An old turn of phrase suggests one “stop to smell the roses”.


Whoever said this never stopped to consider the possibility of one having taken a shit in the flower bed before you got there, and now you’re profusely gagging after taking a huge whiff of floral asshole

Today, on our continuing replay of GoldenEye 64, after the atmospherically driven level “Statue”, we bite directly into a fat fucking flank steak of gameplay with the following level, Archives, which is a complete 180 in terms of structuralism, as where as Statue was all about tone and mood, Archives is a straight up blitzkrieg of frenetic fury.

Rewatching this part of the film, I totally forgot just how “full ham” Bond goes with an AK on so many poor Russian bastards; it’s quite visceral, but as it goes in Hollywood, you can basically drop a 100 dudes on screen in a crazy shoot out, and as long as you don’t see a drop of blood, it is all goochie in the hoochie, dog.

Hearkening back to my reference point of golden standard adaptations, this part of the movie is quite “screenplayie”, as everything that is happening makes enough sense where you don’t question some of the mechanics of it, and equipped with the rule of cool in tow, you kind of just go with the flow and enjoy the show. Developer Rare (obviously) has to worry even less about the real world logic of how things play out, with GoldenEye 64 being a video game and all that jazz, and is therefore appropriately video gamey in execution. Ironically, the game ends up being more grounded, both literally and figuratively, than its counterpart in the film, which is a rarity, I find, amongst these kinds of endeavoring contrasts, as games usually go full on stupid, as movies are usually bound to stricter laws of what’s show on screen, both in relation to the laws of physics, and in a moralistic sort of manner, as well.

As a fan of speedrunning, I usually find myself with a need for speed and smack dab in the middle of the fast lane by the time I’m replaying any title I like, as the act (or art, as it were) of speedrunning just seems ingrained into my blood. Any game worth its salt in mechanics is always a pleasure to speedrun, and GoldenEye 64 definitely fits the bill. Even though speedrunning itself, usually an extra-cirrcular activity in most games, you’ll still get the occasional title that has some kind of time based challenges attached to completion awards, whether it be ingame unlocks, achievements, trophies etc. Though they have rereleased GoldenEye to accommodate for achievements, even back in the day, Rare had attached unlockable cheat codes paired on every level, so each mission had plenty of incentive to go back and attempt to perfect your runs for some game altering fun.

Two of what I remember to be the “hardest” cheats to unlock, at least, two which I remember having to play to death, in endless repetition, as both have extremely unforgiving margins of error rate attached to them, meaning one little mistake and it’s game over, is Invincibility and Invisibility, unlocked on Facility and Archives, respectively. Both are on 00 Agent, so you’ve got to go full blown hard mode to even have a shot, and the completion times are insane, with Facility needing 2:05, and Archives needing 1:20. Absolutely brutal….on one hand, though totally and utterly addictive on the other, for any speed obsessed or 100% enthusiasts that inhabit the gaming real, these kind of tasks end up being a great good challenge and a total delight in terms of where endgame content is concerned.

Even on this playthrough, which as a reminder, is on Agent, thus negating me from unlocking the cheats, I still replayed Archives to death, as I still wanted to see how fast I could do it. I was able to shave it down to 30 seconds, with what ended up being a next to ideal run, but it took me a good half hour of false starts before I got there. So much RNG (random number generator) can completely fuck up both gamers just normally, but also speedrunners in devastating manners, as one can even have all of the techniques and pathing down to a t, but if RNG kicks in, and a random element doesn’t go a certain way, the whole run is ruined beyond your control. A merciless but devilishly charming way to separate the few and the proud who have the stomach to keep their eye on the prize, and tolerate the endless amount of practice it takes to get everything just right.

All of this makes strange sense, as in the film, the scene flies fast and heavy, and just from moment one in the game, when the hyper energetically tense music kicks in, it almost feels as if the level is spurring you to get the fuck out as fast as possible. The first time through the level, you might feel like you’re in some kind of demented virtual reality version of an M.C. Escher painting, as the level seems as if some kind of warped paradox that turns around on itself, as you get lost in a seemingly endless topsy turvy building that sort of just blurs together. The hectic nature of the whole thing is well done, even when one is drowning in minutia, which is a perfectly apt way of describing mastering the art of speedrunning itself, as it is never the big moves that get you, but the 1000 tiny movements that you take for granted when not bustling to the finish line that take you by surprise.

While the main crux of the mission does involve an escort mission in the form of saving Natalya, who of course gets immediately captured as soon as the level is over (which is totally glazed over in the game in a jarring fashion, but the details of her capture in the film were reminiscent of why Runway was so dramatically changed: the math ain’t mathing, and that shit on screen just ain’t going to translate to the GoldenEye 64 engine,), as long as you realize the troops disregard her after she is saved, the player can just zoom all the way to the moon immediately following this exchange, and Natalya is just kind of “there”, or “there enough” to count, even when you say, end the level by jumping out of a window. If you do engage in gun fights, and don’t accidentally give her a friendly fire makeover with a clip of magnum bullets, she will run and hide in the attic, which…if you’re doing a speedrun, you’re largely not worried about firing your gun anyways, as outside of extremely needed moments, any second you waste doing anything but moving, is another second docked off your final time, so aggressive pacifism is the key on the way to be.

Quite like the rapid nature of this part of the film, and the vibaliciousness that pairs graciously with the Archives level, I similarly was tight on time, and had to write this article in the blink of an eye, due to scheduling issues, so I’m not entirely sure I elaborated as thoroughly as I intended to, but I think I did the conceit of the Archives justice enough, to feel good enough about a job well done.

And good enough is good enough for me.
~Pashford