Fuelled by spite following commentator shade-slinging over setting Baldur’s Gate 3 speedrunning records by murdering Shadowheart and setting off magical nukes to skip Act 3, a misunderstood genius of the community has set a new record for the All Acts category, clearing the previous one by 12 minutes.
Since Baldur’s Gate 3 was fully released earlier this year, speedrunner Mae has been a constant presence on the scene. They set an early record by completing the D&D RPG in around 10 minutes by essentially utilizing Gale’s bounce capabilities to reach the end of Act 2 quickly before setting off what’s essentially a magical nuke to end the game, skipping Act 3 entirely.
Never content to rest on their laurels, the speedrunner refined the run to under five minutes, partly by skipping heaps of Act 2 by murdering Shadowheart and stuffing her in a box – ‘Shadowboxing,’ if you will.
Mae’s methods aren’t for everyone, apparently, despite the impressive results. As the speedrunner summarises at the start of their latest video, naysayers have dismissed their efforts over various reasons, such as avoiding Act 3 rather than playing it or the Shadowboxing trick taking advantage of something unintended.
Call it spite or the ultimate clap-back against their YouTube comment section, but Mae has responded by setting a new world for the All Acts category, and by 12 minutes to boot, as verified by Speedrun.com. They’ve clearly addressed criticisms of not doing Act 3, but don’t think that means they aren’t going to break the D&D RPG while doing it.
"People told me that my Any% speedruns were fake speedruns, so I decided to speedrun the entire game of Baldur's Gate 3," they say. "That means no Gale, no early ending. Every single act, including Baldur's Gate 3's boss fights. Strap yourselves in, because by the time this speedrun is done, we're going to break Baldur's Gate 3 with more glitches, bugs, and exploits than you can count on two hands."
Dare I jinx it, the comments seem to be more positive this around.
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