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[jshackles]

Famed high-score gamer Billy Mitchell, best known for his leading role in “The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters” documentary, was officially stripped of his “Donkey Kong” and other video game high scores and banned from submitting scores to the world’s largest tracker of video game world records following a decision that he cheated, Twin Galaxies announced today.

More from Variety.

 

[B-52]

You hate to see it happen to such a nice guy

 

[Revolutionary]

Steve Wiebe: (laughs)

 

[Cert.in.Death]

Liberal bias, deep state conspiracy, fake news. Sad!

 

[ScrapBrain]

For an organization that hands out records and claims to be 'prestigious', it's baffling that these investigations took place after complaints from the community where evidence was presented to spur an investigation. They should've been taking record keeping seriously in the first place and investigated every record with scrutiny from the beginning, but even more so once they teamed with the Guinness World Record team. Now it just makes you question the legitimacy of any record they hold, and what standard the other records from older periods are held to...I wonder which records will be revoked next, it's practically inevitable...

 

[deriks]

Better later than never

 

[MrTroubleMaker]

I'm glad that is sorted out finally.

 

[synchronicity]

You hate to see it happen to such a nice guy

Lol, I know right. That dude comes off as one of the most unjustifiably smug individuals I've ever seen. He's like a walking cartoon.

 

[iconmaster]

Although he’s always been made to be the villain of the scene, this still disappoints me. I’d rather have a Karate Kid Johnny Lawrence than a Bernie Madoff.

And while it's completely reasonable for Twin Galaxies to strip Mitchell of all records, I'd still like to know which of those were publicly witnessed and therefore reliable -- such as the perfect Pac-Man game, which I believe was achieved publicly.

 

[Kenpachii]

Saw his documentary and boy oh boy this guy is full of himself.

 

[OH-MyCar]

Everyone says King of Kong mischaracterized Mitchell, but did they mischaracterize Twin Galaxies as one of the saddest, most cult-like menageries of disorder ever committed to film?

 

[Mathrin]

I'm getting major Deja Vu here... I'm sure we had this topic a month or two back.

Maybe it was something similar back then?

 

[OH-MyCar]

I'm getting major Deja Vu here... I'm sure we had this topic a month or two back.

Maybe it was something similar back then?

The accusations of Mitchell cheating surfaced after the Todd Rogers blow-out. Now it's news again because Twin Galaxies has finally removed his scores.

 

[Mathrin]

The accusations of Mitchell cheating surfaced after the Todd Rogers blow-out. Now it's news again because Twin Galaxies has finally removed his scores.

AH! Thats it. I know I had heard his name linked with cheating but couldn't shake where from. Cheers.

 

[floatstarpx]

Lol, I know right. That dude comes off as one of the most unjustifiably smug individuals I've ever seen. He's like a walking cartoon.

Legally, he's nothing like a cartoon
Billy Mitchell isn’t an exploding, floating cartoon head

 

[synchronicity]

Legally, he's nothing like a cartoon
Billy Mitchell isn’t an exploding, floating cartoon head

Ha, I knew nothing about this. That's hilarious.

 

[AlphaMale]

Glad to hear. Anyone who watched the "King of Kong" documentary should suspect some fishiness with his bad VCR recording.

 

[SpiceRacz]

I trust Jace did a thorough and fair investigation. However, it seems a lot of the people contributing in the TG forum dispute obviously have an axe to grind with Billy and it still makes me question some of the "evidence" that was presented. The behavior of that community has been really gross throughout the entire process, with the whole labeling people as "Team Billy", ripping on that Carlos guy, etc.

 

[Trogdor1123]

How did he cheat?

 

[AnimalFather]

many of his records were live in front of an audience. this is nothing but a politically motivated decision.

 

[iconmaster]

How did he cheat?

Passed off footage of an emulated Donkey Kong as the real arcade machine. You can set scores with an emulated (MAME) version, there's absolutely a category for that.. but you can't lie about it.

 

[goldenpp72]

If you don't do it in person it shouldn't be counted. I know that's frustrating but it's too easy to fake this stuff.

 

[Harlock]

Is bizarre how a lot of old high scores are impossible to get and way above from the second place. Is the kinda of thing that did not get enough attention before the Atari 2600 Dragster case.

 

[Petrae]

Mitchell and Rogers have done a lot of damage— not just to their own reputations, but also to the competitive retro/arcade scene. Scrutiny for other record holders and doubt of their scoring accomplishments, as verified by Twin Galaxies, will increase.

This whole mess is unfortunate.

 

[lukilladog]

Noooo!

 

[WouldYouKindly]

So who has the high score now

 

[ilfait]

So who has the high score now

Some woman named Millie Bitchell. Nobody's seen her in person but I don't doubt the legitimacy of her scores.

 

[MrBenchmark]

Some woman named Millie Bitchell. Nobody's seen her in person but I don't doubt the legitimacy of her scores.

Prize to you winner of today's internet.

 

[Nikana]

I didn't realize this was for that Donkey Kong tape in King of Kong. I thought it was for something not recent

How did this even come up after so long??

 

[ReBurn]

Prize to you winner of today's internet.

It was just OK

 

[ilfait]

Crisis averted. Inaccurate assessment of joke corrected. Shutting down.

 

[Grinchy]

I really wanna see how Steve Wiebe feels about all of this.

 

[LordPezix]

Long hair, don't care...

 

[Sapiens]

Wasn't it obvious to anyone who watched King of Kong that Mitchel and Twin Galaxies were the biggest cheating chodes of all time? Just a weird boys club full of beardy weirdos. Glad it finally came out. All of our suspicions confirmed. So many gate-keeping losers involved in that era of gaming.

I really wanna see how Steve Wiebe feels about all of this.

I bet he knew all along that something was fucked about it - but he's so god damned polite and kind-hearted, he rolled with the punches.

 

[Spukc]

JUSTICE

 

[Nikana]

So what I gather is Twin Galaxies took it upon themselves to be the official referees of the whole high scores thing but failed to take the time to actually verify the stuff they promised they would verify.

It seems like the people who made a lot of these fake scores never anticipated that tech would evolve to the point where people could find the literal limitations of games by studying the code leading to a lot of these players getting caught which in turn led to TG being expose.

Cool.

 

[camelCase]

Although he’s always been made to be the villain of the scene, this still disappoints me. I’d rather have a Karate Kid Johnny Lawrence than a Bernie Madoff.

And while it's completely reasonable for Twin Galaxies to strip Mitchell of all records, I'd still like to know which of those were publicly witnessed and therefore reliable -- such as the perfect Pac-Man game, which I believe was achieved publicly.

If he wasn't an asshole this wouldn't even have happened and people would be fine with false records

 

[strange headache]

I'm getting major Deja Vu here... I'm sure we had this topic a month or two back.

Yes, I created a topic about Todd Rogers having his high-scores revoked and Billy Mitchell's scores being contested. This has been brewing for months now and it's really sad to see these former legends of gaming falling so far from grace. But it's really good to see that the speedrunning and high-score community is trying to clean house, because cheating became rampant to the point of damaging legit gaming efforts. RWhiteGoose and Apollo Legend are doing a pretty good job in covering these events:

 

[Scopa]

Liberal bias, deep state conspiracy, fake news. Sad!

Nah, it was the Russians. Definitely the Russians. They hacked Twin Galaxies.

 

[The Bloody-Nine]

Billy responds. Claims investigation to clear his name is underway.

https://www.destructoid.com/billy-m...galaxies-donkey-kong-controversy-498857.phtml

If he isn't sponsored by Just For Men, he should be.

 

[MrBenchmark]

I really wanna see how Steve Wiebe feels about all of this.

Many a person owes that dude a serious apology!

Billy is straight up a Bond villain I swear.

 

[DeepEnigma]

Turns out, he can break a million with an arcade cabinet and not emulation.

https://twinfinite.net/2018/08/turn...ly-can-score-over-one-million-in-donkey-kong/

 

[MultiCore]

Turns out, he can break a million with an arcade cabinet and not emulation.

https://twinfinite.net/2018/08/turn...ly-can-score-over-one-million-in-donkey-kong/

I think the problem has always been him misrepresenting himself. I don't think anyone claimed he cheated, just that he wasn't using the platform he claimed he was.

I'll be shocked if they ever let him back on the leaderboards.