AGDQ 2017

AGDQ 2017 notes

This was my 5th event. The long wait was over to finally show Big Nose the Caveman to the world.

Our trip started earlier than expected, as there was a huge winter apocalypse heading our way. Millnium and I left my city at 2 PM, hoping to arrive at 11. We (I) tried to reroute the midgame of SMRPG along the way, talked about SM64, and other speedstuff. He fell asleep as expected, and I listened to podcasts. We arrived at 10:45. Got checked into the room, and headed down to the stream room to see if anyone was around. We got to hang out with staff, which was pretty cool, and see the setup process in action. I proceeded to get the best night of sleep I would have for the next 10 days.

As people started to trickle into the event, the excitement grew. We channeled our excitement into folding the GDQ shirts.

Highlights:
Battle mode - Still the highlight of AGDQ. The new 4 player rom-hack was amazing. Dotsarecool is a genius, and he helped make this event even more fun. 4-player is definitely unpredictable, but it gives everyone a shot at winning because of the chaos. Playing with TMR, darbian, Blechy, cyghfer, and others was really really fun. Time to get a SNES Multitap.

Meeting the SMB1 boys: AndrewG, Kosmic, Supersonic. I did get to do a few races with them (and darbian) in SMB1 and lost levels. I was able to get a win in both games, which was super satisfying for me. Also learned Devil's Spell, which is really cool tech, and is more consistent than the original wrong warp in SMB2J.

Super Enemy Fire - The rom hack created by JeffXvX. 12 people raced this and I ended up winning by a large margin, finishing in 59:59. Every enemy in the game shot fireballs, and it was a really tough challenge. 7-3 was the toughest level. Try it out!

SMRPG: Meeting pidge was really cool. She has done so much for the community. Her excitement from being at the event was really cool, she was always in a great mood with a happy wave when I would see her. SMRPG was on a TV in the practice room 95% of the time. It was cool to hear it in the background when I was playing something else. SMRPG Race: We had the biggest SMRPG race ever with 15 participants. Thank you to everyone who helped put it together, and the Nintendo dude for the sweet prizes. I got an awesome Mario wallet for 1st place, where I edged out Claude by .89 seconds. Really fun race to do in person, especially with super jumps. If you can hit 100 in that environment, you are truly a god. Meeting LCC was a treat as well, I'm really mad I didn't have my signature cart with me for him to sign. I am honored to be the hero of day 1 for him.

Meeting the NES gods: Toad and Endy were on the top of my list to meet. After watching their play for over a year, it was truly an honor to meet them and watch them play their games.

Zelda 1: It was really really cool to meet MikeStone. He has been a part of my stream from the beginning. It was like seeing a long lost brother. Cantaloupe and I did 2 players 1 controller. It was an adventure for sure, but pretty doable. I fully credit myself for his 28:57 lastnight, as he took detailed notes on my movement :) We then raced afterwards, and it was close win for me. I also met Justinman and TGE, people who I've known online for a long time. Really cool to meet them.

SM64: The best races of AGDQ were between myself and Millnium, we decided to do a 70 star race every day of the event (except the day he was dead). Every race was exciting, but we had one race that was less than a second apart. I did PB in the last race, even though I lost. 2017 is the year of SM64.

Big Nose: My run went extremely well, +12 on PB. I didn't get hit except the last stage which didn't matter because I had an invincibility in the bank. It was so much fun to show this game on the GDQ stage. I think the crowd had fun, and it was cool to hear from the people that donated during the run. If auth and I weren't screwing around in the shops, I probably could have PBed. This was the smoothest experience as a runner I've ever had, so thank you to the staff for making that possible. Well Done Big Nose!

FF6 learning: puwexil is truly the most knowledgeable speedrunner of any video game. I likened the learning session to sitting in front of a fire hose of FF6 knowledge. I learned the World of Ruin from him, and hope to get it into my next run. It was really cool to sit down with the master and listen to him.

Playing Wario's Woods and Tetris Attack:
Wario's Woods was a mind-bender. I sat down and played against Edobean and Golden. That game is really fun, but I couldn't wrap my head around it. I played against cyghfer in TA, and he is ridiculous. I held my own in a 5+ minute match, but he crushed me in L10. Was really fun to play him.

Runs I saw in the stream room:
Mega Man, SMB1, LL, SMB1 warpless, Contra, Super C, Mario Paint, Castlevania, T&C 2, Waynes World, Big Nose, LTTP, Super Dram World, and Lost Levels SNES. I missed a bunch of runs that I wanted to see, but will check the vods.

Clemson game:
I did get to watch my school win the National Championship in football on Monday. A truly emotional experience. Thanks for watching Xarnax, JVeth, kaocleyra, Andy, jkoper, and Mill.

BBall crew 2017:
Dalo33, RaidenTheQuick, Millnium, and Fastatcc. Great times especially when we showed up at the wrong place and walked out. That poor dude at the desk.

Trip home: I've never been more tired in my life, but somehow survived. I slept for 15 hours when I got home. Good trip.

Not 100% on attending SGDQ, definitely won't be there for the start of it (family reunion). Thanks for a great time, I really enjoyed this GDQ!