im my opinion, runners can be divided into 5 classes:
1.gods(no need to explain): markus, peter, joe. any questions? no? good.
2.great players(no explaination either): stubbz(this one getting very close to dogs), martin, timo, ilkka... etc.
3.good players(players above the average skill, and sometimes make great demos occasionally): amrik, pretty balls, carl, daniel hansson, denn, robert...
4.human players(players with average skill, we are just human so we cant help making mistakes for all time, and we can never make a great demo): me, ken, basil, and most guys at sda who have a few records and dont show up very often.
5.defected players(too handicapped to make even demos of average level): morfans, tim, and a few others, there are too few of them so i can't name.

hmm defected eh? thats pretty bloody rude, not everyone likes to run how everybody else does so when you compare them all based on stuff like that well then some ppl will look like shit but your view is biased.

It seems your view is mainly based around bunnying and the ability to get "MUST DOWNLOAD" demos, I would ask you to change our "status" from "defected" to "casual players" or something similar.

Another thought, if we are so defected, I would ask you to stand by your word. If we can't even make demos of an average level then it wouldn't be too hard for a human like yourself to beat ALL of Morfy and my demos. I will give you 1 week to start this task of removing the crap demos, and every week from then on I expect another improvement.

If you fail this task then I expect a full apology to myself and Richard.

One last thing, I don't think you should have posted that .. or if you did then you should have worded the last bit differently

hehe makes it sound like they are 2 different ppl :) but you have some good point basil, we play the same game for different reasons, play different maps and make different demos.

As regard to my own records, I can say that I'm working harder on getting my movement and aim right, than I'm working on improving my bunnies. I know I might be able to beat some really nasty id easy/nightmare runs if my bunnies improved, but I'm not really that interrested, I like to do 100%'s because it involves ALOT more than just being able to run fast, you know to maneouvre very well, you need to have a steady aim and a low sensitivity, you need to plan your routes carefully, come up with new tricks that save time etc etc., and most important of all, you need to be persistant and just keep trying and trying until you get that "perfect" run (which can take months in the most extreme cases!)

To name a few people that has inspired me:
- Yonatan Donner (for his reign in the early days, and his smoothness)
- Nolan Pflug (for being persistant and keeping SDA alive all these years, and for being an id 100% nut before I came along :-)
- Stefan Schwoon (I've always like his casual style, and the fact that he is a genius also adds another point in my little book, hehe)
- Matthias Belz (for filling all the nasty holes in the tables)
- Ilkka Kurkela (the name says it all really! Mr. Kurkela has been a major influence on most speedrunners, excluding the ones that retired before he entered the scene...)
- Justin Fleck (for the sheer amount of tablefillers! and he's actually not a bad player...)
- Peter Horvath (the Devil himself, need I say more?!)
- Jozsef Szalontai (same as Ilkka, the name says it all, and he seems to be unstopable!)
- Markus Taipale (the master of smoothness in my opinion, and he really took speedrunning to a new level that was previously unheard of!)
- Valeriy Burmistrov (no other speedrunner has optimized so many records!)

...that was more than a few people, but I couldn't really mention one without mentioning all the others, right? ;-) And I didn't even mention Will Marsh, Attila Csernyik, Sergi Cami, Timo Nieminen, Daniel Lindberg, Daniel Magnusson, Ingmar Poerner, Thomas Bergendorff, Martin Selinus, Fabian Kollakowski etc etc etc etc.....

Ok, I've written enough now, my views on speedrunning are open for debate ;-)

Neither Joe or Markus would be able to do NH demos as crazy as Thomas does *wink* :-)

And get off that "god" and "defected" bullshit, it's ridiculous.

In South-East-Asia we used to say "Ain't all of us just humans". Or perhaps that was on SpeedCon when Ilkka was puking into Marlo's garden. But whatever.

This post by openGL makes me feel pity, not only for him, but for me, because, honestly, even though I'd like to think I never acted as retarded-like as him, I *kinda* used to think like him, pretty damn much.

Through times, I've read some logs, and I can't truly understand how people like Nolan could take SO much crap from me before finally getting pissed off. This post makes me understand a bit better why a few people on the SDA/QDQ staff felt I was (or AM, don't know) a complete idiot, a f*cked up and stupid inmature piece of sh*t. And it really hurts to realize they were, *cough*, right... :/

Back when I started speeding I guess I was just too bloody excited. I can't blame my age, I must've been 15 or so.. but, believe it or not, I've always been fairly mature for my age (and that's being honest). But with SDA.. it was different. The demos were so impressive, I just _had_ to 'stalk' the "gods" (as openGL would say); I was also so bloody thirsty for updates, that I'd bother the staff via ICQ just about 24/7. :/

Just as I told Graffz on IRC moments ago.. I was never too adicted to Quake.. Well, yes, in a way, I certainly was! But I can honestly say I never liked playing as much as I liked watching kickass demos! And that's what made me so annoying, coz I just wanted more and more demos.. Hell, I've made some demos myself, but, in case you haven't noticed, I don't make demos as often nowdays.. I can say I got kinda tired of speeding.. nowdays I just play QW, and on my machine (still no adsl or cable, damnit!).. And yeah, I do talk to some of the greats in QW, but I haven't pissed anyone off... yet. :P (Just kidding).

Anyways, just wanted to express my thoughts.. And to those of you who I've bothered in the past: Sorry, wish I could make it up. :/

And, btw, openGL: I am really THAT low on your scale? Heh.. I like to think I'm a bit better than you think, then. :)

Agree with Jozsef, also.. Style is VERY important. Smoothness in the movement.. Demos that show complete control of your moves every single milisecond.. I kinda think like Thomas S. in that way, for what I've read.

And since everyone gave opinions... Here's mine: Those classifications are idiotic, but if I were to classify my favourite (favourite!!, not who I think are the best) players, I'd say (in no order): Daniel Lindberg, Timo Nieminen, Sebastian Olsson (e4m5_059 is now slow, but still so damned cool) and Markus Taipale, although he didn't have that wide movement. Denn has it, but some of his moves are a bit exaggerated for my taste.

ken: your post is so long that i started to fall sleepy and really can't get your viewpoint. -_-b

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[AK]Naga$akeY 2003
http://www.PlanetQuake.com/illMind/