The Gold Split - Week #2: The Path of Exile Deep Dive
Week #2 (July 11th): Path of Exile campaign beaten in 55 minutes; Portal without portals; Marathon News; New World Records: Super Mario 64 (120 Star), Ocarina of Time, GTA V, Final Fantasy VII.
SGDQ has concluded, and the entire community is recovering from their collective hangover. But with that also comes a new wave of enthusiasm for the hobby and new speedgames to tackle, so I expect a ton of personal best times to be vaporised in the coming weeks.
It was a great week, but I’m looking forward to discovering the news cycle outside of the SGDQ event horizon (and passing it on). This is what the last seven days (and slightly beyond) had to offer:
Contents
Up to Speed ⚡️
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Quick Poll: What’s Good?
Ah, the most basic way of gathering feedback. And what better time to start than now? You have one (1) vote and may choose the section you enjoyed the most. I’d be happy if you did, but no pressure!
Story of the Week
Beating the Path of Exile campaign in 55 minutes doesn’t seem like a bigger deal than any other new best time in any other game, but I do think it’s worth talking about - for two reasons: exclusivity (it’s something only a handful of players will ever be able to attempt) and… I’ve played the game for over 4000 hours so I can actually write about it.
First, some info to get you up to speed: Path of Exile is a free-to-play action role-playing game, notorious for its complexity and onion-like layers of game mechanics. A first-time player might finish the campaign in 30 to 40 hours, or less if they’ve done some research before. It will take a moderately experienced player about 10 hours after a league reset and 5 hours or less with the use of prepared levelling gear.
But a solo time of under 60 minutes within a challenge league seemed unthinkable for a long time, even among the Path of Exile elite. However, the game receives a new league update every few months, and with that, new possibilities for abusing the mechanics and items that come with it.
The rules for this run are quite simple: it has to be done solo, in the current challenge league, and you may use any gear. You may set up your inventory in the first town Lioneye’s Watch and time starts when you enter The Coast, the zone following it.
This project was a collaborative effort between some of the most brilliant minds and best technical players in the game, spending hundreds of hours on theorycrafting, gear crafting, and practising. Havoc, who performed the run, has a rich history of participating in racing events within Path of Exile, setting speedrun records and competed in the finals at Path of Exile’s own Exilecon. Behind the scenes, Empyriangaming and Bazukatank assisted with crafting of the gear Havoc would be using and a large chunk of their own ingame currency as well.
Empyrian states in their commentary video that they spent about 21 Mirrors of Kalandra on crafting the equipment for this project. A Mirror is by far the most rare item in the entire game. It can clone any piece of equipment and therefore has insane value. To put the rarity into perspective: I’ve not found a single mirror in my over 4000 hours of playing the game, and I don’t expect to. For the ones of you keen on diving into a rabbit hole, Empyrian also has a crafting video showcasing some of the gear that would be used during the actual attempts.
Aside from the insane equipment for a low-level character and some obvious optimisations like ignoring optional side areas that would give passive skill points, the group used a lot more neat tricks, strategies and experience:
The Ranger class is used for the best access to action speed increases, the best way of scaling movement speed.
Using the current league mechanic, Havoc’s character gets to level 28 within the first few zones where you usually would be level 7 or 8. This means that the character meets the level requirement for a lot of the gear very early and gives them the passive skill points needed to path towards jewel sockets on the skill tree.
The four second rule: several modifiers on pieces of gear supply the player with speed buffs for four seconds every time an enemy is killed or the stance is switched.
Deathwarps are used to make strategies viable that are usually only possible with multiple players: leaving a town portal at the next (closed) progression point, acquiring the item that opens it and then killing the character to warp back to the town in order to use the portal.
A movement speed buff that would normally be gated behind the Eternal Labyrinth and choosing an ascendancy class are acquired early through a set of unique jewels.
Zone layouts are randomised, so this requires a ton of experience with how different map puzzle pieces can fit together in order to find the fastest route through each zone.
But, as much of an incredible showcase of what’s possible as this is, it’s not a speedrun to be put on a leaderboard. And I’m sure it was never meant for that. The barrier to entry in terms of equipment in order to compete is impossible to overcome for anybody but a handful of players at the top of the game. If you don’t have that gear, you don’t have a chance. Leaderboards thrive on accessibility.
But that’s not a bad thing. Feats like this can still spark enthusiasm in other players, motivate, empower, or simply provide great entertainment. Not everything needs to be a competition.
The current league ends in a few weeks, and with it, the possibility to level up extremely quickly. It might be a while before Havoc or anybody else gets another shot at besting this time.
Up to Speed
⭐ Weegee beats his own record in Super Mario 64 (120 Star) (1 hour 37 minute video)
Weegee improved his previous record from Jan. 16th by 19 seconds with a 1:36:02. It is now only a matter of time before the first run within the 1:35:xx realm, with multiple players regularly on pace. Who will get it first?
🕳️ The story about Portal players trying to beat the game without portals (28 minute video)
French content creator EGO tells the story of the why and the how Portal speedrunners started attempting to beat the game without portals. The video is in French, but English subtitles are available. They do an awesome job at breaking down very complex mechanics and making them understandable. This is paired with clean visuals and great editing. Check it out!
📅 Dates for AGDQ & SGDQ 2025 announced
AGDQ 2025 will take place between Jan. 5th and Jan. 12th 2025 in Pittsburgh, PA
SGDQ 2025 will take place between July 6th and July 13th 2025
🏃♂️ Australian Speedrun Marathon 2024 kicks off on July 16th (2 minute read)
The coolest marathon you may have never heard of kicks off in just a few days, raising money for Cure Cancer. There’s a ton of great talent from The Land Down Under that don’t make it to other events in the US or Europe and this is your chance to discover somebody whose streaming hours coincide with your working hours! Check out their schedule and watch the event on Twitch when it starts on July 16th.
Marathon News
Finished:
Summer Games Done Quick 2024 raised $2,575,410+ for Médecins Sans Frontières
FINNRUNS 10V raised €4,300+ for WWF Finland
Running:
Until 15.07.2024: FangameMarathon (Schedule)
Upcoming:
Starts 12.07.2024: LEGOthon2024, raising money for Extra Life (Schedule)
Starts 13.07.2024: Binary Breakers Summer BBQ, raising money for LGBTQ Freedom Fund (Schedule)
Starts 16.07.2024: Australian Speedrun Marathon 2024, raising money for Cure Cancer (Schedule)
This Week’s Top Times
🥇 First Place:
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (Defeat Ganon: No SRM) in 00:10:22.250 by TKC (He/Him)
Video • Twitch • YouTubeSuper Mario 64 (120 Star: N64) in 01:36:02.000 by Weegee (He/Him)
Video • Twitch • YouTubeA Difficult Game About Climbing (Glitchless) in 00:03:35.930 by orzyjk_ (He/Him)
VideoBanjo-Kazooie (Nintendo 64: 100% FFM) in 01:56:29.000 by Funderful
Video • Twitch • YouTubeGrand Theft Auto V (Any%: Classic, No) in 05:39:21.000 by UnNameD (He/Him)
Video • Twitch • YouTubeClustertruck (Any%) in 00:11:27.250 by EmilySailor (She/Her)
Video • Twitch • YouTubeS.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl (Any%: Novice) in 00:08:49.000 by Horned_Reaper
Video • YouTubeMario Party DS (Boss Bash) in 00:03:41.639 by rhin_woods (She/Her, It/Its)
Video • Twitch • YouTubeFinal Fantasy VII (PC: Any%, No Turbo, No SCM) in 01:34:16.000 by zergu12
Video • TwitchCroc: Legend of the Gobbos (Any%: PlayStation) in 00:40:59.000 by bluntbows
Video • Twitch • YouTube
🥈 Second Place:
Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury (Super Mario 3D World: Any%) in 01:25:34.000 by Xylex (She/Her)
VideoGrand Theft Auto III (Any%) in 00:59:34.000 by Chivu
Video • Twitch • YouTubeHalf-Life 2 (New Engine: Any% No Voidclip) in 00:39:26.730 by Eold (He/Him)
Video • Twitch • YouTubeMetroid Fusion (100%: Normal) in 01:35:45.000 by monkeysmb (He/Him)
Video • Twitch • YouTubeCrash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex (Any% (No Crystal Duplication)) in 00:50:43.000 by Solarson (He/Him, They/Them)
Video • Twitch • YouTube
🥉 Third Place:
Portal (Inbounds: PC) in 00:08:22.529 by Hrvatskii (He/Him)
Video • YouTubeOutlast (Any%: Main Game, PC) in 00:04:44.449 by Bloodquane (He/Him)
Video • YouTubeSuperliminal (Glitchless: PC) in 00:21:20.660 by first_try_i_swear (He/Him)
Video • Twitch • YouTubePokémon Crystal (Any% Glitchless: ENG) in 03:09:54.000 by hwangbro
Video • Twitch
Fun Stat of the Week
📊 Phasmophobia is the game with the most full-game (non-miscellaneous and non-archived) leaderboards on speedrun.com.
All different combinations of category, version, difficulty and other subcategories bring the total to 4320 leaderboards. Only 150 of them have at least one run on them, the rest stands empty.
There are 4170 free world records up for grabs! 🦀
Reddit Choice
🔝 The r/speedrun choice of the week is this footage from within the SGDQ crowd when Peanut Butter the Doge hit the game-winning home run in the SNES classic Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball. If you haven’t watched the full showcase yet, now is a great opportunity:
👋🏻 And that’s it for this week! See you next Thursday, July 18th 2024. 👋🏻
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Special shoutout to Sarim for supporting with some copywriting. Find the words he writes over at gameluster.com!