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Scott Buchanan,[1][2][3] known online as Pannenkoek2012, pannenkoek2012, pannenkoek or pannen (/ˈpænɪnkoʊək/ PAN-in-koh-ək),[a] is a YouTube personality who specializes in highly in-depth and technical Super Mario 64 videos. He is best known for his "A-button challenge" videos, in which he attempts to play Super Mario 64 while pressing the A-button as few times as possible. The A-button is the "jump" button, and a normal playthrough of Super Mario 64 can be expected to take thousands of A-presses.[1]
| pannenkoek2012 | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Personal information | |||||||
| Born | Scott Buchanan c. 1994[1] | ||||||
| YouTube information | |||||||
| Channels | |||||||
| Years active | 2010–present | ||||||
| Genre(s) | Gaming, Super Mario 64 analyses | ||||||
| Subscribers | 281 thousand+ (pannenkoek2012) 126 thousand+ (UncommentatedPannen) | ||||||
| Total views | 71.06 million+ (pannenkoek2012) 34.03 million+ (UncommentatedPannen) | ||||||
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Last updated: September 8, 2024 | |||||||
In 2014, he received media attention for collecting a particular coin which, due to a bug, had been thought to be uncollectable.[5] In 2015, he offered a US$1,000 bounty to anyone who could recreate a rare but useful Super Mario 64 glitch called an "upwarp" that was accidentally performed by DOTA_TeaBag.[6] As of 2024, the bounty has not been claimed. One theory is that the upwarp was caused by a one-off bit flip caused by a cosmic ray, although this is not universally agreed upon.[7][8]
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As a kid, Super Mario 64 was the first video game pannenkoek2012 ever played.[5] In 2013, while still in college, he started uploading Super Mario 64 videos to YouTube.[1] These videos showcased his attempts to complete all of Super Mario 64 without pressing the A button (the jump button, Mario's primary ability), making use of environmental hazards and various glitches instead.[2] These alternative strategies are often only possible with tool assistance.
Pannenkoek has produced many in-depth YouTube videos deconstructing the mechanics of Super Mario 64, which have been described as esoteric "programming lessons".[9] In one video, pannenkoek explains how a player can manipulate the random number generator of Super Mario 64 by kicking up dust in a certain way. Despite the highly arcane nature of these videos, videos on pannenkoek's main channel regularly get hundreds of thousands of views.[9]
He also runs a second channel, UncommentatedPannen, where he uploads raw footage without commentary. He does not upload videos to his main channel if they fail to meet his standards of quality.[10]
A-button challenge
The bulk of pannenkoek2012's videos are about the "A button challenge" (ABC), a self-imposed challenge whose ultimate goal is to complete Super Mario 64 while pressing the A button as little as possible.[1] In regular gameplay, the A-button makes Mario jump; this is one of the fundamental game mechanics of Super Mario 64, a platformer whose gameplay has been described as "all about jumping".[11][12] It is possible to jump without the A-button in very rare, but often useless circumstances.[13] In one video, pannenkoek shows that it is possible to collect the star in the level "Mario Wings to the Sky" without pressing the A button at all. To do this, pannenkoek uses glitches that enable him to "clone" a large amount of Goombas to form a ladder. This took two years of planning, and the video took 55 hours to make.[14]
"SM64 - Watch for Rolling Rocks - 0.5x A Presses (Commentated) [OUTDATED]"
On January 12, 2016, pannenkoek uploaded a commentated video in which he explains how to complete the level "Watch for Rolling Rocks" in "half an A-press".[15] His strategy originally took 14.8 hours from start to finish,[16] most of which were spent using a glitch to accelerate Mario to the high speeds necessary for "parallel universe" movement.[17][18][failed verification] This was reduced to 5.4 hours in 2017.[16] The video became popular and was widely spoofed online for its incredibly obtuse and technical content, especially pannenkoek's "half A-press" notation (meaning that he began the level with the A button already held down) and his use of parallel universes (a collision glitch caused by integer overflow).[17][19][better source needed]
On October 1, 2023, pannenkoek uploaded an updated video of Watch for Rolling Rocks in 0 A presses[20][21][22] using a technique named "Mario's Platform Adventure" documented by Thadortin only a week prior.[23] This strategy also saved time over the previous Watch for Rolling Rocks ABC run in 1:49:16.77 by Marbler from 10 days earlier.[24] In August 2013, when pannenkoek began working on the A button challenge, over 200 A-presses were required to complete Super Mario 64.[25][user-generated source] As of October 2023, a 120-star playthrough of Super Mario 64 can be completed in as few as 13 A-presses.[26][27][non-primary source needed] A 70-star ABC (70ABC) or 98-star max% run can be completed in 0 A presses, but only on the Wii Virtual Console versions of the game, due to a version-exclusive floating-point rounding error in which certain moving platforms in Bowser in the Fire Sea rise slowly over time, which can be used to save an A press.[28] A 70ABC run has also been completed without tool assistance by a runner named Marbler.[29]
Impossible coins
In June 2014, pannenkoek collected what was known as "the impossible coin", an item hidden in the level "Tiny-Huge Island", which was originally considered impossible to reach. The coin was discovered in 2002 by a GameFAQs message board user named Josiah.[30] Likely due to an oversight by the game's developers, the coin was placed underneath the ground. Pannenkoek managed to collect it using tool assistance by jumping and kicking on a single frame while moving out of water. He noted that it should be possible to collect the coin without tool assistance, but he added that doing so would be very difficult and require a lot of practice.[5]
In the Super Mario 64 level "Bowser in the Sky", pannenkoek discovered a misplaced Goomba located at the bottom of the level, which he dubbed the "mystery Goomba". Since Goombas drop a coin once killed, and the enemy currently seems to be impossible to kill, he called the mystery Goomba's coin the "new" impossible coin.[31] In October 2016, pannenkoek discovered another impossible coin in "Tiny-Huge Island".[32]
Other videos
In September 2013, Twitch streamer DOTA_TeaBag encountered a glitch in the Super Mario 64 level "Tick Tock Clock" in which Mario suddenly teleports upwards. In 2015, this "upwarp" caught pannenkoek2012's attention, as replicating the glitch could allow players to skip large sections of the game or reduce the required number of A-presses. Pannenkoek offered a US$1,000 prize to anyone who could recreate the upwarp glitch without modifying the game.[33][34]
The bounty has not been claimed. However, the glitch's effect can be replicated by modifying the game and flipping a single bit of memory. Since no legitimate method for flipping this bit has been found, it has been speculated that, in DOTA_TeaBag's case, a stray cosmic ray caused the bit to change. This would mean that it is very unlikely for the glitch to occur again naturally.[better source needed][35]
Pannenkoek started working on a video detailing the workings of Super Mario 64's geometry in summer 2016. He eventually finished this video in May 2017, releasing it under the title "Walls, Floors, & Ceilings". The video details how Mario's movement is measured in the game―it varies depending on whether Mario is located on the ground, in the air, or in water―and how the character interacts with the hitboxes of objects along the way. Pannenkoek noted that he considers the information in this video "extremely important", as he has been using this information to help him execute or dismiss strategies for years. Gamasutra described this video as a "passionate delve into the most granular details of level design".[36][37] Since then, pannenkoek has released two more "Walls, Floors, & Ceilings" videos.
In March 2019, pannenkoek uploaded a number of "no joystick allowed" videos in which he completes levels in Super Mario 64 without using the controller's analog stick, which is ordinarily how the player moves Mario.[38]
"SM64's Invisible Walls Explained Once and for All"
On April 13, 2024, pannenkoek uploaded a video titled "SM64's Invisible Walls Explained Once and for All" in which he explains the many causes and locations of invisible wall-like phenomena in Super Mario 64's stages. With a runtime of just over three hours and forty-five minutes, it is the longest video on the pannenkoek2012 YouTube channel, and as of December 8, 2024, has received 6.6 million views making it the most viewed video on the channel.[39][40]
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- A pannenkoek is a Dutch pancake, and is pronounced [ˈpɑnə(ŋ)ˌkuk] . Thus, a Dutch pronunciation of the full username would be [ˈpɑnə(ŋ)ˌkuk tʋeːˈdœyzənˈtʋaːl(ə)f] . However, pannenkoek2012 uses an Anglicized spelling pronunciation, /ˈpænɪnkoʊək tuː ˈθaʊzənd ˈtwɛlv/ PAN-in-koh-ək too THOW-zənd TWELV, to refer to himself.[4]
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