Half-Life Speedrun Sets Amazing New Record

[Zefar]

Sigh, the times when games were 20-40 hours long and speedruns under one hour.

Now the game is 4 hours long and speedrun is 3:50 because most of the gameplay are cinematics and scripts forcing you to walk.

Half-Life is actually a pretty short game and so was most older FPS titles as well. It might only have taken long in the first place because you where a kid back then.


Anyway I love these types of Speedruns that glitch the hell out of the game to do the most impressive feats that Gordon can pull off.

But as long as they don't use cheats like God mode and infinitive ammo and such things it's fine. Scripts are fine for me.

 

[Adeptus Aspartem]

I'm usually all in the "Play the game straight"-camp. And i really enjoy glitchless speedruns.

But that vid was just brilliant. I understand that these runs are just there to bend the game over and let it beg for mercy. Holy naga tits i'm amazed.

 

[Trude]

... why would you count it if it includes different segments? The individual pieces do make up that whole, but whats the point if you can do the run five hundred times and take the best bits of every segment of the game? Might as well count noclips in speedruns and aimbots in marksman challeges if you're going to do that much.

Because it's still within the realm of possibility and human ability. That's what segmented runs revolve around: polishing something to a mirror shine. Compare it to writing and re-writing an essay. Your first draft likely looks like shit compared to the final product.
And why do people insist on a non-categorical system for everything? You're not going to compare this run to a non-segmented one because that's just dumb. You don't give the same gold medal for weight lifting and acrobatics because they both require strength and dexterity.

 

[AgedGrunt]

Multiple runners. Heavily segmented. Heavily "scripted" (inhuman optimization).

Eh, it's an amazing watch but as far as "records" go a humanly impossible speed-porn run spliced together for technical perfection. Awesome runners, but, need some huge asterisks on that time.

 

[UNHchabo]

Something is screwy with that speed run. There were several points where the player fell a ridiculous distance and took no fall damage. In fact, they should have died several times but didn't. I dunno how they did that.

There are many glitches that allow for falling from any height to not take damage, some are due to the angle of the surface you fall onto, others are to do with falling directly onto edges.
There's also a bug where you can crouch-jump right above a surface and you don't take fall damage.

Here's 3 hours of them explaining the run:
http://www.twitch.tv/dabigbooi/c/4067025

I haven't watched the explanation video, but in many cases they're just barely landing on ladders. Most notably the one at the six-minute-mark. The only damage he takes there is from the grenade.

 

[Skeleon]

@UNHchabo

Why do you allow glitches but disallow cheat codes and tricks like crooked cartridge?
Using glitches is simply trying to use whatever is within the rules of the game to your advantage. When you use a cheat device or outside alteration, then you're breaking the game's rules. As for cheat codes and debug codes, they differ from glitches in being intentionally programmed, so they are naturally outside the rules of the game as defined by the designers.

I suppose that definition works, although I find it hard to consider scripts that take over some of the controls for you under those rules. A script that bunnyhops for you or whatever is an "outside alteration" as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Zefar]

First time I played HL was when I was 18. Half-Life takes most people 15-20 hours to finish, that was never short by shooter standards. In fact I remember how just 2-3 years later, games like Max Payne and Voyager Elite Force were massively criticized for their 6-hour long gameplay.

Sure, just last week I finished KOTOR with 70 hours, but that's a different genre.

Play it again. It's shorter than you think. It won't get you 10 hours. Not by a mile.

 

[Techno Squidgy]

Wow. This is a hell of a run. Serious kudos to the team behind it. They didn't just beat the previous record, they obliterated it.

And now to sit back and watch the Escapist forum shit all over this run; decreeing it 'illegitimate' because it "wasn't done in the spirit of the game" or some such bullshit.

Anyone want some popcorn?

I do! I can't be arsed to argue with people about speed runs again, but I'll happily observe the Turd Typhoon currently ripping through this thread.

Regarding the run:
Holy shit. That was incredible. The gldsrc engine must have been screaming for mercy. Clearly those years of planning were well spent because those 20 minutes and 41 seconds were perhaps some of the most entertaining gameplay footage I've ever seen. Man, I thought I was so clever when I worked out how to bunnyhop and tau jump all those years ago...

For those who think this is some kind of scam or otherwise not legit:
For what it is, it's nothing short of amazing. I have my opinion, you have yours and we both know that we're not going to change each others minds.

 

[UNHchabo]

@UNHchabo

Why do you allow glitches but disallow cheat codes and tricks like crooked cartridge?
Using glitches is simply trying to use whatever is within the rules of the game to your advantage. When you use a cheat device or outside alteration, then you're breaking the game's rules. As for cheat codes and debug codes, they differ from glitches in being intentionally programmed, so they are naturally outside the rules of the game as defined by the designers.

I suppose that definition works, although I find it hard to consider scripts that take over some of the controls for you under those rules. A script that bunnyhops for you or whatever is an "outside alteration" as far as I'm concerned.

Actually reading through, it looks like SDA may not allow scripts. Take a look at this run, which is still the current single-segment record-holder at SDA:

Spoiler

 

[Merlark]

how is this considered a speed run, its pretty much cheating. mine as well turn god mode on and clipping off while your at it. I say no but it was fun to watch so for that, cool.

 

[Mutie]

Looks like Dr. Freeman had a bit too much coffee on the train ride :/

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

Half-Life is actually a pretty short game and so was most older FPS titles as well. It might only have taken long in the first place because you where a kid back then.

First time I played HL was when I was 18. Half-Life takes most people 15-20 hours to finish, that was never short by shooter standards. In fact I remember how just 2-3 years later, games like Max Payne and Voyager Elite Force were massively criticized for their 6-hour long gameplay.

Sure, just last week I finished KOTOR with 70 hours, but that's a different genre.

70 hours? holy shit son. As a highly advanced kotor player, that is a fuckton of hours to put into that game. I've done literally everything on multiple playthroughs (and thensome, considering how many hundreds of mods I've had installed on that game over the years) and never come close to 70 hours in one playthrough, even doing malak glitches and other malarkey.

 

[thom_cat_]

Something is screwy with that speed run. There were several points where the player fell a ridiculous distance and took no fall damage. In fact, they should have died several times but didn't. I dunno how they did that.

There are many glitches that allow for falling from any height to not take damage, some are due to the angle of the surface you fall onto, others are to do with falling directly onto edges.
There's also a bug where you can crouch-jump right above a surface and you don't take fall damage.

Here's 3 hours of them explaining the run:
http://www.twitch.tv/dabigbooi/c/4067025

I haven't watched the explanation video, but in many cases they're just barely landing on ladders. Most notably the one at the six-minute-mark. The only damage he takes there is from the grenade.

As I said, there is a jump bug where if you crouch and jump correctly between 0 and 4 units above the floor as you are falling it nullifies the fall.

 

[UNHchabo]

might as well turn god mode on and clipping off while you're at it

They already did that. The same guy did this video:

Spoiler: Half-Life NOCLIP speedrun

As I said, there is a jump bug where if you crouch and jump correctly between 0 and 4 units above the floor as you are falling it nullifies the fall.

In this case they're using the ladder; you can see it better at 8:50 of this run:

Spoiler: Half-Life single-segment (no scripts/hard) in 36:58

 

[thom_cat_]

As I said, there is a jump bug where if you crouch and jump correctly between 0 and 4 units above the floor as you are falling it nullifies the fall.

In this case they're using the ladder; you can see it better at 8:50 of this run:

Spoiler: Half-Life single-segment (no scripts/hard) in 36:58

The ladder is on the other side of the area down there, watch the explanation video and skip to that part and they say that they used the jumpbug for it

 

[Senare]

I for one think that this is an amazing run, with or without tools and scripting. It is also very entertaining to watch. Kudos to the efforts of the runners.

 

[Snotnarok]

Heavily scripted, it's not impressive. Yes, it's totally neat to see 'someone' zip through but it's not skill, it's not a speed run it's just people with scripts running through extra fast.

Really, really sick of T.A.S. speed runs, it's cheating! Exploits? Fair enough because that's in the game.

 

[Athinira]

It'd be more impressive if they didn't use cheats.

Scripting is not considered cheating. It just puts the run in a different category. Real cheating is never allowed in speed runs.

And i actually think that the scripting makes i more impressive, because it speeds the gameplay up so much that it requires extreme precision, skill and knowledge to pull off some of the stuff they do at the pace they're moving at several times.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

70 hours? holy shit son.

Now what if I tell you that it took me 10 days?

as in you did those 70 hours in 10 days? I honestly wouldn't be surprised by that, everytime I play kotor I usually do it in 3-4 day spurts of longggg hours myself too.

 

[ZCAB]

So you're allowed to use the console? Alright then. I'll just open the it, type "map c4a3", and defeat Nihilanth. 3 minutes, I win! Oh, I can edit the footage, too? Let me just speed up by 2x. Bam, 90 seconds!

Seriously, I can understand exploiting glitches and game mechanics for speedruns to an extent, but this is ridiculous.