Desert Bus for Hope 9
Desert Bus for Hope 9 began on November 14th, 2015 at 10:00 AM PST, and wrapped up on November 21 at 2:25 AM, having raised a record $677 158.00. Post run donations brought the final total to $683 720.00. The event was held in the Alacrity Foundation space in Victoria, otherwise known as the Lunar Module Mk. 2. Date: November 14, 2015 I
Drivers
All driving shifts (except the last one) were 8 hours long. Times below are in 24-hour time format, set to Pacific Standard Time (aka Moonbase Standard time).
The driver's name was "Daniel" throughout the run, in memory of Daniel Davis.
Driver | Shift Start (PST) | Total Money Raised During Shift | Avg. Donations Per Minute | Points Earned | Bus Crashes | Bus Stops |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
No Driver | Pre-Desert Bus | $6,500.00 raised beforehand | ---- | ---- | ---- | ---- |
James | November 14 @ 10:00 | $39,254.63 raised during shift | $81.78 per minute | 0 points | 0 crashes | 0 stops |
Ian | November 14 @ 18:00 | $40,943.13 raised during shift | $85.30 per minute | 1 point | 2 crashes | 3 stops |
Andy | November 15 @ 02:00 | $17,758.10 raised during shift | $37.00 per minute | 0 points | 4 crashes | 0 stops |
Kate Watt | November 15 @ 10:00 | $20,801.82 raised during shift | $44.34 per minute | 0 points | 3 crashes | 0 stops |
Jer | November 15 @ 18:00 | $30,258.00 raised during shift | $63.04 per minute | 0 points | 1 crash | 2 stops |
Beej | November 16 @ 02:00 | $16,368.37 raised during shift | $34.10 per minute | 1 point | 0 crashes | 1 stop |
Ashton | November 16 @ 10:00 | $18,311.55 raised during shift | $38.15 per minute | 1 point | 1 crash | 0 stops |
Tara | November 16 @ 18:00 | $30,766.38 raised during shift | $64.10 per minute | 0 points | 0 crashes | 0 stops |
Matt | November 17 @ 02:00 | $15,461.92 raised during shift | $32.21 per minute | 1 point | 1 crash | 3 stops |
Ashley | November 17 @ 10:00 | $17,240.00 raised during shift | $35.92 per minute | 0 points | 0 crashes | 0 stops |
Fugi | November 17 @ 18:00 | $41,156.27 raised during shift | $85.74 per minute | 1 point | 3 crashes | 4 stops |
Cam | November 18 @ 02:00 | $24,866.27 raised during shift | $51.80 per minute | 1 point | 0 crashes | 3 stops |
Tally | November 18 @ 10:00 | $52,283.92 raised during shift | $108.92 per minute | 1 point | 0 crashes | 0 stops |
Liz | November 18 @ 18:00 | $21,138.18 raised during shift | $44.04 per minute | 0 points | 5 crashes | 0 stops |
Alex | November 19 @ 02:00 | $17,097.37 raised during shift | $35.62 per minute | 0 points | 0 crashes | 0 stops |
Kara | November 19 @ 10:00 | $20,146.12 raised during shift | $41.97 per minute | 1 point | 0 crashes | 0 stops |
Graham | November 19 @ 18:00 | $31,700.95 raised during shift | $66.04 per minute | 1 point | 1 crash | 1 stop |
Johnny | November 20 @ 02:00 | $16,608.16 raised during shift | $34.60 per minute | 1 point | 1 crash | 0 stops |
Jamie | November 20 @ 10:00 | $62,388.15 raised during shift | $129.98 per minute | 0 points | 1 crash | 0 stops |
Paul (7 hours) | November 20 @ 18:00 | $132,745.23 raised during shift | $316.06 per minute | 1 point | 0 crashes | 5 stops |
No Driver | Post-Desert Bus | $391 raised afterwards | ---- | ---- | ---- | ---- |
Totals (WHILE BUSSING) | 159 Hours | $676,767.00 raised | $70.94 per minute | 11 points (High: 2) | 23 crashes | 22 stops |
The Desert Bus for Hope 9 Team
The Crew
- Alex Steacy - Event Organizer
- Ash Vickers - Event Manager
- Ashley Turner - Shipping Coordinator
- Ashton Cummings - IT Coordinator
- Brendan "Beej" Dery - Event Manager
- Graham Stark - Graphic Designer
- Ian Horner - Overlay Engineer
- James Turner - Project Manager
- Jeremy Petter - Event Organizer
- Johnny Blakeborough - Broadcast Coordinator
- Kara McLachlan - Communications Coordinator
- Kathleen De Vere - Volunteer Coordinator
- Liz Smith - Special Guest Coordinator
- Matt Wiggins - Special Guest Coordinator
- Paul Saunders - Event Organizer
- Serge Yager - Event Manager & Nomordinator
- Tally Heilke - Prizes & Sponsorship Coordinator
- Tara Theoharis - Media Relations
Volunteers
Drivers
Broadcast Team
- Ben Ulmer - Broadcast Tech
- Coriander Dickinson - Broadcast Tech & Overlay Engineer
- Jason Chinnock - Broadcast Tech
- John Bates - Broadcast Tech
- Louis Moga - Broadcast Tech & App Developer
- Sarah Mendiola - Broadcast Tech
- Thomas Ourada - Broadcast Tech
Communications Team
- Alex Ashman - Social Media
- Jordan Hopkins - Blog
- Kate Stark - Social Media
- Kelly Voorhaar - Social Media & Comms Assistant
- Mike Whitaker - Blog
- Tim Lindvall - Blog
Infrastructure & Software
- Anubis - Web Tech
- Chris "Fugiman" Gamble - Web Tech
Photographer
Public Relations
- Dan Wu - PR Assistant
Shipping Team
Site Volunteers
- Andre Van Slyke
- D. Max Loy
- Graham Fielding
- Helen Cowart
- Matt Griffiths
- Paxton Grill
- Peter Fulker
- Rek Feldman
Guests
Call-ins
- Scheduled Calls
Guest / Website | Best Known for | Call-in time (all times 24hr PST) | $9 Nemesis | Video |
---|---|---|---|---|
Ashly Burch | Writer, Voice Actress, Content Producer | November 15th @ 11:00 (Sunday) | Batman | [1] |
Paul and Storm | Musicians | November 15 @ 17:00 (Sunday) | The ParKing / The Batman | [2] |
LeVar Burton | Actor, Director, Producer, & Speaker | November 16 @ 08:00 (Monday) | Green Lantern | [3] |
Michael Stevens | YouTube Personality (VSauce) | November 16 @ 11:30 (Monday) | "Someone who judged you based on your cleanliness." | [4] |
Mikey Neumann | Chief Creative Champion of Gearbox Software, Writer, Voice Actor, Content Producer | November 16 @ 18:30 (Monday) | Hawkeye | [5] [6] |
Jennifer Hale | Actress, Voice Actress | November 16 @ 21:30 (Monday) | Donald Trump | [7] |
Kris Straub | Writer, Web Cartoonist, Podcaster | November 17 @ 11:00 (Tuesday) | Iron Man | [8] |
Daniel Saunders | Podcaster, Writer, Vision Scientist, Brother of Awesome | November 18 @ 9:00 (Wednesday) | — | [9] |
Jimmy Wong | Actor, Musician, YouTube Personality, Podcaster | November 18 @ 11:00 (Wednesday) | Someone like Aquaman | [10] |
Mike & Tifa Robles | Former Community Manager for WotC / Former Brand Manager for MtG | November 18 @ 18:30 (Wednesday) | Tifa: Kanye West / Mike: [points at Tifa] | [11] |
The Doubleclicks | Musicians, Songwriters | November 19 @ 13:30 (Thursday) | Aubrey: The Flash / Angela: Superman | [12] |
Aaron Forsythe | Director of R&D for Magic: The Gathering | November 19 @ 18:30 (Thursday) | Squirrel Girl | [13] |
Phil Plait | Astronomer, Public Speaker, Science Evangelizer, & Author | November 20 @ 14:00 (Friday) | Cognitive Bias Man | [14] |
- Unscheduled Calls
Guest / Website | Best Known for | Call-in time (all times 24hr PST) | $9 Nemesis | Video |
---|---|---|---|---|
Penn Jillette | Magician, Desert Bus Co-Creator | November 15 @ 12:54 (Sunday) | — | [15] |
Max Temkin and Friends] | Designer, Game Designer | November 20 @ 19:22 (Friday) | "maybe a True Neutral character?" | [16] |
Penn (and Teller) | Magician, Desert Bus Co-Creator | November 20 @ 20:30 (Friday) | — | [17] |
Visitors
Guest / Website | Best Known for | Visit time (all times 24hr PST) | Video |
---|---|---|---|
Kathleen De Vere | LRR member | November 15th @ 14:49 (Sunday) | [18] |
Steven Dengler | Entrepreneur, Investor, and Geek | November 17th @ 17:00 (Tuesday) | |
Harrison Krix | Propmaker & Graphic Designer | November 17th @ 17:00 (Tuesday) | |
Ken "Value Added" Steacy | Comic Book Writer/Artist | November 17th @ 18:00 (Tuesday) | |
Zahra Premji | Reporter, CTV News | November 18th @ 11:43 & 17:50 (Wednesday) | [19] [20] |
Molly Lewis | Songwriter, Ukulele Player | November 19th @ 16:00 (Thursday) | [21] [22] |
Milestones
(Times given in PST)
- Year 1 total exceeded ($22,805) - Saturday, November 14, 12:13
- $2.5m lifetime reached ($64,554) - Saturday, November 14, 22:13
- Year 2 total exceeded ($70,424) - Sunday, November 15, 1:21
- Year 3 total exceeded ($140,450) - Sunday, November 15, 20:46
- Year 4 total exceeded ($208,250) - Monday, November 16, 19:39
- $2.75m lifetime reached ($314,554) - Wednesday, November 18, 8:55
- Year 5 total exceeded ($383,125) - Wednesday, November 18, 22:22
- Year 6 total exceeded ($443,630) - Thursday, November 19, 19:27
- $500,000 reached ($500,000) - Friday, November 20, 12:08
- Year 7 total exceeded ($523,520) - Friday, November 20, 15:58
- $3.0m lifetime reached ($564,554) - Friday, November 20, 19:09
- Year 8 total exceeded ($643,243) - Friday, November 20, 20:20
Video links
Playlist from the Video Strike Team
Quotables
Notable Memes, Happenings, and Changes
See also the Desert Bus Lexicon
- The four time-based teams—named last year as Dawn Guard (6 AM-noon), Alpha Flight (noon-6 PM), Night Watch (6 PM-midnight), and Zeta Shift (midnight-6 AM)—now have official pennants, hung in the back of the room. (YouTube)
- "Alpha Flight" was greeted with a "CAW!" by Liz, on its first mention.
- In spite of Graham's protestation, this immediately became canon.
- The [Random Dance Party] Button, the auction starter, and The Device were combined into one unit. Naturally, this worked perfectly, and never led to the wrong function being triggered. Or not.
- The Device now talks, GlaDoS-like, announcing each effect.
- The Device has been named DAISy.
- The end of a Device effect now sometimes comes with a MST3K overlay heralding Normal View.
- Andrew loaded The Button with song clips this year. They are no longer necessarily 60 seconds long.
- Engineering played Cookie Clicker for three days as part of a challenge, before cheating to get all the achievements. Toward the end, it was calling upon about 7 GB of virtual memory, 2 GB of physical memory, and 400% of the processor power. (YouTube)
- Creepy Doll has been joined by Bill's stunt double, Frank Socrates. (YouTube)
- And, later, by the stuffed dog PresidentBarackObamaAllOneWord. (YouTube)
- Achievements apparently are no longer a thing.
- There are new couches and an office chair named "Mega," "Cynics," and ".com," after their sponsor.
- Andrew decisively won a long-running DickButt war with Kate, surprising her with a giant plush version. (YouTube)
- This year's question asked of all guests is "Nine Dollar Nemesis": if you were a supervillain, which superhero would be your nemesis?
- DAISy's "Lefty" effect appeared to be broken, effectively leading to an automatic crash. (Such a crash in Ashley's shift, when this was confirmed, was not counted against her.)
- Later in the shift, it was found that Lefty did work, but that maybe you had to push down on the D-pad really hard.
- Max Temkin of Cards Against Humanity ran a surprise donation drive for three sets of everything they'd ever issued, and matched all donations. The matching payment of $27,371 immediately vaulted us over the DB8 total.
- The final stretch run of Desert Bus was coined "Omega Shift" on the final night.
And his name is...
- And his name is John Cena!
- And his name is Iron Man!
- And his name is Bob Ross!
- And his name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.
- And his name is This Is CNN.
- And his name is Spartacus!
- And his name is The Law!
- And his name is "it's me, Luigi!"
- And his name is Captain Jack Sparrow!
- And his name is Commander Shepard! (male and female versions)
- And his name is Slim Shady!
- And his name is Steven Universe!
- And his name is Bill Nye, the Science Guy!
- And his name is Mario?
- And his name is Reading Rainbow!
- And his name is 2-4-6-0-1!
- And his name is Sailor Moon!
- And his name is Zoolander?
- And his name is Prince Ali!
- And his name is Liquid Snake!
- And his name is Hal Johnson and Joanne McLeod!
- And his name is John Baptist Emanuel Zorg!
- And his name is Metal Gear!
- But with nothing to consider they forget my name (ame, ame, ame)
- And his name is Winnie the Pooh!
- And his name is the Crystal Gems!
- And his name is Psycho Mantis!
- And his name is Wario!
- And his name is Obi-Wan Kenobi!
- And his name is Hal Johnson and Joanne McLeod!
- And his name is Lupin the Third!
- And his name is Blast Hardcheese!
- And his name is Captain Jean Luc Picard!
- And his name is The Lord! [Pulp Fiction]
Craft-Along Participants
Go to the Desert Bus crafters page to see a full list of which crafter donated what!
Aasta | Adamantine Accessories | Alexander Rodgers | Amanda EM Haynes | Amy Meister | Beamie's Buddies | Beth Larsson | Brendan Tang |
Brian Dickeson | C.M. Galdre | Carolyn G | Chemistring | Courtney Stone | Danielle Pepin | Darian Glover | Dee Staab |
DialMforMara | Eric Johnson | Erin Nix | Featherweight | Flailsquared | Fogoe | GeekyKraftyKel | Gregory McIntyre |
Haldaraumo | HollyberryArt | Ie Dineen | Ingrid Nordbø | J Barr | Jack Miller | Jessica Schwab | Joel Hustak |
Kanitaria | Kate "LadySephiroth" S. | Katherine Bagdasian | Katie Tasky | Katrina Keller | Kayla Riddle | Kelsey McKay | Kim Swanner |
Lareina Chan | Lovely Patches Cloth Creations | Madame Ximon | Marisha Alexander | Matty Makes | Melissa Franks | Michael Magill | Michael W. Delaney |
Michelle Bilokrely | Mirrored Line Props | Miryenne | Monique Gairns | MsSweetSatisfaction | Nicole Gustafsson | OccamsRazor | Octochan |
Orin Drake | PunkRockZoologist | Punzie | Rocky Mountain Cookies | Sarah | Sarah Brownjohn | Sarah Overall | Schala-Kitty |
Scott, Just Scott | Sean Robert | Shandi Wagner | Az Martin | Steven Lauterwasser | Tania Richter | Tara Heilke | Tina Bongorno |
Vaso | briedoof | halfaringcircus | qlipoth |
Sponsors
Organizing Partners
Prize Sponsors
- Wizards of The Coast
- FanGamer
- Penny Arcade
- MegaCynics
- Valve
- Geeky Hostess
- Ken Steacy Publishing
- GSTQ Costume Replicas
- Big Punch Studios
- League of Geeks
- Tin Man Games
- Lady Planeswalkers Society
- Volpin Props
- Samurai Punk
- Doctor Geof
- Cookie Brigade
- NoScope
- Wyrmwood
- Inkworks / Unwritten RPG
- Diamond Dust Dreams
- Crossy Road
- Wander
- BlinkByte
- Legacy Books Press
- GamesRadar
- Brendan Baker
- Chris & Catherine
- Andrew Ferguson
- Samuel Henson
- Colin Lamphier
- Mikey Neumann
- SwiftAusterity
- Matt & Allison Whilden
Official Desert Bus Artist
Event Sponsors
Technical Sponsors
General links
Event logs
Gifs and photos
Poster
Apps
Buy official merchandise!
- Desert Bus 9 shirt (second run; will ship in January)
- Desert Bus 9 poster (pre-order)
- Desert Bus 8 photo book
- Bundle of DB9 poster, DB8 book, and DB9 shift pins
Unofficial merchandise (for the children!)
- Desert Bucket for Hope (original art)
Media coverage
- The most boring video game in the world returns for Desert Bus for Hope fundraiser, Camosun College Nexus, Nov. 4
- All Aboard the Desert Bus, The Escapist, Nov. 11
- Why these comedians can't stop playing the worst game in history, CNET, Nov. 13
- Watch people play 'Desert Bus' for days in the name of charity, Engadget, Nov. 14
- Desert Bus for Hope 9 underway – watch people suffer for charity, VG24/7, Nov. 16
- Players take on the Desert Bus challenge for charity, PC Gamer, Nov. 16
- How Desert Bus For Hope Turns The World’s Most Boring Video Game Into An Act Of Charity, Tech Times, Nov. 16
- The Desert Bus Live Stream Is Fundraising for Charity and Offering Awesome Gear, The Mary Sue, Nov. 17
- Watch ‘Desert Bus For Hope’ Play a Bad Game For Charity, Once Again, Wired, Nov. 17
- Gamers Raise Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars a Year by Playing the Worst Video Game Ever Made Smithsonian.Com, Nov. 18
- Victorians play 'world's most boring game' for 7 days straight, CTV News Vancouver Island, Nov. 18
- Big Picture: Boring bus game travels worldwide, Times Colonist, Nov. 20
- Victoria-based fundraiser Desert Bus for Hope raises over $675,000 for children in hospitals, Global News, Nov. 21
- Gamers raise $677,000 for charity in boring-video-game marathon, Times Colonist, Nov. 25
- Desert Bus for Snorsh (parody)
- Desert Bus de l'Espoir (French marathon, inspired by DBfH but not affiliated with it, runs Nov. 20-22)
Desert Bus for Hope |
1 (2007) – 2 (2008) – 3 (2009) – 4 (2010) – 5 (2011) – 6 (2012) – 7 (2013) – 8 (2014) – 9 (2015) – 10 (2016) |
(11) 2017 – (12) 2018 — (13) 2019 — (14) 2020 — (15) 2021 — (16) 2022 — (17) 2023 — (18) 2024 |
Desert Bus Lexicon |