Videogame Records Site Refuses To Reinstate 'King of Kong' Billy Mitchell's High Scores (twingalaxies.com) 80
An anonymous reader writes:
Billy Mitchell is the intense videogamer made famous in the 2007 documentary The King of Kong. Last month he threatened to sue both the Guinness Book of World Records and the videogame record-keepers at Twin Galaxies for defamation after they revoked an entire lifetime's worth of videogame high scores. An online discussion had argued that videotapes of three of Mitchell's performances suggested they'd been achieved using a MAME emulator -- but the organization revoked all of Mitchell's high scores (including his uncontested perfect game of Pac-Man in 1999).
Last week Twin Galaxies finally posted their response to Mitchell's lawsuit. "It is not necessary to hire lawyers and threaten Twin Galaxies out of the blue to get it to review and consider relevant new evidence -- all anyone has to do is simply reach out and directly request an opportunity to present the information...
"There will be no retraction or reinstatement. It should be noted that Twin Galaxies is under no obligation to maintain Mr. Mitchell's scores in its database. He has no divine right to be part of the Twin Galaxies community either. Twin Galaxies has unlimited authority to maintain the integrity of its score database." They also write that any lawsuit will be considered a strategic lawsuit against public participation and countered accordingly, followed by a second suit over malicious prosecution. "Please advise Mr. Mitchell to tread lightly, and choose wisely."
Last week a massive new 16,000-word profile of Mitchell pointed out that after his records were revoked, Mitchell had actually webcast himself playing Donkey Kong on Twitch, "obtaining scores equal to those that had been disputed, broadcast live from public venues.... Mitchell had proven he could earn those scores now. But he hadn't outlined a clear defense to prove he'd achieved them at the time of the original submissions."
Last week Twin Galaxies finally posted their response to Mitchell's lawsuit. "It is not necessary to hire lawyers and threaten Twin Galaxies out of the blue to get it to review and consider relevant new evidence -- all anyone has to do is simply reach out and directly request an opportunity to present the information...
"There will be no retraction or reinstatement. It should be noted that Twin Galaxies is under no obligation to maintain Mr. Mitchell's scores in its database. He has no divine right to be part of the Twin Galaxies community either. Twin Galaxies has unlimited authority to maintain the integrity of its score database." They also write that any lawsuit will be considered a strategic lawsuit against public participation and countered accordingly, followed by a second suit over malicious prosecution. "Please advise Mr. Mitchell to tread lightly, and choose wisely."
Last week a massive new 16,000-word profile of Mitchell pointed out that after his records were revoked, Mitchell had actually webcast himself playing Donkey Kong on Twitch, "obtaining scores equal to those that had been disputed, broadcast live from public venues.... Mitchell had proven he could earn those scores now. But he hadn't outlined a clear defense to prove he'd achieved them at the time of the original submissions."
Disgruntled Narcissists (Score:5, Insightful)
Only a malignant narcissist thinks he has a "right" to be respected/acknowledged by independent parties.
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Re:Disgruntled Narcissists (Score:5, Interesting)
As much as I hate to defend him, like professional sports stars his records and reputation did earn him a lot of money. Unfortunately when there is enough money to pay lawyers, they will get involved.
That is the saddest, most pathetic thing ... (Score:4, Funny)
... I've read in a long time.
As I say:
Those who can, do.
Those who can't, play.
Those who can't play, spectate.
This here, is like that hypothetical subset of gossip rags that focus exclusively on stamp collectors.
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Private parties still can’t libel or slander a person, and if they make inaccurate claims about you, then you most definitely can sue them.
That said, I know fuck all about the actual case.
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Private parties still can’t libel or slander a person, and if they make inaccurate claims about you, then you most definitely can sue them.
To be clear no one can libel or slander someone else; however, Mitchell must prove libel or slander which means he must prove that Twin Galaxies knew the allegations were false. At this it’s an uphill battle to prove that the allegations were false much less what Twin Galaxies knew.
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Re:Disgruntled Narcissists (Score:5, Insightful)
They even removed records that were achieved before MAME existed.
Which they explained that this was punishment.
This alone shows that their entire "investigation" was nothing more than a knee jerk reaction that was mainly done by them as publicity stunt where they valiantly bag a "baddie" with extreme prejudice.
Billy Mitchell’s own investigator concluded that his video was done recorded on original hardware after many months if this is what you mean by “knee jerk reaction“
There were later some evidence that it was all setup by parties unaffiliated with Twin Galaxies but they will never backtrack on it because it would discredit them.
Citation Needed
But it matters little since they're already discredited enough. At least in the eyes of actual people who participated in those events.
Citation Needed
Re:Disgruntled Narcissists (Score:4, Informative)
Billy Mitchell’s own investigator concluded that his video was done recorded on original hardware after many months if this is what you mean by “knee jerk reaction“
Billy Mitchell's own investigator originally published findings to TG that stated that the recordings could not have been made on arcade hardware. He then signed a document retracting those findings and stating that Billy Mitchell 'did not cheat'. That is not the same as saying that the video was recorded on original hardware (ie an arcade machine not MAME). But the case gets even more interesting. This same investigator has since published a video [youtube.com] where he effectively cancels his retraction, including the statement that Billy Mitchell 'did not cheat', and stands by his original findings. He states he only signed it as he was hoping to be kept out of the lawsuit, and that he signed it with the understanding the document would be revised before being made public.
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It's normal for sporting bodies to remove all of a cheater's records because of they were willing to cheat once they may well have cheated every other time.
It's impossible to verify those records now and at the time it was basically done on trust. They should probably never have been records in the first place.
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That's pretty dumb. The truth should not be rewritten for the sake of punishing one person. They might as well purge all of their trust-based records now.
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That's pretty dumb. The truth should not be rewritten for the sake of punishing one person. They might as well purge all of their trust-based records now.
They also purged Steve Rogers' records as well when they found he had cheated. So not one person.
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They should probably never have been records in the first place.
Then they should remove ALL records for which they have no evidence.
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I kind of agree. Most of the no-evidence ones are historical now, and some where verified at the time via VHS tapes that are lost. But certainly any that are current and which do not have strong evidence should be at least marked as such.
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Bullshit, removing all the scores of a person banned from a sport for cheating is a standard practice.
It demonstrates some minimum level of competence.
Try looking out at the world and asking, "What is it like?" Don't just open your window and shout at the world how you expect it to be.
If you get caught doping in sports, you might even have your past Olympic medals rescinded, and the record books changed to show somebody else in your former place.
Re: Disgruntled Narcissists (Score:1)
Re: Disgruntled Narcissists (Score:5, Interesting)
That's all it takes to invalidate the score as fake.
Due to the nature of sports scores, and more specifically the known policies of Twin Galaxies, cheating even once wipes out everything you did and will ever do, as you receive an all inclusive lifetime ban on all your scores and participation.
If you still want to complain, ask why Pete Rose isn't in the Baseball Hall of Fame. This kind of policy isn't anything new by any means.
Re: Disgruntled Narcissists (Score:1)
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Um track, cycling, and baseball are notorious for being sports where many, or most, top-tier athletes use forbidden substances or techniques like blood doping to boost performance over natural potential. Why didn't you throw in professional American football while you were at it?
https://www.macleans.ca/societ... [macleans.ca]
If those organizational standards are ones you hold up as effective for dealing with cheating, then you probably also think that Trump is draining the swamp.
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Lance Armstrong had his titles stripped without any proven evidence though, the people responsible for the investigation determined he was guilty, and determined how far back to go. All they had was a whistleblower who was actually the one who had failed drug tests. He admitted it later, but there wasn't really a lot of evidence at the time.
Keeping that one win is probably the only reason he admitted starting in 95. That confession is the only thing putting a date on it, without that he'd have lost the rest
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Lance Armstrong had his titles stripped without any proven evidence though, the people responsible for the investigation determined he was guilty, and determined how far back to go. All they had was a whistleblower who was actually the one who had failed drug tests. He admitted it later, but there wasn't really a lot of evidence at the time.
At this point Armstrong has all but admitted that he did it. If fact so many cyclists were using back then the there are no winners of the Tour de France from 1999 to 2006 as they can't be sure who wasn't using.
Marion Jones had her records stripped even though the only evidence was a confession made as part of a plea-bargain from a criminal case that involved actions taken years after the results that were stripped.
You have a very particular definition of "only". Her ex-husband testified against her. Her ex-partner testified against. The head of BALCO which supplied them with the drugs testified against her.
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Twin Galaxies for sure worked in incompetent and lazy way.
Agreed. I would also argue that Twin Galaxies needs Billy more than Billy needs them. Billy is the Michael Jordan of video games, twin galaxies is just the referee. Billy could start his own game record company and gamers would flock to him if done right. He’s got an attitude problem and other issues but no one can deny his awesome gaming abilities.
he provably cheated (Score:3)
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To be clear no one can libel or slander someone else.
Sure they can, by definition.
To show it, you must prove that the defendant either knew it was untrue or showed a reckless disregard for the truth.
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To be clear no one can libel or slander someone else; however, Mitchell must prove libel or slander which means he must prove that Twin Galaxies knew the allegations were false.
False, they also could have published "with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not [wikipedia.org]". And that looks very much like the situation at hand.
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"Reckless disregard" is a higher bar than you think. Once they had the video analysis showing that putative records were generated using MAME -- or even that they were likely generated using MAME -- they passed that bar.
Also, because they disclosed the underlying facts [rcfp.org], their conclusions cannot be deemed reckless no matter how shoddy you think that they may be.
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False, they also could have published "with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not [wikipedia.org]". And that looks very much like the situation at hand.
This is the entire part of the citation. The 1964 case New York Times Co. v. Sullivan dramatically altered the nature of libel law in the United States by elevating the fault element for public officials to actual malice that is, public figures could win a libel suit only if they could demonstrate the publisher's "knowledge that the information was false" or that the information was published "with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not"
You must prove all of that. ALL of it. Not allege it. In the case of Mitchell, Twin Cities did an investigation in which Mitchell's own investigator agreed with them that the screens did not appear from original hardware. That isn't "reckless disregard". It is the exact opposite of it.
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Only a layperson would think that.
You can only "slander" (when written, its libel) someone by making an objectively false statement of fact. An incorrect opinion is not libel. An conclusion based upon disclosed fac
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Only a malignant narcissist thinks he has a "right" to be respected/acknowledged by independent parties.
If the independent parties make a business claim to respect/acknowledge the alleged narcisstst under certain circumstances, then fail to perform on the claim in a way that harms said party, he surely DOES have a right to redress.
Re:Disgruntled Narcissists (Score:4, Insightful)
Nope. Respecting or acknowledging you is not a contract promising servitude and deference, nor is there any implied promise that you will continue respecting somebody. And certainly if you acknowledge something today, and find out tomorrow you were wrong, you're not obligated to lie to maintain the bullshit.
That's just stupid, man. Try harder.
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If the independent parties make a business claim to respect/acknowledge the alleged narcisstst under certain circumstances, then fail to perform on the claim in a way that harms said party, he surely DOES have a right to redress.
They didn't say "Billy Mitchell absolutely cheated on his perfect Pac-Man game." They did say that since he'd been caught cheating with a few tapes he sent in, everything else COULD be suspect and should be under some level of suspicion. A lot of pro-level team sports don't do that retroactively, probably because cheating was so rampant for a time and the players' unions are strong, and there are a lot more factors at play in a team sport than an individual sport.
It's also totally fair to say that cheaters
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Only a malignant narcissist thinks he has a "right" to be respected/acknowledged by independent parties.
Actually a normal person who derives income from this respect / acknowledgement would deem they have a "right" for that independent party to not arbitrarily remove recognition.
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that independent party to not arbitrarily remove recognition.
Please describe what you mean by “arbitrarily” considering that Twin Galaxies did an investigation supported by Mitchell’s own investigator, Carlos Piniero, who concluded that original boards could not produce the animation on Mitchell’s video.
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Talk about a tempest in a 256M thumb drive.
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I think it was actually around 1kb, but it's been a long time since I looked at any of the ancient games.
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Whoa (Score:5, Funny)
I've never heard of a more shocking injustice I cared so little about!
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Re:one thing that bugs me... (Score:5, Informative)
MAME has a whole bunch of features to enable cheating. Once it's been determined it's been done on MAME, there's no easy way to rule out other modifications.
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Re:one thing that bugs me... (Score:5, Insightful)
Using Mame would be illegal as all scores were REQUIRED to be on ORIGINAL UNMODIFIED machines, which totally leaves out Mame.
It was verified that an original unmodified machine will NOT draw the 3 girders frame, despite a significant amount of time attempting to do so.
It was also verified that a version of Mame that was available at the time the tape was made WILL create the 3 girder frames.
So HOW the graphics were drawn is absolutely the point here as it proves that it was not done of an original unmodified machine, and was most likely done on Mame, which by the rules that were and are still relevant, is considered cheating and gets the lifetime ban hammer, a penalty that was stated in their regs, thus removing him from the scoreboard forever.
It's much like the cheating incident with another game that had a score that wasn't in a multiple of 5 despite the fact that the game only scores points in multiples of 5. They may not know exactly how it was faked, but they know the real thing will NEVER do that, so it's a cheat.
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So why don't they create another category for "best score on MAME"? If he didn't try and conceal this (I don't know either way) -- then why should it be considered cheating?
A guy gets a good score on a system they don't authorize -- fine. They invalidate that score. But a lifetime ban? Pretty harsh and it calls into question their integrity of scores.
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From the other comments, the terms & conditions stated the requirements ("unmodified original hardware ONLY") and punishment ("gross violation of these terms will result in deletion of all records and a lifetime ban").
Now, he could totally have played fair, and just used a PC at home out of sheer hubris. Comments about him achieving such scores during a livestream indicate he's still totally able to do so. Or he went to some random arcade and the cabinet happened to be some kind of homebrew knockoff wit
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Does it have value? (Score:1)
This kind of status seeking belongs in underground internet hacking groups, not in court. What's a stupid shallow pursuit.
Does holding a record have value - even psychological value - to the record-holder? Does the keeper of the records run a business and make promises about the accuracy of their published list of records? Did they violate their promises in the way they delisted the record-holder? If so, he was harmed. He has a right to appropriate remedies.
Is this what is alleged? If so, the court is
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Does holding a record have value - even psychological value - to the record-holder? Does the keeper of the records run a business and make promises about the accuracy of their published list of records? Did they violate their promises in the way they delisted the record-holder?
This is really the only argument the plantiff can make that I would agree with. I find this whole thing ridiculous, both that the nature of high-scores matter, and that cataloging them matters. But that said, if the plantiff and the defendants both think it matters, if the defendants market themselves on the validity of their lists, and if the defendant has proof of at least some of his achievements, then he probably has a case.
Additionally, even if some of his achievements could be challenged, that may n
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So I can see how he has a case, even if I think the whole thing is as ridiculous as trying to move a Frogger arcade machine across a busy street without losing a high score.
That seems pretty easy using a good grid-tie inverter, but I guess you could go in and supply DC voltages instead. And it would still be way more interesting than this story :)
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*woosh!* [youtube.com]
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So yes, they have very good standings to wipe him from all their records even if he's caught cheating even once.
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original unmodified machines
I dunno if "King of Kong" can be cited as evidence of anything but there was a score rejected until it was demonstrated on a Twin Galaxies machine due to the difficulty of actually proving the "unmodified" part. In the film it seems like dickish goalpost shifting, but there have been numerous occasions where people have been using, knowingly or not, machines with different base clocks that lead to higher than average scoring potential. Arcade hardware is like that. You buy a vintage Donkey Kong from an arca
Some people have a life. And make things. (Score:3)
Others ... well ... it's this or watching sports/stars.
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A position as self-indulgent as any.
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And being really good at something suddenly means someone has no life. Seriously you could just say how insanely jealous you are. No need to show us all your pettiness.
Two words... (Score:4, Funny)
GAME OVER
Nerd vs. Capitalist (Score:2)
Really Twin Galaxies? (Score:4, Insightful)
"It is not necessary to hire lawyers and threaten Twin Galaxies", "There will be no retraction or reinstatement".
So what they are saying is it is necessary to hire lawyers and threaten.
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Actually, if you've lost a case and you're being ordered to eat mint chocolate chip ice cream to embarrass you instead of placing a fine on you that would ruin your life, it might be legal and survive appeal.
Whereas, ordering to reinstate the scores would lose on appeal, because it directly impacts the business and public reputation of the company in a way that implicates the first amendment.
You cannot legislate an opinion. (Score:2)
Twin Galaxies publishes their opinion on what constitutes a record. You cannot legally demand that their opinion reflect what you desire it to be.
But you CAN legislate its publication (Score:2)
The George Costanza credo "It's not a lie if you believe it" doesn't actually apply to the actual law. If the courts say what you honestly believe is slander or libel, and you publish it anyway, then you are very much on the hook for the legal consequences.
Not say that this happened in this case, but don't go thinking that "doubling down" on an untruth (as Trump loves to do) is some sort of complete evasion.
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No they are saying that is their defense argument, what the courts can or will impose is still open.
Incidentally that's completely irrelevant since you're talking about a different thing that I was. Specifically the guy asked Twin Galaxies to review this in the past and they said they won't. Then he lawyered up and they did while at the same time saying he didn't need to lawyer up. We covered this previously.
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No they are saying that is their defense argument, what the courts can or will impose is still open.
No. They are limits to what a court can impose. Practical limits. If a wife cheated on a husband with his brother, can a court impose that the husband gets to sleep with the wife's sister. Clearly no.
Incidentally that's completely irrelevant since you're talking about a different thing that I was. Specifically the guy asked Twin Galaxies to review this in the past and they said they won't. Then he lawyered up and they did while at the same time saying he didn't need to lawyer up. We covered this previously
Again you are still missing the point: They are not saying you can't sue for any reason; you can. What they are saying is it is highly unlikely that even if he wins he will be reinstated. And that's IF.
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If a wife cheated on a husband with his brother, can a court impose that the husband gets to sleep with the wife's sister.
Clearly the correct approach would be to cut the wife in half so that both brother and husband have an equal share.
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What they are saying is that he cheated, and by definition that is defamation - and when lawyers can get involved.
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They will still need to prove it in court.
It's a Game... (Score:1)
Re: It's a Game... (Score:2)
Back when baseball was just the local kids playing stick ball every summer. Now it's a multimillion dollar industry and baseball is no longer fun. Obviously no one could possibly enjoy playing it anymore. Nobody has fun watching it with all that money tied up into it. Let's call the whole thing off.
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FINISH HIM! (Score:2)
I'd question the integrity of Twin Galaxies (Score:2)
They lost all credibility when they started accepting Pacman scores/times that take advantage of bug (ghost pass-through.)
Billy comes off as a bit of a jerk but Twin Galaxies is worse.
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Regardless of the slant of the "King of Kong" documentary, I agree wholeheartedly that these people are a special kind of jerks. :) I found Mitchell to be one of those high school folks desperately clinging to the past (in his case, high scores) and trying everything to cash in on it (hot sauce ventures, etc.)
The problem with all this is the planet has moved on, with some tiny exceptions. No one seems to care either way about Mitchell's success, past or present. But the last one to noice is Billy Mitchell.