Summer Games Done Quick 2014

SGDQ 2014 has begun (actually, it started yesterday, and I forgot about it. >.<). For those who aren't aware, this is a charity drive set up and run by the speed running community. Think of it as a week long convention where some of the world's best speed runners gather to tear through games as quickly as they can, all for charity donations.

The Awesome Games Done Quick marathons started as a handful of runners performing together, and has blossomed into one of the best expressions of the good of gaming I've seen.

The charity part comes in from donations. There are constant "donation incentives" available, depending on the games being run or coming up. These include things like speed running hidden levels, showing off glitches, taking certain handicaps, etcetera. Each requires a certain amount of money be donated towards it, and when that threshold is reached, the extras will be added on.

There are also "bid wars", to determine certain objectives/donation prizes. For example, do you want them to speed run the classic Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past, or the new Legend of Zelda: Link Between Worlds? There are several of these, and they determine things like what character is used, what the save file name is for some games, etcetera.

You can also get prizes through this. There are some grand prizes for the entire marathon, but there are also particular prizes that you can get during each block (for example, they will run several Megaman games together, and the prizes available at that time will be Megaman related). These prizes are contributed by both the gaming community, and by some of the game developers (Blizzard donated a Tychus Findley statue valued at over a thousand dollars during the January marathon). You don't have to donate towards the prizes, just donate during the proper block for your chance to win.


It's just an absolutely fantastic way to see the gaming community coming together and doing good. Tons of people run games, others help find glitches and tricks to make games faster, others just make prizes (like perler art) to give to the marathon to help entice donations. And each marathon has been doing better and better. In January, over a million dollars was raised for the Prevent Cancer Association. Just because gamers want to help out.

The Summer Marathon is gaining donations for Doctors Without Borders, a humanitarian group that works towards getting medical aid across the world.


Anyone who has some time to kill, stop by the Speed Demos Archive Twitch Page and check out the marathon: SGDQ 2014 Currently Streaming

If you want to make a donation, stop by The Donation Page. It will also list what prizes are currently available, and show what bid wars or donation incentives you can put your money towards. They'll also let you put in a comment. All comments are read, and some are even read on the stream (though they get way too many these days to read them all).



I've been wanting to catch one of these live for so long, I always forget the dates and have to watch the videos afterward. So I figured I'd help remind some people, or help promote it to those who didn't know about it.

Yeah, SGDQ is awesome. Yesterday's games didn't thrill me much, but there's good stuff coming up this week. I always like the Mega Man block.

They even do some Final Fantasy speedruns. Looks like they're closing the marathon with an FF6 run. Whole game in 7:30. If you haven't seen it before, you should watch.

Game Schedule

Actually, it's a tradition among the marathon to always close with a Final Fantasy game. In January they closed with Chrono Trigger, figuring that it was pretty much a Final Fantasy in all but name.

Thanks for posting up the schedule, I forgot to do that. >.<

I didn't know closing with FF was an actual tradition, though I noticed they did it a lot in the past.

I think I'm most looking forward to Bionic Commando on Friday. Watching people destroy old NES games is very satisfying.

In a couple hours are Super Meat Boy, I Wanna Be The Boshy, and Dustforce. Those games are reeeeeeeeeeeeally skill-intensive platformers. Watching someone speedrun them always blows my mind. It probably takes hundreds if not thousands of hours of practice to get to the level of these guys. I highly recommend tuning in if you have the chance.

Super Meat Boy has been rather...odd. There's apparently a difference in timing between the computer being used and the practice computer, so the run has had a few problem spots. Including one point which actually cost him all his lives because of a really, really weird problem at a jump (the jump he usually does, which he's always practiced with and isn't even a precision command was getting him killed).

I hope I'm back from school in time to see Dustforce. It's such a pretty game.

Oh, and lest we forget, there's also a Sumer Games Done Quick Humble Bundle. All proceeds go to the same Doctors Without Borders Charity, but you can pick up games like Dustforce, Guacamelee, Gunpoint, Psychonauts and more!

My sister (goes by the name Adrian Rose) is there with Cosmo right now. I believe she was the last person to play at AQDQ when she attempted a NG+ speedrun of Chrono Trigger. It's where you go fight Lavos as soon as possible (she actually did have the world record for a short time). She didn't break a record live, but she had a good run. Fun fact: She used my copy of Chrono Trigger to attempt it! :)

look at you go with your minor celebrity sister, that's awesome

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Originally Posted by Jiro

look at you go with your minor celebrity sister, that's awesome

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The credit is all hers. I didn't do anything. I just think it's cool that she gets to do so many awesome things!

WEIRD QUESTION I JUST ASKED DENMARK WHO WAS ON SCREEN AND HE SAID COSMO

THIS WEEK IS BLOWING MY MIND

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Originally Posted by Sephex

My sister (goes by the name Adrian Rose) is there with Cosmo right now. I believe she was the last person to play at AQDQ when she attempted a NG+ speedrun of Chrono Trigger. It's where you go fight Lavos as soon as possible (she actually did have the world record for a short time). She didn't break a record live, but she had a good run. Fun fact: She used my copy of Chrono Trigger to attempt it! :)

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That was your sister? She did a fantastic job, both on the run and on the commentary. Marle's refusal to die in the producer ending was hilarious. She wasn't the last runner of that AGDQ, though. Obdajr did a 100% run of Chrono Trigger after her.

If it were my cartridge, I'd probably not have lent it out. Just because I wouldn't be sure how to deal with the save files. I am very protective of my save files.

They have shirts for purchase through yetee and $3 for every purchase goes to charity. http://theyetee.com/gamesdonequick

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Originally Posted by Jinx

WEIRD QUESTION I JUST ASKED DENMARK WHO WAS ON SCREEN AND HE SAID COSMO

THIS WEEK IS BLOWING MY MIND

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Good old Cosmo. Not sure how he puts up with my crazy family!

Anyway, entertaining story. I did tell this in chat a few nights ago, but I figure I'd tell it here. There is a YouTube Channel I watch called Game Grumps. It's basically a non serious Let's Play channel (though some of the fan base can't seem to grasp that fact) that focuses on just playing and being all silly. No speed running or record breaking or whatever. So last year the Game Grumps started to play Wind Waker, which is one of the game's Cosmo is notable for constantly setting world record speed runs in.

Anyway, I told him that he should make a video and send it to the Game Grumps. He would put on a Heisenberg hat on, look all serious and say, "Stay out of my territory." As a big fan of Breaking Bad, he laughed hard at that.

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

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Originally Posted by Sephex

My sister (goes by the name Adrian Rose) is there with Cosmo right now. I believe she was the last person to play at AQDQ when she attempted a NG+ speedrun of Chrono Trigger. It's where you go fight Lavos as soon as possible (she actually did have the world record for a short time). She didn't break a record live, but she had a good run. Fun fact: She used my copy of Chrono Trigger to attempt it! :)

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That was your sister? She did a fantastic job, both on the run and on the commentary. Marle's refusal to die in the producer ending was hilarious. She wasn't the last runner of that AGDQ, though. Obdajr did a 100% run of Chrono Trigger after her.

If it were my cartridge, I'd probably not have lent it out. Just because I wouldn't be sure how to deal with the save files. I am very protective of my save files.

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She's been messing around with that cart for years. I played it to death way before she ever touched it so I don't really mind her using it for whatever reason.

Thanks for the compliment towards my sister. I am proud of her for holding it together. Not sure if I would have kept my cool if I were in her situation.

Just finished the La Mulana run. It was quite fun to watch. I need a good Metroid style game to play. Preferably on handheld. Why have they not made more 2D handheld Metroid games? Fusion was great, and Zero Mission was good. But I want more.

Also, does your sister post here? We can totally use more Chrono Trigger fans.

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Just finished the La Mulana run. It was quite fun to watch. I need a good Metroid style game to play. Preferably on handheld. Why have they not made more 2D handheld Metroid games? Fusion was great, and Zero Mission was good. But I want more.

Also, does your sister post here? We can totally use more Chrono Trigger fans.

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She used to, but doesn't really enjoy posting in forums any more. She's mostly active on Twitter since she can easily communicate with the many people she has met through Cosmo. I think she has a tumblr somewhere and I'll also occasionally see her on Facebook. But yeah, she's not into the forum thing anymore, as far as I know. Next time I directly talk to her I'll ask if she feels like posting again or at least dropping by.

Props to Sephex-sister.

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Just finished the La Mulana run. It was quite fun to watch. I need a good Metroid style game to play. Preferably on handheld. Why have they not made more 2D handheld Metroid games? Fusion was great, and Zero Mission was good. But I want more.

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Did you play the Castlevania games for handhelds? Portrait of Ruin and Dawn of Sorrow and... was there another? They're seriously awesome. I'm really ambivalent toward the Castlevania universe, but I couldn't put those games down. The music/art/gameplay was amazing. Particularly the art; if you're a fan of pixel art, you will literally die after seeings some of those sprites and backgrounds.

La-Mulana was a good run, for as much as I watched. I stopped around the point where it started being spoilers, since I still haven't beaten that game. My favorite runs so far were the Mega Man block, and the whole "indie platformers" block with Bastion/IWBTB/SMB/Dustforce/Guacamelee. The Dustforce runner really nailed his run.

Also Ikachan. ＜コ:彡 ＜コ:彡 ＜コ:彡

If anyone wants to go back and watch a run that you missed, there will be VODs. http://www.reddit.com/r/speedrun/com...q_vods_thread/ is an ongoing list for now.

I tried a Castlevania game once. I had a rather poor experience with it, that has probably turned me off of the series forever. I still loathe that people group them together with Metroid, because the games have vastly different foci, and I definitely prefer Metroid.

Actually La Mulana itself would probably be too much like Castlevania for me to enjoy it, but at least there is a lot more of the stuff I love from Metroid in there.

Oh my gosh. The "No EG" run of Link to the Past was brilliant. 27 Frame-Perfect inputs in a row (on a 60 Frame Per Second game) is just staggering.

It's wrapping up. There are only a few runs left. A Link Between Worlds is coming up next. Don't forget to donate for the Legend of Zelda prizes! It hasn't hit 700k yet, as far as I know, so there's still a way to go for that 1 million! They're aiming for 750k by the end of Link Between Worlds to get the Smash Bros. Finale competition on the main stream.