Five Guys and a Computer Beat Super Mario 64 in Five Minutes

[Logan Westbrook]

Five Guys and a Computer Beat Super Mario 64 in Five Minutes

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Mario gains a few new powers as he glitches his way to a date with the princess and some delicious cake.

A team of five speedrunners have beaten the seminal 3D platformer Super Mario 64 in a little over five minutes. What's more, they only fought Bowser three times, and didn't pick up even one solitary star along the way.

Much like the Portal speedrun [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/106014-Portal-Player-Glitches-His-Way-to-World-Record] from last month, the team makes extensive use of glitches. For example, in certain places, Mario is able to vibrate through walls by skidding backwards on his butt, or race through levels by making one-in-a-million jumps that skip huge sections. The team also uses tricks to get Mario moving faster than the developers intended him to, in order to save time.

This isn't an astounding triumph of human reflexes though, because the run is what's called a "Tool Assisted Speedrun," meaning that a computer did all the actual playing, and the team just told it what to do. That's not to say that just anyone could have done this, just that the team's skill wasn't in moving Mario around, but figuring out how to save time on the run. Every frame was worth saving, and the team's time of 5 minutes and 4.57 seconds was an impressive 24.17 seconds faster than the previous record. You can read about the run in greater detail here [http://tasvideos.org/2873S.html]. It's quite technical, and a little idiosyncratic, but it's interesting all the same.

Source: via Joystiq [http://www.joystiq.com/2011/01/02/tool-assisted-speedrun-shows-super-mario-64-beaten-in-five-minut/]


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[Vohn_exel]

I swear I've seen this someone else before. Infact, I seem to remember the youtube comments being mostly "yiyiyiyiyiyiyiyiyiyyyiiyiyiyiyiyiyiyyahoo!" Still, thats really amazing, and makes me want to try some of those impossible jumps, lol. I don't have a working N64 anymore though. I guess I could try with my DS.

 

[RobCoxxy]

Well that's sucked the fun out of my childhood.

 

[theriddlen]

5 guys 1 comp.

Doesn't that remind you of something?

The voiceover is even worse here.

 

[DTWolfwood]

"Tool Assisted Speedrun" ... that is fail if they dont have the reflexes to do it by hand

 

[standokan]

Aww, they used a computer for all the actual playing, I'd rather see the fastest run done by an actual human.

 

[Iampringles]

Sliding on your ass makes you teleport, huh? Who knew.

 

[smithy_2045]

That's insane...

 

[Saltyk]

I'm both impressed and disappointed.

I'm impressed that they were able to find so many glitches and abuse them to such an extent. And that they completed the game so fast.

I'm disappointed that a computer did the actual playing. Though it does make me feel less inferior at least.

On another note. Who knew Super Mario 64 had so many massive glitches?

 

[LWS666]

does TAS actually mean the computer did it? i thought it just meant saves and turbo keys and stuff like that.

 

[PureChaos]

if you can't do it by hand, getting a computer to do it for you is lame. if they took advantaged of those glitches and did it all themselves then fair enough and congratulations but they didn't so...NEXT

 

[Abedeus]

Ehh sorry, legit speedruns > this crap.

Saw some Mega Man ZX speedrun... gave up after the first fight, when I saw it's just the computer playing the game.

 

[Jeffro Tull]

Bowser picked the wrong day to kidnap peach. Mario was already on his twelfth pot of coffee when he got the word that she was gone.

 

[ultimasupersaiyan]

I'm disgusted by this. Not the fact that it was through glitching(which I am also disgusted by if the person has never finished the game properly before using them) but the fact it was done by a computer. It isn't a speedrun if a PC is doing it, it's just a computer running a routine. If an actual person did it and we saw it done in real time, then it's a speedrun.

My big question is why bother doing this and why even buy games if your going to get something else to play it? It's a grim future we're looking at if people prefer getting a PC to do something that would have been an awesome achievement to do themselves.

 

[Moriarty]

I'm disgusted by this. Not the fact that it was through glitching(which I am also disgusted by if the person has never finished the game properly before using them) but the fact it was done by a computer. It isn't a speedrun if a PC is doing it, it's just a computer running a routine. If an actual person did it and we saw it done in real time, then it's a speedrun.

My big question is why bother doing this and why even buy games if your going to get something else to play it? It's a grim future we're looking at if people prefer getting a PC to do something that would have been an awesome achievement to do themselves.

... you really think those guys never played the game? You don't even know how TAS work and yet you start complaining.

TAS are all about efficiency. To find the exact times you need input in the game to minimise the frames needed to trigger certain events (as in, entering a level). To do that kind of stuff you have to know nearly everything about the game you're trying to run.


Also to everyone else complaying it's not a "proper" speedrun because they aren't holding a controller in their hands:

Thats like a guy running a marathon who complains about a rally champion because it's not real if they're not running themselves. It's a totally different kind of speedrunning, not inferior or superior, only less about reflexes more about knowledge.

edit: the best time without tools is 00:17:31 http://speeddemosarchive.com/Mario64.html#16

 

[Celtic_Kerr]

does TAS actually mean the computer did it? i thought it just meant saves and turbo keys and stuff like that.

Well, basically the team had to play those three levels over and over again to memorize the layouts (or find a layout online, thats possible), then program the exact moments to jump/go onto bum into Mario, and then hit the play button. he fact that their programming had to be REALLY precise is impressive, and if you notice in the third bowser area, mario is right on the edge of some of the platforms.

It's an impressive display of programing skills, but I say you should speed run as a human being, because this isn't really playing videogames so much as programming.

 

[LeonLethality]

Wow, took forever for the news sites to catch wind of this, they did this a while ago. In fact they uploaded two runs if I remember, the second shaved a few frames off. Also the title of the news is misleading, they were passing around savestates so it's more like 5 computers.

I find it hilarious how most of you think TAS means a computer did it, I do tool assisted playthroughs of games myself, you are still the one playing the game, but it is seriously slowed down and you use a lot of savestates.