Extra Life
Extra Life is an American charity benefiting children's hospitals across the continental United States. Their flagship charity event, "Game Day", began in 2008 and has occurred annually since then. Starting in 2013 Dracokon has hosted a 24-hour fundraising marathon for Extra Life in an effort to raise money for Driscoll Children's Hospital in Corpus Christi, Texas. Dracokon says he chose this hospital because when his brother was very young they saved his life. To date, Dracokon and the Gatorbox community have raised over $2,000 for the hospital which Dracokon has matched personally with additional donations of games, toys, and stuffed animals.
Dracokon hosted his 2013 and 2014 marathons from the Extra Life event headquarters in San Antonio, Texas and was a featured performer both years; in 2013 his speedrun of Cosmic Spacehead was featured on the official event livestream and in 2014 he was a participant in some of Extra Life's live skits and comedy content. Extra Life eventually moved their headquarters elsewhere so in 2015 and 2016 Dracokon hosted the marathon from the regular Gatorbox set. A marathon was planned but ultimately not held in 2017 due to Hurricane Harvey destroying the studio where the show was taped. The annual marathon resumed in 2018 with a record-setting turnout both in funds raised ($644) and marathon length (~30 hours).
Gatorbox's Extra Life marathons are styled after popular charity fundraisers such as Games Done Quick and feature 24 hours of video game speedruns with periodic breaks for meals. Starting in 2015 Dracokon began incorporating "challenge" games in an effort to raise more money; for every $50 raised a random game and accompanying challenge would be drawn out of a box and Dracokon would then have 15 minutes to complete it. These challenges were written by Dracokon himself, Roastmaster, Tuna Boat Tony, ElectricSheepCity, and other members of the community through an open submission thread on the Gatorbox message boards. Some games are also scheduled with arbitrary challenges already in mind. In order to keep both M.C. Kids and Kirby's Adventure from going stale for being featured every year Dracokon played through the entirety of Kirby with an NES flight stick in 2016 and introduced the "Cheeseburger Challenge" to M.C. Kids that same year: for every death Dracokon would stop the game, but not the timer, and eat one McDonald's cheeseburger. He infamously ended up eating all six of the cheeseburgers he bought for the speedrun and now the "Cheeseburger Challenge" is a popular in-joke with the M.C. Kids speedrunning community. Both the flight stick and cheeseburger challenges returned in 2018 and have become a staple of the event.
Occasionally, new world records are set in some of the games featured; in 2013 and 2014 new records were set for Super Off Road (as of 2015 Dracokon no longer holds the record).
Below is a table showing every game that has been featured in a Gatorbox Extra Life marathon.
| 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arista's Ring | |||||||
| Asmik-kun Land | |||||||
| Attack of the Labyrinth |
|||||||
| Bible Buffet | |||||||
| Blast Corps | |||||||
| Boggle Plus | ♦ | ||||||
| Bubble Ghost | ♦ | ||||||
| Chiki Chiki Boys | |||||||
| Codename: Kids Next Door |
♦ | ||||||
| Cool Spot | |||||||
| Cosmic Spacehead | |||||||
| CrazyCars 3D | ♦ | ||||||
| Dian Shi Ma Li | ♦ | ||||||
| Donkey Kong Country | |||||||
| Duck Tales 2 | |||||||
| Duke Nukem Forever | |||||||
| Dynamite Headdy | |||||||
| Extreme Forklifting 2 | ♦ | ||||||
| Extreme Sports w/ Berenstain Bears |
♦ | ||||||
| Forgotten Ones, The | |||||||
| Goof Troop | |||||||
| Hacker, The | |||||||
| Ice Road Truckers | ♦ | ♦ | |||||
| Island Xtreme Stunts | ♦ | ||||||
| Jeopardy!: Teen Tournament |
♦ | ||||||
| Kirby Super Star | |||||||
| Kirby's Adventure | |||||||
| Krazy Kreatures | ♦ | ||||||
| M.C. Kids | |||||||
| Maniac Mansion | ♦ | ||||||
| MANOS: The Hands of Fate |
|||||||
| McDonald's Treasure Land Adventure |
|||||||
| Mega Man 4 | ♦ | ||||||
| MegaRace | |||||||
| Mini Putt | ♦ | ||||||
| Monster Truck Madness 64 | |||||||
| Monster Truck Rally | ♦ | ||||||
| NanoQuest | |||||||
| *NSYNC: Get to the Show | ♦ | ||||||
| Pac-Man Championship Edition |
|||||||
| Pokémon Blue | ♦ | ||||||
| Puggsy | |||||||
| River Raid | ♦ | ||||||
| Robot Wars: Extreme Destruction |
♦ | ||||||
| Rugrats: Search for Reptar |
|||||||
| Shovel Knight | |||||||
| Sonic the Hedgehog | |||||||
| Sonic the Hedgehog 2 | ♦ | ||||||
| Sonic 3 & Knuckles | |||||||
| Spyro the Dragon | |||||||
| Star Fox | |||||||
| Star Fox 64 | |||||||
| Super Mario Bros. | ♦ | ||||||
| Super Mario Bros. 3 | |||||||
| Super Mario Maker | |||||||
| Super Off Road | |||||||
| Taboo: The Sixth Sense |
♦ | ||||||
| Tail 'Gator | |||||||
| Twisted Metal III | |||||||
| Twisted Metal 4 | |||||||
| Tyrian 2000 | |||||||
| Vectorman | |||||||
| Wacky Races | |||||||
| Where's Waldo? | ♦ | ||||||
| Wonderful End of the World, The |
* 2017's Extra Life marathon was cancelled due to Hurricane Harvey.
** Games noted with a diamond (♦) signify titles that were featured as a "challenge" and not a full speedrun.