Fallout 3 Beaten in 15 Minutes for World Record
By Kyle Sledge 26 December 2015
One extremely dedicated Fallout 3 fan plays through Bethesda’s post-apocalyptic RPG to beat it in just under 15 minutes, setting a brand new world record.
The speedrunner, YouTuber, and ardent Fallout 3 player known as Rydou has officially played through Bethesda’s open world title at a blazingly fast speed to beat Petite_Miku’s original world record completion of exactly 15 minutes. As it happens, Rydou’s speedy quest through the game’s main storyline of Fallout 3 clocks in at 14:54.71, knocking roughly 6 whole seconds off the former champ’s time.
Speedrun records in Fallout 3 have been tackled many times before, and in order to make it through the title as fast as humanly possible, players have to utilize well-timed tricks, swiftly skip over heaps of dialogue, and exploit in-game glitches. On top of the aforementioned stratagems, perhaps the most important one Rydou used is the quicksaving and reloading technique, which allowed him to occasionally walk through solid objects such as buildings and other structures for brief periods.
Much like Kungkobra’s recent New Vegas speedrun world record of 20 minutes, Rydou also took advantage of an exploit in Fallout 3 that gives a 60 percent boost in walking and running speed after intentionally crippling oneself upon leaving Vault 101 at the beginning of the game and quickloading right before doing so. The scene in question is definitely impressive, for attempting the method has the potential to freeze up the game if not done at exactly the right moment, so it’s obvious that Rydou spent a lot of time practicing.
As seen above, the speedrun is pretty admirable, even if Rydou had its difficulty set at very easy. However, the point of such a feat isn’t to experience the story normally by encountering combat and incurring damage. After all, instead of maintaining the typically friendly relationship with the character Jonas Palmer, Rydou shoots the NPC to force him to move to a more advantageous position for the playthrough.
Now that his name is attached to Fallout 3‘s speedrun world record, Rydou isn’t content to rest on his laurels. As a matter of fact, the speedrunner is looking to employ strategies that will best his own time with another go-round. The player explains his plans in the clip’s YouTube description, saying, “This time can still be improved, even if my raven rock was godly, my vault 87 was pretty awful, so I would like to get a sub 14:50”.
Without question, Fallout 3 is one of the top games of the last generation on PS3 and Xbox 360, and Rydou’s bid to revisit the title as much as possible in order to perfect his speedrun is certainly a testament to that notion. Nevertheless, playing through the game in such a rote, repetitive manner has to get boring after a while, so perhaps he should play as a baby to complete the game as fast as he can just to spice things up a bit.
Fallout 3 is currently available for PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360.
Source: Rydou – YouTube (via Kotaku)
