Pixels Worth Thousands

  Can you imagine a few hundred pixels on your computer screen being worth thousands? One could imagine looking at their wallet full of money and then glance at a virtual item and say, "Like something so unreal could be worth more than the actual cash I have." Well, there's that chance that it could be. There are actually quite a lot of virtual objects that would lead to somebody breaking the bank if they were to purchase them. Here are a few examples:

Platinum Baby Roshan (Dota 2)

Value: $2,300+

Golden Frying Pan (Team Fortress 2) 

Value: $5,000+

Spaceships (Eve Online)

Value: $11,000-

Atrox Queen Dinosaur Egg (Entropia Universe)

Value: $70,000

  

  Quite the sum of money for virtual items, huh. Deriving from this topic, one could go into the virtual economies of video games - usually MMORPGs. However, I would just like to display this and marvel at it while giving a bit of a  personal background in relation to it. It is simply amazing what virtual items can bring gamers towards.

   A while back, I decided to get into the economic aspect of a game I played for quite some time. That game was Team Fortress 2. This economic aspect was just trading and haggling for something worth more than what you already have. Then you could go on and on until you meet riches. A goal for all traders was to achieve this Golden Frying Pan. It carried so much hype around it when it was released that the first person to received one was spammed with hundreds of random invites and messages asking to trade. From his offers, the highest set the bar for the price range it currently is at now - $5,000; however, it will not stay at that price forever.

   The real scope of the matter is that one is trading virtual items worth $0.25 to $10.00 in order to reach another virtual item worth hundreds. From that, they riskily trade up for items worth thousands. It's a lengthy but intriguing system to see people work their way up to riches through thousands of deals. 

Speedrunning Video Games

   Doing things fast and as fast as you can is always interesting. People can run in track to aim for the top in competitive communities and so can gamers in video games. However, they are not actually running but using the skills they've devloped in order to achieve the fastest times they can in beating a game. It is not something to take lightly though. People who are fervently interested in speedrunning video games are genuinely serious and devoted to it. They will spend countless hours to perfect methods in saving even less than second of time to achieve new records.

   There are three main categories for speedrunning: Any%, the fastest completion; 100%, the fullest completion; and Low%, the minimalist completion. Some games allow for more specific categories to be input towards a run. The Any% and Low% category are virtually the same; however, the Any% category requires beating the game as fast as you can and in any way you can. That of course includes major glitches and the like. Before attempting a run, there are preparations set beforehand to achieve the goal of completion - aside from choosing a game they are competent at, of course.

1.  First, they plan a route to take. In a simple sense, a route is the path taken from on position to another - point A to point B. A runner must take into consideration how to approach certain areas in order to avoid unnecessary events that, if confronted, waste time. So, they research and perform multiple trials and errors. Of course, there will be games that have a multitude of possibilities more extensive than that of a linear game, such as Pokemon. All that brings is more research and testing.                                                                            
2.  Second is sequence breaking. Here, runners choose or attempt to avoid certain segments in the game such as cutscenes or items. These events may be integral towards the establishment of a games plot, but they are still avoided. This is where the term sequence break comes from. Stemming from this are glitches. They manipulate the game in ways unintended and can be extremely difficult or fairly simple. 

   An example of glitching for faster times for those of you who have played Super Mario 64 is beating the game with only 16 out of the 120 stars. Usually, 70 is the minimum but by utilizing several precise glitches, one can beat it with only 16. Imagine all the time it saves if you were to speedrun it! Here's a video for reference.

   Similar to using glitches for runs are Tool-Assisted Speedrunning, or TAS for short. The runner utilizes several tools to create optimal events for speeding through events. One prominent tool is the save-state. It is used as a save point to rewind back to in order to revise minuscule mistakes. TAS runs are mainly used to attain perfection. The tools are utilized to perform actions that can be impossible to achieve normally as a human. Because TAS runs require the usage of tools and the like, it is often forbidden from being used in regular speedruns since it would be regarded as cheating. For this reason, they devolved into their own TAS speedrunning category. 

   Now, what else besides seeing how fast you can beat a game or how much you have mastered it can you get out of speedrunning? Millions of dollars apparently. Not for one's self, however, but for several charities. Speed Demos Archive is a website dedicated to video game speedruns. They host two annual speedrunning marathons to raise money for several causes. They are known as Awsome Games Done Quick and Summer Games Done Quick. Here, multiple people just sit down and speedrun video games. They have fun and raise money while they are at it. If you love video games, their streams are amazing to watch and you could even donate too.