Life imitating...speedruns?

2013-02-20 10:41:26 pm

berserker status

So I'm sure most people have heard of the phrase, "life imitates art" and vice versa. It's an expression used to convey the idea that circumstances in life are appreciated through the arts or are mimicked outright (please excuse my seriously lowbrow explanation). My query to you fellow speedrunners and gamers alike is this: have you ever personally experienced something in real life that was astonishingly similar to a scene in one of the games you speedrun or even play casually?

For me, this happened to me months ago after an artwalk in the city where I live. I was biking home at night when I reached a neighborhood en route. Out of some random house (to my left no less) comes rushing this dog just barking and trying to nip at my legs and all I could think was, "WTF MUST PEDAL FASTER..!". It chased me for about a block before it tired itself out or got bored or I don't know, but by then the adrenaline was coursing through me and all I could do was laugh to myself. When I got home I realized that the whole ordeal was strangely similar to how in Paperboy (a game I could speedrun) the same thing pretty much happens albeit during newspaper deliveries. The dog was a terrier mix and I was wearing a baseball cap at the time, go figure.

Now...I would very much like to read anecdotes about boxing matches with Mike Tyson, eating mushrooms while stomping on people's heads, running shirtless through jungles whilst shooting bad guys, vigilantism while wearing a black cowl, or even litigating in court about random stuff. It doesn't have to be identical to what happens in the game, just something that kind of just made you do a double take and left you scratching your head in wonder.

Thread title:

So I'm sure most people have heard of the phrase, "life imitates art" and vice versa.  It's an expression used to convey the idea that circumstances in life are appreciated through the arts or are mimicked outright (please excuse my seriously lowbrow explanation).  My query to you fellow speedrunners and gamers alike is this:  have you ever personally experienced something in real life that was astonishingly similar to a scene in one of the games you speedrun or even play casually?

For me, this happened to me months ago after an artwalk in the city where I live.  I was biking home at night when I reached a neighborhood en route.  Out of some random house (to my left no less) comes rushing this dog just barking and trying to nip at my legs and all I could think was, "WTF MUST PEDAL FASTER..!".  It chased me for about a block before it tired itself out or got bored or I don't know, but by then the adrenaline was coursing through me and all I could do was laugh to myself.  When I got home I realized that the whole ordeal was strangely similar to how in Paperboy (a game I could speedrun) the same thing pretty much happens albeit during newspaper deliveries.  The dog was a terrier mix and I was wearing a baseball cap at the time, go figure.

Now...I would very much like to read anecdotes about boxing matches with Mike Tyson, eating mushrooms while stomping on people's heads, running shirtless through jungles whilst shooting bad guys, vigilantism while wearing a black cowl, or even litigating in court about random stuff.  It doesn't have to be identical to what happens in the game, just something that kind of just made you do a double take and left you scratching your head in wonder.

RabidJellyfish

Edit history:

RabidJellyfish: 2013-02-20 10:58:09 pm

2013-02-20 10:57:56 pm

It's a bit of a stretch, but I've been speed running Lego Racers, which has a whole lot of cutting corners on turns and stuff. I noticed recently that when I'm walking to class, I almost always take as short of a path as possible. As in, when I get to a place on the sidewalk where I need to turn, I'll almost always cut the corner. I also try to walk in straight lines as much as possible Tongue

Equinox

Edit history:

Equinox: 2013-02-21 12:00:24 am

Equinox: 2013-02-20 11:59:43 pm

Equinox: 2013-02-20 11:59:19 pm

Equinox: 2013-02-20 11:57:47 pm

Equinox: 2013-02-20 11:57:21 pm

Equinox: 2013-02-20 11:56:42 pm

Equinox: 2013-02-20 11:55:37 pm

2013-02-20 11:53:23 pm

Obsessicus Parrotus

Hahaha, it takes me 40 minutes to drive to college, but I only leave with 30 due to stupidity. I am constantly checking different routes trying to find the fastest way for a 30 mile drive. I guess it imitates a lot of games I play, but I must stop that. I sort of feel I like I get in the car, turn the key and there's a stop clock running, sort of reminds of Jak 2 or 3 with that timer. Cheesy

I DO NOT SPEED, it is merely a routing thing!!

The rush of getting there on time on certain occasions leaves me with a similar feeling of accomplishment in video games.

Yagamoth

Edit history:

Yagamoth: 2013-02-21 03:01:09 am

2013-02-21 03:00:12 am

INTJ

Optimizing routes.. I do that all the time IRL Wink

Other than that - it would be kind of scary if I'd ever encounter something from the games I speedrun o_o.. Giant Hello Kitty shooting lasers, Oatmeal Box throwing stuff at me or a giant spider jumping roaring at me? No thanks

I guess the closest I've ever gotten to an "ingame situation" was when helping out in a big company, moving IT stuff around. There were 2 female secretaries that were behaving kind of.. unreal. Imagine the corniest movie/video game scene you can imagine and apply the same level of corny-ness (is that even a word?) to those two sitting on their computers, doing nothing productive all day, giggling and talking weird like little girls (one was certainly over age 40, mind you) and making strange/foolish comments. I really didn't know up to that point, that such - for the lack of a better word - stupid people like this do exist outside of movies and games.

KennyMan666

Edit history:

KennyMan666: 2013-02-21 03:31:12 am

2013-02-21 03:28:39 am

Precursor

I speedran building an office chair from IKEA the other week. Used wsplit and all. Made it sub-hour.

Also, when I go shopping, when I first enter the store, I look at my shopping list and make a mental note of where all the items are so I can map out the most efficient route with the least backtracking while not getting the frozen stuff too early.

Kotti

2013-02-21 04:55:50 am

Equinox

Edit history:

Equinox: 2013-02-21 05:07:03 am

2013-02-21 05:05:59 am

Obsessicus Parrotus

ROFL!! That's awesome!! happy

Cranson

2013-02-21 07:16:06 am

Well, I don't know if this really counts, but I'm a bassoonist, so I have to make my own bassoon reeds. This is a really painstaking, mind numbing process that takes forever. There's one step of the process where you fold the cane over, place wires on it, and form the tube, making it into a "blank". I make several blanks at a time (from 6-12), and to make it a little more interesting, I've started using Wsplit to measure the time it takes me to make each blank. It usually takes around 15-20 minutes per reed, but I'm pretty sure I could save more time on it. Tongue

sinister1

2013-02-21 10:25:25 am

sinister1

so pro u don't even know

When shit goes wrong I just blame it on bad RNG.

presjpolk

2013-02-21 10:47:52 am

HELLO!

Last night I went to my PO box, which is the opposite direction from the train station from where I live.

I actually thought on the way back that if this were a speed run route, it would be so horrible not to have anything else to loop around and get on the same trip.

Uilnslcoap

Edit history:

Uilnslcoap: 2013-02-21 11:54:54 am

2013-02-21 11:53:57 am

F*ckin' sanity effects...

Not exactly what you're looking for (though I do like to optimize errand-running, shopping in a supermarket, etc.), but sometimes after I ran a segment of the one game I did...I would find the mentality carrying over into everyday life. "Nooooooo! I could have grabbed that spoon while I was getting the knives ouuuuuuuut!" "Nooooooo! If I had gone the other way around the chair, it would have saved at least half a seconnnnnnnnnd!"

ETA: Kotti's post is freakin' awesome.

Boxfat

2013-02-21 01:27:32 pm

Arbitrary forum emu

When I get hungry, I farm for olives.

...

But on a serious note, yes. When I get up, it has to be for at least two reasons for me to consider it worth it, unless it's one REALLY IMPORTANT reason. As an example, at least two of the following: homework needs to be done, need to eat, need to drink, need to use bathroom, need to bother roommates...

Alko

Edit history:

Alko: 2013-02-21 02:34:11 pm

2013-02-21 02:33:40 pm

Caution: This user contains Kana ^_^

The whole idea of natural product synthesis (which I'm doing my PhD thesis on) seems based on speedrunning concepts: getting to complex molecules from basic starting materials with the least steps possible, optimising the route to minimal costs, minimal number of steps and a few other minimals. Sometimes you get an idea and bypass an immensely complex sequence of reactions by fidgeting only slightly … I guess that's what you call a sequence break (and gets you a paper in the Journal of the American Chemical Society or the Angewandte) xD Oh, and there's glitching: Performing reactions on substances that you wouldn't think they were possible on.

Yeah, it's kinda hard to understand for non-chemists, but I do see the parallels ^^

Countneko

2013-02-21 03:24:03 pm

Sometimes I do sort of feel like I'm in a hurry after I've been doing attempts for a while. It takes a while for me to 'turn it off' so to speak.

Working DK

2013-02-21 03:43:24 pm

I'm always trying to change life to Easy Mode...

mikwuyma

2013-02-21 03:48:52 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

Quote from Working DK:

I'm always trying to change life to Easy Mode...

hahahahaha I <3 you DK

Riskbreaker Y

2013-02-21 09:12:05 pm

berserker status

Loving the responses xD

And yea, I definitely try and route stuff in my head at times. Damn you SDAAA *shakes fist*

Ghostwheel

2013-02-21 09:21:52 pm

The artist formerly known as Qxy

For me it was always the other way around, as a math guy I always had a tick for optimization and efficiency. Speedrunning has become a great outlet in that sense, and I run games how I live my life, just with infinite resets on all my decisions.

In response to the OPs reference to vigilantism, I actually know a guy to professes to be a retired vigilante. He's showed me pieces of his battle armor and explained in detail the gadgets he made for the job.

Riskbreaker Y

2013-02-21 09:31:39 pm

berserker status

Quote from Ghostwheel:

In response to the OPs reference to vigilantism, I actually know a guy to professes to be a retired vigilante. He's showed me pieces of his battle armor and explained in detail the gadgets he made for the job.

whaaaaaaa?? What city??? Is he the chupacabra???? Not but seriously, I wonder if he's been written about based on sightings or something.

Ghostwheel

2013-02-21 09:55:23 pm

The artist formerly known as Qxy

No, as far as I know, he wasn't written about. His career couldn't have been more than half a year long, because apparently large portion of his armor got broken by a guy with a rock cracking hammer.

Riskbreaker Y

2013-02-21 10:05:46 pm

berserker status

He even had an arch-nemesis, wow! Talk about bad RNG o_O''

AlecK47

2013-02-21 11:15:57 pm

I do the routing thing too, but not with the accompanying math. It is not at all uncommon for me to plan when I do certain things so that I visit specific areas a minimum number of times throughout the week, and my routes often take into account such things as minimizing left turns.

The fact that I don't have any speeding tickets after nearly a decade of driving is also a minor miracle, given how fast I drive sometimes (I even take racing lines within my lane on curves and often delay switching lanes to take s-curves more efficiently). Nevertheless I should mention that I don't drive like an asshole (I don't cut people off unless they drive like assholes, and I let people in on the freeway, yield to pedestrians, etc.), and I have never caused an accident (the only accident I where I was driving was the other person's fault - they ran a stop sign at a 2-way stop).

DK28

2013-02-23 12:41:58 am

General Kong - Bullets and Bananas

Quote from mikwuyma:

Quote from Working DK:

I'm always trying to change life to Easy Mode...

hahahahaha I <3 you DK

<3 you more! Grin

tjp7154

2013-02-23 12:52:09 pm

#Casual

If you've ever been to a modern grocery store then there is a good chance you've come across a speedrunnable game there -- the self check out line. Seriously, it can be a challenge to get through as quickly as possible without making the system stop and wait for a customer service representative to unlock it. Try it yourself!

Some tips:
- For the ones with their own conveyor belts, there is a sensor that lets the system know if the item was placed on it.
- A lot of the times (especially at my grocery store) the rollers at the end don't do a great job and make the items get stuck, thus blocking the system and messing everything up. You can avoid this by waiting for the item to pass the sensor and then pushing it down to clear the belt.
- Don't be surprised if you find a larger line behind you because they know it'll go more quickly than the others Wink

Dalimyr

2013-02-24 12:31:30 pm

Quote from AlecK47:

my routes often take into account such things as minimizing left turns

Broken d-pad? Tongue

Speedrunning is warping our kids' minds. My son's dog, Bugle, got hit by a truck and he said "Fuck this fuckin' game! Mummy, mummy, where's the reset button???". Kids these days, they think life is a game. Well, it's not a game - it's very, very serious. My eldest was speedrunning this new game called Pogo the Monkey. The shop teacher called me today, and Sam made a home-made banana cannon in shop class, and was lobbing them across the street at a fast food restaurant. And it's all because of speedrunning. Life does not have a reset button.