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NFT: Donkey Kong "legend" stripped of his records

DanMetroMan : 4/12/2018 1:04 pm
High score record-keeping site Twin Galaxies has removed all of Billy Mitchell's rankings from its database and banned him from competition following accusations of wrong-doing relating to the classic Nintendo title Donkey Kong.

Earlier this year, Mitchell's scores were called into doubt by Donkey Kong Forum moderator and scoreboard maintainer Jeremy "Xelnia" Young, who claimed video evidence suggests that three 1,000,000+ point scores submitted by Mitchell were achieved under emulation rather than original arcade hardware.

Mitchell quickly refuted these claims, claiming that the tape he submitted had somehow been swapped. Young responded by stating that Mitchell's claim "does not make sense".

It would seem that Twin Galaxies - which launched its own investigation following these accusations - agrees with Young. It has issued a statement on the matter, broadcasting its belief that Mitchell did not use original arcade hardware to achieve his scores:

With this ruling Twin Galaxies can no longer recognize Billy Mitchell as the first million point "Donkey Kong" record holder. According to our findings, Steve Wiebe would be the official 1st million point record holder.

Mitchell and Wiebe's epic battle was made world famous by the movie King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters (a movie the former claims not to have seen, even to this day), but Mitchell had achieved fame as a high score-chaser in the '80s, during gaming's first golden era. His other scores were achieved on games like Pac-Man, BurgerTime and Centipede. He also claims to be the first person to discover Donkey Kong's infamous "kill screen".
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King of Kong...  
Chris in Philly : 4/12/2018 1:06 pm : link
is a brilliant documentary, and Billy Mitchell is one of the great villains...
The scores were probably real.....  
Tom [Giants fan] : 4/12/2018 1:08 pm : link
but I bet he used performance enhancing drugs to achieve them!
RE: King of Kong...  
Ben in Tampa : 4/12/2018 1:28 pm : link
In comment 13911291 Chris in Philly said:
Quote:
is a brilliant documentary, and Billy Mitchell is one of the great villains...


Agreed. It’s such a great underdog/good guy vs bad guy story. It’s a go to movie for me.

Although I have heard the directors heavily edited it to make Bill Mitchell look like such a dick, and he was sort of “in on it” the whole time.
RE: King of Kong...  
Essex : 4/12/2018 1:29 pm : link
In comment 13911291 Chris in Philly said:
Quote:
is a brilliant documentary, and Billy Mitchell is one of the great villains...

I 1000% agree; however, the fact that he had been able to get away with it--with the support of the governing body--when he was clearly cheating kind of made his character all the more interesting.
Yeah, talk about a quotable documentary....  
Britt in VA : 4/12/2018 1:29 pm : link
"I wanted to be a hero. I wanted to be the center of attention. I wanted the glory, I wanted the fame. I wanted the pretty girls to come up and say, "'Hi, I see that you're good at Centipede.'"
I stumbled upon King of Kong a few years ago and was just  
PSIMMS 22-25-268 : 4/12/2018 2:20 pm : link
glued.
loved the documentary  
Matt in SGS : 4/12/2018 2:21 pm : link
however, if you want to get super nerdy, the timelines actually don't add up. Mitchell and Wiebe actually knew each other before the documentary shows and there were pictures of them together at the Classic Game Expo and both were on stage.

They had a falling out afterwards and it's when the documentary picks up.
I wonder..  
FatMan in Charlotte : 4/12/2018 3:28 pm : link
if there will be a similar controversy over the Marble Madness record.......
I also went to summer camp from 77-83 in N.H. less than 10 min  
PSIMMS 22-25-268 : 4/12/2018 3:35 pm : link
from Weirs Beach and Funspot (the arcade hosting a lot of competitions and featured in King of Kong).
RE: I wonder..  
Mr. Bungle : 4/12/2018 3:56 pm : link
In comment 13911699 FatMan in Charlotte said:
Quote:
if there will be a similar controversy over the Marble Madness record.......

Haha...surprised that beloved BBIer hasn't posted on this thread yet.
Wow, never thought they'd do it.  
schabadoo : 4/12/2018 3:57 pm : link
Met Billy Mitchell down at DragonCon last year. He's frozen in time.

RE: I wonder..  
Stan in LA : 4/12/2018 4:16 pm : link
In comment 13911699 FatMan in Charlotte said:
Quote:
if there will be a similar controversy over the Marble Madness record.......


There already is/was and it was perpetrated by a sore loser. Twin Galaxies has authenticated the record.
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