Chasing Mario: In Pursuit of a World Record
Article by Brandon Daiker

As I race towards Bowser with a stopwatch next to me and the click of the crappy old VCR slams with my heartbeat, I know any misstep will ruin the whole thing. I'd sweat but I'm not moving; I'm thirsty but a drink would be the end. Mario zips ahead, faster, faster. I don't feel the plastic in my hand. I don't blink. I'm frozen, Mario's in charge of me, I'm in charge of him.

It's sunny, too hot. My grandpa's holding his arms out like this, with his hands extended, measuring an invisible space, a virtual ruler showing everyone and nobody exactly how long this imaginary space is. He could be measuring anything. A fictional bolt, the size of his chest, the barrel of a shotgun, but this measurement isn't for all of that hooey. This measurement's for me, accompanied only by the phrase "this long." Out of context, one might seem a little taken aback, and that's exactly the problem because there was no preface to this story. Just a measurement and a "this long." I know he's talking about catfish though. Where'd you get it, I ask. He tells me. This many pounds, he says. Seventeen. No eighteen! No he was rocking the boat. I almost fell in. Taller than me. He snapped my line at the last second. I swear that bastard had nails for teeth. Smelled like oil and fire. Red glowing eyes. Mutated.

Fishtales pass from mouth to mouth like diseases, tales of imaginary conquest embellished to the point of unbelievability. The more complex, the better they are. Each fish is a battle, each catch is a war. I'm not a fisherman. I'm not a warrior. My tales are heard at the bowling alley, in classrooms, whispered like pieces of celebrity dirt. "You see that guy over there? Nine million on Galaga. Two million at Pac-Man." Hushed like they're crimes, unbelievable in their execution (that'd take hours, man!), impossible in scope. Each tale of video game success is more valiant than the next, growing in unbelievable scope with every pass. His friend's brother beat Mega Man 2 and only died twice, died once, got hit once, never got hit, beat it in an hour, beat it in thirty minutes, twenty-five and never got hit. Millions upon millions at Tetris, Castlevania without using any hearts. Homerun records and batting averages give way to these new achievements. Records aren't just for Guinness freaks or pumped up sports stars, and the word gets out. It's a schoolyard revolution for everyone to share. The ten-year-old's as strong as his father. The drop-out's as successful as a college grad. Every boy's got something to prove, every girl's got everything to prove. It's a living-room pizza-place battleground, and everybody's keeping score. The world records are new, for the first time.

But, for the most part, this enthusiasm has gone largely un-noticed by the general public. For many, video games are a way to waste money and time, and wakka wakka wakka is only a noise made by Fozzie Bear. Everyone knows how many homeruns Reggie Jackson hit last year, or how well the USA gymnastics team did this year at the Olympics, but video game successes are largely akin to the knowledge of how many Pokeemans or Yougiohs there are.

There is the subculture, though, a certain special group of people proud of what they're doing, pushing the calculations of ones and zeroes to their limits, bending the intents of game designers -- proving they, too, can beat a system, any system. Twin Galaxies is their Guinness.

I've been playing games as long as I can remember. I think it started with Ice Hockey on the NES, though I could be mistaken. I have the Kindergarten worksheet listing "Nintendo Ice Hocky" as my favorite sport, and as far as I'm concerned that's as good an answer as any. But like I said, I've been playing them as long as I can remember -- and challenging people about as long. Sure, my two-years-younger sister wasn't much competition, but if there was a goal set, a challenge offered, I'd take it. I'd do hard mode first, then play easy for kicks. Try to finish Ninja Turtles II without using the Konami code (don't know if that's even possible, actually). Speed, though, was always my favorite. How fast can you do it? How fast can you get through the first stage of Mario? The first world? You'd have to be able to get through without dying first. That was the initial barrier. But after that, you'd want more, and I did. So I figured I could get through the first stage in say, thirty seconds. Then faster. Then I started watching the timer on the screen. After a while I realized there was a limit, a perfect speed. Then the second level. Got that one down, too. Eventually a little game called Super Mario Bros. 3 descended upon me for some birthday or Christmas and my Super Mario Bros. speed issues were resolved -- new games to play meant less extraction of entertainment from old ones, and after the Super Nintendo arrived, games were so big and complex that I pretty much forgot about speed in games, instead preferring the RPG approach: examine everything...a lot.

I continued playing games for years and years, got the PlayStation, the 64, the GameCube on launch night, Final Fantasy X, college, Super Mario Sunshine, Metroid Prime, Wind Waker, turned to an Xbox for some games, the collection grew, my time dwindled, the longer games started getting left behind. Last year my enthusiasm for new games had all but shriveled up and died.

And that's about the time I was introduced to the world of speed running. I stumbled onto this Twin Galaxies site. Some guy had finished Mario in five and a half minutes? Super Metroid in under an hour? I was amazed. I started looking up games that I remembered playing fondly.

Super Mario World

Super Mario World's record battle was being fought between two guys, Adam Sweeney and Scott Kessler, eleven minutes nine seconds, and eleven minutes ten, respectively. The closest anyone else was to that was 15:33, sure as hell I could beat 15:33, right? I threw in the old cartridge and just decided to play it as well as I could, just go through the levels like usual and see how long it would take.

28:11, first try. Not exactly encouraging. I played it some more, figured out a route. You can beat Super Mario World from the start screen to the last smack on Bowser in twelve levels. I can't imagine a lot of people initially think about that, but it's true. Out of the seventy-some levels in the game, you can bypass almost the entire world, and it's cause of our little friend the Star World. The path goes something like this:

Yoshi's Island 2, Yoshi's Island 3, Yoshi's Island 4, Iggy's Castle, Donut Plains 1, Donut Secret 1, Donut Secret House, Star World 1, Star World 2, Star World 3, Star World 4, then finally Bowser's Castle.

You take secret exits all the way, starting in Donut Plains 1 by flying up and over the pipe from the beginning to get the key. At Donut Secret you carry the P-Block over to get under the blocks to the key. Donut Secret House uses the silver P-Block at the end, and either the vine or the cape to fly up there. You probably all know the Star World secret exits. Star World 1, you drill down through the right edge to get to the key. Star World 2, you swim under the pipe at the end. Star World 3, either use the cloud or fly up to the key. Star World 4 is the doozy, though. Normally, you don't reach this level until after you've hit all the colored switch blocks. That creates a fancy little platform below the sectioned-off concrete area at the end. To do it without, though, you'll either need the Blue Yoshi from the start, or you'll need to fly all along the bottom of the level and then, toward the end, use your crazy cape skills to climb up enough to get it.