John McAllister is challenging a 25-year-old Joust world record. It’s going on now, as I write this. I’m following the live video feed sporadically.

I found out about John’s attempt yesterday morning, had a look, and I thought, “Wow, he’s really good.” At that point, he’d been going for 22 hours.

Then I worked all day, came back to check out the game in the evening, and he was still going. Now I’ve had a night’s sleep, and he’s still going. He’ll need to go for about 60 hours total to beat the 107 million points. When he takes a break, he just walks away from the controls and burns off a few of the hundreds of extra guys that he’s built up.

Joust is a fast game at the higher levels, and the gameplay is more or less constant. It requires an almost cyborgian level of endurance, but there he is, working with precision at a frenetic pace. He always knows exactly where to be, whether facing the ‘unbeatable?’ pterodactyls, or taking on the blue knights at the top of the screen, predicting their unpredictable fluttery arcs.

So all right, yes, it is the same thing over and over again. And yes, it goes for a long time. Even so, I find the marathon to be strangely compelling viewing. Kind of like when I was a kid in Cheney, probably hanging out at Zip’s, watching someone who was really good. Video games are time machines.

UPDATE: He’s done it. All hail Sir John. His record will live in the annals of history. Ages hence, bards will sing of his jousting exploits, and maidens will swoon.

Or it’ll be YouTubed, which is close to immortality.