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Awesome Games Done Quick | Your Move

Speedrunning is a particular way of playing games where the object is to get through them as quickly as possible. Runners use extensive practice, meticulous planning, and often take advantage of glitches and other ways to manipulate the game, all in an effort to finish a game in the shortest time. I’m talking seriously fast - games like Super Mario Bros in less than five minutes, or The Legend of Zelda in 28 minutes.

Awesome Games Done Quick is a week-long marathon of speedruns done twice a year - the summer installment is called Summer Games Done Quick - with speedrunners coming together from all around the world to raise money for charity. It’s a kind of gaming telethon, with hosts presenting each new run and reading out messages from people who have donated. Games that are played range from the popular, like Donkey Kong Country or Super Mario World, to the obscure, like Animorphs for the PlayStation or Gargoyles for the Sega Genesis.

This year’s marathon is happening this week, and has already had some great runs. I really enjoyed watching the run of Sonic Mania, which is a game with a lot of speedrunning potential that I had never seen run before. Today, there is a run of Star Fox 2, the Super Nintendo game that didn’t even come out until last year. And tomorrow night, I’m looking forward to a relay race - four teams of three competing to see which can get through the first three Mega Man games first.

The whole event will close Saturday night with a run through The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - with all the main quests completed - in less than four hours. I’ll be watching that stream, too, since I’m a few dozen hours into the game and I’m still not done with it.

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AGDQ 2018 Schedule - https://gamesdonequick.com/schedule

AGDQ 2018 Stream - https://www.twitch.tv/gamesdonequick

Samuel McConnell is a games enthusiast who has been playing games in one form or another since 1991. He was born in northern Maine but quickly transplanted to Wichita.