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Classic Games (Games) Entertainment Games

Donkey Kong Arcade World Record Broken 49

Posted by simoniker from the monkey-called-kong-delighted dept.
Thanks to EvilAvatar for pointing to a TwinGalaxies report revealing the world record on the classic Donkey Kong has been smashed, with a score of 947,200 by Washington gamer Steve Wiebe. According to the post, "Steve's achievement took nearly 2 hours of game play, and although he had lost his third life relatively early in the game, he kept things going for a remarkable period of time, reminding gamers everywhere: 'Never give up, never say die', classic advice from another Donkey Kong master, legendary gamer Bill Mitchell." Detailed stats reveal there are 116 playable screens that you can complete before reaching the impossible-to-complete 'kill screen' on this classic title, and it appears the magical million mark may theoretically be attainable.
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Donkey Kong Arcade World Record Broken More

Donkey Kong Arcade World Record Broken

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  • Wow... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 07, 2003 @10:47AM (#6382814)
    2 hours of barrel throwing? Damn Donkey Kong must be tired.

  • Million points? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jvmatthe ( 116058 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @10:51AM (#6382841) Homepage
    Well, unless he missed a ton of bonuses somewhere along the way, he'd have to jump an extra 528 barrels (at 100 pts per barrel) to reach a million points. At 5 seconds per barrel that's 2640 extra seconds of playing, or 44 minutes. Also, jumping barrels is probably a sure-fire way to lose that third man even earlier.

    Which is worse? That he plays Donkey Kong obsessively to the point of making it onto the front page of Slashdot or that I spent the time estimating the time it would take for him to break a million points the next time he shoots for the record? Maybe I should do a risk-analysis while I'm pissing away time...

    • Re:Million points? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Daetrin ( 576516 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @11:03AM (#6382915)
      The article said that he skipped several opportunities for points in the mid-game because he lost two lives so early. I don't know how many points exactly, but he seems to think he can hit a million if he does a little better.
    • You're forgetting the time-based bonus that usually adds a few thousand points to your score when you clear the screen. There are also the occasional blue barrels that are worth 300.

  • I don't have the attention span (Score:4, Funny)

    by Sevn ( 12012 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @10:51AM (#6382844) Homepage Journal
    to play donkey kong for 10 minutes, let alone two
    hours. Now, give donkey kong a railgun or put him
    in a racecar and let me play against some human
    victims and I could play for 36 straight hours.

    • DK Haiku (Score:4, Funny)

      by Picass0 ( 147474 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @11:00AM (#6382897) Homepage Journal
      To play Donkey Kong
      and forsake rail gun giblets
      is to be enlightened

      • Re:DK Haiku (Score:1, Offtopic)

        by Sevn ( 12012 )
        don't get me wrong,

        I do play games other than shmups and racing games.
        I like to play oldschool battlechess again and again
        and again until the computer wins. I love those
        pixilated THO's* the queen gets when she's about
        to take something.

        * - Titty Hard On

      • Re:DK Haiku (Score:4, Informative)

        by hprotagonist0 ( 312387 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @12:07PM (#6383363)
        Sorry, that's not a haiku. "Is to be enlightened" = 6 syllables. How about

        Playing Donkey Kong
        Forsaking railgun giblets
        Is Enlightenment

        ?
        • Technically that's not a haiku either. Japanese have strange sylaable counts:

          Playing Donkey Kong 8
          Forsaking railgun giblets 13
          Is Enlightenment 10
          • I'd really love to know how you came up with those numbers. I mean, if you're trying to count mora, as you would in Japanese, I still don't see how you'd get 13 for the middle line. Anyway, there's absolutely no way to apply Japanese phonetic analysis to English; the syllable structures are entirely different (English allows consanant blends that are impossible in Japanese in both the onset and the coda, and long and short vowels don't contrast in the same way).
            So, if you're willing to call anythin

    • Re:I don't have the attention span (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ip_vjl ( 410654 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @11:47AM (#6383234) Homepage
      Actually, that's the basic reason why I do play games like Donkey Kong.

      It's nice to be able to load up something like Donkey Kong or Dig Dug and play for 15 minutes as a diversion. On the other hand, to pull up any of the newer MMORPGs or FPS games and you'd better have a couple hours to spare.

      • Depends (Score:2)

        by Sevn ( 12012 )
        The exact reason I love FPS and racing games so
        much is because there isn't a large time commitment.
        It comes in blocks of manageable time. I can race
        for 6 minutes, then walk away or race some more.
        Same mentality with FPS games. :)

  • And in related news... (Score:5, Funny)

    by nlh ( 80031 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @10:57AM (#6382880) Homepage
    Peter Jones scored a record 123,372 in Solitare during his 10am conference call this morning. His boss congratulated him with a slap on head and a hearty "stop goofing off, jerkoff."

  • One, is the MAME version accurate enough to have this "kill-screen"?

    Two, does anyone know of a cheat to get to this "kill-screen"? After all, I doubt I'd ever play for 2 hours just to get there, but I would be interested in seeing what lies ahead for the poor guy.

    • The ROMs for Mame are exact ROM dumps, so sure, it should certainly be present. The famous Galaga bug is present in the Galaga ROM (link here [klov.com]), so I wouldn't see why the kill screen wouldn't be present.
      • I'm not exactly a console junkie but you're the first person I've ever met/heard from who knew about that bug. I've taught dozens of people and have yet to meet a single person who knew about it.

        I assume we're talking about the "don't shoot certain character until he makes two passes without firing on second board that leaves the rest of the game not shooting" bug?
        • I'm not exactly a console junkie but you're the first person I've ever met/heard from who knew about that bug.

          It isn't a console game, but rather an ARCADE game.

          I assume we're talking about the "don't shoot certain character until he makes two passes without firing on second board that leaves the rest of the game not shooting" bug?

          More or less, though your specifics are off. Please see the link that I posted in the original...

          (Moderators: I am removing my +1 LOOK AT ME modifier since we see
          • That links appears to be inaccurate, or at least not the only way to go about doing it.

            o I do it on the second board (never realized you could do it on the first).

            o There is no need to wait for five passes. Often a pass will go by without firing any shots ONCE. If a second time occurs then it is safe to shoot the last bug.

            o There is no need to keep both bugs alive, it is only necessary that the bug you leave alive is one of the two mentioned. It's much easier to dodge one firing than two, mostly becau

    • Re:Couple of MAME questions (Score:4, Informative)

      by AndyBusch ( 160585 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @11:05AM (#6382928)
      I'm not up on MAME cheating, so I can't verify, but it seems that MAME could handle the kill screen. After reading the run-down, it seems that all it is is a level where the timer ticks too fast to make it to the top. If you want a simulation, run around a level until the timer runs out (an elevator stage would be best, as you could just stand there). It's not like the Pac-Man bug where half the screen garbles at the last level.
      • Hmmmm... I wonder what would happen if you stopped the timer and finished the kill screen level thingy. The article makes the last level seem possible(but then again, not).

        This is interesting though, I should do some research.

        Probably not though playing as I can not even get past level 3(or was that 2?).
      • According to this interview [classicgaming.com] with a previous high-scorer (879,200 in Aug of 2000), the trick is to use up all your lives before you reach the kill level, effectively trading them in for points. But, that's assuming you have lives left to spare at that point...

  • Video game memories (Score:5, Interesting)

    by AtariAmarok ( 451306 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @11:02AM (#6382913)
    One of the more amusing game-related memories I recall is that of a Defender champ playing Defender in the college arcade for hours and hours.

    The guy racked up hundreds of extra lives. Eventually, he got tired of it and walked away (leaving kids to scramble to take over his game).

    This video game whiz, obviously not a jack of all trades, walked to the nearby Donkey Kong console. He put in a quarter. Within seconds, Mario was crunched by a barrel. In anger, he hauled back and swatted the control knob, knocking it flying (joystick attached) across the room. He then left the arcade.
    • I had Defender for the Atari 800 and I remember that it was a very easy game. I think you got a bonus life every 10,000, instead of being limited to 1 or 2 bonus lives. So you could theoretically play forever. I remember once playing for 1 hour, getting bored and started killing myself. It took forever (well, I was a kid, probably just 10-15 minutes) to kill all my ships).
      • I could do the same thing with Robotron 2084, clearing all 255 waves (and then it restarted at wave 1). It'd give you a life every 25k points (which you really needed).

        I'd play inside a convenience store and often just walk away from the cabinet, go buy a coke, go back, and start playing again. During my time away I'd lose a few dozen lives. No big deal! :)

    • One of my fondest memories was to watch my pal (Matt Maline, if you're lurking around /. somewhere...) play through the entire Dragon's Lair game with us covering his eyes. He had memorized every choice and relied on the sound cues for timing. Pretty impressive for a 6th grader, or so I thought.

  • I got 7600 (Score:4, Funny)

    by Inda ( 580031 ) <slash.20.inda@spamgourmet.com> on Monday July 07, 2003 @12:10PM (#6383388) Journal

    This was one of the first video games I ever played. Played it on a BBC micro if I remember right. Very cool back then.

    Anyway. I managed 7600 points, first go on the Java emulator. Surely a million isn't that hard :p

    http://web.utanet.at/nkehrer/JDKong.html [utanet.at]

  • Donkey Kong? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Chalex ( 71702 ) on Monday July 07, 2003 @01:32PM (#6383926) Homepage
    Where's the "donkey" in Donkey Kong?

    • Re:Donkey Kong? (Score:3, Informative)

      by emiddlec ( 673376 )
      In the name "Donkey Kong", the "Donkey" was added to mean "Stubborn." I think the name was coined in Japan (?), where the game was originally designed.. See "The Ultimate History of Video Games" for a thorough retelling of the relevant details..
    • I think it's a play on the Japanese phenome "don", which means "stupid" or "blunt." (ex. "donkusai" - stupid, retarded; "donki" - blunt instrument.)

      KLOV [klov.com] has more details, as well as a slightly sketchier rumour that the original title was intended to be "Monkey Kong", but a blurry fax caused the finished cabinet art to be titled "Donkey Kong".

  • Bot? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by PhilHibbs ( 4537 ) <snarks@gmail.com> on Monday July 07, 2003 @05:01PM (#6385914) Journal
    It shouldn't be too hard to rig up a bot program to the controls of a DK arcade machine. If you can write bots to automate Diablo II, then DK shouldn't be a problem. That would tell us if 1 million were possible.
    • I believe there is some element of randomness to the fireballs in the rivet levels - you can tell from the article that those are by far the most difficult levels.

      The Diablo bot is a very discrete situation - a loop to walk to one close-by boss and shoot a couple fireballs, pick up the loot then start again.
  • --M4d Propz to Robert T Mruczek for making the reporting to interesting...
  • All I can say is....2 hours straight play of Donkey Kong...he deserves that win!!! He must be pretty darn good!

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