Calithon 2018 Promotes Charity and Speedrunning on the West Coast
By Alex McCumbers ·
The West Coast speedrun and charity event Calithon 2018 has begun! Tons of runners showing their best, all for a great cause.
The more and more we delve into the speedrunning world, the more events we end up finding! On the west coast this week in sunny San Francisco, California speedrunners will be converging to raise money for Water and Direct Relief through their passion and skills at Calithon 2018. After a name change from Californithon to a more palpable Calithon, the event returns to continue striving to be one of the biggest speedrun events on the West Coast, for the West Coast.
Beginning in 2015, the event started like most things like this. A bunch of people wanted to get together, play games quickly, and support a good cause. The video above is a little old, but a pretty good representation on what Calithon is.
The event will begin on April 12th at 5pm PST (8pm EST) and continue into Sunday evening on the 15th. All of the action can be found on the Calithon Twitch channel. A full schedule for the games being played is also available.
Things will be kicking off with xwater running Super Mario Odyssey Any% and who is a regular Nintendo (mostly) streamer and a co-host of the Warp World Podcast with Jaku and GrandPOObear. Those guys will also be at the event with Jaku running Yo! Noid and GrandPOObear running Super Mario Bros 3 All Forts. Speaking of the Mario community, a few of them are coming together to do a Blind Relay Race in Super Mario Maker. For those that haven’t seen this sort of race, it is often one of the most exciting parts of a live streamed event like this.
All in all, those into speedrunning should definitely check out Calithon as there is sure to be a ton of energy this year. It’s amazing just how much reach these speedrun events have. With platforms like Twitch, events like Calithon can easily be coordinated in any community all over the world with the potential to reach thousands of people. There’s something special happening for those that get to attend physically in that space though, visiting online friends in person, making new ones, and all of the silly things outside or around the the venue makes them unique.