Video game speedrunners raise funds for Doctors Without Borders this weekend

By Danny Cowan July 24, 2015

summer games done quick raises 1 2 million sgdq 2015 header — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Want to watch your favorite games get utterly wrecked by skilled players this weekend? Check out Summer Games Done Quick, an annual charity fundraiser and video game streaming marathon benefiting Doctors Without Borders.

Kicking off this Sunday, Summer Games Done Quick boasts a packed schedule of video game speedruns throughout the next week, offering a large quantity of prizes and player-challenging incentives for generous donors. Playthroughs will be streamed live via Twitch.

A collaboration between Speed Demos Archive and Speed Runs Live, the annual Summer Games Done Quick event brings together speedrunning community members from across the globe for a week of high-level gameplay, glitch demonstrations, and charity fundraising. This year’s event begins on Sunday at noon CDT with an estimated three-hour, 100-percent run through the Super NES platformer Yoshi’s Island by noted speedrunning community member Trihex.

Other highlights throughout the week include a swordless playthrough of the original The Legend of Zelda, a “Summer Games Done Quack” block of speedruns dedicated to Disney-licensed games from the 8-bit and 16-bit eras, and back-to-back completions of Capcom’s infamously difficult arcade platformer Ghosts’n Goblins and its sequel Ghouls’n Ghosts.

Speedrunners will additionally show off blazingly quick playthroughs of modern games like BioShock Infinite, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, Saints Row: Gat out of Hell, and The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth. A start-to-finish run through Bethesda’s Fallout 3 on Friday, July 31, is expected to clock in at under half an hour.

This year’s event will also mark the return of Tetris: The Grand Master and Kevin Birrell, the first Tetris player outside of Japan to reach the game’s ridiculously difficult-to-achieve Grand Master rank. The assembled “TGM crew” will show off their skills on Monday, July 27.

Last year’s Summer Games Done Quick raised more than $700,000 for Doctors Without Borders, and companion event Awesome Games Done Quick earned over $1.5 million for the Prevent Cancer Foundation.

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