"Awesome Games Done Quick 2023" wrapped up its week-long series of weird and wonderful speedruns on Sunday. This first charity event of the year featured lightning-fast playthroughs of games like "Dark Souls 2," "Neon White," and even the unreleased SNES title "Steven Seagal beat-em-up (opens in new tab)." What I love about Games Done Quick is that fundraising is at the forefront, and Awesome Games Done Quick 2023 managed to raise a staggering $2,642,493 for the Prevent Cancer Foundation.

Games Done Quick announced the fundraising total on Twitter, writing, "Thank you to everyone who made this marathon possible and for your amazing generosity and support."

Since the first event 13 years ago, the speedrun charity has raised $43 million That's more than $2 million, which is an amazing amount of money, and I always love it when the speedrunning community comes together to break world records and participate in speedruns that are a little different for a great cause. Some of the records broken this year include the six-person Powerwash Simulator run (opens in new tab) and of course the aforementioned Steven Seagal Games world record. (opens in new tab)

Awesome Games Done Quick 2023 was also founder Mike Uyama's last event as managing director. He is now stepping down from his role to "take a break and a vacation" before "diving headfirst" into his next job (opens in new tab). He is succeeded by Matt Markle, who had been serving as GDQ's Operations Director. His first event as managing director will be Frost Fatales, a women-only speedrunning event that will take place from February 26 to March 4 (opens in new tab). This will be followed by Summer Games Done Quick, which will be held from May 28 to June 4.