I Read your Speedrunning Hot Takes...

TWITCH: / lunaticj
TWITTER: / lunaticjtv
DISCORD: / discord
I asked the speedrun community what their unpopular opinion/hot take on speedrunning was. These are the responses.
#speedrun #Zelda #LunaticJ

[@LunaticJ]

Background Music in order: Wildlands - Super Smash Bros. Brawl Dracula's Castle - Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Torvus Bog - Metroid Prime 2: Echoes Main Theme (Twilight Princess) - Super Smash Bros. Brawl Hidden Mountain & Forest - Super Smash Bros. Brawl Hooktail Castle - Paper Mario: TTYD We're Finally Landing - HOME Wario's Battle Canyon - Mario Party Tantal Night - Xenoblade Chronicles 2 Frozen Hillside - Kirby's Air Ride Twilight Sniping - Metal Gear Solid 2 Preliminaries - Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories Redial - Bomberman Hero Bowser's Castle - Mario Kart Wii Staff Roll - Zelda: Ocarina of Time

[@Hallootjest3d]

"5 hours ago" 😂

[@Gamingwithahandicap]

You should really do a video on Tak and the Power of Juju speedruns! The 2003 GameCube 3D platformer classic! The movement in that game is insanely good!

[@johnthomson3827]

i challenge you to speed run final fantasy 14's story hehehe

[@DrUnfunny]

My personal take on "the only categories that matter are any%, low%, or 100%" is that I love all of the unique and quirky categories, I just REALLY wish that the more unique finish condition categories got more spotlight.

[@themora3922]

And it excludes some very popular categories like 16 stars in SM64 and of course MST in Ocarina of Time. Like if you want a category that is not too long but you don't want to watch the game beaten in 3 mins (including the starting cutscene) with some arbitrary code execution (which I can understand), MST is literally the best category for you Every game is different and that's why the speedrun community is so diverse

[@DrUnfunny]

@@themora3922 I know, I'm talking in general about categories that are unpopular despite an amazing premise.

[@obiwancannoli1920]

SM Oddysey Nipple% Metroid Dread Hypothermia%

[@DrUnfunny]

@@obiwancannoli1920 Yeah, I like those, I like the them a lot

[@pokeninjafireemblem]

Myhouse.wad lawnmower%

[@AcroxShadow]

23:49 Discord should not be used as a replacement for dedicated forums and wikis, ever. This needs to be brought up more.

[@HolyHolyHandGrenade]

Yes, I have been saying this for _ages,_ and it's not just speedrunning, either! I run into this with games or communities in general, but there's just no good way to host documents or what have you; the number of times I've been told "go to the discord" only to get there and get immediately linked to a google doc is _infuriating._

[@avasam06]

I'll add an additional detail to turbo: it's not just being tired, it's also about developping real and crippling hand health issues! Especially when it's not considered a important competitive skill in some games, as you've already pointed out.

[@xana3961]

Carpal Tunnel is crippling. Any office worker will tell you this.

[@g24eva27]

I used to be able to button mash. Until I got ganglion cyst surgery. And now I lost that ability. But I only miss it to Mario party GameCube games. The smaller switch buttons I can still button mash on.

[@cortexavery1324]

Interesting. I never considered that. I'm 100% on your side.

[@Delcatty16]

Today I learned that "GSR" didn't stand for Gold Skulltula Reward. I thought this whole time it was a speedrun for getting all 100 Gold Skulltula Tokens and getting the final reward.

[@parcosmaulo1]

the discord damage is already done. too much information, in all sorts of topics, all over the world, is locked behind groups and will without doubt be lost in the future. if not because discord ceases to exist, then because discussions are so badly organized that no one will ever be able to find shit reliably, in fact that already happens frequently lol

[@everythingpony]

Or private votes to block the wiiu version of oot

[@Cute___E]

@@everythingpony It was Majora's Mask, and that was a good decision

[@HolyHolyHandGrenade]

@@Cute___E While I agree that it was best for the health of the game, I _really_ have to ask, as a total outsider... Why the heck didn't they just ban WiiU VC??? Isn't that the thing that everyone was actually worried about? If it's _that bad_ of a version, it's not like banning it is going to reasonably bar people from participation; in addition, if there's a different exploit found to use the debug menu in other versions, then you don't have to deal with "well wait this wasn't what we were trying to ban, now what do we do?"

[@marcosdly]

You probably get this compliment all the time, but you look like that employee that got their scream power sucked out of them in Monsters Inc.

[@HenriqueVieira8128]

How is that supposed to be a compliment? 😭

[@ShayyTV]

i did it mom i'm in a lunaticJ video

[@LunaticJ]

Omg it’s shayy undertale

[@MiroBouchard]

Shayy undertale is here. It is button maching time.

[@paularized1]

“Good for you son. Now go get a damn job!”

[@LucOfArcadia]

oh i love picking apart the "7 hour rpgs are just playthroughs" mentality. i used to run a game that was, at the time, 14+ hours for any%. it's just barely under 11 hours 10 years later because it's tightly made. average playthroughs of the game are in the 50-60+ hour range, and it's been proven that cutscenes in it make up about 8 hours of the run, so we condense those possibly 60 hours of gametime into roughly 3ish hours. there's REALLY difficult strategies, insane amounts of information to memorize and RNG to adapt to on the spot, skips to overcome that take days to weeks of grinding, and it's a genuine beast to tackle when your 10+ hour run has a fairly long stretch that could kill it under 2 hours in and you can MAYBE get one complete run in every 3 months because you have a life. there's value in all sorts of runs and categories, and it's a lot of skill to turn that 60 hour game into a run 20 times shorter. related, my take is: the ultimate skills that new runners should develop are healthy, mindful habits, starting with listening to their bodies. i developed really bad muscular problems in my hands, probably partially due to running a lot of games over the years and some having intensive movement, and i can't do many daily tasks without pain anymore, much less complete a speedrun. 30 minute runs are short, but they can do serious damage when that big, necessary trick you're having trouble with is 10 minutes in and you're resetting a ton. setting timers to take breaks and following through, using those breaks to refresh your water or a snack, stretch, stand, etc. and assess your hands for pain to determine if you need a break is the difference between being able to run for the long haul or not being able to run a game ever again.

[@graham7784]

You don’t know how to play the game. Only I know how to play the game. You’re wrong, I’m right, bye bye.

[@itsmarshallll2600]

Classic

[@degmcgee]

most open minded glitchless runner

[@PlayPodOG]

"i hate it when some people find ways to speed run a game even faster" is basically what the major glitch guy said. like. what do they think speedrunners are gonna do? not try to find ways to beat the game faster?

[@BananaGatorProds]

I agree with them to an extent. In terms of the core purpose of speedrunning then yeah its a trash take, and sure categories exist, but sometimes a major glitch gets found that is something so visually boring that the run devolves into staring at a black out of bounds void for 90% of the run. Like congrats you beat the game faster but now the run is boring as shit to watch and usually just as boring to actually play. Was it really worth it?

[@bakedbeananimation]

Also thank you for always taking the time to explain what all the acronyms and terminology means, even though most people watching probably already know. You always explain things in such an easily digestible manner that never feels condescending or elitist or gate-keeping. Very excited about the energy from this channel man

[@SparkySummers]

Seeing this man stare into my soul and not emote in the slightest is really giving me the creeps

[@WannabeMarysue]

Speedrunners should move back to forums, so I can lurk them more efficiently. I love to lurk TASVideos, whose forum is still active. Forum culture can be a lot less strict than it was 15 years ago, mods let you use chat speak and necropost

[@xxProjectJxx]

The thing about categories is that, that's all well and good for popular games with plent of people running each category. But for smaller games, you can't say "if glitches pester you, just watch a glitchless run" if no one is really bothering with glitchless.

[@daddyespressodepresso2207]

as someone who got INTO speedruns with BotW Dog%, I'm completely baffled by the "100% or Any% are the only categories that matter" take.

[@never_bored_again]

high score runs are just as cool and often cooler than speedruns

[@JBLilPaper]

Here’s mine: Id rather be decent (like top 40) at a lot of games and categories than be top 5 in one category in one game. I’d hate to throw myself at the same run over and over and over again just to save 500 milliseconds

[@CyclopsDragon]

I've basically just started mentally replacing "this run sucks" with "I can do better than this". 99% of the time it means the same thing as what the runner meant, and it doesn't downplay the quality of the run.

[@paularized1]

9:50 If you’re worried about needing pee breaks then just run a Zelda game and get an early bottle. Problem solved.

[@Bluestk]

Tbh one take I like to give is that load screens unironically hurt speed games a lot and should be removed from the full time whenever possible (for example makes a lot of games ban emulators or backups through modded consoles like the Wii on principle, makes some games have the worst version be the most commonly run like DK64, can cause people to have to buy a digital version of a game just to be able to be on equal ground and in general it can cause a lot of inconsistencies over time with consoles getting older and loading screen changing a lot depending on the platform you play)

[@KTSpeedruns]

This is honestly why I think developers should put time into speedruns modes for their games with an onscreen timer that pauses during loads. If you want your game to have a huge following, you might as well give a nod to part of that following that will want to speedrun your game.

[@TimsGamesDoneHard]

I mostly watch speedruns of Souls games, and those games tend to have accurate in-game time that has loads removed. And when they don't, the community is very quick to create a live split timer that pauses during load screens. This sadly isn't reasonably possible for many console games, especially older ones, but when it is possible, it feels like the gold standard

[@HolyHolyHandGrenade]

I first heard of load removers from watching Tomatoanus's commentated Fallout runs, and I am consistently _astonished_ that every community hasn't jumped on that whenever possible; like, games just don't release for _only one_ platform anymore unless it's PC or a Nintendo game, for the most part, you'd think there would have been an effort to create a load remover that's compatible with most games in order to prevent gatekeeping and also prevent people with monster PCs from getting an advantage in games where the framerate matters (which is a lot of them, way more than it should be) or there's a lot of lag.

[@truhhhhhhhokIII3]

This might be a weird comment, but im a pro skater that loves watching gaming speedruns…Yes though i have no understanding of any of these games, what i do understand and love about these videos (speedrunning), has a lot to do with the personal stories they tell! I connect with hearing of their resilliance of the mind in not giving up after accumulative millions of tries. Heck, ok so i played the original mario bros bc my dad had a nintendo, i mowed lawns to get a n64 and smash bros was my thing but never even got or played SM64. but when i got into skating i realized you cant get better with rage quitting which i learned from gaming. You just have to grind it out and put in the work. So where i guess some kids complain like “oh these people story is too long blah blah” i kind of do see the benefit to highlighting the struggle some people have gone through and the sheer determination of thousands of tries in order to obtain one goal, which should be highlighted for the achievement it is. What a lot of people dont understand about skateboarding is the amount of understanding of physics, knowing your own body mechanics, and mental anguish that goes into one singular clip you would see in a video. Gotta do all the same things in speed running a game, it just physically hurts less bc trust me jumping off roofs sucks lol. The public just sees a 4 second insta video of a board flip, the person rides away and some perturbed security guard…what they dont see, is that whole story that is presented in some of these summoning slt videos etc. growing up it took them 5 years to just learn the trick, then had the confidence and wanted to film one and it took 200 tries between 5 trips back, and the pure relief when the work pays off. So i guess i relate to yall and kinda understand the crazy glitches and just hoping everything lines up. Say getting one setup to work just for another setup to hope the third works or else its a dead run in game, is like when skateboarders link multiple tricks in a row with each other. you usually want one super hard trick at the end or beginning of the sequence. Thus its like that framerule or whatever: where you have to be frame perfect like 3 or 4 times in a row and if you are even one bit frame off the speedruns dead. but for tricks, its like that second frame is perfect but the third in sequence you jumped on literally a millisecond wrong frame, so you lean to the left hit a sidewalk crack (thats bigger than the one you were rolling over) and have to jump off your board and start the entire sequence over again…2hours later you land it, yay…but thats now only 12seconds of your 4 minute skate video lol. Like, i very much relate to the type of trial and error this all takes, and how the speed runners nowadays go to the most extreme depths it can go…just to take off seconds and clean up a run! Some kids have yet to see the benefits of simmering down and appreciating a persons whole story, vs seeing a minute long clip! But i also understand bc ive been that kid, and still battle adhd haha Anyways keep up the great work, im hyped on yalls community it kinda reminds me of skating how close knit it is, and how everyone celebrates and encourages even trying! And the bullies are getting tossed out of both groups over the past 5-10 years so im lovin in 🔥 Ps the self critic thing applies to both too, i have my name on the bottom of a board but im like “i suck” and i get way more stoked when the homies land tricks or beat a record yk? Haha We can be our own biggest hater

[@eyesistorm]

A couple hot takes from me: SM64 31 Star should be on the main leaderboard. It has clear non-arbitrary rules: Beat the game as fast as possible without skipping the 30 star door, and makes a good category for people who can't consistently do MIPS clip. 12 eye portals in Minecraft ruined Set Seed. All the category is now is rng, movement and an ender dragon fight. While the record is certainly impressive, the fact that you don't need to visit a nether fortress makes the category less interesting in my opinion.

[@billionai4871]

my take on "speedrunning should exist as both hobby and esport", I mean, almost all sports also exist as hobbies. The kids playing soccer in recess or shooting basketballs on the weekends are a great example... I don't understand how turning something into a sport (or e-sport) would rule out it being a hobby...

[@Purpletrident]

On the topic of randomizers aren't speedruns, how does that differ from, say Minecraft where every seed is different (if you're not doing the set seed category)? It's basically a big 'ol randomizer at that point

[@aronspiker72]

Because you barely need anything to begin with, and all of the stats are based both finding out when a seed is bad enough to reset on, and being able to quickly determine when something you need is in a specific location, and they're basically just making luck as irrelevant as you possibly can; lowest percent has a video on this. In a true randomizer however you basically search through checks as quickly as possible until you get enough items pointing you in a particular direction. In short, Minecraft runs usually have the same "route" more or less every time, while randomizers have you build the route as you go.

[@TimsGamesDoneHard]

I think there's no difference at a high level. Minecraft has a set of key item/location requirements to reach the end of the game, and where they spawn is random within some set of possibilities. That's true in a randomizer of any game. The route to do those checks is generally the same, and that's why it's a pretty popular run, but to say it's distinctly different from randomizers in other games doesn't seem right. You have to route on the fly in either case. Maybe you don't have to do major route modifications based on your seed, but it's still a route change every time you start a new run. That said, there's random elements in a lot of speedruns, usually with drop rates or enemy behavior, so there's definitely some gray area between full on randomizers and speedruns with zero RNG. Minecraft leans towards the randomizer side of this with the world and items within changing every time you do a new run, but I wouldn't discount it as a speedrun because of that

[@HolyHolyHandGrenade]

@@TimsGamesDoneHardTL:DR; I agree, I think part of it comes down to language and perception between players/non-players. You bring up an interesting point here; Minecraft really does exist on that wibbly-wobbly line of randomizer vs. speedrun in a lot of ways. It has all the hard-line required elements of a normal speed game, (which is basically only "definable moments for the start and end", to be honest,) but at the same time, it has _absolutely nothing_ that's completely constant in-between those two points, which is much more in line with the way a randomizer plays. Then you have games like roguelikes (or roguelites I don't care about the weird genre name right now, you know what I mean) that kinda _already_ play like speedruns in a lot of ways, and have the exact same formula where nothing is constant except the start and end point; is a roguelike speedrun a randomizer? I don't think I have an answer to that, but I can say that the roguelikes I enjoy almost always seem very similar in appeal to a good randomizer for me. That's not even considering the distinction of how a game looks vs how it plays; if all you care about is the watchability of the end result, then a randomizer and a Minecraft run probably do look pretty similar. In both cases, the viewer likely doesn't understand any of the decision-making going on, so to them, both would just look like someone getting really lucky and finding things quickly; the same sort of applies to roguelikes. It isn't really about runner vs. non-runner, it's about the level of familiarity with _that specific game,_ since even a WR holder isn't going to be able to follow a fast-paced run that relies on quickly processing information and making decisions based on it. (MMBN speedruns really exemplify this, since it's effectively an execution-based deck builder.) Finally, on the point of randomizers not being speedruns, I think the issue is partially that there is no "root" term for "playing a game way, way better than a normal person would ever think was possible". Like, I play ZOoTR sometimes, and I've learned a fair amount of speed tech along the way; however, I could _never_ do an actual OoT run, unless the route was basically just "vanilla plus whatever I can figure out how to skip" since I didn't learn a _run,_ I just learned all the check locations, and some fun speed tech so I can feel like I'm getting away with something. Even still, the fact remains that I'm calling it "speed tech" and not, like, "rando tricks" or "rando tech", because "speedrun" has become the de-facto root word for that entire category of skills, kinda like how any controversy is "something-Gate", even though the "Gate" part comes from the name of a hotel, or "thing-ception" even though nesting wasn't even what inception meant in the actual movie, it was planting an idea and making someone think it was theirs. (They both became what's called a "libfix", incidentally, kinda like "suffix" or "prefix".) The problem is that the word "speedrun" really doesn't break down well for that, both "speed" and "run" are existing words, and while "speed tech" is sort of like a libfix, it's not quite, since it's two words. "Speed tech" is just descriptive; it's a tech for speed. I don't have a suggestion as to what to call it or whatever, but it's been a thing that's on my mind for a while. Like... the closest analog is a chess master/grandmaster, but IIRC those are both rank-based, so that couldn't work here. They have the necessary _depth_ of game knowledge, but we have no benchmark by which we could say someone has that type of skill in a video game context; that itself is interesting, though. It's not often that you run across an obvious example of a thing there _could_ be a word for, there just isn't because no one _needs_ it.

[@1un4cy]

A lot of minecraft stuff is straight external cheats. Like pausing the game pauses the timer so you can spend 5 minutes plugging coordinates into a calculator that tells you exactly where the end portal is.

[@StardustSauce]

Why couldn't a randomizer be a speedrun? Roguelike games of all stripes have thriving speedrun communities, in Fixed Seed and Random categories alike, and that's to say nothing of the outlandishly popular Minecraft speedrun. Even intense, incredibly skill-heavy games like punch-out often come down to grinding out the best possible luck. I don't see why a Randomizer is any different. It looks like a speedrun, it walks like a speedrun, it quacks like a speedrun, and I'm clearly not alone in the feeling.

[@revengeofthelolin]

bro looks like that dude from monster inc after going through the scream extractor

[@rphntw1n]

Bruh

[@darkychao]

but like, randomizer speedruns are still speedruns, thought. I feel like trying to make exceptions like that would mean you'd also say that roguelike game speedruns aren't speedruns, or random seed Minecraft runs aren't speedruns.

[@DarkAuraLord]

Yeah, definitely agree. People are willing to run games that INNATELY have more rng in them than some randomizer settings, but for some reason randomizers can't be a speedrun? Randomizers are handled very similarly in approach to the games you mentioned - the strats for them tend to revolve around things like leveraging your odds and making the game as consistent as possible. In other words, there is skill to speedrunning both randomizers, and the games with heavy amounts of RNG factors such as random seed MC, and many roguelite/like games.

[@KaineWraith]

Agree, they are speedruns, but I don't think randomizer speedruns are good fit for leaderboards and world records.

[@bl4ckhearts802]

@@KaineWraithwouldnt a randomizer speed run be more fun to watch since everything is where its ment to be so makes it harder so why couldnt they get their own leader boards and world records

[@KaineWraith]

@@bl4ckhearts802 Because it would be such a luck heavy category. Just endless resets hoping Mido's house has 4 useful items. It would devolve from a unique random challenge to see who could find the best random seed the quickest.

[@djinnspalace2119]

they are vastly different. IF oot or any game like that had a randomize option within the game, it would be different. but they dont.

[@mhfsilver_]

12:35 This is one I feel is a good take. Especially when learning a game, it's important that people learn at their own pace and do things their own way. Make your own route based on what you can and can't do. Or if a game is new, I think it's a good idea to route things yourself. When Mario Odyssey came out, I didn't join any Discord for it, just routed it myself. Did runs of my own route then looked at the times. Granted, my best was like 30 minutes slower than what the community was making, but that time I spent making my own route to cater to my own abilities, was vital in my enjoyment of the run and overall improvement in the general gameplay. Now if only I had actually learned the real route...

[@KingWafl]

I agree GSR in OoT should be renamed to "No Major Glitches" or NMG. That way the community can just say "everything not in this speedrun is a major glitch and it is not allowed"

[@neros_soren]

NMG means No Major Glitches and the idea is "don't use anything that sequence breaks". Door of time skip, certainly sequence breaks.

[@KingWafl]

@@neros_soren this is not true for Majora's Mask No Major Glitches, or Super Metroid No Major Glitches, which both have sequence breaks and skips all over their run. NMG would fit fine for GSR

[@ZeroKitsune]

@@neros_soren "major glitch" doesn't have a defined meaning and is determined by the community

[@MWBgq]

16 star is basically a low % speedrun, which is one of the 3 that commenter finds available. Terrible example.

[@themora3922]

Lunatic makes a 28min video with hot takes just to make his own takes into a video is pure gold, I love it

[@shadowelza1923]

While I don’t speedrun most games, I do however like to take tactics from speedrunners and add it to my game. It made some missions in GTA San Andreas so much more easy than doing it the intended way

[@neros_soren]

Literally how many speedrun boomer/baby-boomers started. "oh, that looks fun, I want to try that myself" and it never stopped from there.

[@flavionms]

Speedrunning is already infinitely accessible. Anyone can do it in any way they want. They might not be able to compete in a leaderboard because they're doing things differently than others, thus it wouldn't make sense to put them head to head, but you don't need a leaderboard to speedrun. If you do want to compete in a leaderboard, though, then preserving the purity of the category is important, because a competition needs to be fair to all. Compromising that to make it more accessible would be both unnecessary and detrimental.

[@rphntw1n]

You can certainly start your own leaderboard and try to build a community. It’s worked a few times. 🤷🏻‍♂️

[@MarlowPreston]

5:17 Using Air Swim which is pretty much boss rush the speedrun skipping all of the traversal between bosses as an example of being boring is just as big a hot take as being anti glitch itself. If anything I've always seen that used as a golden example of a speedrun balanced between glitches and no glitches.

[@TimsGamesDoneHard]

Idk if I agree, in Shura Any% you only fight phase 2 of Geni, and Emma/Isshin. Otherwise you skip every boss or cheese them in a corner. Not to say I find the run boring, I love that run, and corner cheeses are not easy at all, but I wouldn't say it's a good balance of glitches to not glitches, though it's pretty subjective

[@themanwithaplan7678]

Coming into this a year later, as a kinda hardcore-casual oot speedrun fan I think "Any% No Powerful Glitches" makes more sense cause like there's an obvious difference between major glitches like Door of Time or Supersliding and these like super reality breaking glitches

[@Junipart]

I think a lot of bad takes speedrunning come from something of a disconnect between the speedrun community and the general public I used to be one of those obnoxious "glitches are cheating" type commenters, and for me it really just stemmed from the fact that without context, many runs are incomprehensible to watch. If someone likes a game and just wants to see it be played fast, and they look up a speedrun and see someone make a bunch of bizarre movements and then warp to a different area entirely, that's not going to satisfy what they were looking for and they likely don't know enough about the speedrunning community to be aware of other categories that might better fit what they want to see from a run. Honestly, even now, while I've grown an appreciation for the effort it takes to speedrun games and I love channels like this, or summoning salt or bismuth or lowest% which explain the mechanics behind speedruns and the history of how they developed, I still have trouble watching straight runs of a game, especially without knowing the history of strats that are going on. That's just my perspective on things I guess.

[@bl4ckhearts802]

tbf depends how the glitches are used cos in a way it is cheating but obvious single player games whos cares cos its not *cheating* to win something multiplayers games can be seen as *cheating*

[@abdalln8554]

I think im in the same boat as you, i like watching glitchless runs and like hearing/watching recaps of glitched runs.

[@andrewmurphy2093]

Yeah I imagine that's where the comment about runs skipping most of the game comes from as well. Watching someone do something I don't even understand to skip all the content isn't very satisfying to watch. Some glitches can be cool to see though, but things like wrong warps just make it less interesting for the viewer. Although, the viewers aren't exactly the point of running in the first place.

[@HolyHolyHandGrenade]

I fully agree with the idea that it's about a disconnect. Personally, I feel like the most relevant factor for those of us _in_ the community is remembering that how "good" or "valid" a run is has nothing to do with how interesting it is to watch. I've seen a lot of runs that were mediocre even when they were done, but because they were presented well, they're way more enjoyable than say, watching Super Mario World 3 ACE world record with no commentary. The latter run is _infinitely_ more impressive, objectively speaking, but _subjectively,_ (i.e. the only one that matters when it comes to entertainment value,) most people aren't going to be able to tell what the heck just happened in the second one. One is much more technically difficult, while the other is more entertaining, but both are valid speedruns. This is why I think it's so important to commentate runs; both so that a non-runner can follow what's happening, and also because it means that down the line when those strats are outdated, _runners_ will still be able to follow along even if the discord goes down.

[@tkienjoyer]

12:37 I love this. I speedran mk8dx rainbow road for YEARS and put hundreds of attempts in it, and of course I tried every strategy to make my run shorter. But I never used super-glider because I found it unfun, mainly pausing to turn on tilt controls just really killed the pace of the run for me. But I kept running it anyway because it is my favorite track and I loved running it. I stopped running it about a year ago because I got THE run. I got my 2nd best lap 1 EVER (-0.5 iirc) and I matched the last 2 laps from my previous pb. I'm not going to beat that run in a long long time, if ever. Mainly because I am satisfied with my performance in the category

[@rateeightx]

17:50 You said it right there, "In the traditional sense", Randomiser speedruns are still speedruns, As someone is trying to beat the game as quickly as possible, they are simply not traditional speedruns, And obviously are not as competitive as traditional speedruns (Unless you're racing someone on the same seed or something), But that doesn't make them any less of speedruns, I can imagine people getting enjoyment out of watching or doing a randomiser speedrun for the same reasons they would out of doing it for a traditional speedrun. It's definitely fair to separate them out from traditional speedruns, But to suggest they're not speedruns at all is simply incorrect in my opinion.

[@YeahImRose]

I totally get the summoningsalt thing, just feels like the formula got stale a few videos back

[@RichConnerGMN]

for the first hot take, a game that ive thought about in this context is hollow knight. for some reason, that game's igt doesn't include time spent in screen transitions. this would make sense, because it does have to account for loads, but it also includes the fadein to the black loading screen. this means that screen transitions don't incur as much of a timeloss as (i think) they logically should, which seems to especially be an issue in runs with main menu storage. this is just my perspective as a total outsider though

[@urlocalcrypt1d762]

Helps bridge the gap between high end PC's and low spec

[@loftwyng131]

Oh man I have so many opinions and rebuttals to these I feel like I can’t even encapsulate them all in a single comment

[@stefanowohsdioghasdhisdg4806]

re: glitches not being how the game was intended to be played The game also wasn't intended to be speedran. What game dev says "boy I sure hope people zoom through this and skip as much as possible"? You already aren't just playing and enjoying the game. You are doing a completely different thing. That's why speedruns are different from let's plays and walkthroughs. Also I'm pretty sure glitchless categories exist for most things, so like... you can watch those if you like

[@WMFawn]

Tfw you called AstralSpiff a random KZbin commentor, he's got several speedruns under his belt!

[@biiome_nf]

He wasn't calling spiff a random commentor. He was agreeing with spiff, saying that if the people spiff was referring to (mostly random yt commentors) got what they wanted and decided all the rules, the speedrunning scene in question would go belly up

[@zeb7926]

Definitely one of my favourite speedrun youtubers keep up the great work

[@thesunlightguardian]

For a good example against developer intent and glitches, ask the person to post a video of Gen 1 pokemon glitchless. Not the category, but purely no glitches and as the game was "meant" to be played. It is legit almost impossible

[@ZeroKitsune]

If you mean without encountering any glitches, it is actually impossible, you run into a glitch during the intro.

[@lolidemon3163]

​@ZeroKitsune i'd even make the argument in gen 1 that the ai is a glitch bc do u think the developers intended say the opponent just spamming agility or rest bc they find those moves "super effective" against ur pokemon

[@jacquelineking5783]

True but there is a difference between unavoidable glitches and say in a solo run using harden to raise your speed because of a glitch.

[@ruinerryan]

I’ve kinda expanded to other games speedruns and it’s really really fun. Also really good video Lunat 🔥

[@JBLilPaper]

Yo a fellow Wii sports dude

[@ruinerryan]

@@JBLilPaper hello there

[@damiencouturee6240]

Oh one more thing. I think SRM and ACE are just the absolute coolest things ever. They definitely need to be kept in their own category, but god DAMN is it so cool. Just like, take 2 steps this way backflip pull out these 3 items and bam the credits roll its like wtffff lmao, it is SO cool.

[@CodingItWrong]

"I don't understand how people can sit and play for that long with no pee breaks." "Sitting" eh? I just thought of a solution, but it would involve no video feed of the runner, and an audio feed of the runner might get awkward.

[@rateeightx]

Hot Take: We have 100%, We should have other specific percents too, 50% speedrun, 75% speedrun, Screw it 61.3% speedrun, Why the hell not? EDIT: Also, more serious hot take: People doing random stuff for no apparent reason are the backbone of speedrunning communities, That's how many important glitches and skips were discovered. EDIT 2: Screw it, I got an even hotter take: Resetting often makes the run less fun to watch. It's more fun to watch someone do a slow complete run than to watch them try the first 5 minutes of a run 300 times until they get it right.

[@Shoefae]

You can speedrun randos. Game knowledge and execution still play a major role, sometimes even moreso than regular rehearsed categories. Routing on the fly being a huge part of that. Something having a random seed doesn't make it "not a speedrun," it just doesn't make it a directly competitive category. But saying something needs to be that for it to be a speedrun directly contradicts other opinions you state in this video. Going as fast as possible while achieving goals in something is speedrunning.

[@canicalr]

*My hot take:* Using calculators in Minecraft speedruns should be considered TAS, since you are using an external tool to assist your speedrun, literally what the acronym stands for. Same thing for turbo controllers.

[@aronspiker72]

The acronym itself basically has no meaning at this point and is just a shorthand for creating the run frame by frame and then playing it back.

[@canicalr]

@@aronspiker72 Frame advance is just one of the tools you can use but not the only one, it cannot even be used on a Minecraft random seed run, so using external programs to partially trivialize the challenge is pretty much as TAS as it can get

[@biiome_nf]

I see what you're saying, but I'm not sure I would go as far as to say that using calculators for minecraft runs can be equated with the tools used in TASes. The tools used are fundamentally different in two important ways: 1. The player is not being given any values that they otherwise would be unable to obtain 2. The tools do not trivialize the gameplay itself. Sure, there are calculations that would otherwise have to be done manually that are trivialized, but the gameplay itself remains the same. If your response to this is "tools are tools," that's perfectly valid and I do believe there is merit in what you're saying. However, couldn't you go a step further and say that using a pencil and paper is also a tool in the same sense? Using a pencil and paper certainly makes those calculations easier when compared to doing it all in your head. Some people who may read this might be saying "but they're not the same," and to them I challenge you to prove that. At the end of the day they are both tools, one is just more powerful than the other, and the entire discussion here revolves around the question, "what tools are we willing to allow minecraft speedrunners to use while doing runs?" My personal answer to that question is... I'm torn. On one hand I don't personally see anything wrong with using a calculator in runs, but on the other hand I think disallowing them would have some really positive effects for a number of people who decide to take up running the game. Right now the way we (at least in America) teach kids math is terrible. Our math curriculum takes something as rich, deep, fascinating, and fun as what we're capable of with numbers, and systematically strips away the wonder and fascination before presenting what's left: a boring, tedious, labor-intensive chore of a subject to learn and engage with. For a small group of people, having to work through basic trig by hand to have a good minecraft speedrun might just be part of the solution! Whether it serves as an introduction to trig before they learn about it in the classroom, or a way to freshen up and/or keep fresh with the knowledge they already have, minecraft speedrunning could play a role in fostering an interest in math as a whole, and for a predominantly young audience, no less! On the other hand, prohibiting the use of calculators entirely from minecraft speedruns might just be too much for too many people, and I think it's important that speedrunning remains accessible for as many people as possible, ideally everyone. I think a good middle ground would probably be to allow for calculators that can perform operations up to and including trig functions, but nothing more powerful, like graphing capabilities or programs where you just plug in your values and get coordinates. I think triangulation is a really cool technique and should have a place in minecraft speedruns, but I also think it's better for the details of triangulation to not get hidden behind something like a program that does the whole process for you. Without allowing simple calculators, triangulation would likely become too difficult for the majority of players and thus become a barrier of entry into high level speedrunning that has nothing to do with the gameplay itself, which I don't agree with.

[@thesunlightguardian]

Your randomizer argument does bring up the question of if some games even can be ran in your mind. By your take on randomizer you would also discount the entirety of random seed minecraft runs. Minecraft and rogue likes and many more are heavily based on their random seed generation and it isn't as easy as you state

[@tree_0550]

My take: skill is subject to luck just as much as luck-related events are subject to rng, especially in games that require extreme precision. To say something that has 14 frame perfect inputs in 5 seconds is a "skill issue" is idiotic. Furthermore, when factoring in the inevitability of nerves and the effects this nervous state has on the body/mind, a complete reliance on muscle memory becomes unavoidable, and muscle memory can not be 100% consistent. If that weren't the case, why would we ever fail? These opinions are obviously subjective and derived from my personal experience. However, I believe that nerves in speedrunning have a lot more room for research and documentation; that was the hardest part of progressing in my endeavors because of how little is expressly told, and by extension known, to a majority of people in the community.

[@czr.]

if your run is not done on an instrument, it is cheating

[@taken_over3416]

17:50 this seems reasonable, but would it not apply to Minecraft and other similar games as well?

[@alface935]

12:03 Case and point just in the Call Of Duty games alone You can: - Finish the Campain as fast as possible - Finish Invidiual Levels of the Campain as fast as possible - Finish Spec Ops Missions as fast as possible regardless of Rank - Finish Spec Ops Missions with the Highest Rank in each as fast as possible - Finish Individual Spec Ops Missions as fast as possible - Finish Individual Spec Ops Missions with the Highest Rank as fast as possible - Getting high rounds on Zombies - Finishing the Main Easter Egg Quests on Zombies - Getting high rounds on the starting room area only on Zombies - Getting high rounds without power on Zombies - Finishing the level in Extinction as fast as possible etc etc etc And that is just in the Call Of Duty games alone Imagine what other games even have to offer too

[@ac31048]

If randomizers aren't speedruns, then what's Minecraft?

[@rayseodium]

My personal hot take? I don't understand why Pokemon Speedruns don't use hacked safe files - talking about the starter pokemon obviously. I get it, it is a skill to frame perfectly press A on a beat to selcet a starter capable of doing the run. But the amount of resets needed to get a run going is insane. The games are already full of RNG and the skill in a speed run comes from navigating that RNG, while still using fast strats. Why can't we just give everybody a starter that is capable of finishing the run and than let the actual skill of the runners decide?

[@aronspiker72]

It's specifically because in the games where that's relevant, the RNG setup is often very complex, cannot just save & reset right before the starter, and often require perfect movement through several minutes of the game or lasts even after you get your starter. In BW2, the RNG of the game is based on your DS' Mac Address which is different for every DS so you have to develop your own RNG manip from scratch, and that game also has the most amount of movement before getting your starter (at least before the 3ds and Switch where RNG manipulation isn't really possible at all to begin with), and you have to do the same set of convoluted movement (which is different for every runner) perfectly before you can even check your starter. One think that Pokemon speed runners are long overdue for implementing is time without loads as every switch pokemon game has had inconsistent load times for various reasons and with other console speedruns they immediately removed loads from the final time once something like that is discovered, while PC games typically do time without loads by default is some people might not have a powerful enough PC to have minimum load times meaning money is involved in a time disadvantage.

[@KTSpeedruns]

I welcome speedrunning communities take steps or allow mods to remove frustrating RNG that can ruin runs. It sucks to see WR or PB pace runs die because of something the player has no control over. Three minutes ahead, sorry, Dampe is gonna take 16 tries to dig up that piece of heart you need for a valid 100% run, and now you're 5 minutes behind. That sucks.

[@neros_soren]

@@KTSpeedruns GO ahead with it, but keep it out of normal any%. Make it a separate category, if the community likes or even prefers it, they will flog to it.

[@DinoTechSR]

I gotta disagree with randomizes because Minecraft is basically a randomizer, but it is a speedrun

[@aronspiker72]

My reply to other comments about this: You barely need anything in Minecraft to begin with, and all of the strats are based both finding out when a seed is bad enough to reset on, and being able to quickly determine when something you need is in a specific location, and they're basically just making luck as irrelevant as you possibly can; lowest percent has a video on this. In a true randomizer however you basically search through checks as quickly as possible until you get enough items pointing you in a particular direction. In short, Minecraft runs usually have the same "route" more or less every time, while randomizers have you build the route as you go.

[@DinoTechSR]

@@aronspiker72 thats fair.

[@bl4ckhearts802]

@@aronspiker72 but you are still speedrunning through the game to beat it as fast as possible which is a speedrun

[@locustofchiron]

On the topic of Glitched vs. non-glitched runs, Linkus7 put out a video last November about the loss in popularity of OoT and Zelda games and the idea of Glitch vs. Non-Glitch speedruns. Pretty interesting watch.

[@isenokami7810]

On one hand, I do agree that speedrunning glitches aren’t playing the game “the way it was meant to be played”; in fact, I think speedrunning in general goes against the way things are meant to be. On the other hand, that’s why I’m here watching this stuff: the experiences speed runners make instead, especially the discoveries made with glitches, are fascinating. I might prefer what’s intended…and be intimidated by the alternative, but I could watch videos about that alternative for hours and still be in awe. Never let naysayers stop your speedrunning for not being “what’s intended”; that being true only makes it more amazing.

[@novelezra]

"You're playing the game wrong"

[@avasam06]

Classic

[@robthatbin127]

In regards to "More orgs should pick up speedrunners". While it would be amazing to see it happen, there are a multitude of reasons why it won't. It's the small size of the audience, the low amount of money that is made from events and the current state of finances in eSports as a whole. There is barely enough money coming into these orgs to fund high viewership eSports rosters so why would they sign a speedrunner that, sure, is popular in their own game, but outside the leaderboards no one has ever heard of and doesn't break 100 viewers per stream. If you want to be signed to an org as a speedrunner, become a popular streamer, size wise think of Cheese or Simply, have them put in your streamer contract that they'd fund travel expenses for a couple of speedrunning events a year (as it's your main form of content output) and do it that way, but speedrunning as an eSports is financially from neither side (event organisers & organisations) possible.

[@shovelclaws]

we're so back

[@cinnamoncat8950]

20:18 :O YOOO ASTRAL SPIFF IS ON HERE, hes for sure within my top 10 favorite youtubers of all time. also yeah what he says makes sense, why should you have a say on the future of the category when you dont even know what the present is like

[@TildeQ]

I disagree with your claim about randomizers not being speedruns. Random seed Minecraft speedruns are a popular category. Never seen anyone else claim that Minecraft isn't a real speedrun.

[@nallesounds5074]

As someone heavily involved with the OoT community I'd like to add my opinion on the whole "GSR is an awful name" in comparison to something like No Major Glitches (wrote this in response to LunaticJ's original tweet so will paste it here) Both names need a trip to a rules page either way, and defining what's a major glitch in OoT is quite tough (especially trying to get a community consensus) especially when GSR bans stuff that most people wouldn't consider major (blue warp cs skips) That's why changing the category from a restrictions based category into a goal-based one was done. When that's the idea, making a name for the category is hard. There are no perfect names, and GSR was the least bad one as decided by community vote. Also yes please people look at other categories besides any/100%!!

[@LunaticJ]

I plan on running GSR and maybe All Dungeons in 2024 since I’ll finally have the free time. Def wanna bring more awareness to these overlooked runs!

[@neros_soren]

Exactly. lttp literally uses NMG as "no sequence breaking". Now explain to someone who joins OoT, why door of time skip is allowed in a NMG category. Naming non any/100% categories is, and will ever be weird and most often than not, will not be self explanatory anyways.

[@SJrad]

I wonder how much 70 star runs would change if bljs and/or door clips were allowed. You still have to collect 70 stars. of course this would be as a category extension

[@ineedyoutostop]

In game time in souls games makes the runs so unbearable for me to watch. Save quitting out over and over to "save time" where it actually takes far more time irl is just stupid. I would love those games for speedruns otherwise.

[@jordanbugni8931]

Yeah but is it more fun for the people playing them

[@yukino4636]

ASTRALSPIFF wow i did not expect him to be here! i absolutely agree with him

[@Hot_Headed_Geek]

Damn I should have put more thought into my comment originally. Super Metroid is the clear favorite to speed run but personally Zero Mission is one of the Games that is designed in a way to very much encourage speed running.

[@drake_diangelo]

Thr comparison of speedruns vs randomizers is something I've though a lot about. "Speedrunning" tends to be a bit of a catch-all phrase for organized ways to play a game that wasn't intended by the devs. Lowest percent "speedruns" are another example of this. I wish we had a better phrase for it, but at the same time all of the randomizer runners I watch are also speedrunners, so I don't see it come up much where a distinction is necessary

[@birdfacemd]

Challenge runner might be closer to the right term

[@ShadySniper00]

the one comment talking about "normies" absoulutely got bullied and needs to touch some grass.

[@Sonicmaster4]

To say that randomizers are not speedruns is very close to saying that Minecraft random seed isn't a speedrun

[@aronspiker72]

My reply to other comments about this: Because you barely need anything to begin with, and all of the stats are based both finding out when a seed is bad enough to reset on, and being able to quickly determine when something you need is in a specific location, and they're basically just making luck as irrelevant as you possibly can; lowest percent has a video on this. In a true randomizer however you basically search through checks as quickly as possible until you get enough items pointing you in a particular direction. In short, Minecraft runs usually have the same "route" more or less every time, while randomizers have you build the route as you go.

[@thewhitefalcon8539]

Randomizers are a different game, which you can speedrun

[@bl4ckhearts802]

@@thewhitefalcon8539 so if you can speedrun it why isnt it a speedrun?

[@randomgamer-te8op]

@@aronspiker72 i mean that kinda depends on the game and randomizer itself

[@sycamorph]

I think speedrunning isn't 20% skill and 80% time, there also needs to be a lot of willpower. You need some strong willpower and determination to actually speedrun and keep going until you get good, thousands of hours later.

[@samszotkowski]

5% pleasure and 50% pain as well

[@lolidemon3163]

​@@samszotkowski and 100% reason to remember the name

[@brandino6030]

damn seeing myself pop up in this was a funny jumpscare. Thanks for featuring my take!

[@themariomaster5207]

This channel only has 69k subs? I've watched you for probably a year, but i thought you had over a million.

[@cho4d]

turbo should be allowed in long ass RPG games because doing 5-10 hours of mashing days on end WILL result in an injury sooner or later

[@CarlWidegrip]

Please blink

[@damiencouturee6240]

19:00 about putting runners on a high pedestal. I dont think theres anything wrong with that to a point anyway. People give praise to actors and all they do is pretend. And sure, maybe they just hit buttons fast. Thats all Mozart did too if you think about it. You can absolutely go too far and be a creepy obsessive weirdo, but theres nothing wrong with praising runners for there achievements. For example, I think GreenSuigi is cool as shit dude, Im a 31 year old guy. I dont wanna move in with him or anything but Id be stoked if I got to talk to him for a minute at GDQ or something. I guess I just mean its like everyything else - moderation. Its a skill that takes a lot of practice, no different than a professional athlete or a famous singer its just more niche

[@damiencouturee6240]

21:45 "both are equally valid" are you high man?? Letting people enjoy what they want? That's crazy talk, we're supposed to argue and belittle each other because of what we find interesting! It's funny that that argument only goes one way too. Glitchless fans have no problem telling glitch fans how dumb they are or whatever, but there's absolutely no one who likes glitch runs whining about glitchless runs. So can y'all just stop being assholes lol? You don't like it, that's completely fine, go do literally anything else with your life than taking the time to go to something you don't like just to let people know you don't like it. Just... Just don't watch it!?

[@mageius]

One of my hot takes is sometimes allowing a cheat code can be useful for setting up some situations for something like a new game+ or for IL runs where Maybe technically possible for a setup to try and run in, but not practical to do so because the amount of time it would take in order to get things set up for each attempt Please note I'm speaking as a leaderboard mod here for a few games that are ment to be replayed but once you finish the game it becomes a real pain to do full game runs with what you unlock. (Hence why the unlock everything is allowed as a way for NG+ runs.) Side note some codes are allowed in games if it only affects things like cosmetics or anything that would not affect a run. (Edit added more).

[@biiome_nf]

there are leaderboards that seriously expect you to play normally to the point where you actually start your timer when there are other much more convenient means to get there? whoever is in charge of those games needs to be replaced immediately

[@mageius]

@exittea616 (Face_exhaling emote) I mean, some people want to have things be as pure as possible. It's why I said, at least, for my perspective being willing to allow some things for a practical perspective is something I always try to think about. I mean I speedrun for fun not to make money on it at present.

[@Shlonzs]

ACE in OoT allowed one of the most beautiful moments in gaming history to happen (triforce%) ❤

[@briangang3977]

glitches are almost necessary for a run to be good and entertaining, but some are just so hard that its discouraging and makes entry too difficult

[@rphntw1n]

I love that you backed some of these. Hot takes rule!

[@kevandre]

Re the in-game times, at first I wasn't really into those but overall I think it's probably a more fair assessment given load times differing depending on the hardware the game's running on. For example, the modern Hitman trilogy speedruns are insane and use the in-game timers, and I think it's the right call, even with some pause buffering at the end of some levels

[@neros_soren]

And now consider, that most communities going by IGT, do not have to consider "hardware". Pokemon is one of the best examples.

[@ChillWin]

Those sure were some spicy speedrun takes

[@virtualdefender1847]

The comment about the major glitches is understandable, i wish that leaderboards had more categories, major glitch, for those technical wonders like airswim, no glitches where its just as perfected of a normal gameplay as it can be and minor glitches, I run serious sam fusion and the first place time has speedrun skips implemented that I cannot find resources for or explanations for. 5:31

[@relo999]

Speedruns are just highscores based on a timer rather than points.

[@cyanideOwO]

so many people i used to watch on twitch in 2018

[@cortexavery1324]

I mean... From outside the speedrun community the hate towards summoning salt feels like some people don't like that new people look at/enter the speedrun community. Those people got to understand that their ennemies are both inside and outside the community. Agreed with 100% of your takes (altho some i'd need more knowledge on).

[@poppipo1222]

6:20 he said the run was boring not the entire game

[@surprisedmarshmallow]

it's ironic that the process of a speedrun (Mostly when it's done by the top runners) takes longer than playing the game normallly, with all the trial and error stuff

[@PlayPodOG]

i don't think anyone has ever said randomizers are speedruns. you can speedrun a randomizer but randomizers themselves are not meant for speed.... they are meant to be random and thats it. adding a timer and trying to beat a randomizer fast turns it into a randomizer speedrun.

[@bl4ckhearts802]

so how can a randomizer speedrun be called a speedrun if it isnt a speedrun? since speedruns are beeating soimething fast? so shouldnt it be counted as a speedrun?

[@PlayPodOG]

@bl4ckhearts802 speedrunning a randomizer isnt the same as speedrunning the game. Its a whole different catagory with a totally different skill.

[@lalleruga2279]

Turbo categories should exist only in games where you can/need to abuse a specific glitch multiple times to just not ruin your hands My main game has a speedglitch that is nuts. It needs constant inputs on dpad throughout the whole game and it's pretty demanding People get discorauged so we made a turbo categories to make it easier and less stressful

[@Leannehef]

Someone told me I was in this video and I had no idea what I'd said. Happy to see I was just chatting breeze as always

[@OlderSnake]

I appreciate that one song from Bomberman Hero~

[@Doktario_Mystario]

20:45 but performing all those glitches is what shows your skill and knowledge of the game tho. glitches by their nature are often very hard to pull of (let alone pull them of consistently) and the route you take is fundamentally different from a glitchless run, so unless the speedrunner does both any% and glitchless anyway it's not comparable

[@wulfleyn6498]

Don't most over 4 hour categories allow for 30 min food and pee breaks whenever a runner wants?