed runners are doing Nintendogames speedruns such as we just
mentioned Super Mario Bros.
Games on the SNES. It's a SuperNintendo. So
Juke (01:17):
Is that the one that's like handheld?
Perf (01:22):
I don't think so.
Juke (01:24):
Nevermind. I don't know this stuff.
Perf (01:26):
Talking about Game Boys?
Juke (01:27):
No, there's like a Nintendo Switch.
Perf (01:31):
No c'est ca, it's a more retro game.
Juke (01:34):
Okay. So like the the games everyone grew up with?
Like our generation grew upwith?
Perf (01:41):
Yeah, pretty much.
Juke (01:43):
So people now are still playing those games, but like
speed running them?
Perf (01:47):
Yeah. So the kids from our time, are speed running, the
retro games.
Juke (01:52):
And then they like teams now are like, wow, those guys
are so cool. But it's becausethey've played it their whole
life.
Perf (01:57):
Yeah, it must have been doing the game for a 100 times,
Juke (02:02):
Damn.
Perf (02:02):
And more.
Juke (02:03):
All right. So before we talk about people who do
speedrun, can you define kind ofwhat speed running is?
Perf (02:11):
Well, it's what like the name suggests is doing the game
as fast as you can. And thisincludes using exploits in the
game. There's some times bugsor, or, how can we do this, but
(02:32):
it is exploits from the gamedesign, let's say..
Juke (02:36):
Like flaws or..
Perf (02:37):
Yeah exactly.
Juke (02:38):
Things you normally not able to do. But now because
there was an in the programmingof the game, a glitch or
whatever, you can do this thingfaster.
Exactly. It's it's discovered bydoing the games over and over
again, or, just by chance, purechance you you're stuck in a
corner and you realize that bypressing a certain a sequence of
(03:01):
buttons on your controller thatyou go through a wall, for
example, or you jump, you gainaccess to a zone that you're not
supposed to access at a certaingiving time in the game.
Okay, but this would be, becausethat sounds a lot to me like
(03:25):
when like I don't have a lot ofexperience with this. But my
stepbrother used to play GrandTheft Auto, and you can like you
could find cheats, and you do asequence of like a b x x x x Z,
blah, blah, blah, and then youlike helicopter view or
something. But this would not beachieved.
Perf (03:45):
It's a completely different, well, it could be
still considered to be likecheating, but it's not, it's not
a cheat code.
Juke (03:53):
Okay.
Perf (03:55):
It's just a way of exploiting the game in your
favor for just for timeactually.
Juke (04:02):
So you were talking to me about a game that you play with
Zik where if you like hug thewall and you you could like
shoot through the wall eventhough you're not supposed to
because of how the game isprogrammed walls there it made
it kind of like accidentallyshoot through it or something.
Perf (04:25):
Well, that that's the case in many of these game exploits
that you get.
Juke (04:30):
Okay.
Perf (04:32):
Let's say you're hugging the wall, pressing a few buttons
and you end up being outside ofthe of the map of the program
that's been designed for thisparticular level, a particular
time in the game. And dependingon the game, you can end up
seeing, see the actualprogramming of the map design.
(04:55):
So it allows you to go throughwalls, to, through enemies..
Skip entire zones of the game.
So So speedrunning is not alwaysfun. It's not... Because you you
see all the flaws in the game,you see how it's made. But you
skip some fun parts toosometimes. And..
Juke (05:20):
So the goal of speedrunning is to get to the
end of the game...
Perf (05:28):
As fast as possible.
Juke (05:29):
As fast as possible. Is there so? Like, is the goal of
speed reading to find as many ofthese loopholes as possible? Or
is it really just to get to theend? Because in my mind, if
you're doing these loopholes,then are you really finishing
the game? If you end up skippinga whole part? Because you found
(05:50):
this loophole, then did youfinish the game if you didn't do
that part?
Perf (05:55):
Clearly not. It's a, let's say a speedrun. Is as opposed as
Juke (05:55):
It's the opposite you mean.
a completionist. Acompletionist.
Perf (06:03):
Yeah.
Juke (06:03):
Okay.
Perf (06:04):
Yeah, it's the complete opposite.
Juke (06:05):
Okay.
Perf (06:20):
Every file, every upgrades, every everything that
the game designer puts insidethe game. And as a speed runner,
you're going to skip as muchstuff as you can, and still be
able to defeat let's say, theend boss.
Juke (06:34):
So no side quests, unless you need that specific reward to
beat the boss.
(07:19):
there's a lot of Nintendo gamesthat are, let's say spin offs
from the real story.
Because I was watchinggame. It's a game show called
Hmm actually done by CollegeHumor. You probably don't know,
but probably a lot of listenersknow it because College Humor is
pretty big. And I'm actually islike a fun game show where the
(07:39):
host says fact there's somethingwrong. In fact, first one to
buzz in and say what's wrongwith the fact that he said, he
has to preface like after hebuzzes he has to say Hmm
actually and then say hiscorrection, if he doesn't say
Hmm actually..
Perf (07:56):
I think you showed me that.
Juke (07:57):
Yeah, so in that in that show. I found out that while we
like in the whole Mario brosuniverse, Waluigi is not related
to Mario, he is Mario'schildhood friend, that ends up
turning against them. So thatepisode of Hmm actually actually
(08:18):
taught me that there was more tothe lore of Mario Bros, than I
thought, because I was like,Waluigi? I mean, Wario? I meant
Wario. Did I say Waluigi,whatever I meant Wario, Mario
with a W. Like, I thought, youknow, they were related. That's
why their names are so but no.
Perf (08:37):
For some reason, I thought they were the evil cousin pair.
Juke (08:42):
Yeah, something like that.
Like I thought they were likethe evil parallel universe or
something or evil twin that wasuglier. I don't know. But no
he's a childhood friend orsomething. It's, it's, there's
more story to it than I thought.
But in the games, it's not thatstory focused.
Perf (09:00):
No, sure enough.
Juke (09:01):
And so do you find that in speed running? It's mostly games
that don't have a story or ismostly games that do or speed
runners don't give a fuck theyjust want to speed run,
Perf (09:12):
I think is the third option. Okay, be honest. As long
as the they can find all theexperts needed, and they can
speed run it. They don't caremuch about anything else. Okay,
the only thing they care aboutis how to optimize their run to
have the lowest time possible.
Because for many of speedrunners I think the the the end
(09:32):
goal for them is not the loreit's not the completion of the
game. It's world records.
Juke (09:41):
So a bit like people who like to sprint you want to be
the fastest sprinter Yeah,pretty much it's the same thing.
Yeah, versus someone who wantsto through hike they want to see
the best views. Like a slowhiker wants to see all the views
a sprinter wants, the best time.
Perf (09:57):
I guess we could say it's the sprint version of a video
games?
Juke (10:02):
Yeah, that's, that's interesting. But so you were
showing me I don't know, if youwere leading up to that, but you
were showing me kind of on thescreen earlier, what a speed run
stats look like?
Perf (10:13):
Yeah, they stream it on, let's say on Twitch. For the
viewers they're gonna the speedrunner are going to show you the
average time for which theyshould acquire certain items or
attain certain place in theirlevel or in the game. And right,
(10:36):
besides this average time,you're going to have their own
time, it's going to be green ifthey're ahead for, let's say, 15
seconds ahead or in red, or ifthey're behind. And all of this
is in real time.
Juke (10:51):
Yeah, so what what I'm getting from that is that the
goal isn't only to get to theend of the game as fast as
possible, but also to hitcertain milestones before
certain time. there's this, butI'm guessing there's a certain
order anyways, that you have todo it to get to the end, as fast
(11:11):
as possible.
Perf (11:12):
Exactly these milestones are, are there to give them a
certain reference so they canevaluate if this speedrun is
actually worth finishing, to bethere on time. Or just to start
all over again.
Juke (11:33):
So like, halfway through the they realize like, they hit
too many milestones late, sothey know they're not going to
beat their time. So they mightas well start over.
Perf (11:41):
Exactly.
Juke (11:41):
Aha. I see.
Perf (11:43):
I've seen that happen only for Resident Evil 2. Because
it's the only game I have beentrying to speed run a few times.
But I'm not even close from therecord world records.
Juke (11:56):
But Resident Evil also gives you a grade at the end of
your game.
Perf (12:01):
Exactly.
Juke (12:02):
Which I, the games I've played, which are very few, like
Borderlands, you don't reallyhave a you don't you don't get
graded at the end of your run.
Perf (12:11):
Borderlands is considered to casual I think to have a
grade after.
Juke (12:16):
Me, it was the first time I had ever seen a grade, at the
end of a video game was ResidentEvil and I was very surprised. I
think from what I saw, it'sconsistent through all of the
Resident Evil?
Perf (12:28):
Pretty much yeah. It's graded from S to D or E I think.
Juke (12:35):
And so on Resident Evil is your grade related to how fast
you do it or related to how welllike someone who does a speed
run the fastest speed runner, ishe gonna have an A plus? Or is
he gonna have like a, b becausehe doesn't care about the grade
only cares about the time
Perf (12:55):
He's most likely gonna have S tier still, which is the
highest because the main factorsthat determine your grade is the
time you take for the run. So bydefinition, you will most likely
have the best time you can. Andthe other one is the amount of
(13:15):
time you save in the game.
Juke (13:18):
Meaning doing the action of saving so as to not lose your
progress?
Perf (13:22):
As acheckpoint, exactly.
Juke (13:24):
Okay, so it's important to..
Perf (13:27):
Save less.
Juke (13:28):
Okay, so the less you save your progress, the better you.
Perf (13:32):
Yeah, cuz it's, it's harder if you save less, because
if you die, you're gonna have tostart over from a longer period
of time.
Juke (13:44):
So you're more badass if you did less save, so you get a
better grade. And there's a inthat in Resident Evil, it takes
time, you have to go somewhereto save. That's why it takes
more time.
Perf (13:56):
Exact Yeah. There are different predetermined places
that you have to go physicallygo in the game, to save.
Juke (14:03):
Okay . See, that's an interesting thing. Because if
your kid or your boyfriend is aspeed runner, it's obviously not
an online game. So you mightthink, oh well, he should be
Yeah because technically. Well,speedruns are made offline.
able to pause. If I'm going totalk to him, you know, he should
be able to stop his game,whatever. It's not an online
(14:24):
game, so I'm not bothering hisfriends. But if your partner is
into that type of stuff, and istrying to get a good grade, then
then that might be a huge thingif you ask him to like stop his
game and save so that he can goI don't know, do whatever chore
you need him to do. He it mighthinder the result of the of the
(14:47):
game so they're in anotherreason as to not being able to
necessarily pause or end or savethe game.
Yeah. It can be done offline.
But if you pause to go dosomething else, you're gonna
it's gonna kill your momentumand your focus for sure.
(15:10):
Yeah. That's interesting.
Perf (15:14):
Because these guys aside from exploits, they can still do
pretty impressive skill basefeats, if I can say.
Juke (15:25):
That's cool, is there, like competitions that are for
speed runners?
Perf (15:30):
Yeah, I can't say I know them very well. But I know that
there's world records andcompetition, I think that was
from LAN ETS. I know there wassome competition for speed
runners.
Juke (15:37):
Ah yeah? There was like a speed running section?
Perf (15:44):
Yeah. Pretty sure there was.
Juke (15:48):
Interesting.
Perf (15:50):
Just to give you like as somewhat of a reference, let's
say Resident Evil 2, of course.
A normal run would take youabout, let's say, 8 to 12 hours
depending on your level ofcompletionism. But as far as I
know, that best time and I don'tremember the name of the person,
(16:12):
but it was 53 minutes.
Juke (16:15):
Oh, okay. That's...
Perf (16:17):
So it requires you to know every weakness of every single
enemies their pathing. The mapsby heart, the timing of the
enemies, when they're when andwhere they're going to come out.
There's a few random elementsyou can't control because
depending on how the game isprogrammed, the the enemies are
(16:40):
going to spawn at some differentspawn points. And this is
randomly generated. Sospeedrunners have to do with
that, it's generally the, themain obstacle they're going to
go through. Because otherwise,they, they just remember
(17:00):
everything else perfectly.
Juke (17:03):
That's interesting, because if I think back on the
times that you showed me,Resident Evil, which is a game
you speed ran, as a beginner, itwas interesting to see because
we would walk by a dead bodythat was just laying there that
wasn't necessarily I wasn't ableto interact with at that moment.
(17:26):
But you were like, but you youwere telling me on your way
back, this guy's gonna reanimatewhich was interesting for a
beginner, especially a beginnerwho doesn't like horror games.
Because then that had, I had asense of preparedness.
Perf (17:42):
It's taking out the effect of jumpscares.
Juke (17:45):
Yeah, so I think that that, if a last, not last
episode, sorry about that. Inone of our previous episodes, we
talked about how you got me intogaming and stuff like that, I
would say, for a gamer who mightwant to get the partner into
gaming, maybe a game that youknow, as, like, if you're a
(18:09):
speed runner, maybe that's agood game, to show your beginner
because you can give them allthese cues that are going to
make it easier for like a firstgame depending on the game, of
course, but if you know a gameto that level that deep where
you know, the maps by heart andthe timings by heart, it might
be a great game to explain sinceyou know, know it, so well, you
(18:34):
know.
Perf (18:35):
To a, to a noob?
Juke (18:36):
Yeah, not in the speed run manner, but in the sense of
like, since you know, all thetimings and you have your noob
playing, you'll be like, Okay,so like that, see that guy over
there, he's gonna get he's gonnawalk all the way to that point.
And he won't go further. So youcan do this or that, or this,
you know, stuff like that, whichis really useful when you know,
a game so intensely.
Perf (18:59):
We could certainly do that together. But it takes out the
the element of surprise, and ittakes all this.. It's clearly
spoiling the game.
Juke (19:08):
Yeah. But I mean, in the in the sense, not necessarily
for me, like you've shown meResident Evil. It's not
necessarily my vibe. But ifwe're thinking about a gamer
trying to get a non gamer intogaming, maybe someone who's more
reluctant, and who doesn't. Whojust focuses on the fact that
it's hard, which I think a lotof non gamers who don't want a
(19:29):
game, just focus on the factthat it's hard, and they don't
get past that, then that couldbe an option. I don't know we
don't have to..
Perf (19:37):
It is but you'd have to take the person by the hand and
show them exactly what's gonnahappen. But it's certainly
doable for sure. Yeah, if youguys want to just check out a
few of the best speed runnersthere's out there. And there's a
on Twitch Of course, yes,there's a Zfg1, which is the
(20:04):
most reknown speedrunner forZelda Ocarina of Time. I know
there's a lot of people thatknow this particular game. Even
if you're not a gamer, you havesurely heard of this before. So
he's got like, 77,000 followers.
So that's quite a lot. If youwant some more kids, kids like
(20:29):
game, you can go withfiredragon764. He's got a lot of
Nintendo game speed runs andthere's also Caleb Hart. 42.
With streams, Megaman speedruns.
For the more retro gamers outthere.
Juke (20:49):
I think we'll try to remember to link them because
Twitch, fight names are never
Perf (20:54):
Yeah, I'm gonna put them in the description of course.
Juke (20:58):
Yeah. So what's the appeal? Like when people watch
speed runs? Are they watching?
Are they watching to learn,like, in your opinion, because I
know you don't watch that muchspeed runs. But in your opinion,
when people watch speed runs, isit more because they're trying
to learn how to speed run? Or isit more like when you're
watching people sprint at theOlympics? You're just like, wow,
they're fast?
Perf (21:18):
I think it's a mix. It's both. You can clearly watch some
speed runners to try and speedrun yourself. But it's not it's
not the other than theentertainment. I don't think
there's much else to speedrunning.
Juke (21:38):
Yeah, it's more of a watching a sport. Like a fast.
Perf (21:42):
Yeah, exactly.
Juke (21:43):
All right.
Perf (21:44):
It's only for good sports.
Juke (21:46):
So let's say someone at home, like one of our listeners
has a speed has a speed runnerat home. Is there anything that
like they can do? For you know,that can help your speed runner
out? Other than leaving themalone? I guess not right.
Perf (22:06):
Good question. Maybe just trying to help him find some
other speedrunners that arebetter than him.
Juke (22:13):
Yeah, I would not go with that. Generally, people don't
like your mom. You definitelydon't want your mom to say, I
know you like that game. I foundsomeone who's better than you.
That's like the most annoyingmom thing you will hear. But no,
I don't think there's reallyanything that that like a home
(22:35):
can be done to improve that, butI'll definitely say.
Perf (22:41):
But I mean, watching other speed runners is sure surely a
good thing to do because you'regonna have more chance to
discover and learn about newexploits on the game that you
might not have thought before.
Juke (22:55):
Yeah, but I meant more like as a partner or parent of
someone who likes speedrunningbecause if I think of the games
that you are not in like thatyou don't speed round but that
you just play I I would say thislike a parent or partner to just
like, like I checked off on myphone for the news, gaming
(23:15):
stuff. So like, since you wereinto Hearthstone, I wanted to
get like Hearthstone news andBlizzard news, since you're you
you play a lot of Blizzardgames. But if you're if
someone's up to speed running,then you're not really
interested in necessarily goingdeep into the lore of the game.
So there's not really anythingthat you can do as like a
(23:37):
partner or parent of a speedrunner to like really get into
that vibe especially if speedrunning isn't your thing you
kind of just have to let them dotheir own thing and and maybe
just ask them their scores andbe like oh, did you beat your
record?
Perf (23:54):
Yeah, but whether we pretty much it because it's very
specific and you can't reallyhave.. is that would be very
surprised you're getting a lotof those Oh, I've tried trying
these, this sequence of buttonsin that specific corner and this
specific level ..
Juke (24:11):
It's like asking your speed runner his his score at
the end. If he beat his level orasked your speed runner what's
the hardest part? What's What'sthe part that like slows them
down every time in the game andlike make him explain that to
you that that's a fun..
Perf (24:28):
Yeah, exactly. Maybe just do something in a casual
conversation about it and youmaybe first he's gonna like the
attention and second and maybehe's just while he's talking to
you maybe he's gonna find orthink about another way of
speedrunning this thisparticular part of the game.
Juke (24:47):
Yeah, cuz if I think not a game that your speed running,
but the game that you play wouldsay critical Gears of War. Yeah,
yeah. Is that the game where youcan accidentally shoot through
walls?
Perf (24:59):
Yeah, it's one of them.
It's like a loophole. Right?
If we want, we can say that.
Juke (25:04):
That for me, because get your Gears of War is a game that
doesn't really interest me. Likeevery time I see you play, I'm
like, oh, cool, you're playingbut I'm never like, Oh, I'm
gonna play, you know?
Perf (25:14):
Yeah, well, it's a very high skill cap. .
Juke (25:18):
High skill cap?
Perf (25:19):
Yeah. Third Person Shooter.
Juke (25:20):
And it's online too. So, but but it was interesting even
though it's a game that I'm notinterested in it was interesting
to find out about this littleloophole because it's, it's
like, oh, like, that's weirdthat you can shoot through walls
and do this random stuff. Likethere.. there is stuff that can
be interesting if you're even ifyou're not interested in the
(25:41):
game. So if you want to start aconversation, and you're clearly
noticing that your gamer is moreof a speed runner type, then
having those types ofconversations like Oh, what,
what's the cool loopholes inthis game? You know, and stuff
like that?
Perf (25:53):
Yeah, it can take all their imagination. Maybe they're
just gonna talk to you aboutthat with all their heart. You
can also buy them drugs so theycan go faster. No don't do that.
Juke (26:06):
Don't do that.
we're not giving such advice onthis podcast.
Perf (26:11):
No. Clearly, not giving advice and telling people to go
buy drugs.
Juke (26:17):
No.
Perf (26:19):
That would be evil. And fun, but mainly evil.
Juke (26:26):
Alright, so this episode's gonna have been on the shorter
side of things appropriate for aepisode about speed running for
it to not be too long.
Perf (26:36):
Yeah, is a speed speed episode.
Juke (26:39):
Can go to getting gamers.com We have a glossary
there that gives great littledefinitions of gamer terms. And
you can find us at gettinggamers on Twitter and Facebook
mainly. And you can find me atJuke underscore ish on Twitch
(26:59):
Twitter, Instagram. That'spretty much it. And Perf is
Perfectedl notwitch.tv/perfectedl.
Perf (27:08):
Perfected with an L at the end. And if if there's even only
one person asking for it, I cando a personal speedrun well try
a personal speedrun fromResident Evil 2 remake. Yeah,
there's gonna be my very owneaster egg from these episodes.
Juke (27:27):
To be honest, I think even if people don't ask for it, he
might do it.
Perf (27:31):
Yes but I'm just gonna make it twice.
Juke (27:35):
Alright, then. GG!
Perf (27:36):
GG!
Juke (27:38):
The artwork for this podcast was made by my dear
friend Arielle you can find heron Twitter at @profitpossum. And
you can find her on Instagram at@profitOpossum. Our intro and
outro song is made by David.
Perf (28:00):
Job's done.
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