Read it so you don't have to - someone found a choice you can make in the second act that counts as an ending. So, they basically ran through act one and made that decision immediately.
They did not play through to what anyone would actually consider the end of the game.
Side question - Can someone try and define the line between the acts without spoiling? I just hit level 8 and found the nightsong last night. I think I'm in Act 2? Was kinda expecting major cutscenes or narration like DOS and BG2 to define them.
You are in the later part of act 2. The end of act 2 is now pretty straight forward. The City is Act 3, and everything before entering the shadowlands is act 1.
Entering act 3 removes the ability to go back, finding the nightsong locks out most of act 1 and 2.
I saw that news article too and didn't read it because I think it would be a spoiler. But it is interesting that some one figured out a way to do this.
I play Dark Souls and there are people doing speed runs to be the quickest.
I like to take games slow and enjoy the content. But still amazing what these guys do.
I'm not reading it for the same reason you aren't, but I can't help but wonder if there's something similar to the game "Myst" from the 90s going on, because 10 minutes seems way too short. For reference, in Myst, the entire game was essentially puzzles to solve other puzzle to solve other puzzles, but once you had gone through it once, you could "beat it" in like 5 minutes because the you could just go to the last puzzle and solve it using your knowledge from a previous run.
Maybe there's something you can do very early on that ends the game without having to progress through the actual game. I'm bookmarking the article to read after I beat the game.
Many games have “joke” endings as punishments for doing something incredibly stupid or out of character. Basically “this obviously killed you, but we’re going to have more fun with it than just ragdolling you”. They speedran to one of those.
I will read it too after I finish the game. But the speed runs I saw in other games used game breaking bugs or out of bounds game play to skip areas.
But it could be as simple as an how you play an NPC's story-they would affect the main story and shorten the game to one of the many endings.
Reminds me of the old pick a path adventure books. "What do you do go right or left? I go right. A bugbear jumps out of the shadows and kills your character." Game over you died. LOL
I’m always impressed by these speed runs, I don’t want to do it myself but I’ve watched a few streamers like elajjaz do dark souls speed runs and it’s something for sure
Figuring out the fastest route through a game is one kind of a journey. There’s often big collaborative efforts involved in finding and perfecting the tricks necessary for the run. The actual journey is far longer than the resulting 10 minutes, and some people love being part of that journey.
I am of both sides. I play for the story and the choices and such, and take a long time to play... But then after I've seen everything, I like to dick around and see all the ways I can lose, and how fast I can get certain things or how early I can complete the game. For example, beating Chrono Trigger the normal way is cool and all; but have you ever defeated lavos the very first instance you can attempt it? It finishes the game super early, but it's also the hardest challenge the game offers.