Obvious Cheater Fakes Blindfolded Super Mario 64 Speedrun

Despite the immense popularity of Super Mario 64

speedrun

ning, there are a comparatively small number of people racing in the categories

blindfolded

, a testament to how difficult

blindfolded

speedrun

ning really is. And it was surprising when I was on Twitch this week and was notified that another racer was doing 16 star races blindfolded. Super Mario 64 blindfolded racing has recently become popular thanks to a small but EXTREMELY dedicated group of speedrunners. However, there are clear differences between the careers those established players have completed and the careers this particular person is completing. The main difference, of course, is that this particular racer is creating fake races and trying to pass them off as real.

I have a video of one of these runs here, and my goal is to show some of the clear discrepancies between this run and the genuine blindfolded sm64 runs that exist. When watching this race, it's important to note that the author claims to have not done much blindfolded speedrunning, and that this is apparently only his third blindfolded race. He claims to offset this with the fact that he has been playing Super Mario 64 for the past three and a half years. However, it should be noted that despite the amount of time he has dedicated to the game, the best time in a race he has achieved is 18:26, a relatively average time for 16 stars.

The first thing that really put me off when I saw this run was the fact that the transmitter had tracking alerts and text-to-speech alerts turned on. If you've ever watched a fast run blindfolded, you'll know that runners almost always have these types of audible alerts turned off. Considering how important sound cues are when you literally can't see, you'd think he'd do the same. However, this guy is so good that he apparently doesn't even need clear sound cues to run. Throughout this run, he also tries several times to explain the strategies he has been using, except that there are multiple problems with what he says versus the things he is actually doing.

He mainly claims to be using a combination of sound cues and muscle memory for most of his strategies. However, most sprinters know that VISUAL cues in particular are just as important as muscle memory in many cases. It's very unrealistic to assume that anyone could simply make a blindfolded run on visual muscle memory alone, no matter how long that person has been playing. "I can't make a star blindfolded. Although I've played this game for years and years and years, even trying to make a star blindfolded is tremendously difficult." Blindfold sprints often employ what are called standardized strategies.

A normalized strategy is any strategy that is performed in such a way that the result is always exactly the same. Many of these types of strategies can be used in Super Mario 64. For example, moving in a cardinal direction on a notched controller, using two slow walks to grab the corner of a platform, or hitting a wall to push Mario a fixed distance are normalized strategies. As you can imagine, these types of strategies are usually completely different from what you would see in a normal race and require hundreds of hours to learn correctly. And yet, this person claims to be able to do the same thing after openly admitting that he has little to no training.

Keep this in mind when looking at the so-called "blindfold" strategies said to be employed here. The race begins in Bob-Omb Battlefield with Behind Chain Chomp's Gate. When looking at a legitimate example of Bubzia, you can see that he is using a consistent setup with a clear intention to reach the Chain Chomp pole. Consider using a notched angle and a fixed camera to ensure a direct path to the post from the corner of the door. Comparatively, this broker does not seem to have any standardized settings. He takes what looks like an intentional kill or a legitimate mistake and then tries again a second time.

This time, he appears to be using an almost completely different, though not yet normalized, setup to hit the post. The unexpected hit he takes here from the Chain Chomp should have immediately unnerved him, and yet somehow he's still able to turn around and recover. The broker appears to be making intentional mistakes along with false setups to try to sell the idea that he is actually blindfolded. Many more of these will appear along the way. The race is already off to a suspicious start, however, with the first absolutely massive red flag appearing at Whomp's Fortress when the racer decides to go for the no-owl option, a strategy usually reserved for sighted races.

One should also take into account how much the runner speaks during this input-intensive and space-dependent section. Again, anyone who has ever watched a real speedrun blindfolded before knows how quiet the runners tend to be during difficult sections. With so much concentration and skill required to complete a race blindfolded, it is an anomaly that this barely practiced runner is able to do a strategy that no other blindfolded runner has attempted. And yet, without any standardized strategy, he seems to do everything with relative ease. By watching a race this same runner has done without a blindfold, you can see that he can do the EXACT SAME moves whether blindfolded or not.

His muscle memory must really be that good. On his first attempt, he is able to triple jump to the floating island without giving himself any indication of where he is. With absolutely no normalization, he can set up and fail without owl three times before finally landing a fourth time. He even comments on the fact that he should probably "learn" how to use the blindfolded owl, and no one knows why he didn't choose to learn this much more consistent strategy in the first place. On the next star, he opts for the traditional cannon-less setup you'd normally see in most forward-thinking races.

Again, looking at a blindfolded version of this strategy, there is clear intent with each entry using normalized moves and guaranteed setups. However, looking back at this walkthrough, the movement across the falling bridge and onto the piranha plant is extremely wobbly and very inconsistent. He then lines up next to the table using these extremely small settings that have no audio signal. Anyone who runs this game or has tried this trick before knows that it is quite accurate. The only possible way someone could do it blindfolded with the move used here would be if they weren't actually blindfolded and instead used a clearly visual cue.

From this point on, the race becomes increasingly suspicious. After a couple more extremely unstable and unnormalized builds in Cool Cool Mountain, we arrive at Bowser in the Dark World, Bowser's first stage. Here, only a true gamer like this guy could somehow dodge this goomba, quickly make his way down the path, and then make this long jump to the next platform, all while completely blindfolded and WITHOUT needing any SETUP. Just amazing. He then hits a goomba that he claims to have “heard” even though there is no good way to measure the distance as accurately with sound cues in SM64.

It probably would have been faster and safer to keep walking forward anyway. He then notices the small adjustment he makes to align with the final slope. Anyone blindfolded here would surely have stood their ground without any adjustments. And yet, this man somehow knew that he was too far down despite having no real setup beforehand. If none of this was suspicious enough, the next step is Bowser's first throw. Looking at Katun and Bubzia's legit runs, we can see that a setup is being used to slowly move Bowser towards the bomb without even throwing him. For a faster strategy, you can also throw it a little earlier with a slower spin, which provides a much larger than normal frame window to make the throw.

It should be noted that there is also a consistent way to launch Bowser at full speed using a combination of pause and a sound cue. When Mario is spinning Bowser, a distinctive "whistle" sound will play. This noise will always play whenever Bowser faces north, regardless of the camera angle or Bowser's orientation when grabbing it. Additionally, the whistle will make a slightly different sound depending on the frame you pause on. This is the strategy that Nobori implements, and this is how he can constantly pause a B press to launch Bowser into the bomb. However, it seems that this broker didn't care to learn any of these strategies.

Instead, he opts to launch Bowser the conventional way, while he claims that he too is using a sound signal. However, notice that he also chooses to turn his camera towards the bomb. As explained, rotating the camera during turns does not affect the timing of the audio cues, so it would make no sense to do so if the racer was actually blindfolded. It's pretty

obvious

here that he's simply rotating the camera so he can visually see when he's pitching. Moving on to the basement we see another series of extremely suspicious and inconsistent configurations. In Shifting Sand Land, he is somehow able to obtain the Claw Star using a strategy that is only viable for visual racing.

The amount of adjustment needed to jump long toward the fly and turn toward Klepto is simply too precise to be performed consistently in a blindfolded race. However, that doesn't stop this guy. He can do it on the first try without problems. However, in Hazy Maze Cave, he reverts to setups that could pass as blindfolded to try to further sell the idea that he can't see. However, the “settings” he is using in quotes don't make any sense. In the emergency exit star, he seems to have created some kind of false counting system that involves more abnormal and inconsistent movements.

Compare this again to Nobori's strategy, which uses normalized movements along with the game's fixed camera option for even more consistent angles. Up to this point, the race has been extremely suspect at best. However, what happens in the second half completely destroys what little credibility it had at the beginning. The last half of this series is so blatantly fake that it makes the previous 20 minutes seem completely legit by comparison. We now come to the MIPS clip, in my opinion one of the most impressive sections of the 16 star blindfold. Successfully performing a MIPS clip in a real blindfolded speedrun requires an extremely precise setup that involves walking into a corner with the correct camera angle and then repeatedly recapturing the mips to achieve the correct gate gap.

This is one of the most difficult and precise sections of the entire route. In the castle basement, even the slightest mistake to the left or right can mess up the camera completely, breaking any setup you've had. This runner, however, throws all that out the window. To get through the basement door, he basically runs straight into it and ends up in the right place, no setup required. Remember there are absolutely ZERO sound cues here. There is no way for him to know how close or far he is from this door with the move he is using. Exactly the same goes for the clip of him through 30 Star Door.

Again, without any discernible audio cue and without any real setup, he somehow knows exactly where he is at the door or is just lucky enough to get through after taking a random guess. He spends about thirty seconds pacing back and forth along the door, and is somehow able to find the exact spot to walk through. Somehow he still gets worse after this. At this point, he pretty much spends the rest of the game without even thinking about what a real blindfolded race should be like. It really seems like he has simply given up trying to sell the illusion any further.

He approaches the submarine in Dire Dire Docks from a seemingly random angle and then tries to make it look like he knows where it is by jumping on it. The fact that he says this is strange to me. There is literally nothing else in this level you can slide around besides the submarine. So there's really no point in him acting like he has to figure out what he's slipping into. He needed to make it look like he had some kind of sign to follow and then did the bare minimum to try to make it convincing. Then itzooms in on the back of the sub like you would in a normal speedrun, but ends up under the fin, causing the camera to move in an awkward direction.

It should be painfully

obvious

how bad this looks. A true blindfolded runner would be completely disoriented in this situation, and there is no consistent way to realistically recover from this. Despite this, he is somehow able to turn around at the perfect angle and land back on the fin, once again with absolutely no sound cue or any configuration. There's nothing suspicious to see here. And then there is the sea of ​​fire. Okay... So after some more bogus strategies in Fire Sea, a bogus Bowser launch setup, and some suspect blj lineups, we finally get to what manages to be the worst part of the race by far.

Bowser in the Sky from this run is pure gold. He contains such a large number of glaring flaws and inconsistencies that it's crazy that anyone can look at him and believe that the person playing the game can't actually see him. The course immediately begins, again, with completely non-standardized strategies, advancing throughout the course with small adjustments that apparently have no explanation. He then commits what is possibly the most obvious and completely blatant move of the entire race. I was laughing out loud when I first saw this. Not only does it somehow know exactly where the 1-up box is, but it also knows exactly which direction the 1-up will go once it spawns, something completely determined by the RNG.

Then, after chasing him around a moving platform for a completely arbitrary amount of time, he somehow knows exactly when and where to jump to the left. You don't even need to know anything about Super Mario 64 or blindfolded speed racing to understand that what just happened is a complete lie. Immediately after skipping the first 1-up, he wastes time on the first spin lift grabbing the next 1-up in the process. All clearly a calculated setup. After this, he once again makes an intentional mistake to make people think that he is actually blindfolded. This is somehow the first and only time in this forty-minute race that he accidentally goes off a platform.

Except that immediately after falling, he somehow also knows to back up to the right so as not to fall completely. Only then does he comment that he knows he has fallen, again without any discernible sound signal. After this, he crosses the wooden platforms and attempts another 1-up. He clearly saw this 1-up with his eyes, but then remembered that he was supposed to be blindfolded. Then he passes it by acting like he knows there should be a 1 up there and goes back to grab it, again with absolutely no setup. Look now how you somehow know exactly where you are on this rotating platform and you know exactly where the first pole is.

Again, anyone blindfolded here would probably have continued to hold left and run away. However, this guy is capable of making a completely random amount of adjustments to get to the post. He then heads to the next pole and grabs the red one that he seems to be using as an audio signal. Then, immediately after jumping off the pole he KNOWS he was right on, he tries to use two bob-ombs on the next platform to better determine his position. This is absolutely useless since he had just checked where he was. All he had to do here was keep going and he would have reached the next wall.

At this point, he once again reiterates the fact that this is only his third run blindfolded. In the last four minutes alone there have been countless points of extreme suspicion. From the moment he walks on stage to the moment he enters the final tube there is almost nothing that can be considered remotely legit. However, Bowser's final throws that he performs over the next four minutes are somehow EVEN WORSE. He starts by grabbing Bowser using the normal visual method. Running around Bowser in a tight enough circle to grab him is something that relies heavily on visual cues to do correctly.

That's why in a real blindfold race, a setup is used for the first two grabs that involves luring Bowser toward a bomb from the edge of the platform. For the final release, a separate normalized configuration is used. And yet, after just one failure, this person is able to grab Bowser the normal way, with no problem. Note that after this first mistake he doesn't miss a single tail grab for the rest of the fight. Then he takes the first throw and misses. Once a shot is missed, Bowser will jump back onto the stage differently depending on where he fell.

There's no very good way to account for this, so the only real backup is to run away and try again from the beginning. But this guy doesn't do that. Instead, he goes for a re-record and gets it, again with no setup or sound cues. He performs the throw on his second attempt, again using the normal visual method of throwing. During his second throw, he stops and talks for about thirty seconds to explain how he first learned to run fast while blindfolded. Once again, he talks constantly during a section that should require great concentration to execute. And yet, he still figures out exactly when he needs to get rid of Bowser.

After dawdling for another minute, he grabs it again, once again with no setup or possible audio cues. During the final launch, he rotates the camera not once, but twice to visually target two separate bombs. He then continues with another explanation about how he is able to do Bowser's throws the way he does. Obviously none of this makes sense in the first place, but here it directly contradicts itself. Here, he says something vague about using where his thumb is on the stick to figure out where Bowser is, which doesn't make sense on its own anymore. Except he also mentioned in his first Bowser pitch that he was using beeps.

All this time he has been giving false technical explanations to try to convince his viewers that he really knows what he is doing. Except he also misses this throw because he, first of all, he was too far away to hit the bomb, something he probably should have known whether he could really see it or not. Maybe he's just pretending to be blindfolded so he can hide the fact that he sucks at Bowser's throws. He finally manages to take the last shot, luckily avoiding all the fire on the ground and barely avoiding running off the edge. Nothing but pure skill and game sense.

Once the race is over, one of the only skeptics in his chat challenges him several times. He is asked to verify that he can really perform Bowser throws blindfolded, but he refuses to perform even the simplest test to prove it. Despite the obvious flaws in this person's gameplay, he has somehow been able to convince all but a few that his blindfolded racing is legitimate. Messages from him in his Twitch and Facebook Gaming chats show that most people watching are completely convinced that what they're seeing is real. The best I can guess in this situation is that it's possible that he's actually doing some of these parts at least partially blindfolded, and that he's only looking through the blindfold when he's completely lost or doesn't know what to do. do.

Either that or the blindfold is completely transparent and his only goal during the race is to make it look like he actually can't see. I almost thought this race was a joke, but from the way he talks about his game it's clear that he's completely serious. I can also only speculate on this person's motives for faking these races, but my best guess is that he does it for money or views. It should be noted that during this run, the only way to communicate with the transmitter was to donate bits to play a text-to-speech message in the broadcast.

Considering the race is fake, this seems like a disgusting way to take money from people. But honestly, for only 1 bit per message it doesn't seem that bad. If the amount was larger, he'd probably have a much bigger problem, but whatever small amount of money he raised is probably the least of our worries here. There hasn't been a notable cheating incident in the Mario 64 community for a few years now, so I guess we were about to experience another one. By faking this race, this person has not only completely made a mockery of blindfolded speedrunning, but has also detracted from the hard work of people who have actually put in the enormous amount of time needed to do it for real.

This particular race finished with a time of 42 minutes, however he claims to have completed a faster time of 33:23, a time that would be considered second place on current leaderboards. However, when asked if he would perform this time, he stated that he wants to take first place before making any appearance. However, I trust that the mods in the category are smart enough to see that any run I submit will be clearly invalid. Although I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't even submit a run, because he probably knows it will never be verified anyway. If you see this guy on Twitch or anywhere else, just don't interact with him.

I have intentionally left his name out of this video 1. Because I don't want anyone to harass him for this and 2. Because I don't think any

cheater

deserves attention beyond simply being exposed. I want to say a huge thank you to Katun and Bubzia for their incredible help on this video. They helped clarify a lot of questions I had about the SM64 blindfolded and this video wouldn't have been as complete without their input. Also thanks to them and Nobori for allowing me to use his images for comparisons. I left links to all of their YouTube streams and channels in the description.

PLEASE check all three out if you want to see some legit blindfolded executions of SM64, as well as many other games. These people have truly invested the incredible amount of time and focus required to successfully complete these real races. They are the ones who really deserve it. If you want, you can also subscribe to this channel and watch me on Twitch. My races still aren't as cool as these guys, but we'll still have fun.