smw beat the game%

ABOUT CREDITS WARP

First, let me say that I have been pretty fascinated and impressed by the work that people like Seth, dots, and -- by extension -- jeffw and the TAS community who supported these discoveries have put into the credits warp glitch that have brought it to where it is now. The run is quirky, quick, and has a huge, exciting payoff at the end due to how infrequently successful it is. The smw community seems to be receptive to it in general, and that is awesome to me.

As far as naming the category, let's start by saying how arbitrary the choice is. I think that Carlsagan said it best when he stated that it wasn't objectively obvious that the credits warp should be considered to "beat" the game. While it triggers a portion of the credits to start, it manages to circumvent any portion of the game that would be conventionally seen to be considered completion. It boils down to a really interesting "parlor trick", and one that should be praised and investigated, but it just is unclear whether we should call it "any% credits warp" even, because the "any%" typically denotes that the game was "completed".

But really, does any of this even matter? The smw community has gone back and forth several times on whether it should be "any%" vs "credits warp", or "any% no credits warp" and "any%". Both have a ton of valid points, and really, I think our community would be happy with either solution. If I had to guess, I'd say that we will probably end up calling the credits warp category "any%", but I'm unwilling to say for sure, insofar as I might be seen to be speaking on behalf of our large, diverse community.

ABOUT THE SPEEDRUNNING COMMUNITY (OUTSIDE OF SMW)

When I started speedrunning, one of the things that I loved about the hobby was that the focus was on self-competition. Most people want to be better than *themselves*. That, I think, is one of the reasons why we are so often willing to help each other, even if it might mean someone beating our own times -- because the focus is on bettering ourselves, in most cases. Even competition with others is typically just used as a vehicle to encourage our own self-improvement.

The way that other speedrunners have responded to this whole issue has been deplorable, at best. It ranges from the fairly harmless bickering over what people should name categories that they don't run, to people harassing GDF over what he called the category that he GOT THE WORLD RECORD IN, which is vile. People are beyond ridiculous, and I just can't understand how people are so obsessed with drama that they are willing to derail the accomplishments of others. I personally prefer not to shit on the hard work of others, no matter how "important" I see their work or contribution. If it is important to them, then it matters. I don't want to say anything else about this.

ABOUT THE SMW COMMUNITY

Most of the smw community has avoided the drama and just chilled out. Most are reasonable and happy to have any category get any name and just wants some sort of consensus. I don't want to go deep into calling people out, but I will say that if you ever take a stance on something, and you find that you are agreeing with volpe a lot, you may want to seriously consider if you are *actually* on the right side of this argument.

https://twitter.com/mylittlegoobi/status/558759434860920835
https://twitter.com/Volpey/status/559381005728235520
https://twitter.com/TrainingMode/status/558783557997719552

It shouldn't be that hard to see that Seth has become a part of the smw community. He has basically gone from printing money by making Minecraft videos, to achieving a more modest viewership by playing smw, because it is something that he is PASSIONATE about. To criticize him for the attention he has gotten from Kotaku, or the actions of his foaming-at-the-mouth fans, is to basically punish him for being popular (which I guess at this point shouldn't surprise me with the way this community cannibalizes anyone who gains even the slightest bit of popularity).

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm really disappointed from all the has-been smw ex-runners who are attempting to cash in on the ability to be relevant once again by throwing their snark into social media. If you're trying to sabotage the existing smw community just because you aren't a part of it anymore, #1) you're failing and #2) you're only making it clear how washed-up you really are.

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I'm just disappointed I guess. I'll probably go back to Hello Kitty's Flower Shop. At least that community is nice.