Awesome Games Done Quick 2020 ran over the past week, and ended with a record-breaking $3.13 million raised for charity.
The $3,133,062.78 total raised from approximately 54,134 donors are both all-time best figures. It’s more than $700,000 above what AGDQ 2019 raised, a nearly 30 percent increase. The 24-hour speed running marathon, which is also celebrating its 10th anniversary, received pledges coming in from more than 80 different countries. The 2020 event was attended by over 2,750 people at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel in Orlando, while Twitch viewership peaked at more than 236,000 concurrents, GDQ organizers reported.
GDQ focuses on raising funds through viewer donations and merchandise, and has worked with a large number of charity organizations including Doctors Without Borders and the Prevent Cancer Foundation to help fight disease and problems all over the world. The runners themselves are a diverse lot, though they tend to come from North America, as Europe has its own organized speedrunning community and charity events.
Awesome Games Done Quick 2021 has already been announced for the week of Jan. 3-10, 2021, with location TBA. Summer Games Done Quick 2020 is on for June 21st-28th in Bloomington, Minnesota. In all, 134 games were run over AGDQ 2020, with the highest amount of themed or gimmick runs seen so far in the event’s history. The full list of runs, with video-on-demand links, can be found on the r/speedrun subreddit. Alternatively, you can check out Games Done Quick’s official YouTube channel, where videos are still being cut and uploaded due to a delay. We greatly appreciate the efforts of all the runners and event organizers involved, and we hope to see plenty more awesome speedruns and massive charity donations in the future.