A Super Mario 64 streamer has become the first recorded person in the world to finish the game without pushing the A button, a challenge that has stood unbeaten for roughly 24 years.

If you're a big Super Mario 64 fan, chances are you'll have come across a few strange challenges. The "A Button Challenge" is a prime example, and while it has a rather messy origin in the Super Mario 64 community, it's generally perceived to have started in the early 2000s, tasking players with finishing the entire game by pressing the A button as little as possible. Given that the A button is the jump button, you can already see how difficult this is.

Over the literal decades since this challenge's inception, the number of button presses has gradually been whittled down - documented thoroughly by Ukikipedia - gradually going from hundreds of button presses, to dozens, to single digit numbers. However, over 24 years on from its original conception, the A Button Challenge has been utterly bested, as a Super Maro 64 streamer has accomplished what many thought was actually impossible.

Our history-making Twitch streamer is known as Marbler, who recently posted a clip of their achievement (which you can view above) on their Twitch channel earlier this week. Even without the knowledge that this perfect run was over two decades in the making, you can see just how rough it was to pull off when you realize it took Marbler almost 87 hours to finally complete.

And while this is also Marbler's achievement, and nobody can take that away from them, it also wouldn't be possible with the other Mario fans out there that have worked for over two decades to figure out exactly how to earn each required Star without pressing A. If anything, this is a culmination of over two decades of a community's collective efforts, and that definitely deserves celebration if nothing else.



Posted: Jun 01, 2024 9:44 pm
Related Forum: Gaming Discussion

Source: https://www.thegamer.com/super-mario-64-just-beaten-without-pressing-a-button/