On Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I always knew sub 2 hours was possible, but It'd be very difficult to achieve. It became allot easier thanks to new Skips I found. After achieving sub 2 hours, I didn't know if sub 1:50:00 was possible or not, but I managed to get it big time, I got 1:45:53! which shocked me, and it felt amazing. I've felt so accomplished. I THINK Sub 1:40:00 is possible, and I definitely want to get down to sub 1:30:00, but that's for sure impossible unless new Skips are found.
On my game, Pirate101, I remember thinking the boundary for Fin% was just under 13 minutes, but shocked myself by getting a 12:31. Isn't directly related, but then another person by the name of ImPoop began running the game as well, I thought the boundary was just under 12 minutes after he started to take the record down close to that range, but another shock happened when he got an 11:26. Then that record stood for a year before it was beaten about 3 and a half weeks ago, so I guess that record was good.
In a game called Grey-Box Testing, the speedrun is just under 1 minute long. Most of it is just walking, so optimized movement is really the only way to save time. The world record used to be a high 56 second time by @Mimoz , and a 55 second time was considered impossible. One day, A runner who stopped running the game decided to improve their 58 second pb, and got a low 56 second time. Suddenly, 55 was kinda close to happening. Later that same day, they got a 55.310, which was a 1 second improvement in an already very optimized game. They did a strat at the ending which was so hard that nobody else has managed to replicate it. Still to this day, nobody has gotten a legitimate time within a second of his run. https://www.speedrun.com/gbt/run/yv6nrk4z
In a game called Demon Castle, the world record stood at 2:31, and there was no timesave left in the run (only 2 frames could be saved by doing a frame perfect jump in the final level, and better movement could save a few fractions of a second). A 2:30 seemed impossible until a new route was found that saved 2 seconds. After @xatrixx , and myself both got low 2:29s, we thought a 2:28 was maybe possible, but then a faster quick kill for the first boss was found, and a new way to save 1 cycle in a room with moving platforms was found. xatrixx got a 2:27 this way. If another newly found quick kill was used in the third level, a 2:26 might be possible with perfect play, but nobody is willing to grind for it. https://www.speedrun.com/demon_castle/run/mr93jd8m
In a game called Mobility!, a sub 7 minute time was considered impossible. A time of 7:14 was estimated to be the theoretical limit. However, when one of the retired runners returned, they discovered a plethora of new strategies and the community started to be more active than ever before. Now, with more motivation to grind and lots of easy timesave, the time was taken to a 6:53 by me. Now, the world record is a 6:44, and a sub 6:40 is imminent. https://www.speedrun.com/mobility/run/zpll44gm
Never had that as a runner, but as a viewer I remember when darbian got the first 4:56 in SMB1 and his own run comment was like "I'm done, this is as good as it'll ever get." And I felt like that too. A run with the same time as that one is now 24th place :D It's such a wild game to follow. The WR seems to hop between kosmic and random people who just happened to get the run of their life sometime.