The 2016 Amazing Games Done Quick speedrunning charity drive has been running since January 3, and one of its most remarkable gameplay demonstrations occurred on January 7. A speedrunner by the name of Staiain played StepMania for about a half hour. Which may not seem too extraordinary on its own, except he was cranking up the rate at which notes appeared by 1.3x.
It really started getting exciting at about the 18:45 mark, when Staiain picks “300 (Detach M-Style),” a 300 BPM song, and set it at a 1.3x rate. But because of the increased rate, it’s actually about a 390 BPM song. Also, don’t forget to skip to the 30 minute mark, where the notes appear in two different scroll directions, while the notes spin.
Staiain’s performance also resulted in an increased interest in StepMania. This is an open-source PC game which allows people to add their own songs and create their own step patterns for each track. Holo, the StepMania site administrator, even reported on how the increased attention had a temporary detrimental effect on the site and game servers.
For people interested in StepMania, it’s a free-to-play game. The last release was StepMania 5.0.10 back in October 2015. It’s available for Windows, Mac, and Linux and works with keyboards and dance pads. Information about songs, song packs, themes, announcers, characters, and skins can be found in the official forums.
AGDQ 2016 will run until January 10. Money earned will be going to the Prevent Cancer Foundation.
