Trading records The story of Billy Mitchell's Donkey Kong record didn't end with King of Kong. In fact, after the events of the movie, he broke Steve Wiebe's record, then had his own record broken again. In the years since the documentary, the high score was passed multiple times by several players.
With all these new players surpassing their records, it's tempting to wonder why anyone would bother focusing on Mitchell at all. Until he was removed from the the leader boards, Twin Galaxies had him ranked at #14, right behind Wiebe https://psellion.org/online-gambling-ads/. At the same time, Mitchell's 25-year record still stands as a monumental achievement, and his status as the subject of an award-winning film raised his profile enough to keep people interested. All of this served to cast some doubts on the truth behind the record-setting tape he was able to produce after Steve Wiebe beat him the first time. "I explained to him he could lose his life, but don't lose the tape." The investigation The challenge to Mitchell's record came from an unlikely place. It was Jeremy Young, the moderator of the online Donkey Kong forum, who analyzed the tape and determined that Mitchell's record-setting performance wasn't actually done on a Donkey Kong arcade machine. Instead, Young alleged that Mitchell used an emulator, and Twin Galaxies agreed. The evidence cited by Young begins with the fact that while Mitchell has racked up plenty of impressive scores, he's never managed to break 1,000,000 points while playing in public with witnesses. Everyone has an off day or two, so that's easy enough to dismiss, but it got Young investigating the infamous tape of Mitchell's 1,062,800-point performance - the one that made Mitchell the first person on record to break the million-point mark. From there, the evidence began to stack up. It comes down to some pretty technical stuff, but one of the most compelling pieces of evidence involves a frame-by-frame comparison of how the first level of the game is rendered on the monitor. The slight differences between the true arcade version and its emulated equivalent led Young to conclude that Mitchell used an emulator called MAME, or Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator, for his record-setting score. Arcade vs. Emulator So here's the big question: if the actual code of the game is the same across platforms, then why does it matter if he played on an emulator? For starters, emulated games are going to be easier to manipulate, down to adjusting how the game adds points to your score. Even if the game's code remains unaltered, however, running it on different hardware can create slight differences in how the game is played. Regardless of the platform, emulation is almost never 100% perfect. When you're dealing with something like world-record arcade scores, where split-second timing and minor variations in pattern recognition can make all the difference, then the slight changes from emulation can make for an entirely different set of patterns to exploit. But that doesn't necessarily make them easier. Even Jeremy Young admitted as much, telling Polygon: "to say that [emulation players'] accomplishments on emulator are somehow less than that of their arcade competitors is ridiculous." If Mitchell's score was recorded on an emulator and not arcade hardware, then it was presented under false pretenses, in violation of the rules. In this case, it's the lie that matters more than the actual score. "I'm not God. I don't have all the answers. So I have to be careful how I share my opinions." Struck from the record After launching the initial investigation in February, Twin Galaxies announced on April 12th that they had determined Mitchell's Donkey Kong score was fraudulent, banned him from future competition, and removed all of his records. Not just this particular high score, but everything - including scores in other games and that original 25-year Donkey Kong world record from 1982. Even his Guinness World Records are gone, as Guinness relies on Twin Galaxies for their video game scores. As for Mitchell, he maintains that his score was legitimate, and that he'll be able to prove it and reclaim his rightful place in video game history. "Everything will be transparent, everything will be available. I wish I had it in my hands right now. I wish I could hand it to you." He's even accused Young of creating falsified footage using an emulator, which would require Young to have done a pixel-perfect recreation of Mitchell's legitimate game in order to discredit him. Young responded by calling the allegation ridiculous, saying: "The amount of foresight, patience, and technical knowledge required would be staggering." Wiebe victory Given their history, it's tempting to see Mitchell's downfall as a victory for Steve Wiebe, but that's not exactly the case. But there is one big change that comes for Wiebe as a result of Mitchell's disqualification. With Mitchell's score removed from the records, Wiebe is officially the first player on record to ever break 1,000,000 points in Donkey Kong. No matter how many new high scores are set, being the first person to do something is the kind of record that can't be taken away. Unless, you know, you cheated. "There's some poor bastard out there who's getting the screws put to him, hahaha." Thanks for watching! Click the SVG icon to subscribe to our YouTube channel. Plus check out all this cool stuff we know you'll love, too!
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AuthorI like sport and all types of gambling games. Also, I`m a writer, so I help people to understand the online casino niche and other related niches like betting on sport, iGaming etc. Working with gambling projects: Archives
May 2019
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