The Top 10 Video Game Speedruns on YouTube Right Now

Usually most gamers want to extend their playing experience as long as possible. Check nearly any gaming message board and a common inquiry always revolves around how lengthy the title is. If it's short, it hits the Gamefly queue. If it's got replay value, then it's worthy of a purchase. Because of that basic concept, speedruns seem like a bizarre offshoot of gaming subculture. But after watching these uploaded videos (for like, two seconds) you realize that these people have spent more time with their games of choice than any five of us combined. All of these runs border on the work of savants. Give us 50 years and we couldn't match these combinations of planning and skill.

We should be clear on what our criteria is. We did our best to exclude TAS's (Tool Assisted Speedruns) because, let's face it, they're not as impressive. We also did our best to avoid glitch exploitations. There's no real purpose to watching a video of a guy fall through a wall to beat a game. This is the Mount Rushmore of the gaming world, and we wanted to celebrate virtual artistry. If you can top these you belong with the rest of these greats at the summit of the field. Here are the Top 10 Video Game Speedruns on YouTube Right Now.

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RELATED: The 10 Best Video Game Speedruns

Time: 10:48
Platform: NES
Gamer: Freddy Andersson

Warping or not, this is bonkers. Think about all the plotting, the funding of henchmen, the building of castles, all the work Bowser put into kidnapping a princess...and within 11 minutes Mario shows up at his castle and shits all over it.

Time: 54:54
Platform: Playstation 3
Gamer: alternalw

If you beat this game in under 60 hours you're probably a stud, so if you beat it in under 60 minutes, you challenge every belief we've ever held. When SCE put this title together they probably didn't envision that any player would dead sprint past every enemy, and yet that's exactly what "alternalw" does. As the man (we're assuming he's a man at least and not, say, a woman god) races through one of the toughest games of the generation he really puts in perspective how mediocre to bad a lot of us are at our hobby. Like being the best ballplayer in your sandlot and realizing there's millions of other sandlots outside your block, this quartet of videos is a rude awakening.

To continue watching, peep the other three parts of his run: Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.

Time: 1:44:25
Platform: Playstation 3, Xbox 360, Wii U
Gamer: Robosparkle

This is how a Batman game is meant to be played. No nonsense. No bullshit. No collecting Riddler trophies. Just get in, do the job, and defeat Joker. The one catch is that "Robosparkle" (come on, do we have to call him that?) didn't include any of the Catwoman missions. But when you top an Arkham game in less time than an actual Batman movie we figure you deserve a spot on this list.

Time: 56:00 (Approximate)
Platform: Nintendo GameCube
Gamer: MilesSMB

This is a legitimate 20 hour start-to-finish game with a number of stop-and-think moments when a breather is necessary just to figure out what's next. We understand that Miles probably played this at least 20-25 times before taping this run, but the fact that he's immediate with every decision, that he knows which items are essential (and which aren't), and that he doesn't waste his time with energy tanks (which increase your life and are necessary—or, so we thought—for enemies later in the game) is astounding. Look up "Hardass" in the dictionary and we have no doubt that his picture is next to it.

Time: 25:18
Platform: Super Nintendo
Gamer: xISOmaniac

It's one thing to burn through a game, that's hard enough, but to add the caveat of "not taking damage" is to further set yourself up for frustration. Imagine a game where one hit kills you. Any screw-up, any slip, you're starting over. Now imagine that that game is already mind-boggingly difficult without the self-added pressure.

But this run is Muhammad Ali against fuckin' children. Blind children. A man who defeats 16 consecutive boxers without taking so much as a jab? Come on now. To anybody who's ever played the Punch-Out!! series, you know we're talking about a gamer with massive nuts. You might be able to top him in terms of sheer speed (though we highly doubt it), but to go flawless victory for the entire run? Don't even try.

It's not worth the anger.

Time: 15:18
Platform: Sega Genesis
Gamer: Mike McKenzie

Sonic is a series already predicated on speed, so to watch this half-man, half-cheetah sprint through this makes us think he's qualified to drag pod race. Sonic was always intended to be the Jesse Owens of gaming, and this run is a perfect example of what Sega had in mind when they realized Nintendo already grabbed the plumber niche, so they needed to find their own audience.

And it just so happened to be cocaine addicts.

Time: 1:52:59 (Console record)
Platform: Playstation 2, Xbox
Gamer: Daniel Burns

This is a video that you may intend to watch for a minute, two minutes, or whatever, but an hour later you're mesmerized as the man never seems to fuck-up, not even once. We mean, he has everything put in order, every next move planned and every step perfectly executed. If he put his mind to it he could probably make a million dollars. Instead, he chose to register the only sub 1:53 run in console history for Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.

That's—uh—that's just as good...

Time: 7:27.81 (Gameplay time)
Platform: Nintendo GameCube
Gamer: MilesSMB, again

In case you're reading who the gamer is, it's MilesSMB, the same guy we had for the Metroid Prime slide just moments ago. It really puts us all to shame. While many of us are working on our first big accomplishment, Miles is on no. 2 (and it wouldn't surprise us if he had a lot more). Even the guy who cured polio stopped there. He didn't go on to cure cancer, as well.

Miles, take a step back, man. You've made your point, you're an apex gamer. No need to continue making the rest of us look bad.

Time: 4:57.69
Platform: NES
Gamer: LordSaradoc

Breaking the five minute mark on the original Super Mario Bros. was a lot like breaking the four-minute mile, except that A) nobody cared and B) it wasn't anything like that. Since that milestone was reached, gamers have improved upon it by a whopping 2.31 seconds. The world record holder's performance (embedded above) is so pristine that it actually causes debate over whether it's a tool-assisted run or not. From what we can tell, it is not. Then again, who the fuck are we?

"LordSaradoc's" execution is even more impressive than most of this list because everybody and their mother has played this game. We mean that seriously, a lot of mothers have played this game. It was wildly popular and spanned multiple generations. To emerge from the millions upon millions to take a shot at this 2D side-scroller? Mighty fuckin' impressive.

It's been around almost 30 years now, and there's little (if anything) more that can be done with it. Seeing as how he never stops, we don't see much of an opening to better this run. With his new world record Saradoc joined the very, very select pantheon of gaming gods along with fellow immortals Billy Mitchell and Gavin Evans.

Time: 1:44:01
Platform: Nintendo 64
Gamer: Siglemic

When it came down to it, this is No. 1. It's absolutely unreal.

The memorization required to nail the precise steps show an amazing mental approach. The parkour-like virtual jumps he pulls off with ease show an amazing physical approach. Regardless of your willingness to sit through any of the earlier slides we suggest you give this one a watch as it's truly the Citizen Kane of gaming.

Allegedly, Siglemic beat his own record with a sub 1:44 run, but after hours seconds of searching YouTube, we gave up. If anyone finds it, throw it in the comments section so we can all see how he could've possibly topped this indisputable gaming masterpiece.