Billy Mitchell Sets Donkey Kong Highscore
If you are not aware of who Billy Mitchell is, let me first start by making it clear that this isn’t a story about the character from Eastenders. Billy Mitchell is, perhaps, one of the best-known names in terms of gaming high scores. He initially shot to some notoriety in the ’80s for setting various high-score records for a number of classic arcade games. For example, he was the first person to complete a ‘perfect’ game of Pac Man. That’s collecting everything and achieving the maximum score, triggering a ‘kill screen’ (where the game crashes) and all on 1 single life.
He did, however, perhaps become far more notably famous when he appeared in the semi-documentary ‘The King Of Kong’. The film (which you really should watch), showed Steve Weibe attempting to break Billy Mitchells long standard World Record in Donkey Kong. Earlier this year though, although he no longer held the World Record, many of his Donkey Kong scores were brought into question.
To MAME Or Not To MAME?
The issue of contention was whether he used MAME (an arcade simulator) or an actual verified machine. Billy Mitchell always stated he used the latter while nearly all the evidence pointed towards him using MAME. Twin Galaxies was sufficiently satisfied to declare that he did use MAME and as such, while they did not call him a cheater, they removed all of his records and banned him from appearing on their charts again.
Since then, he has been on something of a mission to redeem his name and reputation. As such, he has posted various videos on Twitch showing him working to prove that he is legitimately a top player. More specifically, that he doesn’t cheat!
Having A Re-Think
In the video above, you can see Billy Mitchell posting a video with the score of 1,050,100. This is a (near enough) a score of his that was previously removed from the records. While it doesn’t necessarily prove that he didn’t use MAME, it does at least confirm that he is capable of producing million plus scores legitimately.
Now, Twin Galaxies are almost certainly not going to overturn their decision. As far as they see it, they don’t think he cheated. In fact, very few do. What they do believe, however, is that he was dishonest about how he achieved the score. For anyone who knows the speedrunning or high score community, the format in which you achieve it is highly important. For example, a Resident Evil 2 speedrun will be proven down into the category of a format in which it was achieved. Be it, PC, PS1, Gamecube, emulator etc.
While Billy Mitchell might have been dishonest about this, these videos are making me reconsider my opinion on him. While he might have told a lie, he clearly has the skill to achieve these scores legitimately. It might be a small step, but he is actually redeeming his reputation with me just a little. Not, I’m sure, that he gives a crap what I think about him.
What do you think? Impressed with the score? Has he redeemed a little in your eyes?- Let us know in the comments!
He cheated . Everyone knows this. I have been following this very closely. It’s been proven he cheated and that’s why Twin Galaxies will not accept any score from him. His lies hurt others and robbed players who played legitimately. What he and Walter Day think about what Billy brings to the community as being more important is hogwash. You can also add blame towards people like Richie Knucklez who in their obscene and selfish desire for fame decided to put aside right and wrong only cause they care more about perception than reality or doing the right thing by all gamers. Billy and Richie should be banned from Kong Off’s and the community should step up and do what they did with the scoreboard and make it their own and take it back. Peer-reviewed by the DK Community! Not tainted by people who have been outed as cheaters or accomplices in wrong-doings.
Also…Had Billy come clean and admitted to what we all already know then I too would have considered giving him a pass. Mostly considering how entertaining it made the movie. But I’ve watched his latest Twitch streams and he still talks like he didn’t cheat. He also talked about how he stole Roy Schiltz’s money bag once when he first met him and bragged about how upset it made him and how it was his fault that he got so angry. This is not a good man.
Terrible article with so much misinformation I don’t even know where to start.
“Very few do”? Based on what? The sycophants in his Twitch channel? There was plenty of evidence apart from the MAME stuff that the performances were completely fabricated just based on the statistical analysis alone.
With 5 seconds of investigative journalism you would’ve found that the original 1.05 wasn’t even a kill screen. If it was, the score would’ve been over 1.1m. How does a kill screen of 1.05m equal a thrown away 1.1m game?
If this is THE Wes Copeland, then hello to you good sir. In answer to your comment, I would not pretend to understand the situation as well as yourself. I have, however, spent a fair amount of time looking into this matter and as such, with respect to your views, do feel that I am entitled to an opinion that is based on some knowledge of the situation. I should also note as well that while some of the points you raise are valid, we do have to write these articles based on the assumption that someone reading them has little or no understanding of competitive Donkey Kong. I do, however, have to respectfully disagree with your view. At present, the only thing that has been ‘proven’ is that Billy Mitchell did not use a legitimate cabinet for a number of his record scores. His removal from TG (as far as I can ascertain) was based solely on this and the exceptional likelihood that he used MAME. There is, of course, the factor of whether he used saved states to ‘create’ his high scores, I have, however, seen nothing conclusive to prove that. It is, of course, a very real possibility though. I am hardly a Billy Mitchell fan (you can check the numerous previous posts I’ve written about him to confirm that). I am not, however, going to detract from what has been a seemingly legitimate play by him in an attempt to show he does, at the very least, have the ability to produce good scores. You speak of ‘sycophants’, but I would suggest that there are people as equally devoted to discrediting him entirely.