Legendary Super Mario 64 Speedrun Rivalry Heats Up

Last month, a speedrun for collecting 120 stars in Super Mario 64 went down in history for being the first run to ever go under a time of 1:40:00. It was a record that took years to achieve; some people didn’t think it was even possible. Last weekend, that legendary record got beaten twice in a span of a day.

The previous highly-celebrated record, achieved by Allan “Cheese05″ Alvarez, stood at 1:39:57. On June 3rd, speedrunner Puncayshun topped that with a run clocking in at 1:39:49.41. The hype was real, people went wild in the chat—they had just witnessed someone outdo a historic speedrun. “My heart’s pounding…oh my god,” Puncayshun says at the end of the clip. “First time holding a world record in a long time,” he wrote in the description.

Now highly motivated, Cheese05 punched back with a fantastic run of his own the very next day. As it became clear that Cheese05’s pace could potentially outstrip Puncayshun’s, the chat reinforced the rivalry:

Sure enough, Cheese05 knocked out a new world record at 1:39:28, and you can watch it below:

Beyond the display of platforming mastery, this new record is notable because of what happened after it was achieved. “Oh my fucking god, dude,” Cheese05 screams as he bounces around the room. “I’m a fucking legend!”

After watching Super Mario 64’s closing credits for a while, Cheese05 sits there in disbelief. “I don’t know what to do,” he says. To everyone’s surprise, Cheese05 actually calls up Puncayshun to rub it in. This clip contains the first part of the conversation, though you can hear it in full on the actual livestream around 6:11:00.

“Why can’t you let me be happy, dude?” Puncayshun immediately says.

“You got fucking wrecked, bitch,” Cheese05 laughs. “You got fucking wrecked.”

“I know, in a day! What the fuck,” Puncayshun responds.

“You didn’t just barely beat it, too…” he continues, later on in the conversation.

“No I did not barely beat it,” Cheese05 interjects. “You got fucking wrecked,” he says.

It sounds serious, but the two are clearly friendly. You can hear Puncayshun joking about getting “Bodied.com” at one point, and then the conversation turns to the particulars of the Cheese05’s run.

“I didn’t feel scared like I usually do,” Cheese05 says. “And I owned it, dude.”

Cheese05 goes on to ask the question that is on everyone’s mind: what happens next? Will Puncayshun try to take back the throne?

“I mean yeah I will [keep running 120 stars], but…that run I got was pretty insane for me,” Puncayshun says. “Getting 22 seconds faster is gonna take a long time, I would imagine. It took me months to get that run, but you never know.”