Doing a Breath of the Wild speedrun already sounds pretty intense, but Bubzia just completed it blindfolded in under two hours.
It may sound weird to attempt a speedrun while blindfolded, but there's actually an entire community dedicated to doing just that. Bubzia has been a blindfolded speedrunner since 2017 and is currently the moderator of the community. He most recently defeated Breath of the Wild in under two hours without peeking even once.
Bubzia has completed a wide variety of games without being able to see, including Super Mario 64, Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and Pokémon Red. He most recently beat Breath of the Wild (any percent) in 1:48:24.
The way that Bubzia beats video games without seeing is quite impressive on its own. He essentially memorizes the game first and then goes by memory and sound alone.
At the start of the Breath of the Wild run, Bubzia explained that he basically keeps a beat inside of his head that's similarly paced to Super Mario 64. He will do certain inputs as he keeps the tempo, which seems pretty crazy to do for two entire hours while the landscape is changing and enemies are attacking, especially in a game like Breath of the Wild where you have to also be mindful of your resources and collect weapons.
Bubzia explained that you can press the Y button on your Pro Controller to sort your inventory based on the item ID. This way, Bubzia can easily choose an item from his inventory based due to its alphabetical order.
At the Cryonis shrine, Bubzia performed his longest beat count, which was about 150 beats. He does this while doing precise movements to run around the rocky, wintery terrain. At one point he shield surfed off the ledge by taking it out on a sloped surface, which turned Link in the wrong direction.
"There's so much that can go wrong. It's such a dynamic and 3D-ish game," Bubzia said.
When Bubzia reached the final boss, Dark Beast, he explained that he also listens to sound and dialogue prompts to know when to attack enemies. Bubzia said when he hears Zelda say a certain word, he knows to beat count, jump, pull out the glider, and then shoot the Dark Beast to destroy it once and for all. Bubzia also said he turns the language to French since it's spoken the fastest.
"This run time is improvable by quite a lot," Bubzia said.
While he did make some silly mistakes, the speedrunning community was left astonished at his accomplishment. His incredible memorization of an entire open world game as well as using so many sound and rhythm cues has impressed gamers all over the world.
Check out blindfoldedgaming.com to learn more about his accomplishments and the growing community.