Digging Deeper With... Carlibraun!

How did you come up with your username? Carlibraun is a screenname that Ive had since I went online for the first time. Back in the early 2010s when ICQ and Skype were the big messaging apps, my family decided to make accounts. Since I was rather young and had no idea what this ment I went with suggestions from my family. My sister came up with the name of Carlibraun. Obviously a play on Charlie Brown from the Peanuts, which my family found cute, it fit my IRL name and using the german word for Brown added an extra twist to it. It was good enough for me so I used it for everything else from that point onward. The name grew on me a lot and Im happy I kept it as mine consistently for so long. Kinda allows for a sort of “branding” for your online presence. And It reminds me of my Sister :)

What's an interesting fact about you? I am studying physic, although that has been quite a trainwreck for a while now… :))))))) I do have a beginner Interest in philosophy (specifically this podcast) and I like to learn about ideas and different ways of thinking in general. Uhh… I am Italian, but grew up all my life in Germany, specifically a part of Bavaria that doesn’t want to be considerd part of it. I like to use that to annoy people by cycling through “I am italina/german/bavarian/not really bavarian” :^)

How did you first get into Spelunky? Im not 100% sure anymore but Im confident it was a Summoning Salt video back in late 2017. I knew of Speedrunning before but never found the idea of doing exact inputs over and over again interesting. The Videos made me want to try it anyway. So I decided to look over my Steam Library of games I owned. Stuff like GTA5 were options but my PC wasn’t that great. After some more scrolling I found Spelunky HD. I had played it before but only beat Olmec the hard way, and I didn’t even care for Hell. That was back in 2014 when I saw it in a Letspaly of a German YouTuber.
I was already a big fan of Roguelikes and especially The binding of Isaac at that time (which I knew would be a horrible Speedrun game without doing any research… funny how I ended up still running it for the Pentathlons :D). I did some quick research on Lunky Speedruns and decided that a game with short run times, that is not a “static” Run, had everything for Speedrunning build in and was not super massive/competitive anymore would be neat to try out as my first Speedgame. I did some runs on my own and quickly discovered the Top runners streaming on Twitch. Spef was the first person I talked to In chat. Watching him, Kinni, Ix and others and just trying to copy what they are doing made me improve rather quick. I also started to try out to stream my grind sessions, mostly micless, and joined the Discord. People started to show up in my chat to talk and Especially Ixs words saying that I was doing well and had potential made me stick around and grind for my first submission. I wanted it to be respectable: a sub 3:30 low% (or a no% completion but Ix talked me out of it). I go that run eventually and that’s how I got roped into the Community.

What run of yours are you most proud of? I think that goes to the Max no% completion, rather unsurprisingly. That was the run I worked the hardest and longest for. I like no%, as to me it embodies the concept perfect play at all the times the best. Getting a good no% time was one of my first long term goals, even before Max Low, Low hell or filling out my main page. Being one of the few people who cared about no% as a Speedcategory also felt like I had to get it. To fill out the ranking, cause if not me then who. Even more so after a lot of other people who were going for it lost interest post the “max nah%” completion. When I finally did get a run that was allowed on the ranking I did shed some Tears :’^) Im also quite proud of my first Max Low Hell, the No% WR, my Max Low No Gold Hell, and, to a degree, the ASO WR.

What is your favorite part of the community? When I joined the HD community I really liked the small size and maturity of it. Everyone was respectful, easy to talk to and kept stuff fun and not too serious, drama was a rarity and/or small and interpersonal. The average age of the active members was def. higher than my Age, which contributed to that feeling I think. That changed a lot with S2 unsurprisingly, but overall the Spelunky community is definitely still one of the best videogame communities I know of. Ive made some good friendships over the years even if some didn’t hold as well as I wished…
Having a nice place to talk about a shared interest in ones favorite videogame, without toxicity while still being somewhat competitive and helping out with information where they can, is just really nice in general!

What is your favorite game?
I don’t think this is much of a surprise but obviously Spelunky HD. It’s the Singleplayergame Ive spent the most Time in by a massive margin. Other than that I do like all of the Pentathlon games a lot, nowadays Nuclear throne the most of the other 4. Its probably my second favorite game overall. It is quite literally the perfect score game: no hard cap on the potential Score in any given seed, nor does it actually go on for infinity. I also played a lot of Team Fortress 2 and Minecraft Minigames back in the day. Minecraft is probably the only game that would trump my Spelunky playtime.

What is your favorite TV show/movie? This is the only other “Whats your favorite X” question that is easy to answer, since Ive only ever watched one TV show all the way through. That would be Breaking Bad. Absolute top tier quality show. I also liked what I saw of Better Call Saul and shows like House M.D.. Oh and Scrubs and Once Piece when I was younger!
Movie wise… hard to pick. I do like the Humor of the Monty Python Movies a lot. I also enjoy the Movies from the Coen brothers, Tarantino and Christopher Nolan a lot. Big Lebowski, No country for old men, Interstellar, Inception, Pulp Fiction, hell throw Gran Torino in there why not. Don’t know if id call any of those my “favorite”. Its not as clear as with BB.

Who is your favorite musical artist? I don’t have one. But my music taste is very varied and broad. Some artists of various different Styles include Mika, Gheist, Ratatat, Worakls, French 79, Frank Sinatra, Amy Winehouse, Sewerslvt, Lemmino, Peter Fox, ENV, Caravan Palace, Käptn Peng, Obylx/Odjbox, Sim Gretina, Animal Collective … I could go on for a while…

What is your favorite food? I don’t know, theres too many things to pick from.. I like japanese cuisine a lot and italian is just overall the best european food you can get T B H. Anything from a grill is always a good pick too!

Describe your personality in three words. Caring, Egotistical, Sexicon B)
I am not going to elaborate further.

If you could have any superpower, what would it be and why? Honestly I do not know what Id do with some supernatural power. Once you pick one you’d always feel like “but the infinite possibilities of all the other ones :(“. Teleportation or Freezing time sounds amazing, just so you can do more things. Eternal youth so you can do anything in life without the curse of not being able to die is also neat I think. But honestly I don’t know. So just 10 quintillion Dollars for me please. All while staying anonymous. With that I can live my life how I want, can do tons of good things for my loved ones, me and in general and since its a secret I don’t get to deal with all the social alienation of being ultra rich.

Do you have anything you’d like to say to the community?
gg people, great hell runs. lol
What? Kiri already made that joke? Back in 2018?!? :(