“You shall not pass!” That was clearly the collective statement from Awesome Games Done Quick (AGDQ) to the calamitous effects of cancer. Last week, hundreds of volunteers, speedrunners, and gaming enthusiasts alike came together in Pittsburgh, PA to host the renowned speedrunning marathon for a solid week straight. The fundraising event was for the Prevent Cancer Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing cancer screening access and educating the public about cancer prevention. By the end of the week, AGDQ had raised over one million USD. The amount remarkably doubled before the end of the last night, closing to a grand total of $2,515,720 USD for Prevent Cancer.
For the first time in several years, an in-person audience gathered to get in on the action, and the event was live streamed 24/7 for the convenience of faraway spectators to come and go as they please. Various prizes crafted entirely by independent artists were also available as giveaways if specific donation tiers were unlocked. The enormous game schedule, of course, was packed with a myriad of all sorts of games developed across the decades, from golden classics to the hilariously wacky.
As far as Zelda games go, the week began with an Any% run of the endearing Zelda-like game Tunic by Radicoon, followed by a 100% Glitchless run of the NES Legend of Zelda on Tuesday by Cantaloupeme. On Wednesday, SpitleSan braved a run of Ocarina of Time on the Wii Virtual Console, but the best was yet to come. On Friday, a 100% NMG relay of both the original and 3DS remake Majora’s Mask was commenced by the quad group Marco8641, morpheus80, popesquidward, and dopezzera.
Last but not least, gymnast86, who is renowned for his record-breaking runs of The Wind Waker, returned to demonstrate an impressive Any% speedrun of Tears of the Kingdom, finishing the entire game in less than an hour! During the play, mutual speedrunner Linkus7, who was unable to attend AGDQ, sent a donation and a thank-you note to gymnast86 encouraging him to keep going. Audiences were wowed by the technical prowess of the speedrunners and learned many things about game development and the tricks commonly used to get through the games at mind-bending speeds. For gymnast86, this included item duplication, Zonai wing stacking, clipping out-of-bounds in the dark, and even Link experiencing an enormous buzzcut and temporary limb loss. (Trust us, the payload is worth it.)
If any of these sound bizarre, you just have to see it for yourself. Fortunately all of the speedruns were recorded into YouTube videos so you can watch the action all over again, including gymnast86’s Tears of the Kingdom run, below:
Games Done Quick will return for their weeklong Summer Games Done Quick from June 30 – July 1, 2024 in Minneapolis, MN. You can check out their website as more information becomes available.
