Hello ladies and gents, it’s EZScape and
the ending of the
speedrun you just watched was the first ever
1 hour and 14 minute speedrun of Super Mario
Sunshine by Nindiddeh back in December of
2016.
This was a monumental run for its time, because even to this day there are
only 4 other speedrunners on the leaderboard
with a sub 1:15.
Nindiddeh was way ahead of his time when it
came to speedrunning this game.
In fact, the day he achieved this time, second
place was just barely a sub 1:16 - a full minute
slower.
But this wasn’t always the case.
You see, Nindiddeh has always had a very interesting
mentality when it comes to speedrunning.
Instead of how most speedrunners approached
games by developing routes around their skill
level and slowly integrating strats as they
improved, Nindiddeh always went for the most
difficult tricks that he could pull off.
Also it wasn’t always that the strats he
used were necessarily different from what
other runners were using, it’s just that
his movement was much more refined.This allowed
him to shave off a second or two on many levels,
which definitely adds up over the course of
an entire any% run.
A few examples being the backflip Gelato Beach
Skip strat, using an insta-momentum spinjump
off this wood hut in Bianco 4, and a glitchy
wallkick dive off this ledge in Pianta
Village.
Some of these have more consistent or faster
alternatives now, but for the time, they were
extremely impressive.
Moving onto early 2017, Nindiddeh was still
pushing his time lower, and on May 20th the
1:14:40 was achieved.
This run was really never supposed to be a
milestone run for this game since Diddeh still
had quite a bit more time he could realistically
shave off.
A couple of months went by and the Super Mario
Sunshine world record history video by AverageTrey
was posted.
In this video Trey explains that he thought
the record would most likely be beaten within
the following months... but it wasn’t.
The record actually ended up standing uncontended
for over 2 years.
Yes, 2 years with dozens of active high-level
runners, and still, Diddeh could not be overtaken.
But how is this possible?
Even if the competition had yet to catch up
to him, why couldn’t even HE beat his own
record?
He still had quite a bit of time to save - especially
since his run contained a death in Bianco
6.
Sometime in the summer of 2017 Diddeh began
dealing with several health issues which included
seizures and he couldn’t continue speedrunning.
Very recently Diddeh has actually come out
and expanded on his health issues and it turns
out his house contained toxic mold on top
of a dozen other health issues laid out in
his gofundme page.
The gofundme page is meant to help Diddeh
and his mother make a down payment and afford
rent on a new apartment.
He has a single mother who isn’t able to
work because she has to take care of him,
and they have to get rid of most of their
material possessions to not bring the mold
into their new apartment, so if you want to
help Diddeh and his mother get back on their
feet, improve his health, and hopefully make
a return to content creation, every little
bit will help and the link will be in the
description.
So what was it going to take to dethrone Diddeh?
Well, putting the incredibly steep skill ceiling
aside, Super Mario Sunshine does have its
fair share of luck elements.
This doesn’t necessarily mean the run is
luck based, but it does mean that when you
finally get that run with perfect luck
you have to take full advantage of it.
So before we get into how the record was beaten,
let me cover just how much luck, or RNG, can
affect this run, and how much of a role in
played in the record being broken.
So, the first major RNG point would be the
Petey the Piranha boss fight in Bianco 5.
The movement leading up to Petey is always
the same to wake him up.
After doing so you'll have to chase him around
the village, the only problem being that his
landing pattern is completely random.
There are roughly 700 unique patterns - with
the worst patterns being able to lose up to
a minute in time.
These patterns are extremely rare, but are
technically still possible.
Some of these patterns have a 1 in a million
chance of occuring, but others are much more
common at a 1 in 4 chance.
Thankfully the second pattern is relatively
common and is barely slower than the fastest.
The fastest pattern doesn’t happen all that
often because it is extremely rare for Petey
to take a direct path without branching
off into a different direction.
After each landing, Petey will have a chance
of sending out a tornado.
Therefore, the maximum number he can send
during a fight is 3, but there is a chance
he won’t spawn any at all.
Every tornado costs roughly 2 and a half to
3 seconds each and there’s around a two-thirds
chance he’ll send at least one.
The next RNG point would be the chucksters
in the Pianta 5 secret.
Ideally here speedrunners will try to go for
the fastest cycle known as Ramel cycle.
Unfortunately, the chucksters are random in
their stops and walk patterns.
In an ideal situation, the beginning chucksters
would constantly be walking and not making
any stops, while the final chuckster regularly
stops for significant lengths of time, which
increases the chance of hitting Ramel cycle.
This cycle saves roughly 20 seconds, but
is estimated to have a 1 in 5 chance of happening
assuming perfect movement in the secret.
In the case that a speedrunner is too slow
for Ramel cycle they’ll use a trick called
ratbouncing, found by this dude named Rats.
It’s basically a way to manipulate the chucksters
to prevent them from stopping while walking
to their locations.
By bouncing on them and activating their yelling
animations it will waste about 2 seconds,
but you’ll save that time back by not having
them stop so much.
Of course there is the chance that they don’t
stop at all and the runner loses time for
it, but this is fairly uncommon.
Next up is Sirena Beach, where lots of good
runs go to die.
In the first episode is the Manta ray boss
fight.
Compared to all of the other RNG sections
this one is actually the most controllable,
but if it goes badly it is extremely difficult
to save.
During the boss fight you have to spray the
manta boss and as you do it will break into
smaller and smaller pieces resulting in a
total of 128 smaller manta rays.
After the mantas are broken into smaller pieces
their movement becomes completely random,
so you either have to hope they move the way
you want them to or react to the location
they end up.
The best strategy is to gather them all together
to be able to spray multiple pieces at the
same time.
There is also a manipulation that a lot of
runners go for where they start the fight
from on top of a hut.
This makes the manta ray turn away from Mario
allowing runners to setup more consistent
sprays, but it does waste a bit of time.
Once the mantas are in their smallest form
they will turn pink and target Mario, making
them much easier to spray rather than having
to chase them down.
So getting them all to the smallest form first
and then finishing them off is ideal.
Getting a godlike Manta fight only happens
once in a blue moon, and some top runners
have only seen it a handful of times.
Later on in episode 5 of Sirena Beach we have
the casino.
Thankfully the other casino shenanigans are
able to be skipped, but we still have to deal
with the King Boo boss fight.
For this fight we have to spin a slot machine
which dispenses fruit that damages King Boo.
Ideally you’d want to get a fruit right
away, but the following cycle cannot be fruit and
the boss will spawn enemies.
The enemies can be cancelled as soon they
are spawned by running underneath King Boo,
then you can try again for fruit.
All subsequent cycles after the first can
be cancelled right away.
After the enemy cycle you’d want fruit to
appear, and if it’s not fruit you can cancel
it immediately, but it does cost about 7 seconds
each time.
Therefore the best King Boo pattern that you
can get would be fruit, enemy, fruit, enemy,
and fruit.
On average you’ll get 1-2 extra phases each
run, but the possibility of 5 or more extra
cycles is always there.
In the couple of years following Diddeh’s
hiatus the rest of the community spent time
catching up, but who would finally be the
person to take the highly sought
record and dethrone Diddeh?
Well let's have Average Trey, an ex world
record holder for every Super Mario Sunshine
category, explain it for us.
Often times, the activity of a speedgame is
associated with how frequently its world records
get improved.
If this is true, was Mario Sunshine way more
active in 2015 due to all the new records
that were set?
Of course not!
From my personal experience, there’s been
as many active high level players in the past
year than at any point in the game’s history.
The last few months have been an exciting
time with various players reaching the 1:17’s,
16’s and even 15’s and upper 14’s.
There has also been a boom in popularity for
racing Mario Sunshine on SpeedRunsLive after
a period of racing being relatively dead.
All of this activity ushered in the possibility
of a handful of players breaking Nindiddeh’s
record.
Starting with easily the most decorated SMS
player at the moment - Nanashi745.
After the absence of Levaten the consistency
king, Nanashi made good pace toward breaking
the 1:14:40 with his series of personal bests
starting in December 2017.
After setting his 1:15:14 however, he decided
to go in a different direction and claim the
records in every other main category.
With his 120 shines record set in January
2019, he had actually managed to break every
main category record except for 2: hoverless
any%,
Which he actually managed to get the record in recently
and of course
any%
During the same month, some other insane records
were set by JJsrl and Weegee - who both managed
to claim their first 1:14’s.
This instantly proved their world record potential,
and made them the 3rd and 4th people to ever
get a 1:14.
Let that sink in for a minute.
At this point, four people had ever gotten a
1:14, and the first one by Nindiddeh was set
back in 2016.
Weegee is known for his absurd technical skill.
He’s arguably the only player with movement
on par with Nindiddeh’s, but unfortunately
this comes with a price of sacrificing consistency.
Weegee doesn’t tend to get as many runs
going as some other players, but when he does it’s truly a spectacle.
JJ on the other hand has a radically different
playstyle - opting for consistency over riskiness.
This makes him arguably the best racer of
SMS, with many 1:15s to his name even after
making large mistakes in a run.
That being said, he does include some lesser-done
tricks that give him a bit of an edge - most
notably, the 1-stu setup for Early Yoshi-Go-Round.
As 2019 went on, even more top level players
were on the come up.
The old school Sunshine legend, Samura1man,
was finally seeing results after months of
grinding out more difficult strats.
He got a 1:15:20 without early cycle, and
was motivated to push onward to breaking Nindiddeh’s
record.
Furthermore, two more incredible any% times
were set in recent months by both Yuto and
ShadowMario27 - making the world record competition
even fiercer.
All of the aforementioned players could break
the record with any given run, but in order
of likelihood, the top 3 players are Nanashi,
Weegee, and JJ.
Nanashi was seeing crazy results in his most
recent return to any%, improving his personal
best down to a 1:14:58 in less than a month.
He would stream attempts on nicovideo almost
every day, getting many runs that were on
world record pace to mid and even late game.
However, his next PB he set on May 27th would
best be described as bittersweet… if “bittersweet”
was spelled like this.
To set the stage, a very large factor in this
run was the Manta fight.
As EZScape discussed previously, this bossfight
is mostly random with all of its 128 moving
parts.
The average Sirena 1 split for a top level
player will be anywhere in the 2:40 to 2:50
range.
But sometimes, the planets will align, and
the manta will cooperate in such a way that allows
you to reach the pink phase extremely fast.
In this run, Nanashi manages an ungodly manta
split of 2:23 - far below the commonly desired
range.
He maintained amazing pace going into Corona,
and even into the Bowser fight.
This run was looking to be a 1:14:2X, but
you know what they say - everybody’s gangsta
until the groundpound misses.
Aaand just like that, this run finished 5
seconds off of Nindiddeh’s record.
Truly heartbreaking.
Nanashi was clearly favored to take the record
any day at this point, but Weegee was putting
in serious work of his own.
He would alternate between phases of grinding
Sunshine for 8 to 10 hours a day a couple
weeks in a row, then taking a short break
to avoid burnout.
Weegee was managing runs out of Pianta and
even Pinna on easy world record pace.
It was just a matter of clearing the RNG gauntlet
of Sirena Beach and not choking the run in
late game.
After persevering through losing several runs
on amazing pace, he finally clutched one just
under the 1:14:40 mark.
At long last, history had been made.
The longest standing record in modern-day
SMS speedrunning was no more.
All it took was the skills of a runner with
movement nearly on the level of Diddeh's, Ramel
Cycle, and 0 deaths.
Weegee knew he could definitely improve this
record further with some more grinding, but
he opted to take a break and focussed on some
other games.
Many people expected Weegee’s record to
happen, given the dedication of his grind
and his sheer technical ability to run
the game.
However, world records can also happen at
the least expected times.
Going back to JJsrl, he never gave up on pushing
toward improvement and further building his
consistency.
His passion for Mario Sunshine never faltered
over the numerous any% sessions he’s put
in during 2019.
September 14th.
JJ gets home from having oral surgery for
a couple of teeth that were coming in crooked.
After taking several medications that helped
him fall asleep, he would awake the next morning
with terrible mouth pain.
The whole day he was to lay in bed and take
relaxation pills that would numb the pain
and cause drowsiness.
Consequently, he used the opportunity to stream
attempts of SMS any% all day.
He didn’t use a mic on stream as to relax
his mouth.
He noticed that he was playing considerably
well, but then the mouth pain started returning,
resulting in taking more meds.
After passing out for 3 hours, he was up and
ready to take on more attempts.
12 total hours of streaming later with
many promising runs coming and going, JJ was once again
on incredible pace after cooperative RNG from
Petey and the Chuckster Secret.
The combination of the meds and being in a
discord call with a few other sunshine runners
completely calmed his nerves, and he continued
playing solidly in conjunction with a Manta
split in the 2:30 range and a King Boo with
0 extra cycles.
The discord call remained calm as to not insight
any nerves as JJ tackled Corona Mountain - opting
to play it safe as he recognized that he should
be in the clear
So there you have it - JJsrl clutched out
an insane record of 1:14:22 - which is where
the record stands as of the release of this
video.
A well deserved time as a mark of JJ’s impeccable
consistency, his love for the game, and perhaps
the help of some minor... performance enhancement.
When discussing speedrunning there are certain
unavoidable game mechanics like RNG and unskippable
cutscenes that in a lot of cases would lead
you to believe that a game isn't competitive
nor fun to speedrun.
But Super Mario Sunshine has both of these
things, yet still remains near the top as
one of the most popular games to speedrun.
I think this is a perfect example that if
a game is fun to speedrun and has the skill
ceiling to be extremely competitive, or in
other words, a dope speedgame, people will
run it.
It's up to the speedrunners to prove it to
everyone else and to push the boundaries of
what otherwise seems impossible.
I find storylines with games like Super Mario
Sunshine to be really interesting and I'm
glad I got to cover it, huge thanks to AverageTrey
for all of his help with this video and sharing
so much knowledge with me.
If you haven't had the chance to watch them
make sure you go check out his world record
history videos on Super Mario Sunshine, I'll
link them in the description.
Anyways guys if you liked this video be sure
to leave a like as it's the best way to show
support.
As for myself I've been streaming a ton lately
setting a bunch of records in the Spyro Reignited
Trilogy so if you're interested in checking
those out make sure to follow me on Twitch
at twitch.tv/ezscape.
Other than that guys subscribe for more speedrunning
related content, and as always, I hope you
have a beautiful life.
