The History of Cuphead World Records

[00:02] may affect viewers with photosensitive epilepsy. Viewer discretion is advised. really, really hard game. You're tasked with fighting boss after boss, each one

[00:17] harder than the last. As you work your way across three islands, all the while, there's a non-stop barrage of attacks. Get hit more than a couple times and you're dead. It was honestly one of the toughest gaming experiences I've ever

[00:31] had. And yet, there are people who speedrun it and make the game look completely trivial. Since its release in 2017, Cuphead has had a big speedrunning scene. These guys race each other to beat the game as fast as humanly

[00:46] possible. They use tricks, glitches, and countless other techniques to fly through the game. And it is a punishing speedrun. One piece of bad luck, one accidental hit, and your run can come crashing down. The world record speedrun

[01:02] has had lots of competition, and over the years, it is completely transformed. This is the history of Cuphead World Records. Records. [Music]

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[02:48] Thunder for sponsoring this video. [Music] When Cuphead was released in late September 2017, it was an immediate smash hit with speedrunners. At the time, most popular speed games were

[03:01] older, as it was typically a generation rediscovering games from their childhood. But Cuphead was different. Within days of its release, speedrunners were all over it. Famous players like Distortion 2 and the Mexican Runner set

[03:15] world records in the game's main category, all bosses world record. Amos world record, boys. >> Cuphead speedruns became a viral sensation. It was a run filled with

[03:29] glitches, allowing speedrunners to beat bosses in a fraction of the time that developers intended. Most of these glitches revolved around one trick, the weapon swap glitch. In Cuphead, you equip two weapons that you can switch

[03:43] between. Each weapon has a cooldown that limits how fast each bullet comes out. For instance, the lobber has a bullet that comes out every 21 frames. Now, initially this cooldown was global, meaning after firing the lobber, you

[03:57] could switch to your secondary weapon and fire that and the lobberers's 21 frame cool down would still be active. You could just switch between weapons over and over and fire much faster than normal. This was the weapon swap glitch,

[04:10] and it allowed you to completely obliterate bosses, even skipping certain phases of the fight. It was a thriving speedrun community. But that's not what we're here to talk about, because on December 1st, 2017, the developers

[04:25] released a patch that devastated some Cuphead speedrunners. They fixed several glitches that speedrunners used, but the most important change was the weapon cooldown went from being global to only being active when the weapon was out.

[04:39] This destroyed the weapon swap glitch as you could only build cooldown on one weapon at a time. The ultimate result was the leaderboard being split into two categories. A legacy version where you play on the original version with weapon

[04:52] swap glitch and version 1.1 where you play on the patched version. Both are still speedran today, but at this point, the more popular category is 1.1, and that's what we're going to focus on. So, our story begins in early December 2017

[05:08] with the news of the patch still resonating throughout the community. busy debating how the patch would impact the categories and rules, a few decided to see what they could get. The first to put in a serious attempt was a player

[05:23] named Alphacong, the 51st ranked speedrunner on the unpatched version. His run had a lot of deaths and was only the record for one day. On December 3rd, a 13-minute improvement was performed by a player named Luigi 100. Luigi was a

[05:40] record holder in various side categories on the pre- patch version of Cuphead. Compared to that, 1.1 had very few glitches available, so they were banned outright for 1.1. and the category was named glitchless. A lot of YouTube

[05:54] prefer to see games played as they were originally intended, and Luigi kind of agreed. He was excited to try running the game in a cleaner, less broken way. On December 3rd, he set a world record of 3657.

[06:09] And to understand this run, we first need to understand the framework for a Cuphead speedrun. The goal of Cuphead is to make your way through the three aisles before ultimately defeating the devil at the end. One very important

[06:21] concept is the weapons you choose to use. In Cuphead, you start with the peashooter, but can purchase other weapons that deal a variety of damage, travel in different patterns, and have different ranges. Each weapon also has

[06:34] an EX attack, a special which deals more damage. Using an EX attack costs a card earned by damaging enemies or parrying pink projectiles. You purchase weapons with coins, which are mainly collected in running gun stages. These are

[06:49] sidescrolling levels that appear in addition to the traditional boss fights. You don't need to play running guns to beat the game, but they can be very valuable to unlock different weapons. So, speedrunners have a tough decision

[07:02] to make. Is it worth it to waste time playing running guns so that you can purchase different weapons? Well, Luigi opted to start his run by playing two of them. forest follyies and treetop trouble. He used those coins to purchase

[07:15] the weapon spread and charge. Spread offers the highest damage per second in the game, but with a very short range. Charge has one big benefit. Many fights have periods in them where the boss can't be damaged. So, with charge, you

[07:29] can use that time to charge up a shot. Then, the instant the boss is vulnerable again, you'll be able to deal more damage than with any other weapon. Now, as for the boss fights themselves, the very first one, the root pack, is a

[07:42] Each boss fight is broken up into different phases. Once you damage the boss enough, it triggers a cue to move into the next phase. In the root pack, phase one involves fighting a potato while he shoots projectiles at you.

[07:56] Luigi runs right up next to him and pelts him with spread. Nice and easy, and he's defeated after a few seconds. Phase two is the Onion. Luigi begins by shooting EX attacks just as he spawns in, then continues pelting him with

[08:10] spread until he's defeated. Finally, phase three is the carrot. He jumps up and shoots charge EXs while strategically taking damage on certain projectiles so he doesn't have to reposition himself. This is the easiest

[08:23] you an idea of how runners switch weapons and use EX attacks. Absolutely everything is planned out ahead of time, and runners know exactly what they're going to try to do. Luigi continued this play style all throughout the different

[08:37] boss fights. Since this was his first run of the category, he sometimes pulled back and didn't go for the quickest kills, opting instead to try and stay alive. He tended to overuse charge by staying back rather than getting close

[08:51] with spread. After finishing all three aisles, there are two more fights in the aisles, there are two more fights in the game. King Dice and the devil. We'll talk about the devil later, but for now, I want to show you how Luigi handled the

[09:03] very unique king dice. In this fight, you're dropped onto a game board and have to roll either a 1, two, or three. The space you land on determines the mini boss you fight, and there's also free spaces you can land on without

[09:16] fighting anybody. Because of the spacing on the board, you're forced to fight at the end, where you fight King Dice himself. So, which three did Luigi want to fight? Well, he went with the 248

[09:29] route, which speedrunners had done since the game's launch. This was a very safe but still very fast route that fought Chips, Betigan, Pip and Dot, and Mangostein. Luigi dodged attacks and landed either charge or spreadshots.

[09:44] Then, by the time he fought King Dice, he built up five cards so he could unload EX attacks and end the fight fast. Just a couple minutes later, Luigi finished up the run. a final time of 3657.

[09:58] This was the first somewhat optimized record of 1.1, but this was still a brand new category in a popular speed game. And over the next few weeks, things were going to get hectic. It started on December 11th when a

[10:12] runner named Soul Wrath broke the record twice in one day. Soulrath was a pretty being the first person to ever beat the game without taking any damage. Now playing on the patched version, he first got a 39 second improvement, then took

[10:27] another 10 seconds off. Luigi was right there in chat cheering him on. >> Yo, thanks Multi Luigi. Dude, you're really cool. Thanks for stopping in the That's You're awesome, man. >> Soul's time save mainly came from being

[10:42] more aggressive, not backing away quite as much as Luigi. Over the next few days, Luigi came back and beat the world record twice. first a 3418, then a 3352.

[10:54] The second of these runs was notable because he skipped both running guns at the start. This meant that he only had the coins to purchase spread and nothing else. He essentially traded out the ability to use charge for a 2minute time

[11:07] save at the start of the run. It meant Luigi had to get right up close with the bosses. No more standing back with charge. After this was a formerly lost world record. The Twitch VOD was deleted and it wasn't included on speedrun.com,

[11:22] but it was rediscovered during the making of this video. It was a 3339 set by TMR. TMR is a speedrunning legend. He was a former world record holder in big classic NES games like Contra and Battle Toads.

[11:39] [Music] But when Cuphead was released in 2017, he came back with a second act. He was one of the best early Cuphead speedrunners, repeatedly setting the world record. And after 1.1 came out, he

[11:54] decided to give it a try. Probably the biggest change TMR made was going 348 on biggest change TMR made was going 348 on King Dice rather than 248. Space 2 was Chip's bet again, and it's easy to miss shots here like Luigi did. Instead,

[12:07] space 3 is Mr. Whezzy. He's just out of range to hit with spread at the start, so TMR had to land a steady stream of the peashooter. But in the next phase, he's super close. So TMR pelted him with spread. He even intentionally took

[12:23] damage to get eye frames, allowing him to walk through and behind the boss's hitbox to safely fire more spread. Not even a day later, another record was set by a player named Krime. Much like TMR, KP Prime was a pre- patch record holder

[12:37] who decided to try running the game on 1.1. The bulk of his improvement over TMR came on one boss, Grim Matchstick. This fight has randomly generated clouds the boss. To make things a little more

[12:52] consistent, K Prime intentionally took damage at the end of phases two and three. This allowed him to enter the dragon's hitbox and repeatedly EX attack dragon's hitbox and repeatedly EX attack to finish him off, saving 13 seconds.

[13:04] The next record came on Christmas Eve 2017. It was Luigi striking once more with a 3255. And this run shows the true difference between Luigi and runners like TMR or KP Prime. For the latter group, their true

[13:19] passion and interest was with Legacy, where you could perform crazy glitches and obliterate certain fights. They just played on 1.1 to try it out before moving back to Legacy. But Luigi genuinely preferred 1.1 over Legacy. He

[13:35] the fights, having to play them all straight up. This is why Luigi was able to reclaim the 1.1 record time and time again. It was his true passion, not just a side project. In under a month since the patch came out, runners had taken

[13:50] the record down to 32 minutes. There was frantic activity with nearly every highle runner playing. But finally, with this 3255 by Luigi, things settled down a bit. And entering the first couple months of 2018, the record stayed put.

[14:15] still 3255 by Luigi. Most runners had lost interest in 1.1 and had gone back to playing the more popular category, Legacy. But one runner hadn't made his grand appearance yet. He'd been lurking in the background, watching when the

[14:31] patch was released in December. He found it fascinating to watch players route the game without any glitches and he wanted to join in. Only problem, he didn't have a Twitch account, a Discord account, or anything he could use to

[14:44] collaborate with other runners. He was too shy. After the 3255 in late December, the category seemed to be quiet, but in reality, he was playing offline without telling anybody, and eventually he found himself good enough

[14:59] to be challenging the world record. Now, he had to decide what to do. Should he reveal himself to the community or stay in the background while others competed? Well, that came further into question on February 6th, 2018 because he set a new

[15:16] world record of 3251. He was only doing this for his own personal enjoyment. But since this was a world record, he knew what he had to do now. He made accounts on speedrun.com, Twitch, and Discord. And SBDWolf showed

[15:32] off to the community what he had done. Over the next few weeks, SBDWolf and Luigi traded the world record back and forth. It was extremely impressive that this newcomer had shown up out of nowhere and was now able to challenge

[15:45] the category's best runner. Heck, he did more than just challenge Luigi. He was beating him time and time again. Luigi would set a new record, but within days, SBD Wolf always took it back. Eventually, he took the record down to a

[15:59] 3152. How was SBDWolf doing this? Well, as it turned out, he was actually using a technique across the whole run that gave him an advantage. Something so subtle that neither SBD Wolf nor anybody else

[16:14] in the community even realized he was doing it. A trick that would later be known as caliba swaps. If you do an EX attack on a ground level, your weapon stops firing from the time you press the button until the time the EX animation

[16:27] is complete. But if you swap your weapon during this period, the game lets you continue shooting your weapon while the EX animation plays. The game resets this when the EX shot comes out at the midway point of the EX animation. So to fire

[16:42] throughout the entirety of the EX animation, you need to cal swap twice, once before the midpoint and once after the midpoint. All that just to keep firing during the second half of the animation. But it's worth it if you can

[16:56] do it. It helped to make faster cycles on bosses. Briney Beard, for instance, thanks to Caliva swaps, he was able to one cycle the final phase, meaning he avoided the laser where you can't deal damage for a bit. Across the whole run,

[17:10] SBDWolf was saving about 15 seconds over Luigi, and nobody had any clue. The trick was formally found by a runner named Calva a couple months later, and that's when SBD Wolf realized what he'd been doing. He pressed EX and then

[17:24] switched weapons so that he could fire his original weapon for slightly longer without realizing this was also allowing him to keep firing during the EX animation. So without the knowledge of why SPD Wolf was going so much faster,

[17:38] Luigi played to try and get the record back. Around this time, he was joined by another runner, Calva, the namesake of Calva swaps. Much like SBD Wolf, Calva had slowly gotten better in the background, inching closer and closer to

[17:52] the 1.1 world record. Both runners played extensively in March and April played extensively in March and April 2018. And on April 3rd, both Luigi and Caliva ended up breaking the record. Neither world record was a particularly

[18:05] so that the previous three records were each set by a different player. Then just a few days later, Luigi got a bigger record, 3142. One of the biggest time saves in this run came on rumor honey bottoms. As

[18:20] usual, there's three phases here, and Luigi beautifully executed his game plan through them all. Phase one is the security bee. You get up close and hit him with spread. It's important to kill him before he reaches the left side of

[18:32] the screen. Since once you kill him, he flies offcreen in the direction he's traveling. Then in phase two, Rumor herself comes out and she has three attacks. She can randomly start with the B missile, the orbs, or the triangles.

[18:46] She went with the orbs, and Calva got some bad luck with the platforms in his run. The platforms usually have one randomly not spawn in per row, and it made it so that Calva had to retreat and not damage Rumor for several seconds.

[18:59] Luigi got better luck with the platforms and had a very clean fight, finishing off Rumor very quickly in phase three and saving about 8 seconds. Probably the best split in his entire run. Then a couple weeks later, it happened again.

[19:11] Both Luigi and Caliva set world records on the same day. This time it was Caliva first with a 3136. Then a few hours later, Luigi got an amazing run of 3116. This was easily the cleanest run of the

[19:27] game so far. He'd implemented Calva swaps by now and was saving more time with them across the run. With Calva and Luigi pushing each other, the world record had plummeted fast. But this 3116 by Luigi was a pretty impressive run. No

[19:41] major mistakes throughout all 19 bosses. There's a good chance that it would have stood for several weeks, even months, as it was now 20 seconds ahead of second place. But that's not what happened. Because on May 2nd, 2018, a major shift

[19:57] was made on the Cuphead leaderboard. Up until now, there were two main categories. All bosses and all bosses glitchless. In all bosses, you play on the old version and do whatever tricks you want. In all bosses glitchless, you

[20:11] play on the 1.1 patch and all glitches are banned. This initially worked out pretty well because the developers seem to have done a great job patching out all glitches from 1.1. But now, 6 months

[20:24] after the patch, players had really torn apart version 1.1, and they discovered that maybe this wasn't such a glitch-free patch after all. So, they decided to redo the categories. Instead of all bosses and all bosses glitchless,

[20:39] everything was now just all bosses, and there was a subcategory denoting if you were playing on the old version or 1.1. Glitches were now allowed on both versions of the game. And as of May 2018, there were now a few new tricks

[20:53] that players were able to implement in their 1.1 speedruns. First, a simple one, shop glitch. Normally to buy items in the shop, you press confirm to buy them and then press back to exit the shop. However, if you

[21:08] press confirm and back on the same frame, you can exit the shop while the purchase animation plays. In addition, you can even buy a second item while the screen fades out back to the map. It saves a few seconds, was found shortly

[21:21] after the game's release, and now it was available for 1.1 speedruns. Another trick was on the second boss of the run, Ribeian Croakkes. First, we need to understand a concept called overdamage. We already know that boss fights are

[21:35] broken up into different phases. But importantly, even though each phase is triggered by an amount of damage, the fight usually won't transition to that phase until the boss is done with whatever move or attack they're doing.

[21:47] And the damage you do during that time counts as damage in the next phase. You can make certain phases much shorter or in some cases even skip phases altogether. This is known as overdamaging the boss. Enter the Ribe

[22:02] and Croak Super Skip, a trick involving overdamage that lets you skip phase 2 of the fight. It was long known to be possible on the pre- patch version, but lack of weapon swap glitch on 1.1 seemed to make it impossible. But in March

[22:16] 2018, a player named Jumper N found a way to do it. You get the frog's health on the cusp of transitioning past phase one. Then the instant they begin an attack that they must finish before transitioning, you unload a barrage of

[22:30] spread fire and EX's into a precise spot where their hitboxes overlap. You also damage boost inside of their hitbox for better damage. If all is done properly, you do enough damage to end phase 2 before it begins. Instead of separating

[22:44] for phase two, they roll into each other and turn straight into the slot machine for phase three. It saves time by skipping a transition animation, about 8 seconds. The fact that 1.1 runners were now allowed to do all this and more was

[22:58] very exciting, and it was enough to bring SBD Wolf back to running the bring SBD Wolf back to running the category. to be a huge reset point. It was just the second fight in the run, but getting

[23:11] the super skip required both good RNG and difficult execution. He decided that whenever he missed it, he'd just reset the run. He felt the 8 seconds were that important. It was tough having to reset early so often, but it eventually paid

[23:26] off. On May 6th, SBD Wolf got the first sub31 in Cuphead 1.1's history. SBD Wolf didn't intend to improve the run any further since Riian Croak super skip

[23:38] made the category frustrating to play, but a couple months later, he accidentally did. While practicing for a tournament, SBD Wolf set a new world record of 3050. This was the first world record to use new tech found by Luigi

[23:52] called Luigi swaps. Similar to Caliva swaps, they let you keep shooting during an EX on the flying levels, but unlike Cala swaps, you must press EX and fire on the same frame. A month later, Caliva took the record back with a 30-47,

[24:07] followed a short while later by SVD Wolf reclaiming it with a 30-45. And it was around this time that SBDWolf began looking into implementing a new trick.

[24:19] Remember, allowing glitches in 1.1 was still a new thing, and runners were glitches from Legacy could be adapted to 1.1. And everyone knew there was a white whale. One glitch from Legacy that would be more valuable than any other. If they

[24:35] could find a way to make this one work without weapon swap glitch, it would be without weapon swap glitch, it would be the biggest time save in the run. This the biggest time save in the run. This is Bey Glitch.

[24:50] boss called Bey the Clown. Just like Ribe and Croakkes, it's possible to overdamage him and skip transition animations. In phase one, Bey moves back and forth and then slides across to the other side of the screen and hits the

[25:03] wall, repeating this pattern over and over. Once you've damaged him enough, then the next time he slides across the screen, instead of turning around, he'll fall off the bottom. That's the trigger to begin phase two, and it's the perfect

[25:16] spot to overdamage him. Bey doesn't transition to phase two until after he slides across and falls off the screen. So, you want to deal almost enough damage to trigger phase two. Then the instant he slides and hits the wall,

[25:29] start shooting him and deal enough damage to pass the next phase trigger before he slides and falls off the screen. If done properly, phase 2 never ends, and the game gets confused. Bee's phase 2 death sprite loads in, but the

[25:42] fight is actually in phase three, and his hitbox is active the entire time. He stays in this glitch state for the rest of the fight, so you end up skipping both the phase 3 and phase 4 transition animations. Now, on the legacy version,

[25:56] Bey Glitch was very doable. Thanks to weapon swap glitch, you could deal enough damage before the transition to phase 2. But when 1.1 came out, that seemed to mark the end of Bey Glitch. Until SPD Wolf managed to hit it with a

[26:10] spread and peashooter combo in June 2018. As soon as Bey hit the wall on the right side of the screen, SPD Wolf unloaded everything he had into him, taking him out as he slid back to the left. It was also random. Bey needed to

[26:25] avoid sliding for as long as possible to deal enough damage. But as hard as this all was, Bey glitch was officially possible on 1.1. And it was a 20se second time save if SBD Wolf could get it in a run. He knew how huge this would

[26:41] be. With the current record at 3045, a 20 second time save would leave runners just 25 seconds away from an enormous milestone, the sub30. However, actually pulling this off in a run was going to be a big ask. On August 27th, SPD Wolf

[26:58] had a run that was a bit behind midway through, but with a 20 second time save potential on Bey, he knew this was recoverable.

[27:16] no time to deal enough damage. That being said, he followed this up with the fastest grim matchstick he'd ever played in a run, and he closed it out as a small world record. Yet, he barely even cared.

[27:30] nice. >> He cared so little, in fact, that he kept his stream going. And a couple hours later, he had another run. This was a significantly better pace into Bey, a huge opportunity to try and get

[27:44] the glitch. Once again, SBD Wolf set up Bee's damage, unloaded at him at the right moment, and then, >> nope, that's not the better.

[27:56] >> Unlucky again. Not only did he not gain time, but he lost 7 seconds. Yet, it was a repeat of the last run. He had an excellent grim matchstick, golded rumor the game. >> All right, it's not 3030. Very nice.

[28:14] This was a pretty big one. The first ever sub 3030. And more importantly, if he could hit Becky glitch, that alone was a 30-second time save over the split in this record. No other top level players were actively playing. This was

[28:28] players were actively playing. This was his milestone to reach. The next day, it was a familiar situation. SBD Wolf kept it close through aisle one with a chance it close through aisle one with a chance to pull way ahead on Bey.

[28:41] to pull way ahead on Bey. [Music] messed it up by getting something runners call a nothing. When doing a cow

[28:54] swap, if you weapon swap on the exact frame the EX attack is supposed to come out, the EX attack gets cancelled and never comes out. So it was the same story again. No bey glitch, but he played well in the late game and pulled

[29:08] off yet another world record. So he was lowering the record, but this particular run felt about as good as it was going to get without Bey Glitch. He really needed it for sub 30, but it was just never happening. Maybe he needed a

[29:23] different approach. Part of the problem was Bey needed to stay still for long enough to deal the damage. But it turns out Bee's delays here aren't fully random. They're only partially random. He has 10 possible delays, and they

[29:37] always occur in order, but the starting point in this sequence is random. This is how most RNG works in the game. You can technically predict what a boss is going to do next. If you're able to identify where you are in the RNG

[29:50] sequence, so SPD Wolf realized he could apply the concept to Bey. If he could identify where Bey was in his pattern after the first two delays, he could identify if the third delay would be long enough to do Bey glitch. If it

[30:04] wasn't, he could wait one or two more cycles to do Beyitch, losing a bit of time, but still saving time overall. This clever idea gave him a much bigger chance of hitting Bey glitch in a run. And the very next day after discovering

[30:18] And the very next day after discovering it, SBD Wolf did this.

[30:48] Sub 30 has been achieved. >> This was such a satisfying run for SBD Wolf. He hit Bey glitch by recognizing his pattern. His hard work had paid off that he was able to use it to get the first sub 30 in Cuphead history.

[31:02] Congratulations flooded in from the community. It was by far the biggest community. It was by far the biggest milestone in 1.1's history. And SBDWolf milestone in 1.1's history. And SBDWolf was now in first place by a full minute.

[31:14] was now in first place by a full minute. [Music] Given all the activity, it's easy to forget, but at this point, Cuphead wasn't even a year old. And yet, version 1.1 had already seen 27 world records.

[31:31] Hardly a month ever passed without a new record, as runner after runner came along and got good. But now that the sub30 was achieved, things finally slowed down. Compared to the previous nine months, the fall of 2018 was a very

[31:44] quiet period for Cuphead speedruns. Through all of September, October, and November, no new world records were set. SBDWolf's strangle hold on the leaderboard was too strong, and it stayed that way until something big

[31:59] happened in late 2018. To understand the next chapter in Cubad's history, we have to look at the seventh place runner, a player named Grandius. Careful viewers may have seen his name earlier in this video. Grond got into Cuphead speedruns

[32:14] in the spring of 2018. Just another person who played the game shortly after its release, loved it, and decided to pursue speedrunning it. By that summer, he moved into the top 10. He was a good player, but not really a threat to the

[32:28] world record. But even if his skills weren't there, Grond was a very creative runner, always looking for new ways to go faster. And in November 2018, while stuck inside due to a snowstorm, Gron started messing with a radical new idea.

[32:43] He wanted to throw out the current run and reroute the entire game with a new and reroute the entire game with a new weapon combination, lobber and spread. This was an interesting duo. We already know that spread does a ton of damage,

[32:56] but with a very short range. Lobber also deals great damage and was particularly intriguing because of its EX attack which has an unintended mechanic, double which has an unintended mechanic, double damage lobber EXs. A lobber EX normally

[33:10] does 28 damage. However, if it hits the ground, the game accidentally creates splash damage twice. So, if a boss is within range, it'll deal 56 damage to the boss. It's also possible to hit a precise spot on some bosses where the

[33:25] lobber EX explodes and the boss is hit by both double splash damage and direct impact, dealing a total of three times normal damage. However, even if you do it correctly, this only works half the time. But this double damage mechanic

[33:41] combined with spread could be extremely powerful. The problem is that in order to purchase lobber you need more coins and that means having to play a running gun at the start forest follyies which takes an extra 50 seconds. So if Groond

[33:57] could manage to save at least 50 seconds with lobber then it would be worth it. Grond got to work. He found that doing caliva swaps with a lobber ex and spread up close was a powerful combo. He had to figure out new routes for several fights

[34:11] all on his own. And the more he played, the more he was able to reap benefits from the lobber. Gro told SBDWolf what he was doing in November 2018. He was losing 50 seconds at the start of the run, but making up a chunk of that time

[34:25] across the remainder. Not worth it yet, but if he kept looking, he thought he could close the rest of the gap. And he kept finding new stuff. For Bey, with have to wait four or five cycles to get the right pattern. But with lobber and

[34:41] spread, you could always get the glitch in three cycles. He also refined Baroness von Bonbon. This fight features three mini bosses selected out of a pool of five. There's 60 possible combinations. Grond relearned every

[34:55] option with lobber and spread, figuring out the optimal way to play every single scenario. So, he had the new weapons. He had the new strategies. It was still slower than the old route, but the gap was

[35:08] shrinking. He'd already made up 27 of the 50 seconds. Grand wasn't sure if he could take it the rest of the way, but he wanted to try. And over the next he wanted to try. And over the next couple months, it started to get close.

[35:32] Yes, there is. Yes. Okay. [Music]

[35:49] We did it, dude. We freaking golded it, dude. So 30, man. dude. So 30, man. [Music]

[36:16] >> This was the culmination of an enormous effort in research and execution. Grond had set a massive world record. Indisputable proof that the lobber and spread route was the way to go. Despite having to spend nearly a minute at the

[36:29] start collecting coins, Grond was pretty adamant that he was done. He'd had an incredible story arc in this game, practically inventing a new route and now getting a world record with it. At this point, there wasn't much motivation

[36:42] to continue, but maybe SBD Wolf could egg him on. with the Wobburn spread route, and just like Grond, he found it to be the faster

[36:56] option. He set a new personal best of 2945, then continued with attempts to get the world record back. SBDWolf and Grond helped each other and as they did more runners began adopting the Wobburn spread route, but it was SBD Wolf who

[37:11] closed in and just after the new year, he came through with a new world record of 2921. Guys record done. In this run, SBDWolf saved big time on Hildabberg. This is a flying level in Isisle 1. Hilda sways

[37:27] back and forth through the fight, and the idea is to use EX attacks when she's moving right so that she travels with it and takes more damage. When she charges forward, runners intentionally take damage so they can fire an EX attack

[37:39] that hits her over and over. In GR's run, he accidentally took damage on a parryable, which meant he couldn't intentionally take damage later and it threw the rest of the fight off. Spwolf capitalized on the time save. After this

[37:54] run, SBD Wolf looked to play other categories, and he also started focusing on Castlevania speedrunning, where he'd eventually claimed the world record, so he moved on from playing any% 1.1 speedruns. But Grond, on the other hand,

[38:08] was nowhere near done. The torch had been passed. SBDWolf was way ahead, but now Grond had fully caught up. And just days after the 2921, Grond took the

[38:20] record back with a 2910. We did it. All right. World record >> The most notable split in this run was Baroness. He got Cupcake, Waffle, Candy Corn. One of the fastest patterns. Much faster than SBD Wolf split, which got

[38:36] faster than SBD Wolf split, which got Jawbreaker, Cupcake, and Gumball. In general, Waffle is super fast, so you want that to be one of the three. Suddenly, just 11 seconds from the next minute barrier, Grond pushed onward. He

[38:49] grinded off and on all through the month of January while also searching for faster ways to defeat bosses. One thing he discovered was tech called flick lobbers. Instead of holding down the fire button to repeatedly shoot lobbers,

[39:02] you manually tap it so that you can face away from the enemy between shots. It's where you need to repeatedly move away from the boss but still want to damage from the boss but still want to damage him. Now officially going for sub 29. On

[39:16] February 8th, Groond got one so close it clocked in at 29 minutes flat. Just one more second until the next minute barrier. Then a couple weeks later, he had an up and down run. He got a good Baroness pattern, but lost time on

[39:29] Beyitch. He got good RNG on Rumor Honey Bottoms, but lost time down the stretch in aisle 3. This type of run is so common in Cuphead. It's hard to get everything to line up. But then he golded King Dice, saving another 4

[39:44] >> Oh my god, dude. This might actually be it. >> Just one fight left to go. The devil. We haven't talked about him yet, but he is one last enormous roadblock right at the very end of the run. For starters, he's

[39:58] extremely random, more than just about any other boss. In phase one, there's the clap and the parryable attack with bubbles. But through all this, there's one massive piece of RNG. At some point during the phase, it's very likely

[40:14] you'll either get the spider attack or the serpent attack. Both attacks have subsets of RNG within them, but in general, you really, really want to get the serpent, not the spider. The serpent either comes out from the left or right

[40:28] side with fairly straightforward RNG. The spider is unpredictable. It bounces a random number of times, randomly lands in different spots, and more. It's so hard to make a game plan. In general, the spider is at least a 6 to 7se second

[40:44] time loss over the serpent. It's 50/50 which one you'll get. So, at the very end of the run, there's basically a coin flip as to whether or not you make it. And that's just phase one. You then jump down a hole and there's a brief cutscene

[40:58] animation where Cuphead stares in awe before phase 2 begins. If you pause and unpause, then use an EX, you can shoot and move during this animation. the geo buffer. So on this pace with sub29 on the line, Grond had a lot to think

[41:12] about. The devil opened with some normal attacks and then the moment of truth. attacks and then the moment of truth. Was this spider or serpent? Was this spider or serpent? Oh my gosh.

[41:30] It's happening, guys. It's happening. >> Dude, I did it. Heck yeah, man. This was another satisfying run for Grond. He got the goal he was looking for, broke another minute barrier, and now that SBDWolf wasn't playing anymore,

[41:43] the next closest runner was a minute behind. With the sub 29 achieved, Grondro moved to play other games, and the community died down once again. These types of periods are normal in speed games. Sometimes there's a rush of

[41:56] activity and it seems like everyone is playing. Other times, everyone's on a break at the same time, and there's no real competition for the record. The latter was definitely true in the spring of 2019. Gron's 2853 was an amazing run,

[42:11] and now that glitches had been allowed for several months, it was less exciting and new. But in midApril 2019, this period of inactivity came to an abrupt end because that's when the developers released yet another patch for Cuphead,

[42:26] version 1.2. Speedrunners were looking forward to this update, but were soon disappointed. Version 1.2 removed a lot of glitches. They patched out double damage lobber EXs, got rid of the ability to clip

[42:40] through objects, and changed various hitboxes. 16 months ago, when the game went from 1.0 to 1.1, it worked out well from a speedrunning perspective. Major glitches were patched, so runners were forced to

[42:54] were patched, so runners were forced to come up with new tech. But 1.1 to 1.2 2 took it a bit too far. That cool tech was now removed and it made fights last longer. It was a fine update for casual players, but speedrunners didn't know

[43:07] what to do. There was a big debate over how to deal with version 1.2. The end result was it became its own category. No major glitches where in addition to the patched out tricks, stuff like bey glitch and Luigi swaps were also banned.

[43:22] glitch and Luigi swaps were also banned. So now 1.0, 1.1, and 1.2 2 each had their own categories. And of the three, the one that developed the most momentum the one that developed the most momentum was 1.1 because in mid 2019, Jason 2890

[43:37] came back to the category. Jason was a Cuphead legend. He'd held the 1.0 record in 2018 and recently set the 1.2 record as well. The only record he hadn't held was 1.1, where he currently sat in third place behind Grond and SBDWolf. In fact,

[43:54] careful viewers might have noticed them earlier in this video. Cuphead runners are some of the most collaborative I've ever seen. Jason and Grand talked all the time and compared their fastest segments. And as a result, in late June,

[44:08] Jason took his PB straight from a 2954 to a 29 flat. to a 29 flat. >> Wow. Oh my goodness. I I actually almost got the sub 29. He was actually on world record pace late, but he took a slower

[44:22] route on King Dice and made some mistakes. So Jason had to keep going. He played all through that summer and in August he took the 1.1 record for the first time ever with a 2849. At this point, Grond and Jason were

[44:38] talking with each other constantly, sharing new strats and pointing out optimizations that they had found. Their focus was less on who held the record and more on discovering as much as they possibly could to save time. They found

[44:51] small improvements on Kagny Carnation, Hildabberg, Calamaria, and more. These two were on another level when it came to Cuphead. And as a result of their collaboration, they decimated the world record throughout 2019.

[45:18] [Music] Hey, we did. Hey, we did. 28. We still got it, dude.

[45:31] Oh my god. They just kept going. Every few weeks, one of them got a new improvement. There were a few new minor techniques, but most of this was just Generally, these were very small improvements to the record, but this was

[45:46] nothing compared to the run that Jason got on November 13th, 2019. The run really started on Hilderberg where he got an excellent 103. He then got a solid pattern with a waffle on Baroness, nailed Beyblitch, and got good luck with

[46:01] the clouds on Grim Matchstick. Jason had an unreal 17-second lead over his personal best. This was on pace for a 281X, an enormous world record. After a gold on Dr. Call, Jason faltered a bit, but

[46:15] still maintained a 15-second lead with just one fight to go. The devil. It was all going to come down to the grand decision. Serpent or Spider.

[46:32] so massive that he still broke the record. It was just a 282X instead of a 281X. Grand and Jason both took note of this pace. In their minds, 281X would be the ultimate goal of Cuphead. And as

[46:46] friendly as the rivalry was, they did both want to reach it first. Jason said in the description of his 2829 that he might take a break, but it really didn't last long. only slightly behind the record going

[47:01] into the devil comparing against the run that got the spider. If he got the that got the spider. If he got the serpent right now, this could be 281X.

[47:16] 281X pace of the devil and he lost the 50/50 both times. A few weeks later in December, Jason finally got the serpent, but it was after a very slow phase one where he took damage, missed shots, and bled a lot of time. A new world record,

[47:32] but not quite the 281X. Despite the lackluster end, Jason was very satisfied with this run. He was truly happy with how he'd played outside of a brief moment on the Devil. Even though he didn't have the arbitrary

[47:45] milestone of 281X, did it really matter? This was the exact type of run he was looking for. Jason decided to step back and leave it to Grond, who continued his grind for a few weeks. He used all the strategies that he and Jason had worked

[47:59] together to develop over the past several months. And on January 17th, 2020, it paid off with the greatest world record in Cuphead history. Grond saved big time on Wally Wbles and never looked back. He got great RNG all the

[48:14] way through with very few mistakes. And at the end on the devil, Grond managed the luck he was getting. >> What is this, >> dude? What the freak was that devil, dude? We got that. Oh my god. 2813.

[48:31] dude? We got that. Oh my god. 2813. Oh my god, dude. There it was. Cuphead's ultimate world record. Over the past year, Jason and Grant had pushed each other so much that they'd run away with the category. They were a full minute

[48:43] ahead of anybody else. These guys were able to get times on fights that nobody else could even come close to. And the end result was this record, a 2813 that Grond officially set, but was ultimately deserved by both runners. What they did

[48:59] through the second half of 2019 was remarkable. But it wasn't to last because after this 2813, both runners were done. They'd had their fun and were ready to turn it over to somebody else. But was there anybody else waiting?

[49:15] But was there anybody else waiting? [Music] Up until now, 1.1 speedruns had sort of been the secondary category, while 1.0 runs were considered the main speedrun of Cuphead. However, that gradually

[49:30] changed as more and more runners wanted to play 1.1. It was a perfect balance between having lots of tech while not being completely broken. Throughout 2021 being completely broken. Throughout 2021 and 2022, 1.1 exploded in popularity and

[49:44] eventually overtook 1.0 as the main category on speedrun.com. boosts during this time as people suddenly had a lot more time on their hands, but Cuphead 1.1 is an extreme example. In just a couple years, it went

[50:00] example. In just a couple years, it went from 87 runners to over 300. This could be due to popular games done quick runs, tutorials that Grand made, or the fact that the game just remained culturally relevant. The game also came out on

[50:12] other platforms that didn't allow down patching, which made it harder to play 1.0. But whatever the cause, the end result was undeniable. By 2022, 1.1 was

[50:24] the premier category of Cuphead, which was now a very popular speed game. And was now a very popular speed game. And yet, despite this, GR's 2813 still remained on top more than 30 months after it was set. There were more than

[50:37] 200 new runners, but nobody could beat either Grond or Jason, still holding down the number one and number two spots in late 2022. It was a testament to what these guys accomplished back in 2019. Their run stood the test of time. This

[50:53] unexpected given the frequency of records in Cuphead's early days. But still, there were a lot of active contenders, improving their skills and leaderboard. If one of them could just get that small amount better, they could

[51:08] separate from the pack and make a run at the world record. For many months, nobody could do that. But on August 1st, 2022, someone submitted a 2816 to the leaderboard with one simple line in the description. I'm coming for you,

[51:23] Grandas. This is Clipboard Guy. Clipboard Guy started running the game shortly after GR's record was set in January 2020. He actually learned from the tutorials that GR made. Like many in

[51:38] the community, he gradually improved over the next couple years. By May 2021, he had a sub 30. And by that October, he had a sub 29, a distant third behind Jason and Grond. But he was the best active runner of the game. And he had

[51:53] the best chance of beating 2813. To help, he implemented a couple new strategies, both of which Jason found years earlier. The biggest was on Phantom Express, a risky strategy called the cart push, allowing him to get up

[52:07] close without wasting as much time and saving a couple seconds. These time saves on the margins were super important. When going after a record as good as the 2813, literally every second matters. And on October 28th, 2022, it

[52:22] happened. Clipboard guy got good time saves on the flying levels Hilderberg saves on the flying levels Hilderberg and Calamaria and did this. >> And a goal. [Music]

[52:35] >> No. >> One off an ox. After nearly 3 years of being on top, Gron's 2813 had been beaten. It took a monumental effort from a huge group of runners, and ultimately, Clipboard Guy was the one to do it. In

[52:50] true speedrunning fashion, the community immediately turned their attention to the next milestone. They were now just 10 seconds away from the next barrier, 10 seconds away from the next barrier, the sub 28. Sub 30 came in 2018. Sub 29

[53:04] the sub 28. Sub 30 came in 2018. Sub 29 came in 2019. Now it was 2023 and there was no sub 28. It all comes back to the world record gap. New strategies were found in the last few years, but they were pretty minor. And with GR, Jason,

[53:18] and SBDWolf all stepping away in 2020, it took time for other runners to catch up to their skill level. But now with a minute barrier on the line, the stakes were higher than ever. Of the three former top runners, Jason and SBD Wolf

[53:32] had no interest in returning to the category. But Grond was different. He'd set the first sub 29 four years ago. Returning to set the first sub28 would be pretty epic. He had his work cut out for him if he wanted to be a clipboard

[53:46] guy there. But Grond wanted to go for it. So in 2023, for the first time in it. So in 2023, for the first time in more than 3 years, Grond was back. With such a long time off, he had to relearn the route as well as learn the

[54:00] minor developments that had been made since 2020. To help, Grond used a practice hack of the game with RNG control built by SBDWolf. It allowed him to better practice getting certain RNG on different fights so he was more

[54:13] prepared for any situation the game gave him, especially the rare ones. As he got back into shape, Gron set a few records on individual fights, getting ready to go for the full game record. But during his practice, it was clipboard guy who

[54:28] got the next chance. He pulled ahead of the record in grim matchstick. then continued with a good doctor call. After Wernner Worman in 3, he was officially on his best pace ever. He then entered the very random briney beard. He'll do

[54:42] three attacks in phase one. He can either fire his gun or call in an animal attack, squid, shark, or dogfish. The first attack is always the gun, and the next two are 50/50 likely to be the gun or an animal attack. Gun attacks are

[54:57] generally faster, while dogfish is the worst because you have to wait a long time. Clipboard guy got two guns and then dogfish, so he gave back a little bit of time. But then he got a gold split on King Dice. His best possible

[55:11] split on King Dice. His best possible time going into the devil was a 2759.9. Time for the moment of truth. Serpent or spider?

[55:26] borderline pace, he needed to go for one more thing, the devil freeze. If you deal enough damage during the geobuffer animation to move to the third phase of the fight, the game stops the screen scroll and essentially breaks the devil

[55:39] fight. His animations still play, but he doesn't attack and tears don't drop down. But importantly, stopping the screen scroll early lets the devil's hitbox be closer to the platforms than normal. This means you can land double

[55:53] damage lobber EXs and end the fight faster. However, going for the double freeze is super risky. If you overdamage him and transition past phase 2 before going down the hole, the game soft locks and you can't beat the fight. So on this

[56:09] pace, getting the sub28 required hitting the devil freeze. Despite the risk of soft locking, clipboard guy had to go for it. for it. [Music]

[56:34] >> Yeah, >> it's unfortunate, but cuz I could have gotten double glitch there. And if I did, that probably would have been sub 28, but still really good run. >> It just wasn't quite enough damage. The

[56:47] sub28 would have to wait. But the blueprint for such a run was now in place. Players needed a fast enough run going into the devil. And then they needed the serpent pattern plus the devil freeze. If any of these three

[56:59] things weren't in place, then sub 28 was just about impossible. Clipboard guy and Grond were the only active runners with the potential to do this. It was a race to see who could get everything lined up first.

[57:30] Man, >> that minion totally messed me up.

[57:47] [Music] It's a world record. It's not the sub28, but I got record with spider, man. I'll freaking take it. freaking take it. [Music]

[58:05] [Music] Oh my god.

[58:19] I actually got it. >> There was always something missing. Either the spider pattern or a missed double freeze. And now that Ground had finally gotten both in a run, it just happened to be on a pace that was too

[58:31] slow for sub 28. There seemed to be no way around it. It had to be a good run with a really good level. Well, on August 16th, 2023, Grond got a run going that I would say definitely qualifies as a good pace into the devil.

[59:11] >> As it turns out, the pace was so good that despite an awful pattern, Grond was still able to get it. He'd really gotten just about everything. A good Baroness matchstick, and rumor honey bottoms luck, a great briney beer pattern, plus

[59:27] so much more. And as the celebration began for yet another minute barrier broken, Grond knew he wasn't done. There was a glaring 12-second time loss on the devil. There was potential to do so much better. Both Grond and Clipboard guy had

[59:41] to keep going. Trying to match this pace into the Devil was going to be tough. So Groond looked to really further optimize each individual fight. One thing that helped was DPS improvements. Making sure he was maximizing damage dealt at all

[59:55] times. He worked on managing his cooldown, the time between weapon shots, so that even when he did a caliba swap, he could always ensure a lobber shot would pop out just before the EX. It made only a few frames of difference in

[1:00:09] damage, but it could add up to several seconds across the run if properly managed. Grond also figured something out for one of the toughest fights, Phantom Express. We haven't talked about this fight yet. It's the third to last

[1:00:21] boss in the run just before King Dice and the Devil, and it's notable for not most other fights have. Damage does not carry over between phases. A crucial moment in the fight comes in phase two.

[1:00:34] Here, the conductor comes out of the train, and you want to defeat him before he finishes his attack and goes back in the train, ideally without taking damage. If you can't, you lose at least a couple seconds. It's very difficult to

[1:00:47] one cycle the conductor. you essentially can't miss any shots through the whole sequence. Then on top of that, if the first pumpkin spawns on the left, you're forced to damage boost to get the one cycle, leaving you with just one HP for

[1:01:01] the dangerous phase 4. But in October 2023, Grund found a simple solution to this. He could briefly move the cart over, then quickly back to center. It cost about a third of a second in exchange for not losing the HP and

[1:01:15] having a much smaller chance of dying later in the fight. Cuphead is full of these tiny consistency boosts that in a vacuum don't seem like much, but it's when you add them all up that they really start to shine. Optimizing weapon

[1:01:28] cool down, avoiding one HP of damage, these small improvements helped Grond get more paces into the devil. But as adamant as GR was that the record could go lower, at the end of the day, he was still at the mercy of RNG.

[1:01:48] good run. He gets a good baroness pattern, good luck on rumor honey bottoms, and a gold split on Dr. Call. Then on Phantom Express, he gets the one cycle in phase two. It's all lining up. Grond has a 7-second lead into the

[1:02:02] Grond has a 7-second lead into the devil, but you know what time it is. devil, but you know what time it is. >> Dang it, man.

[1:02:15] there was no serpent. A month later, it was a similar story. A few seconds ahead into the devil with potential for a big record if he could get serpent.

[1:02:33] I'm so sick of this game. In November, Grond had a run with some notable flaws. He got hit at the start of both Grim Matchstick and Calamaria and got worse RNG on Brybeard. For once,

[1:02:46] he was behind into the devil. So, of course, this is the run he finally got Serpent. >> Just kill him. >> Okay, I'll take it, man. >> It just wasn't fair. Of course, Gron was

[1:03:01] happy he broke the record, but he once again didn't have everything line up. It still wasn't quite the run he was looking for. Over the next couple weeks, Gron set a couple more small world records. Just a few months ago, he was

[1:03:14] practically retired from the category. Now, he was unstoppable. He'd set nine world records in a row, taking the time down from 2803 to 2745.

[1:03:26] With this level of domination, it's easy to forget, but Gro wasn't the only record contender. Clipboard guy was still playing. His personal best was still playing. His personal best was 2754 and his goal was a 274X.

[1:03:40] As Grond kept lowering the record, the gap between the two players increased, but Clipboard Guy knew what he was capable of. On November 29th, he got a 658 one, meaning he was ahead of the record by 1 second. It continued in 2.

[1:03:55] Beyitch along with really good RNG on grip matchstick. Entering aisle 3, clipboard guy was 14 seconds ahead of his personal best. He started to falter a bit. He missed two EXs on Rumor Honey Bottoms and slowly bled time over the

[1:04:11] next couple fights, but then Briney Beard just kept shooting over and over. A great pattern, a great fight, and Clipboard Guy was on an unreal pace. He

[1:04:23] tried to stay calm, but he knew this was a ridiculous chance. Phantom Express was going to be a huge moment in this run, one of the hardest fights with the pressure mounting. Phase one was straightforward as he quickly took out

[1:04:36] the ghost. In phase two, he tried to one cycle the conductor, but his DPS wasn't good enough, so he had to settle for the two cycle. Yet, he kept an extra HP into phase 4, and he played beautifully to get the one cycle on the train. It

[1:04:50] wasn't a perfect split, but on this pace, it was more than good enough. He made it to the devil nearly 21 seconds ahead of his personal best. He could get as fast as a 2734 here. Even if he bled 11 seconds on the

[1:05:05] devil, he could still break the world record. Clipboard guy was absolutely feeling the pressure, but it was time to go. He played phase one with the devil, go. He played phase one with the devil, not sure what to expect.

[1:05:23] still had to lead. He had to stay locked in. Time for the devil freeze. He set up the exact right amount of damage with lobber shots. This was precisely enough for the devil freeze to work. But then he secondguessed himself. Clipboard guy

[1:05:40] fired one more shot. Dude, Dude, soft lock. Run over.

[1:05:53] perfectly for 27 and 1/2 minutes, but one extra shot and it all comes crashing down. It's rare to get good enough luck through the run to get a chance at the world record. So, whenever you do get it, the pressure massively ramps up. And

[1:06:07] it's incredibly easy to mess up once you realize you've gotten the luck. And if you do, you have to play over and over waiting for it to show up again. It really was a cruel metag game. Meanwhile, Grond was still playing for a

[1:06:20] 273x, but he too was down on his luck. the Devil, and in general, he was frustrated with RNG. Grond wondered if maybe the grind wasn't worth it anymore. Perhaps he should have stopped after the

[1:06:34] sub28. And now seeing what Clipboard Guy could do, it would be easy to step aside and let him get the record. But instead, just a few days later, Grond made it all a moot point when he set his self-described ultimate run of Cuphead.

[1:07:00] saw this. 2733. Grant had overshot his goal by 6 seconds. This was even faster than the pace clipboard guy was on a few days earlier. Gron started this run with the best Isle 1 ever performed, a ridiculous

[1:07:14] best Isle 1 ever performed, a ridiculous 650, and he just kept it going. He was on his best pace ever for 18 out of the 20 splits in this run. The biggest time saves were on Kagney and Rumor. On the Devil, he got the Serpent and didn't get

[1:07:28] the Devil Freeze, but more importantly, he didn't soft lock. One other little thing that helped Grond, he was really good at star skip.

[1:07:43] After finishing a level, if you press A on the same frame that the stars start to be counted, both stars will appear at once instead of one after another. Runners usually try to mash and hit it since there's no good queue. Grond

[1:07:55] technique to improve the chance that he hit it. Eventually, he got to average 20 presses per second, meaning he'd hit star skip fairly often. This 2733 was a

[1:08:07] huge triumph for Grond. He'd overcome mental agony to get this far, and he'd finished it off with the run of his dreams. While the recent record timeline looks really clean for him, that wasn't the reality of the situation. He'd

[1:08:20] occasions, and his own mental struggles were present the whole way. But he stuck with it. He made it through and ended with a ridiculous world record. Grand was finally done.

[1:08:44] the Cuphead leaderboard. Grandas has a huge lead. Clipboard guy is in second place but not actively running the game. And beyond that, nobody is even close. It's a mix of inactive runners from years ago and modern runners who are

[1:08:58] good but not on world record level. There wasn't much hope in beating Gron's 2733 and so nothing changed through the first half of 2024. Then in July, a runner named Mr. Butter

[1:09:11] became the third member of the sub28 club, getting a time of 2755. However, he didn't pursue a lower time, so he wasn't really a threat to the record. In August, a runner named Quincley got a huge PB of 2740, knocking

[1:09:26] clipboard guy out of second place. But Quincley couldn't beat his time either, as his run was a massive PB for him. Perhaps to take it the rest of the way, Cuphead needed a runner with a bit more experience. Someone like SBD Wolf. That

[1:09:42] month, a local gaming convention near SBDWolf was looking for speedrunners to perform live. He thought Cuphead would be a good run to showcase, so he started practicing for it. SPDWolf hadn't played the category in more than 5 years. His

[1:09:56] personal best of 29-21, once a world record, was now in 19th place. But even though he hadn't been actively playing, he'd still watched Grond and others over the past few years, so you had an idea of the new strategies and techniques. He

[1:10:11] worked on implementing them, and his personal bests started to drop. 2848, 2813, he played live at the convention, but he played live at the convention, but decided he wanted to keep going. 2803

[1:10:26] 2801 2751 what SBDWolf was doing was unbelievable. He hadn't played in years since back in the days when lobber and spread was brand new and really basic. He had learned 5 years of advancements in a

[1:10:41] couple months and he was back to being a world record contender. But he had to act fast. Rond was considered the world's best player and he could come back at any moment to defend his record. If SBDWolf wanted to snag the world

[1:10:55] record, he had to do it right now. He began comparing against the world record in his splits. And it all came down to a run on November 20th, 2024. SPD Wolf fell a bit behind early and he accidentally took damage on Wall-E which

[1:11:10] prevented the fastest kill, but he had a fast bey glitch to pull back even. The world record had a really good rumor honey bottom, so he lost time there. But a good briney pattern made up that time and a gold split on King Dice put him in

[1:11:23] the lead. This was it. Just the devil to go. If SBD Wolf got Spider, then he still be able to get a large personal best. But if he got Serpent followed by

[1:11:35] the Devil Freeze, he'd be able to knock off Grond. Time for the moment of truth.

[1:11:48] A brawl is surely brewing. You're up. [Music]

[1:12:09] Ariel was not going to get record on. That's a freaking good run. Oh my god. >> He got the serpent, but a bad pattern meant getting the devil freeze was impossible. He still beat his run by a mile, but fell just short of the world

[1:12:23] record. Things were looking really tight at the top of the leaderboard, and that put the pressure on Grond. if he wanted to hang on to his record, he had to come back and figure out where he could save time. So, he started practicing again.

[1:12:36] And over the last year, Grandas has embarked on a journey in 1.1 speedruns, working on new strategies and pouring in attempts to lower the world record.

[1:12:52] >> All right, whatever. I'll take it. >> A big change he made was focusing heavily on the spider. He spent hours mapping out all 20 spider patterns and their offsets, figuring out the optimal way to recognize and play each scenario.

[1:13:05] He found ways to make certain spider patterns only a small time loss. Not as good as serpents, but not automatically run over. [Music] >> Let's go, dude. Yes. Actually clutched

[1:13:19] out an insane devil. >> He also heavily grinded individual level records. He'd done this in the past, too. But this time, he took it to a new level. At one point, he managed to hold all 19 world records using the in-game

[1:13:33] timer. [Music] >> Let's go. What? No shot. >> And boy, did Grond work on new strategies. He went for a more

[1:13:46] consistent clip in Forest Follys that allowed him to get more runs going. He implemented a more consistent strategy on Goopy, first used by a runner named Michael. There were many small half a second to a second time saves that added

[1:13:58] second to a second time saves that added up across the run. >> There were also some collaborative efforts. Gond, SBDWolf, and Mr. Butter

[1:14:11] worked together to optimize all 60 patterns on Baroness. Mr. Butter in explaining exactly what to do depending on which mini bosses you got and showing how fast each combination was. Grond used this to his advantage.

[1:14:36] to 2719. He came back in the spring of 2025 and He came back in the spring of 2025 and improved it to 2716. No way. We called it. >> Grant has set the past 16 world records

[1:14:52] in Cuphead 1.1. It's been steady improvements over the past couple years, uninterrupted by any of Cuphead's other talented runners. The last record set by someone other than Grandius was when Clipboard Guy got a 2803.

[1:15:06] Now the record is down to 2716. Is this over? Is this just GR's world record until the end of time? Well, I certainly don't think so. Recently,

[1:15:18] SBDWolf has been making a push for the 1.1 record, and in September, he got a sub 2730, just 11 seconds off the record. And ahead of him are both Clipboard Guy and Quincley, who each got personal best just a few weeks ago.

[1:15:33] That's three runners right on Grandius's tail. He still has the lead for now, but that could change at any moment. and the long reign of Grandius could soon come to an end. This type of activity at the top of the leaderboard hasn't been seen

[1:15:47] in years, but it could be just what Cuphead needs to eventually make it to the next minute barrier. From the early days of Luigi, Soulreth, and TMR, all the way to Grandius's dominance in the modern era, Cuphead's minute barriers

[1:16:01] have always had significance. Each record holder, every top level runner, has all played a part in bringing the record to where it is today. These players and more will help take the speedrun to its next level, and the

[1:16:14] Cuphead 1.1 world record will live on for years to come. Thanks for watching. Thanks again to War Thunder for sponsoring this video. Available for free on mobile, console, and PC. Don't forget about the massive bonus pack for

[1:16:30] new players and those who haven't played in 6 months. Just click my links in the in 6 months. Just click my links in the description or pinned comment below.