Games Done Quick: See You Next Mission

Sterica

Next Marathon: Awesome Games Done Quick 2018

Games Done Quick is a charity event brought to you by the Speed Demos Archive that consists of two week-long speedrunning marathons each year. The first, Awesome Games Done Quick, is a winter marathon that donates to the Prevent Cancer Foundation and was the original marathon that started it all. Eventually a summer marathon, the aptly named Summer Games Done Quick, was started up to raise funds for Médecins Sans Frontières known in English as Doctors Without Borders. Both marathons are roughly equal in popularity, and together they raise about $2.5 million a year for charity. There is also a sister event, Pinball Done Quick, that normally runs concurrently with both GDQ marathons for those interested in pinball.

Over the past few years, GDQ has grown rapidly. It was only three years ago that the first marathon hit a million dollars, and a year later the first summer marathon would also hit that mark. In 2017, AGDQ reached the 2 million milestone. Now both marathons raise roughly the same amount, totaling to roughly three million a year for charity causes. As of this writing, Games Done Quick has raised over $10,000,000 for charity. In 2016 a new series debuted, called GDQ Hotfix, that consists of smaller community events such as race tournaments, special runs, and more! All proceeds go towards charity, and offer another way to get your GDQ fix throughout the year. There is no formal schedule for Hotfix, so follow the official Twitch channel and check in from time to time to see if anything is happening.

This thread in particular is for discussion of the marathon, but during the "off season" (aka the other 50 weeks of the year) feel free to use this place to discuss other speedrunning events going on, or just speedrunning in general.


Below is this list of stream available when a marathon is live. If anything changes, they'll be updated as needed.
Official Twitch Channel
Spanish
French
German
Russian
Japanese
Pinball Done Quick

You're inevitably going to miss a run, but all runs are archived at the GDQ YouTube Channel. Note that while uploads are pretty quick (about 12 hours after the run was finished) initial uploads can sometimes be of iffy quality since tech people are still running the marathon. Normally a second batch of runs are uploaded a week or two after the marathon has ended, which tend to fix most issues. If you are super impatient, you can check out the Speedrunning Reddit that is fairly quick at collecting Twitch VODs in one post. Also, please note that the GDQ YouTube channel only goes back a few years, and the older marathons are archived at the old SDA Channel. If you want footage from some of the earliest marathons (and special marathons like the Spooktacular), then you're going to have to search YouTube and pray someone uploaded it. Some runs have simply been lost to time.

Check under the spoiler for recommendations!

SGDQ 2018
Mario 3 Race - Good players and sportsmanship in the face of terrible misfortune.
Cuphead - TMR brings good commentary to the run.
Celeste - BOTH runs. Watch the regular run first, then watch tasbot take it to the next level
Mario Odyssey - While the couch commentary isn't the greatest, the run itself is an excellent marathon debut for the game.
Super Metroid - GDQ continues to experiment with the perennial favorite, this time with a neat 100% map exploration run.


AGDQ 2018
Awful Games Block - The marathon unearthed a bevy of hidden "gems", making for another incredible block.

SGDQ 2017
NieR: Automata - Half-Coordinated kicks things off with another of his amazing single-handed runs.
Freedom Planet - If you like runs with a lot of information on the techniques and strategy involved, this is for you.
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time - Hennejoe gets revenge on the game that vexed him several marathons ago.
The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past - Like glitchy runs with hilariously tired commentary? This spud's for you.
Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix - An entertaining, solid run all the way through.
Super Mario Bros. Relay - Mario 1, 2, 3, Lost Levels, and World comprise an excellent race.
Metroid Fusion - An amazing run of the very difficult 0% category.
Super Metroid - Phantoon turns another race into a solo run.
Super Panga World: A kaizo game beaten 30 minutes under estimate? No problem.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - You will believe a Link can fly.
Portal 2 - Single player run of the co-op missions. You heard correctly.
Earthbound - GDQ ends the 2017 marathons with a nice run that makes for a great bookend with AGDQ's Undertale run.

AGDQ 2017
Jak and Daxter - A more skill-based run to contrast last year's Owen Wilson odyssey.
Super Hook Girl - A quick but very skillful run.
Kirby's Dream Land 3 - A co-op run where the runners don't even speak the same language.
Sonic Adventure 2 - Big the Cat?
Sonic Adventure 2 - BIG THE CAT!
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D - A game with absolutely no bugs.
Borderlands 2 - We're gonna need a lot of guns.
Silent Hill 4: The Room - Solid run.
Super Monkey Ball 2 - A regular crowd-pleaser.
Mario Paint - Yes, you can speedrun this.
Super Metroid Rotation - A new spin on one of GDQ's most popular runs.
Might No. 9 - Let this run heal old wounds.
Awful Block (First Game | Last Game - The terrible block returns, delivering amazing run after run.
GTA Vice City - Good times in Vice City.
TASbot Block - Everyone's favorite speedrunning robot does it again.
Super Dram World - Speedrunning Mario ROM hacks? You bet.
Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels - Can two men beat one of the hardest Mario games with one controller?
Undertale - Goats will be hugged.

The easiest way to donate is to head over to their main site and hit the big donate button. You can leave a comment, but be aware that it is highly unlikely to be read on air unless A] You know the runner personally or B] you donated a truckload of money at once. You may wish to hold off on donating, however, until a certain time in the marathon. Prizes are raffled throughout the marathon, and to enter a particular raffle you must donate during a specific portion of the marathon. For example, some Mario merchandise may be raffled to anyone who donates while a particular Mario game is being run, or some Sonic swag may be raffled during a block of multiple Sonic runs. Check out the main site for a list of the prizes and when they are raffled, and the stream itself will offer regular reminders about upcoming prizes being offered. Regardless of when you donate, there is a "grand prize" that is selected from all donations throughout the marathon that are above a certain amount.

One other thing about donate: bid war and incentives. Some games have inconsequential decisions that the marathon leaves up to you, the audience. Be it what to name characters in an RPG, or what outfit to dress a character in, they offer fun ways to liven up the proceedings and get some extra money in the process. Incentives are a bit meatier, as they actually result in more marathon content when met. This can be things such as increasing the difficulty of an upcoming run, getting a bonus run of the same game, or having a totally new run squeezed into the schedule. You get to decide where you money goes when donating (and it doesn't affect the aforementioned prize raffles), so consider checking out what's available when you donate. It's totally optional, but is a lot of fun for some people.

There are other ways to contribute!

1. The Yetee: every year, a selection of shirts are made available only during the week of the marathon. All profits from sales of these shirts go to GDQ!
2. Twitch Subscription: Money from Twitch Subscriptions to the GDQ channel go to the total.
3. Fangamer: Various merchandise for the event, a portion of sales going to charity!

If any alternative ways to donate pop up, they'll be added to the list.

Can't afford to donate? Then you may consider submitting the aforementioned prizes that are raffled away during the marathon. This can include games, relevant merchandise, and even homemade crafts so long as the quality is high enough. You can check out the guidelines for submitting prizes over here. You can also help out by just spreading the good word of going fast, and mentioning GDQ on social media or wherever while a marathon is going on. Hit up the Twitter account to find banners, hashtags, and whatever kids these days are using to advertise.


You can attend a GDQ marathon in three ways: as an attendee, a volunteer, or a runner. The main site covers how to sign up for these various roles, so I'll mostly describe what each entails.

Attendees go to GDQ like you would a small convention or other game-related event. These events are far too crowded to let you get even close to the TV the game is being run on, so you'll be relegated to watching runs on a large projection. If you are really into speedrunning, this may be up your alley: you get to meet some of the biggest names in the community, enjoy really exciting moments in person, and just chill in general with like-minded people for a week or however long you stay. On the downside, it's not like a traditional convention, as runs can happen at any time of day, which may not work out so hot for you if that obscure RPG you love gets run at 4 in the morning. It also runs for a week in the middle of January, so you will either have to take additional time off work or just hope the good runs are happening on the weekend. I also question how long a speedrunning marathon can hold your interest for a few days, much less a week, but that's a subjective thing. More details on attending can be found here.

Volunteers help run the show. This is a lot of work, and you will be assisting with setting up TVs and consoles, breaking stuff down, reading donations, helping attendees, and so forth. This is a charity, so while you won't have pay for registration, you will have to pay for travel and other accommodations. You're also working as this is a job and not a vacation, so keep that mentality when deciding if you want to volunteer. Details on volunteering tend to be on the GDQ forums, so head over there if this sounds like something you'd be interested in.

Finally, the stars of the show: the runners. Obviously the process to be selected for running a game at the marathon is way more demanding, and your odds of getting in are slim. How slim? For AGDQ 2017, over 1500 hours of submissions were declined. That's only 12% of submitted hours actually making it into the marathon. I'm not entirely sure what helps get you in, like maybe a YouTube/Twitch channel to show you can handle being in the public eye? There's no guarantee, however. Even GDQ superstars get their submissions declined. Also, keep in mind that runners are volunteers. You're not playing video games for money, and you're most likely going to do a lot of practicing and traveling just to spend an hour playing one game. There is always the chance of attracting people to your fledgling Twitch channel if you really hit a chord with people, but I wouldn't hold my breath. Do it for charity, and not dreams of internet superstardom. You can find a fairly detailed guide on submitting runs over here.


Like any community, a certain amount of jargon gets kicked around during marathons. This section includes lingo for both speedrunning and GDQ marathons. Check out below for any terms you may not understand.

100% - completing a run while grabbing every item, collectible, etc. The definition of 100% varies from game-to-game, although it's usually deign by in-game stuff such as the game's percent complete, unlocking the best/true endings, etc.
any% - completing a run as fast as possible. The only thing that matters is speed, although some games have "warpless" or "glitchless" Any% runs to keep things interesting.
Awful Block - Happening during the winter marathons, this is a block of games typically run one late night during the marathon. It's a series of runs of truly bad/weird games, where the emphasis is less on speedrunning and more showcasing hilariously bad games. It's not uncommon for awful block runs to fail because the game has a tendency to lock up or crash.
bonus stream - during older marathons, this was a period after the event where runners would do random runs, play Smash money matches, or even competitive games like Yoshi's Cookie. These would sometimes last a while, like a week of more after the original marathon had ended. As the marathons grew larger, however, the logistics made bonus streams more difficult to manage. They would grow shorter and shorter until they were officially ended in 2015.
damage boosting - taking advantage of the brief invincibility that most games have after you take damage to bypass certain areas quickly. Sometimes the knockback from taking damage is also useful in accessing areas.
estimate - The maximum amount of time a runner believes their run will take at the marathon. Estimates are typically a below-average time that gives the schedule a bit of a cushion in case the runner has lousy luck and goes long. Some estimates are more reflective of consistency, and may be tighter because the runner feels they can routinely finish in that time. Failing to finish within in an estimate is something of a mark of shame for a runner. Typically runners are allowed to continue past the estimate, but at a certain point the run can be "mercy killed" and ended prematurely to keep the marathon on schedule.
frames - refers to frames of animation. Tends to be a fancy way of saying "portions of a second" as games tend to animate at 30 or 60 frames per second. So in a 60 fps game, a "frame perfect" technique means you only have 1/60th of a second in which to pull it off. There's also terms like "I-frames" which refers to "invulnerability frames" during which your character (or sometimes an enemy) cannot be hurt.
IL - Individual Level. These means a run of just a specific part of the game, which means when something goes wrong there's less to lose because restarting is less painful. As a result, runners tend to use riskier strategies and tricks since flubbing them means you just go back to the beginning of that stage instead of having to start the whole run over.
low% - the opposite of 100%: completing the game while grabbing only the bare minimum of items necessary to finish.
marathon luck - normally invoked with some sarcasm, but basically odd flukes of (usually bad) luck that only seem to happen when you are streaming in front of an audience of tens of thousands. Usually followed by statements of "this didn't happen in practice"
manipulation - doing a particular set of actions to manipulate a quirk or portion of the game's code. One example is item drops in the original Legend of Zelda, where a runner will kill a specific enemy after killing an equally specific number of enemies because it is guaranteed to result in a bomb dropping.
mercy kill - to end a run before it is complete. This is a rare occurrence for when a run goes well beyond the estimate, and is done so that the marathon stays on schedule.
OOB - Out of Bounds. To leave the intended playable areas of the game, which can allow the player to skip large chunks of the game. Some games have No-OOB categories because, in many cases, you can go out of bounds so much you're not really playing the game anymore.
PB - Personal Best, the fastest run a particular person has done for that category. During something like GDQ, a runner tends to use their personal best as a metric to judge how well they did for their run at the marathon.
race - Multiple players do independent runs at the same time to see who finishes first. The quality of these can run hot or cold, as sometimes one person takes a lead and dominates whereas others they get very neck and neck. Races can lead to exciting moments not see in normal runs, as a trailing player may be encouraged to do high-risk, high-reward strats in order to catch up.
RTA - Real-Time Attack. Basically the opposite of a TAS, where you do the run in real-time and have to rely on your own weak human reflexes. Also refers to using an actual timer instead of relying on any in-game timers.
safety strats - (aka "marathon strats") doing something that slows you down, but will save you a considerable amount of time if you mess up a particularly difficult upcoming section, such as grabbing extra health or taking time to hit a checkpoint
sequence break - Performing a trick or exploiting a bug so that you do an unintended skip over large chunks of the game, or go through segments of the game as unintended by the designers. For an extreme example, using a glitch in Ocarina of Time to jump straight to the Ganon fight.
TAS - Tool-Assisted Speedrun, in which the runner uses an emulator when running the game. Normally involves having the game play at very slow speeds, sometimes frame-by-frame so certain strategies can be pulled off that would be impossible or extremely difficult with normal human reflexes. Obviously very dull to watch live, but there is a usually short segment during the marathon to show some recordings of neat TAS stuff.
WR - World Record, the fastest time known for that category. Extremely uncommon during a marathon, as you don't tend to play the game near perfectly in one run. Still, every marathon tends to have one or two WRs occur, typically in more niche or less popular games.
X% - some games have special runs that have been found fun to run. This can involve grabbing all of a specific item that may not count towards 100%, playing as certain characters, or restrictions regarding glitches.
zip - causing your character to fly through a stage or segment. Usually done by trying to squeeze your character into the stage itself (like a block or the ground) so they get stuck and the game forces them out by warping you at high speeds. Tends to be rather tricky to pull off.

And remember...

AbsoluteZero

I have sunk a lot of hours into the GDQ youtube channel. It's like crack.

Knight_

Yes plz gdq time. Need fun time video game marathons to distract me.

Though I don't donate to agdq, only sgdq. Prefer MSF.

HallowedFaith

1 week to go! Wooo!

https://gamesdonequick.com/schedule

Athenor

Woah, a descent 2 speed run!

Sadly I can't watch the ending as I have yet to expose myself to undertake in any way.

TeeMan

That's a hellova OP Bobby, great job. There are so, so many runs I want to check out this GDQ. I highly recommend checking out DOOM (2016) any% if yoy haven't seen it before, it's surprisingly creative.

For the last day I'm going to be glued to the couch for hours and hours on end. TALBOT block, Dark Souls 3 any%, Windwaker any%, 4way Super Metroid 100% (with WR runner Zoast and last SGDQ epic finish saver Behemoth both present) and Undertale true pacifist to end the marathon. It will be amazing!

Sterica

It seems odd to me that the final run is so brief. Usually it's at least three hours or so.

El Fantastico

I should really put on some of the good runs from SGDQ or last year's AGDQ at work, since they unblocked youtube/twitch. Get myself hyped up the new stuff on Sunday.

I usually love the semi-annual GDQs for the charity shirts. Always end up buying a couple and I'm looking forward to seeing what will be on sale this time. There's almost always a Final Fantasy shirt, but this AGDQ only has an FF1 run and I don't think it's going to get picked for a design.

Monger

The last couple GDQs really didn't do that much to catch my interest, but this one has so much stuff that I want to watch.

MGS2! DMC1! Valdis Story! Dark Messiah! Blue Shift! Hyper Light Drifter! They're plugging TASBot into a NES Classic!

It's gon be good.

Bobkins Flymo wrote: »

It seems odd to me that the final run is so brief. Usually it's at least three hours or so.

I'm surprised to not see a JRPG run at the end this time around. They seem to have put Wind Waker HD in the slot where Final Fantasy would usually go.

Sterica

Undertale is heavily inspired by JRPGs so...close enough?

Although I question how entertaining the run will be

El Fantastico

If anything, everyone's just going to bop their heads to the music in the background.

TheySlashThem

I watched the run that the runner applied with and the whole thing does become hilariously broken once he gets the punchcard, but it takes like twenty minutes to get there and it's mostly optimal routing before that point

they're really banking on the fact that people fucking love undertale

BlueBlue

I feel like that's not too different from the regular classic jrpg that normally has that spot

Frem

The Undertale run is worthy of it's location as the grand finale, but it's gonna need a great couch to keep people engaged for that first little bit.

The runner commentary was informative, but like, just informative.

Donnicton

Stream just started, counting down now. 10 minutes until things get underway.

Athenor

Wow, look at that audience.. and man, these guys have stepped up their game in being entertaining / hosting! I haven't seen the last few GDQs, so it is cool seeing them.

Edit: I want that Valoo! HOLY SHIT.

Edit 2: And that Plague Knight and Shovel Knight! Awww..

Maz-

Really weird choice for the first run of the marathon.

cB557

Wrongwarp into a different save file. Alright, sure.

Maz-

Maz- wrote: »

Really weird choice for the first run of the marathon.

Instead, they should've led with this OoT run cause it's really good!

El Fantastico

I was going to say, do we really need to see yet another OoT run? They've been present at the last couple of *GDQs. It just feels like there's nothing new.

At least there's no Majora's Mask this time.

cB557

El Fantastico wrote: »

I was going to say, do we really need to see yet another OoT run? They've been present at the last couple of *GDQs. It just feels like there's nothing new.

At least there's no Majora's Mask this time.

It's an OOT 3D run this year, which means different glitches and so a pretty much completely different run.

VirtualVolt

No matter how much they beef up the stream quality and how much they make it fancy, it still feels like a bunch of nerds playing video games fast, which is what makes GDQ so great.

Athenor

Every time the gags about how complex and technical a fight is, and then one shotting them, I find myself laughing. It's great.

ManetherenWolf

The Yetee shirts this time are REALLY good. Some of the best designs they've done so far.

El Fantastico

ManetherenWolf wrote: »

The Yetee shirts this time are REALLY good. Some of the best designs they've done so far.

I really love the Light vs. Chaos shirt, but I was a little upset that the only colour of the shirt I could get was white.

Still bought it.

I wasn't feeling most of the other shirts, though. So I dug through their normal catalogue and picked up the chocobo KWEH! shirt.

ManetherenWolf

I got the Delfino Island shirt, and want to get the Morph Ball, Mega Man, and Light vs Chaos.

Also grabbed the Alolan Wisdom grass starter shirt. Those 3 starter shirts also donate $5 each to a few Hawaiian animal charities.

I want the Alolan surfing Raichu shirt, but they didnt have one in my size. have to check back later.

Forar

I like the shirts, but I'm loving the Save or Kill Coin.

KoopahTroopah

I forgot this was even happening. Super glad to be catching this Shovel Knight race. Definitely going to pick up that Soul of Cinders shirt and probably the Mega man one as well. I would also love to pick up that coin, but I dunno if I can justify spending almost $20 on a coin... I don't think it'll get that much use unless I turn into Two Face and use it for every decision ever.

metaghost

Shovel Knight is such a goshdarn delight and this has been a solid race. Too bad the couch's chatter screwed up Smaugy's first attempt at Propeller Knight.

Wraith260

metaghost wrote: »

Shovel Knight is such a goshdarn delight and this has been a solid race. Too bad the couch's chatter screwed up Smaugy's first attempt at Propeller Knight.

and it turns again at the next boss. looks like this one is gonna be tight.

ManetherenWolf

6 sec difference. that was a crazy race

Stormwatcher

The OoT 3D run was freaking amazing. BL2 was also incredible.
But this Shovel Knight race was super exciting.

What a great start.

Wraith260

and from Shovel Knight we're now going all the way back to the original Mega-Man. this should be a pretty good race too.

KoopahTroopah

Yolo.

Forar

Normally I just donate instead of buying the shirts, but I decided to splurge and snagged the coin after all. It'll be added to the (small but slowly growing) challenge coin collection.

Plus their shipping to Canada was surprisingly reasonable.

Donnicton

Naked Raiden doing naked cartwheels down a hallway called ascended colon

Kojima plz

KoopahTroopah

Watching the Kalimba run, he's playing co-op as one player and it's nuts. I've never heard of this game but it looks really fun.

Wraith260

just a heads of that the schedule might be a bit off. the runner for the SEUM: Speedrunners from Hell run fell sick and so that run has been rescheduled for some time Wednesday morning. so until then just assume that everything starts around 25-30 minutes earlier than listed.

EDIT: the Adventure Island 2 run as also been delayed, its been pushed back to Thursday morning, so don't expect schedule to correct on Wed morning as i originally stated.

also all times are GDQ local times, so adjust for your own timezone.

DiannaoChong

I totally bought that metroid D&D shirt. It's too nerdy to not get.

Nightslyr

Have the interviews gotten better, or is it just me? A lot less Chris Farley-esque "Remember when you did that thing in your run? ...that was awesome...." and a lot more banter and natural interaction. At least, in the few I've seen so far.

Donnicton

Sometimes I love Twitch chat. Everyone screaming "GENOCIDE! STOP!" when the Katamari runner starts rolling up screaming humans was fairly amusing.