This year’s Awesome Games Done Quick has recently ended with a total of $2,520,621.21 being raised for the Prevent Cancer Foundation. AGDQ is a yearly marathon where dozens of speed runners stream a wide variety of games for the amusement of millions to raise money for charitable causes. This year’s event occurred in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania between January 14th and 21st of January, 2024. If you missed it, recordings of the various runs can be found on the Games Done Quick YouTube channel. This year saw plenty of amazing runs, here are a few highlights.
Peanut Butter the Speedrunning Dog
You read that correctly, runner JSR_ has trained his dog Peanut Butter to play the NES game Gyromite. Released in 1985 Gyromite was one of two games to make use of the Robotic Operating Buddy (R.O.B.) peripheral to play games. Specifically, R.O.B. was utilized to push one of two buttons to help a character named Professor Hector navigate his lab. But who needs a robot when you have man’s best friend? Using a modified set-up Peanut Butter was able to perform the task normally done by R.O.B. by pushing down on a switch. JSR_ then commanded Peanut Butter when he should do so while also giving him treats every time he was successful. Together they were able to clear game mode B in 26 minutes and 24 seconds.
Super Mario 64 Drum%
Super Mario 64 is one of the most popular speed games of all time and has been featured in some form at almost every GDQ event. This time they decided to shake things up with a 16-star run controlled entirely with a drum kit. This feat was performed by the runner CZR who completed the run in 26 minutes and 6 seconds.
TASBOT Runs Super Metroid
It wouldn’t be a GDQ event without an appearance from TASBOT. TAS is short for Tool Assisted Speedrun, it refers to a speedrun that is performed utilizing prerecorded inputs and savestates to create a theoretically perfect run. This year’s TAS was for the popular speed game Super Metroid for the SNES. The TAS was created by SNIQ, it is an any% run which kills the animals completed in 35 minutes and 59 seconds, about 4 1/2 minutes faster than the current world record performed by a human.
Multiple World Records
It is always exciting to see new world records achieved live at an event, this year’s AGDQ did not disappoint in that respect as several new records were set in front of a live audience. First, runner Mechalink managed to beat the record for the Any% set seed category for the 1995 Sega Saturn game Virtual Hydlide with a run of 27 minutes and 11 seconds, more than 11 minutes faster than the previous record. Glitchcat7 managed to achieve a record in the Pride% category in the Super Mario World ROM-Hack Luminescent with a time of 41 minutes and 36 seconds, 7 seconds faster than the previous record. Finally, the runner Tallia managed to complete the beginner category for the Celeste mod Strawberry Jam Colab in 49 minutes and 13 seconds, a full 2 minutes and 30 seconds faster than the previous record.
These are just a few of the many amazing things that happened at this year’s Awesome Games Done Quick. It was a fantastic event that provided hundreds of hours of entertainment all while gathering money for a good cause. I hope that all of you check it out and enjoy it.
