Super Mario Bros: The Story Behind the Speedrun: People who are truly NESquick.

In late 2006, a teenager from Quincy, Massachusetts was doing something dangerous: Thinking. Thinking can bring down empires. It can give birth to nations. Or it can turn a kid gifted with exceptional hand-eye coordination into a legend almost overnight. Back in these early days of video game speedrunning, the art of playing games as quickly as possible, Scott Kessler and Trevor Seguin dominated the original Super Mario Bros. They were playing the game with the intended warps, but they weren't allowed to use glitches by Twin Galaxies' rules at the time. But there was the sixteen-year-old lurking in the backround who was about to turn the original Mario on its head. His name was Andrew Gardikis, and he would soon be known as Andrewg1990, one of the greatest speedrunners of all time, later joining the ranks of Cosmo (now Narcissa) Wright, and Siglemic. He will be remembered forever. But what was his significance?

Well, in 2006, speedruns were only timed by whole seconds and not milliseconds. Andrewg had managed to tie Trevor Seguin's 5:06 time, but Scott Kessler returned with a 5:05, which was generally considered to be a perfect run. Everything was executed perfectly with the known strategies, and it looked like a tall, skinny kid didn't stand a chance. But Andrew had plans. He was going to do the unprecedented: Save the frames and break the rules. He decided to secretly grind the game and ignore what the scoreboards said. There were two known glitches in the final level of the game, 8-4. One was a pixel-perfect and frame-perfect walljump in which Andrew could skip having to reveal a hidden coin block. The other was a wrong warp. In some levels of the game, there are multiple pipes that will take Mario to various destinations. The game, in all of its 1985 glitchy sidescrolling glory, can only load one warp zone at a time, which allows for exploits. In 8-4, the glitch was very easy to perform. Andrew just had to scroll the screen far enough to update the memory value and use a pipe to take him to the destination that a later pipe would take him to. With these strategies, getting the record would be a piece of Princess Peach's cake. But Andrew wanted more.

In the level 4-2, there is a warp to world 8. Getting to it quickly is simple enough. Run through the level, reveal the hidden coin block, climb the vine into the sky and-voila!-you are in the warp zone. Sounds simple, right? Well actually, the tool assisted, or computerized run at the time was able to use another wrong warp to skip the vine growing. Soon after the vine, there is a pipe that takes Mario to a bonus room. By tricking the game into thinking that Mario is farther back on the screen than he really is, a player is able to go down the pipe and it will still take Mario to the warp zone. Just don't scroll the screen far enough for the game's memory to update. Unfortunately, this involves some precise and awkward backwards jumps, but Andrew figured out the setup and surprised the world with a 5 minute flat run in 2007. But that wasn't enough. This kid, turned young adult, needed to be able to tell his friends that he could beat Mario in under 5 minutes. So on Christmas Eve of 2010, he did. Finally, some crazy nerd could actually tell the world that he beat Super Mario Bros in under 5 minutes and he wouldn't be lying.

Then he figured out that jumping at the top of the flagpole was faster than jumping at the bottom, and was able to get better framerules in some levels. The best analogy to explain how framrules work is if you picture the end of each level being a bus that needs to transport Mario to the next level, and in the Mushroom Kingdom this hypothetical bus (say, Magical Mystery Tour) takes departs at a very specific schedule of every 0.35 seconds, or 21 frames. So you don't need to play perfectly, you just need to catch the same big yellow taxi as someone who did play perfectly. This doesn't apply to the last level. The guy who came up with this analogy is a speedrunner named Darbian. Keep that name in mind for later.

Anyway, in 2013, Andrewg got determined. He wanted a 4:57. His way of going about it? Fast 4-2. Remember the wrong warp in 4-2? Well, in order to get it, Andrew had to push Mario at  least 20 pixels ahead. and each backwards bump can yield 7-10 pixels. So Andrew would get pushed 3 times. But eliminating the first bump would save a framerule. The odds at getting pushed far enough and getting the trick to work were less than 5%. He grinded and grinded, and one day, he had a chance. He got fast 4-2 in a run, and he remained a framerule ahead of his personal best. He got the walljump and the wrong warp in 8-4. But then there was Bowser. Bowser's patterns are random and sometimes you have to take advantage of wonky hit detection and jump through his hammers. Andrew did. But it didn't work. He got hit by a rouge hammer and it seemed like the journey was over. No one would have the strength to keep going. But Andrew was unbeatable, or so everyone thought.

We all know that Germany has brought the world the greatest Monk and the most evil dictator. It has brought the world fantastic empires and scientific discoveries, beer, and Beethoven . But as late as June 25, 2014, Germany brought us a 4:57. Speedrunner Blubbler, aka i_o_l aka LordSaradocc, was able to get a 4:57.693. He didn't use Andrew's strategy though. He found a consistent setup for the bullet bill glitch in 8-2 in which Mario stomps on an enemy and clips into the end-level flagpole, skipping some end-level animations and saving 2 framrules if gotten optimally. He shocked the world with an amazing time and never improved his PB.

While all this was going on there had been another player grinding along with Andrewg. His name was Kosmicd12, but he dropped out of the picture in late 2013. In 2013, Darbian started doing warpless races. He was just another of the hundreds of runners with big dreams of shattering SMB. He wouldn't even do normal runs, as he was uncomfortable streaming back then. Nobody would have guessed that in early 2015, he would get two 4:57s in the same week, using the bullet bill glitch. In October 2015, he broke the record by a few frames. But he  didn't stop there.

In late 2015, Andrew came back. He wanted the record back. So he set out to do the impossible once again: get fast 4-2 and bullet bill glitch in the same run. He was able to get it in a run and he was on the best pace that anyone had ever been on. But a slow water section in 8-4 caused serious Mario heartbreak. It was still a PB and just barely a 4:57. 4:57.993. Then Darbian had his own heartbreaker in which he hit the pipe at the end of the water section in 8-4, losing a few frames. But he was able to get records with fast 4-2 and bullet bill glitch. By August 2016, Darbian had a 4:57.244. That was it. It wasn't beatable. Or so we all thought.

Remember Kosmicd12? Who briefly had the warpless record? Yeah, that guy. Well he was back and he wanted the record. And Sockfolder was his only hope. Sockfolder is the glitch hunter who found the setup for cannonless in Super Mario 64. Yeah, that guy. Kosmic had never had the world record and using a new glitch, the flagpole glitch, which had long been considered impossible to pull off by a human, he tied darbian's record. The glitch is similar to the bullet bill glitch but it only saves one framerule. Armed with Sockfolder's new setup he dropped fast 4-2 and replaced it with the flagpole glitch in 1-1 and 4-1. And got an incredible time on October 5, 2016. 4:57.194. But in 8-2, the bullet bill shot late, and the run could have been a 4:56.84. The next day, Darbian turned around on Kosmic and got the first 4:56 achieved by a human, clocking in at 4:56.878. And that is where the current record stands. It took him 22,000 attempts to get here, but he has become the new Andrewg. He never could have done it without him. He is truly standing on the shoulders of giants.

Kosmic is trying to reclaim the record and get his own 4:56. Andrewg is trying to reclaim the warpless record from darbian. And darbian is going after a long standing Lost Levels warpless D-4 category that is held by Hotarubi, the legendary Super Metroid Speedrunner. They are all friendly towards one another despite the competition. Super Mario Bros is quite a community, and a lot more than one guy with a controller.

Here's the TLDR version: Andrewg never would have attempted the run with out Scott Kessler, Trevor Seguin, and lots of TASers. Darbian couldn't have gotten a 4:56 without Andrewg's, Sockfolder's, and Blubbler's discoveries, just to name a few. It is truly amazing how Super Mario Bros has evolved as a speedrun. Don't be afraid to shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars. And don't be afraid of taking risks and trying new things. Don't ever give up. Give it 22,000 attempts if you have to, but keep a balanced life. I don't care what it is: Speedrunning, actual running, cup stacking, Rubik's cube, juggling, standing on your head-even if everyone around you thinks it is a pointless hobby don't be afraid to set a new impossible world record.

Please note: I got most of my info from this article: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/people-are-making-super-mario-go-faster-than-ever/
This video:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdAkY7RfajY and various GDQ  events.I don't have an official right to be posting this but it was all in good fun. If Andrew, Kosmic, or Darbian is out there please leave me a comment! I would love to hear from you guys, although I am just a kid who can't even beat the game. :-).