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Why did I just watch this? Fascinating but I don't even know what a speed run is. In terms of the statistics, heat map and mini game breakdown - pretty slick.

Why did I just watch this? Fascinating but I don't even know what a speed run is. In terms of the statistics, heat map and mini game breakdown - pretty slick. I just don't understand why so much effort was put into unpacking this game within a game :)

jsnell 6y ago
A speed run is an attempt to finish a game faster than anyone else. (Within some set of constraints; e.g. it might mean seeing the credits, it might mean explicitly winning every stage or ever boss in the game, etc). The issue with this minigame was apparently that players would need to waste a basically random amount of time on the minigame, it was necessary to win the minigame to finish the game (in a way that meet these particular speedrun constraints). If the game takes two hours to finish and the minigame can take 1 minute or 5 minutes of it, an attempt where it takes 5 minutes is probably never going to beat the record. You might as well scrap it. And in this case you would not know until half an hour into the game whether this attempt you'd get lucky, or if it was a total waste of time. So this group wanted to find a way to mitigate the randomness, such that the viability of an attempt was determined by player skill rather than luck in a bullshit minigame.
- boringg 6y ago
  Got it - I didn't realize speedruns we're so popular for this game and that this minigame was the crux of the speed run problem. Impressive dedication to such a minute problem.
  - shaftway 6y ago
    There are different categories for speedruns within a game. The most popular is for completion, then for 100% completion. Sometimes other restrictions too. Like Super Mario Brothers has ones for winning with and without warp pipes. The fastest Super Mario Brothers speedrun is under 5 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gum4GI2Jr0s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gum4GI2Jr0s
VHRanger 6y ago
There's intrinsic satisfaction in optimising on a closed problem. Speedruns might seem pointless, but they provide that satisfying closed problem.

jsnell 6y ago

A speed run is an attempt to finish a game faster than anyone else. (Within some set of constraints; e.g. it might mean seeing the credits, it might mean explicitly winning every stage or ever boss in the game, etc). The issue with this minigame was apparently that players would need to waste a basically random amount of time on the minigame, it was necessary to win the minigame to finish the game (in a way that meet these particular speedrun constraints). If the game takes two hours to finish and the minigame can take 1 minute or 5 minutes of it, an attempt where it takes 5 minutes is probably never going to beat the record. You might as well scrap it. And in this case you would not know until half an hour into the game whether this attempt you'd get lucky, or if it was a total waste of time. So this group wanted to find a way to mitigate the randomness, such that the viability of an attempt was determined by player skill rather than luck in a bullshit minigame.

boringg 6y ago
Got it - I didn't realize speedruns we're so popular for this game and that this minigame was the crux of the speed run problem. Impressive dedication to such a minute problem.
- shaftway 6y ago
  There are different categories for speedruns within a game. The most popular is for completion, then for 100% completion. Sometimes other restrictions too. Like Super Mario Brothers has ones for winning with and without warp pipes. The fastest Super Mario Brothers speedrun is under 5 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gum4GI2Jr0s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gum4GI2Jr0s

VHRanger 6y ago

There's intrinsic satisfaction in optimising on a closed problem. Speedruns might seem pointless, but they provide that satisfying closed problem.