Combo Rush 2017 Retrospective

Combo Rush was definitely something.

I’ve always wanted to do a marathon exclusively for action games because I think they are underrepresented in speedrunning, and in December 2016 I finally decided to get off my ass and organize one. I scheduled it for mid-March 2017, which gave me 3 months to prepare everything (which is actually quite long for an online marathon). At first not many runners signed up, so I had to ask some runners individually to participate. The other thing I did was ask a lot of the combo/style community members for permission to use their videos for intermissions or downtime. When all was said and done, I had around 38 hours of speedruns and 2 hours of combo videos to use.

I originally asked NASA staff to use their Twitch channel for the marathon, but they did me one better and volunteered to help restream the marathon. Restreaming 40 hours of content in one sitting is a bit beyond why I can do, so I was very thankful for the offer. Anyways, things are going pretty good and about 3 weeks before the marathon I give NASA a definite schedule. This is where things start to go wrong. The NASA staff member I was talking to noticed that Cyberdemon531 was on the schedule, and because he is banned from Twitch, the staff member was saying that something had to change. We communicated back-and-forth for a few days and eventually I thought we resolved to have NASA staff create a NASA channel on StreamMe which would allow Cyberdemon531 to participate.

Around this time, I make a very detailed Pastebin for runners and restreamers about how to stream to an RTMP server, how to restream, how to balance audio levels, how to use OBS Studio, etc., and I ask everyone to look at it and download the things linked in it if necessary (more on that later).

About a week before the marathon, my parents start owning me (as they usually do) for random shit and my wifi card gets taken away. I’m able to get around this by using my laptop as a wireless bridge and I get a new wifi card a day later. As I’m finalizing the marathon prep by asking runners and restreamers to confirm their times, the NASA staff member I was in contact with responds to my confirmation request to help with the marathon by saying that the other staff do not feel comfortable helping with the marathon if I am not going to have internet access. I inform them that I already resolved that issue and that I’m not asking them to shoulder the burden completely on their own if I get owned, but he doesn’t respond.

So it’s about 12 hours before the marathon starts, and all but 1 runner has confirmed their availability for their time, but the restream staff still has not gotten back to me if they can help. I don’t even know if I’m going to use their StreamMe channel because they have not gotten back to me with the stream key. Cyberdemon531 contacts me with a “scoop” of some kind and as we’re having a Discord call I bring up that NASA staff has not gotten back to me about the marathon 12 hours away, almost as an aside. Cyberdemon531 urges me to contact marathon staff to get the details hammered out, which I do, and luckily a different member of staff than the one I had been using gets back to me within a minute. I tell him that I was promised help with restreaming on a NASA channel on StreamMe, and he basically responds with a giant question mark over his head, implying that my original staff member I had been using for contact had not been relaying information and hadn’t even made a StreamMe channel. I get told that NASA staff is busy at the moment and nobody has time to help out with the marathon.

So I have a marathon happening in 12 hours and nobody but myself to restreaming it. Cyberdemon531 generously offers to restream the marathon upon finding out, and I spend the next hour bringing him up to date on the restreaming protocol and using OBS Studio for this stuff. For restreaming, we decide that he’ll start the 1st day of the marathon on my StreamMe channel and that I’ll take over for the rest of the marathon after that, with the possibility of a third restreamer (Therio) being able to take over for 3-4 hours to give me a break for a nap or food or whatever. We agree to meet back up 30 minutes before the marathon to iron out last-minute issues.

It’s the day of the marathon. I get up about an hour before the stream starts to get breakfast and do other stuff, then 30 minutes before the stream starts I get in a call with Cyberdemon531. Things are looking good, the RTMP server is working flawlessly, and Cyberdemon531 knows what to do. We’re waiting for the first runner to arrive, but as the clock ticks down to the marathon start he never shows up. Thankfully, Cyberdemon531 knows (somewhat) how to run the first game, which is Mega Man X1. He fills in, but then we have another no-show (this time for Mega Man X2 and Mega Man X3). Cyberdemon531 is again able to fill in and somehow put on a run that isn’t a total trainwreck. Around halfway through X3, the runner who was supposed to run (and who was scheduled for the next run) finally shows up with the excuse of oversleeping. Whatever, he’s here now, we put him on, and he does a pretty good X4 run. The X5 runner (who was the first no-show) is still not here, so we improvise using the runners we have. The next few runs happen as planned (and the original no-show eventually shows up and we roast him for being late), but when we get to Silent Bomber the runner was a no-show. This one I was actually able to predict as the runner never actually confirmed his time, so we quickly put BrandonScottHill on stream and he does Toy Story 2: Buzz Lightyear to the Rescue (PC 40 Token). Around this time I head to bed expecting no more trainwrecks and set my alarm for the start of my restreaming block.

I wake up when Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge was supposed to be halfway through, but the run has not even started. Cyber has been playing combo videos for the entire downtime as he tries desperately to fix the tech issues with the runner. The runner has no idea how to stream to an RTMP server and is using Xsplit. I have to download the program, make an account, and walk the runner through the process of streaming to an RTMP, and when we finally get the run started, we are an hour behind schedule. The run itself is something very special, but it finished under estimate and I head back to bed. I get up about 45 minutes before the Ninja Gaiden Black run is over. I see a message on Steam from the originally scheduled Killer is Dead runner saying he cannot make his run, but thankfully both I and Simoteus know how to run the game, though Simoteus is far better than me and after a short discussion I give the timeslot to him. Cyberdemon531’s restreaming block ends, and he goes to bed, leaving me to take over.

Killer is Dead starts and things are going smooth, but about 10 minutes in the audio from the runner (game, call, mic) cuts out completely after a graphical glitch. We have no idea what to do because we have never had Killer is Dead do this before. Eventually, he has to restart his stream, restart Discord, and restart his game to fix it. Things are back on track until later in the run where the same thing happens, except no matter what we do we can’t fix the call audio to appear on stream. He manages to finish the run despite all these issues and 2 game restarts. I quickly get on deck with No More Heroes and though I’m pretty tired I manage to do an okay-run until right before the final section of the game, where I accidently go back to the main menu of the game and am unable to finish the run. Therio managed to get his schedule sorted out and was offering to restream for the next 2 runs (Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance and Bayonetta). I get him set up then pass out. I wake up around when Bayonetta was supposed to end, only to find out the Bayonetta runner never showed up and Ricyosma had to be pushed 2 hours ahead to run The Wonderful 101. So now instead of streaming for 3 hours, Therio has to stream for 6. I offer to take over in the middle of TW101, but he declines on the grounds that cutting stream in the middle of a run is unfair to the runner. TW101 finishes, it’s a great run, the chat loved it, and Therio stops streaming and I take over for the rest of the marathon. I plan to start my run of Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition, but my game will not launch. I try everything I can think of: verifying my game cache with Steam, reinstalling my controller hooks, and even downloading a replacement EXE from online, but nothing fixes the issue. I’d have to reinstall the game entirely to fix the problem and because it’s 25 GB that’d take up way more time than we had. The next runners are not around because it’s 4 hours before they’re scheduled to go live, so I make the decision to cut stream for 4 hours to get back on schedule.

4 hours later, it’s go time for DmC: Devil May Cry, but like Killer is Dead, the runner’s audio messes up. Worse, my parents own me as all of this goes down and I have to leave my computer several times, which leaves the stream in a terrible state because I can’t even try to fix these issues. For 15 minutes, there is no stream audio. I come back from my family bullshit and fix the audio, but then the runner’s stream cuts out completely and they go offline. After 10 minutes of dead silence, the runner manages to get to me using his phone and tells me he can’t fix his internet. I swap his time with the Ninja Gaiden 2 runner’s, which makes him the finale. Before the run, the runner reveals he does not have a mic and does not know how to stream to an RTMP. I teach them quickly and after telling them to fix their crackly audio during levels testing, they go radio silent for 30 minutes, and it takes another 15 minutes after they return to get the audio finalized. He can’t stream a call with someone who could commentate for him and the audio is still a bit messed up (and he has no mic), but we get him live and doing a run.

By this time, I’m getting really frustrated at this trainwreck, so I lie down and mope for almost all of Ninja Gaiden 2. During this time, I learn that the runner’s console hardlocked twice and I was seconds away from cutting the stream and ending the marathon when the runner was able to recover from a console reset. Eventually, the runner finishes, and it’s time for DMC4:SE Vergil Bloody Palace. The run goes pretty smoothly, but for whatever reason the runner can’t stream the call so any commentary I would be able to give and help out with wouldn’t be heard on stream. I spend the next hour silently adding music to play on stream because the Bloody Palace music is turned off (it’s the same track on repeat). The run finished (and was enjoyable but I’m a bit salty I couldn’t help commentate) and DmC goes live. Against my expectations, the run goes incredibly well with no issues. It’s played very fast (the runner almost PBs), the audio is perfect, there are no frame drops at all, and the commentary was a blast to help out with. After watching the credits and shitting on how dumb DmC: Devil May Cry is with the runner, I cut the stream, the marathon ends, and everyone goes home. During my entire restreaming hours, only 2 runs (No More Heroes and DmC: Devil May Cry’s second take) went without issue.

By the way, remember those combo videos I mentioned? I spent about 20 hours curating, collecting, and getting permission to use them on stream (shoutouts to DelusionaryKiller’s massive help in pointing me towards active DMC players who would get back to me quickly upon being asked for permission to stream them), then another 5 hours making a Python script that uses ffmpeg to normalize the audio of all the videos I had downloaded because the levels were all over the place (I’m looking at you MikeKob, because your retarded filenames like “GODHAND -- JETSTREAM SAM 「Combo MAD」 混乱 【VST5・FREESTYLE】 (ﾉ´ω`)ﾉ Player- ミク〜コバ {No Edit Version}+α∞” kept breaking my Python script and your audio levels were insanely loud and I eventually had to manually edit your videos separate from everyone else’s). Anyways, I spent all this time and energy getting these videos and Cyber burned through most of them during the Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge setup fiasco and the rest that would be played during my restreaming time were unable to be used because we were massively behind schedule. It’s disappointing to say the least because I was really looking forward to seeing the average marathon audience’s reaction to combo videos when compared against speedruns of the same games.

So in short, Combo Rush was a very mixed bag. Some runs were very good, but others were complete trainwrecks (and others had to be skipped because of an absent runner). I think I’m done with marathon organizing for the next few months because this was a pretty disheartening experience.