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'King of Kong' Billy Mitchell Stripped Of Donkey Kong Record For Emulator Cheating (hothardware.com)
MojoKid writes:
More drama is unfolding in the ultra-competitive retro arcade gaming scene... Billy Mitchell, the arcade legend who appeared as a central character opposite Steve Wiebe in the documentary The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, has been accused of cheating his way into the record books for high scores in Donkey Kong. As a result, he's now been stripped of his 1.062 million score on the Donkey Kong Forums...
The legitimacy of his score was called into question by Donkey Kong high score judge Jeremy "Xelnia" Young laid out a body of evidence that seems to prove Mitchell recorded several of his high scores on the open source arcade emulator MAME, though he claimed his scores were obtained on an original arcade cabinet, and therefore were not subject to same strict authentication requirements. "It's possible they were recorded in one shot," Young says, but "Given the play style in Billy's videos, it's more likely that vanilla MAME's INP recording feature was abused."
Twin Galaxies recently threw out the 35-year-old record for the Atari 2600 game Dragster, and has now said they're "in the process of fully reviewing the compelling evidence provided by Jeremy Young."
The legitimacy of his score was called into question by Donkey Kong high score judge Jeremy "Xelnia" Young laid out a body of evidence that seems to prove Mitchell recorded several of his high scores on the open source arcade emulator MAME, though he claimed his scores were obtained on an original arcade cabinet, and therefore were not subject to same strict authentication requirements. "It's possible they were recorded in one shot," Young says, but "Given the play style in Billy's videos, it's more likely that vanilla MAME's INP recording feature was abused."
Twin Galaxies recently threw out the 35-year-old record for the Atari 2600 game Dragster, and has now said they're "in the process of fully reviewing the compelling evidence provided by Jeremy Young."
First Dragster, now Kong... Will Space Invaders be next, or.. or.. even, I dare not say it, yes, even Pong? Will Pong fail too? Now that I think of it, you cannot have a Pong record, can you?
Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
Do these titles have a lot of marketing value or command some stream of income? I mean, if they ever come to take away my record for being able to piss the farthest, I'm sure I'll still survive.
Have gnu, will travel.
The movie was a pile of steaming lies but you are correct, he is not beyond cheating to get the attention
However, he really is that good at playing those games
I watched him play Ms PacMan blindfolded
Nothing matters any more. Welcome to 2018.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Twin Galaxies Credibly is shot they need big changes.
Maybe stuff like refs can't have scores maybe or very least can't review friends and family
Some things need ref review
Clear rules about useing game bugs and what is a bug may need per game lists just like per game settings lists.
each rom ver has it own list both on real hardware and emulators (some of the pinball scores don't list rom / software ver and there are small to big changes for each one)
his insubordination. What is this world coming to?
I can't see the gov't surviving this.
No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.
This might be a subtle troll, but Ms Pacman was a big deal because it was one of the first video games with a random number generator.
Regular Pacman you could memorize patterns for most of the levels. If you repeat those exact joystick and button movements, the ghosts move in the same way in response every time. When I was I was a kid playing Oregon Trail on the Apple ][, my dad could play Pacman with patterns memorized until past the "apple" level. My dad was using patterns with visual cues, but you could also learn to do it off of a clock and then do it blindfolded.
Ms Pacman there were no patterns of that sort. Somebody playing with a blindfold is cheating.
It's not even about Donkey Kong anymore.
So if he was the King of Kong,
who was the Kong of Dong?
And where does Don King fit into all of this?
L'Idiot
However, he really is that good at playing those games
In this instance, all they have proof of is that he used MAME to play the game ROMs, instead of the original hardware. Million plus score on DK in MAME is just as impressive to me as on the original hardware.
My karma is in a nose dive
It's not on like Donkey Kong.
Yes you are a troll and no he was not cheating
Unless he also abused emulator features to cheat. That's why emulator runs have additional requirements to prove you're not cheating before they count.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
No. They also have proof that he claimed to have used original arcade hardware for those runs. Why would you like about that?
++ Say to Elrond "Hello.".
Elrond says "No.". Elrond gives you some lunch.
Some are accusing Billy of using the save state feature in MAME on those runs. Still, even then, it's impressive. Just doesn't belong in the high score list for either original hardware or MAME. Even if he didn't abuse MAME features to achieve the score, still doesn't belong in the original hardware high score list.
It was wrong to try to pass it off as an original hardware run, and taints his other records.
My karma is in a nose dive
Does this really matter? A) the scores they are striking aren't even in the top 10 any more, and B) they are striking him from #20 on the high score list for playing on MAME when it was supposed to have been played on a console, and the current #3, #10, #13, and #15 on the same list were admittedly played on MAME? How does that even make sense?
The man has a publicly viewed score of 933,900. It's not like he doesn't have the talent. It's a tempest in an emulated teapot if you ask me.
actually what it proves is that he has LIED for YEARS about how he achieved those scores, and went to an awful lot of trouble to conceal it.
the onus is always on the player to prove they achieved those scores. using an emulator makes it trivially easy to cheat, so it therefore removes any shred of "proof" that a video of him playing would have otherwise provided.
i could live a little longer in this prison
which means his scores are invalid. it also means he's a cheat and a liar. why on earth would you defend this piece of shit?
i could live a little longer in this prison
the tagline for this website is literally "news for nerds" you stupid ignorant dipshit.
i could live a little longer in this prison
His score is still rather impressive, and no one disputes that the guy is really good at arcade games, he just doesn't deserve a record when he's breaking the rules.
Much more on Billy Mitchell (and the real Donkey Kong record holders)
I come here for the love