Speedrunning is an amazing thing, isn’t it? Gamers take it upon themselves to add an extra layer of challenge to what may be an already difficult experience. When it comes to Minecraft, beating the Ender Dragon and activating the ‘cutscene’ is what is considered ‘beating the game.’
Minecraft speedrunners have made a community around doing this as fast as possible, and then creating leaderboards to track progress. Today’s blog will be going over all of the different types of speedrunning Minecraft has to offer along with the current world record holders. Let’s get started.
Terminology
To understand what the different categories are, you need a reference for what each of these awesome vocab words mean. Go get some note cards, because we gotta memorize these by tomorrow’s test!
Seeds – You’ve most likely heard of these. Basically, every Minecraft world has a ‘seed’ tied to it, which is a code that can be used to make the world generate in a specific way. When a similar seed is used, it will generate the exact same world every time.
Set Seed – Set Seed refers to when a speedrun uses a seed that has already been used. This is done to have prior knowledge on the world generation for the sake of obtaining resources and completing the required objectives easier. This genre usually has much faster completion times than Random Seed, as the runner will go over the same world multiple times, chopping seconds off their time by planning and understanding the world beforehand. It is, however, much less popular as it can be seen as monotonous and overdone, with very little variety in seeds used.
Random Seed – Random Seed refers to when a speedrun uses a randomly generated seed. This is done to ensure that the player has no prior knowledge of the world generation, so it will be their first time experiencing this world. Every run in this category must use a new seed each run. This genre of runs is significantly more popular than Set Seed as it is heavily based on quick thinking, adaptability, and game sense.
Versions – Minecraft has multiple versions that correspond with updates Mojang makes to the game. Each update brings new content that may make it easier or harder to speedrun the game, so Minecraft Speedrunning has been split into three separate categories. Pre version 1.9, Versions 1.9-1.15, and Versions 1.16+. This will basically determine what strategy the speedrunner uses to complete the game quicker.
Speedrunning Categories
For Minecraft, there are six main categories when it comes to speedrunning that the official speedrunning community acknowledges, five of which have tracked progress and time recordings. I will list them in order of least to most popular, but this could change depending on any changes made to the game along with future updates.
Set Seed Pre 1.9: This includes all runs that are done in any version pre 1.9 on a set seed. As a set seed category, this isn’t that popular.
Set Seed 1.9-1.15: This includes all runs that are done in any version from 1.9 to 1.15 on a set seed. As a set seed category, this isn’t that popular but since it includes many more versions with varying strategies, it is slightly more watched than Pre 1.9.
Set Seed 1.16+: This includes all runs that are done in 1.16 (and soon 1.17) on a set seed. Contrary to the other set seed categories, this is actually fairly popular because it is the most recent version of the game. Note that this category is not tracked by speedrun.com.
Random Seed Pre 1.9: This includes all runs that are done in any version pre 1.9 on a random seed. As a random seed category, this is usually more popular than any of the set seed categories. However, it is the least popular of the random seed categories.
Random Seed 1.9-1.15: This includes all runs that are done in any version from 1.9 to 1.15 on a random seed. Before 1.16, this was arguably the most popular category as it included lots of the most recent versions in the game while also being based on a random seed. Due to some runners being preferable to skill-based mechanics rather than luck, they have chosen to stick with this category, as it doesn’t include Bartering, a system added in 1.16 which is used to reduce time on runs at the cost of being chance-based.
Random Seed 1.16+: This includes all runs that are done in 1.16 (and soon 1.17) on a random seed. This is arguably the most popular category at the moment, being both a random seed category and also the most recent version of Minecraft. It is heavily based on luck, with the primary strategy being Bartering, a mechanic that involves trading with Piglins.
Conclusion
Minecraft Speedrunning is one of the most, if not the most popular speedrun game of all time. Although this is mainly due to its Random Seed categories being heavily based on adaptability and luck rather than actual mechanical skill, it still speaks to the idea that Minecraft is an amazing game with many different communities that surround it for all types of reasons. With that being said, I hope you learned something new, and have a great day!
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