Last week we reported on the folks over at Games Done Quick, throwing together fundraising event to raise money for the Houston Food Bank as part of efforts to support the victims of Hurricane Harvey. As reported, the event started at 8pm on Friday evening, during which, supporters and donors could watch via Twitch. Over 50 runners participated in the event running 46 different games, ranging from simply playing classic games quickly, to absurd and difficult challenges.
Incentives offered allowed for donors to bid on run events such as the Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past randomizer race event, in which every treasure and item was placed in a random location, and Andy and ChristosOwen had to try to defeat Ganandorf from a new game as quickly as possible (turns out that’s about two hours).
During these 48 hours (First 35 here, last 15 here) $226,932.53 was raised by 4310 donors, which includes the 10,050.00 raised by the Yetee for their Harvey Relief shirts. With that money the Houston Food Bank will be able to provide 680,797 meals for the hungry in the greater Houston area.
The Houston Food Bank is the largest food bank in America, distributing to a network of 600 hunger relief charities. It also has a perfect score and ranking on Charity Navigator, letting you know that those donations are really going to support the people effected by the hurricane.
It is amazing that the GDQ team was able to pull off such a successful event in just a few days, and while they had to postpone their next event, Awesome Games Done Quick, supporting cancer research, they still plan to hold it in January 2018.