AGDQ 2025 Starts This Weekend, Featuring Crazy Taxi With a Live Band, Elden Ring on a Saxophone, and Much More

It’s finally time for the most exciting live competition of the year. No, I’m not talking about the Super Bowl—it’s time for Awesome Games Done Quick, an annual charity speedrun that features a week of talented gamers showcasing the wildest things they can do with video games.

Games Done Quick (GDQ) has been running for 15 years, since 2010. The event is a live speedrunning marathon in which speedrunners take turns demonstrating how to complete video games as quickly as possible, often in bizarre and particularly impressive ways. In recent years, events have featured increasingly ambitious performances, including blindfolded or one-handed running, two players sharing one controller, demonstrations of tricky arcade games and even speedruns performed by dogs.

The annual event is a fundraiser for the Prevent Cancer Foundation, which previously raised a record $3,442,033 in 2022 and $2,539,832 last year alone. And this year’s marathon has some pretty ridiculous races planned. There’s a Crazy Taxi game with a live band, someone playing Elden Ring on a saxophone, a new Super Mario Bros. game. Wii with simultaneous piano playing, Breath of the Wild game for two players and one controller, many randomizers. races, all culminating in a map randomizer race between the best Super Metroid runners. If you’ve never watched GDQ before, you really should.

AGDQ 2025 kicks off at 9:00 a.m. PT on Sunday, January 5, with the launch of Pikmin on Nintendo Switch, followed by Portal 2. In fact, Sunday is full of fireworks: Kirby’s Air Ride follows, then Astro Bot launches, and then The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, a series infamous for appearing on GDQ every year and getting shorter each time as the community discovers new, running passes.

If I go ahead, I’ll just list all the races for the entire event, so here’s a quick list of the highlights you should definitely look out for. Definitely a peak on official website to view the full schedule because there are many great races that I haven’t listed here and the times will change constantly throughout the week.

Sunday

• 9:00 am PT: Pikmin – All Parts
• 10:24: Portal 2 – single player without SLA
• 13:56: Ori and the Blind Forest – Randomizer World Tour 11
• 15:30: Astrobot – Any%
• 18:19: The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker – Any%
• 21:14: Alan Wake 2: Night Springs – all episodes
• 22:01: Alan Wake 2: Lake House – Any%

Monday

• 9:54 am PT: UFO 50 – Various Games Presentation
• 10:51: Super Meat Boy – Any %
• 11:37: Super Mario Maker for Nintendo 3DS – SMC Any% No Auto
• 3:00 PM: Metroid Prime – Any% Within Bounds Race
• 16:42: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – Any% 2 players 1 controller
• 18:45: Horizon: Forbidden Rest – NG+ story

Tuesday

• 7:47 am PT: Unicorn Overlord – story with any percentage
• 8:26: Ys VIII: Dana’s Lacrimosa – all story bosses
• 10:18: Spyro: Reignited Trilogy – Spyro 1, Any% NBS
• 13:25: Super Mario Bros. – Any% STA
• 18:20: The Last of Us: Left Behind – Remake – Grounded
• 20:05: Silent Hill 2 (2024) – New Game Light Restricted

Wednesday

• 8:51 am PT: Sonic X Shadow Generations – any%
• 10:23: Pokemon, Pikachu, Go!/Eevee! – Any% Pikachu/Eevee
• 13:43: New Super Mario Bros. Wii – any% when playing piano
• 15:30: Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze – any% original mode
• 17:07: Fallout: New Vegas – all romances
• 17:52: Super Mario 64 – TAS A-Button Challenge presentation
• 18:27: Rocket League – demonstration of speedrunning the Workshop map
• 19:24: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim – Main Quest

At 8:24 PM PT, GDQ will begin a block of games that in years past were affectionately known as “Terrible Games Made Fast” or “Terrible Block.” It’s the stupid, crappy, broken, or questionable quality games that always make for fun speedruns. You’ve probably heard of the first episode, Superman 64, but perhaps not the rest. The “terrible block” lasts through Wednesday night into the early hours of Thursday morning. Based on my experience, I highly recommend suffering from insomnia and staying up all night to watch it. The block ends with Kevin Costner’s “Waterworld” on Thursday at 3:11.

Thursday

• 10:55 a.m. PT: The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – All Dungeons
• 15:00: False P – Any% without failures
• 17:02: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare – Any%
• 18:55: CHUNITHM LUMINOUS PLUS – Arcade presentation

Friday

• 2:36 am PT: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth – any% easy
• 9:21: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City – tougher vice
• 15:00: Tetris: The Grand Master – presentation of several games
• 16:00: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe – 48 tracks (DLC), 200cc, no items
• 17:45: Kaizo Mario World 3 – 100%
• 18:52: jubeat copious ADDITION – Showcase
• 20:07: Super Mario World – Away Race 96

Saturday

Seriously, just stop sleeping and watch all day Saturday. I want to list every game here. For Pete’s sake, it all starts with Peggle Extreme and Metal Gear Solid! There’s nothing wrong with the graphics! Okay, okay, my editor said I need to narrow it down:

• 6:57 am PT: Pokemon Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire – Any Race Percentage
• 10:32: Elden Ring – DLC Lockout Bingo
• 12:52: Elden Ring – saxophone-controlled boss presentation
• 13:27: Crazy Taxi with live backing band – Crazy Box
• 14:30: The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time – no logic randomizer
• 18:35: The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom – Any%
• 19:55: Super Metroid – Map Randomizer Race

Rebecca Valentine is a senior reporter at IGN. You can find her post on BlueSky @duckvalentin.bsky.social. Have a story tip? Send it to rvalentin@ign.com.