VIDEO

World Record Progression: Half-Life 2 bit.ly/hl2wr

Part of a series by YouTube user Summoning Salt, this history of Half-Life2 speedruns charts the evolutions in skips and glitches exploited by Freemans over the years. Early strategies see NPCs chivvied along during cutscenes by dropping barrels on their heads to teleport them, while later runs rely on prop-flying and perfect execution to whittle down completion time. But it’s the insight into the community that’s most fun: tales of fierce competition, speedrunner habits of arbitrary goal-setting, the agony of near-misses and the ecstasy of finally besting the numbers.