Kosmic, the all-star speedrunner held Super Mario Bros. Any% record until another top-flight speedrunner, somewes, took it from him six days ago (more on that in a moment). Kosmic has a new pursuit for now: the Super Mario Bros. Any% record, one-handed.
Kosmic made the first sub-five minute run of the speedrunning mainstay, using just one hand, on Monday. He already held first place in the category, one of 40 category extensions recognized by Speedrun.com, but it’s the 4:59.823 that makes it impressive.
That time, two-handed, would mark you as a world-class speedrunner (even if it wouldn’t be better than the 64th best verified time). And Kosmic beat his old one-handed mark of 5:01.98, set March 20, 2017, by more than two seconds.
Incidentally, Kosmic will be doing this same speedrun, one-handed, as a bonus event at Summer Games Done Quick, which is June 24 to July 1.
Meantime, if Kosmic is going to retake the overall Any% world record in Super Mario Bros., it is going to be a tall order. First, somewes came in at 4:56:245 on May 25. You can check it out below.
However, know that somewes is not sitting around congratulating himself. Late Wednesday night he held a 4:55 pace in another Any% attempt into World 8-1, where he ate it on a pipe jump. Breaking a time barrier, especially to set a record, is as exciting here as it would be in a track event in the Olympics.
somewes was measuring his heart rate during the run. It got up to 163 beats per minute, actually. Admirably, his reaction on jumping right into the piranha plant to ruin his record run was to laugh. “Beefed it,” he says, exhaling. “Total beef.”
While not successful this time, somewes getting this far on a 4:55 pace suggests that 4:56 is soon to fall. 4:57 was first breached Oct. 5, 2016 by speedrunner extraordinaire Darbian. And Darbian was also the first to crack 4:58, doing so May 17, 2015.
