FFXIV – Beating Em0_oticon's Kugane Record – Any% Speedrun

This has been quite a journey. There is a lot to say, but I’ll spare you the essay if you don’t want to read it… TL;DR is: this was my ultimate goal that I didn’t even think was possible, but somehow I managed to accomplish it through stubbornness, hard work, encouragement from friends, inspiration from rivals and my love for jumping!

It’s taken a lot of practice and experimentation to get to this point. When I first saw Em0_oticon’s runs, they were so ridiculously good that I assumed they some sort of TAS. The more I learnt and the better I became at jumping, the more convinced I was that there was no way somebody could be that good, until Pint brought light to his identity.

From that point, I started opening up to the idea that the runs might be legit, and that reaching that level of skill might be possible for some… I just had no idea how. Needless to say, it was a hard blow to my ego, because I was an insignificant insect in comparison, in spite of being one of the most accomplished jumpers in the community when it comes to speedrunning. This was not acceptable, and so, I set out on a path to improve myself.

At first I had given up on the idea of ever claiming the world record, but I wanted to do my best and see how far I could push things, hoping to at least get close to the new record someday. I assumed it would take me months to go under 40 seconds, so I made beating Pint’s time my initial goal. That took 3 days of practice from the moment I unlocked all the abilities (I had practiced the puzzle without abilities for a week prior to that, and got the “No abilities” world record after the section was added to speedrun.com).

After that, I continued to practice Kugane any% some more, but the Moonfire Faire was around the corner. I was determined to improve my run from the previous year, but there was a new path added that was faster, so I focused on that one, and after a week I got the world record, so I went back to grinding Kugane since I was a bit bored of grinding Moonfire, and a rival of mine was even closer than me to beating Em0’s Kugane time (at this point we were both at under 40 seconds).

After a few days of practice, I finally managed to go under 39 seconds, but I was still 12 frames away from victory. In order to be faster, there was no room for safety or hesitation. In spite of all the effort, I felt like I had hit a wall and I was having a very hard time being consistent, so I decided to take some days off, and when I was about to resume my practice, a friend of mine took the Moonfire record from me a day before the event ended, so I had to go back and reclaim it, which took me most of the last 24 hours of the event.

That situation forced me to push my limits even further, and it helped me uncover some new knowledge I previously only had some hints and suspicions of. That, combined with the few days of rest I had had, and some minor adjustments to the run to improve my consistency, allowed me to reach a whole new level. I felt I finally had the key to beating Em0’s insane world record; it was just a matter of time. This also allowed me to finally comprehend just how insanely skilled and knowledgeable he is under that calm, quiet surface. I was amazed…

I kept trying for days, until I was finally able to finish a run with only 2 minor mistakes. It had taken dozens of hours of attempts with my new knowledge and skill, but I had finally beaten the time. There was only one little problem… that run was only 3 frames faster than the record, and I knew I could do better… it wasn’t satisfactory. So I kept going. The next day I matched the exact same time again, which was really frustrating, but I felt my previous skill and consistency were gone, so I stopped and tried again the next day, and I finally got a run I could be proud of, which still contained one mistake, but was otherwise excellent, and significantly faster than the previous.

I know I’m capable of doing a tiny bit better still, but now it’s time to slow down and focus on other things for a while. This has been a crazy, stressful, frustrating, but magical journey. I’m proud of what I’ve achieved. I never thought I’d ever reach this level, but here we are.

Special thanks to Pint for setting all these crazy events in motion with his masterpiece of a Kugane video, Pydoyks/Shaeden/Em0_oticon for inspiring me with his unmatched skill and showing what is possible, my friends and acquaintances for encouraging me and cheering me up when I felt down, and my rivals for forcing me to push my limits every time I started becoming complacent (hate you guys, I just wanted to slack and enjoy my vacation…).

Even if my records don’t last, this has been a dream come true. Looking forward to being humbled by the GOAT (or elephant in this case) once more, but for now, it’s time to celebrate my accomplishment. If you’ve made it this far, I really appreciate you, and hope you liked my story! ♥

#FFXIV #JumpingPuzzle #Speedrun

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