AGDQ 2017

I usually don’t post news (I probably will now since my site has recently gone mobile) but this is something that means a lot to me:

Awesome Games Done Quick (AGDQ).

Twice a year, people come together in the Midwest of the US to play video games. These certain people are called speedrunners, individuals who play games as fast as they can, using any tricks, glitches, routes through the game to make it through to the end as fast as possible.

This may sound boring to some, but it really is a marvel to see nostalgic childhood games beaten so quickly when the viewer probably has beaten the game in more than ten times the amount of time  that it takes the speedrunner. For example, on an episode of The Late Show with Steven Colbert, a speedrunner was shown to beat Super Mario Bros 3 in five minutes. Let me say that again. FIVE minutes. I personally spent a few hours on that game in my childhood, and this still baffles me how this community of speedrunners found out how to get through this so fast.

Playing video games quickly may sound like it doesn’t mean much to the average viewer, and this is why the GDQ crew has teamed up with the Prevent Cancer Foundation (and later on with Doctors Without Borders for SGDQ in July / August) for donations in order to make speedrunning worthwhile instead of just sitting there watching people play games. Everyone has a family member, friend, or other loved one affected by this horrible disease, so every little bit counts. The staff even reads out the donations from time to time, ranging from “long time watcher, first time donator”, to a clever joke or pun on the game or speedrunner currently on screen, to a heartfelt story about a loved one affected by cancer.

This post isn’t meant to be a cry for your wallets. It isn’t meant to be a cry for video games. This is a cry for passion, love, and doing good for others. Speedrunning, if you don’t know, was kicked off by the Metroid series, and even I speedrun the games when I can, and I hope to host 1/10th of the event this is, where people donate to a good cause because they are seeing their favorite games being played live.

AGDQ 2016 starts at noon EST on Sunday, December 8th, 2017 and ends on Saturday, December 14th at midnight EST.

Please share this post with everyone you know, whether they’re a gamer, speedrunner, cancer patient, cancer survivor, rich individual, friend, family member, acquaintance, or someone who is just plain altruistic.

If you have made it this far in this post, thank you for your dedication. I am sorry that I have not posted enough, but new posts will arrive in the coming weeks as I build a backlog and the bust times wind down. Again, thank you so much for reading and I hope to see you soon with another post.

– Jesse