One Man's Long, Ruthless Fight to Keep His Donkey Kong High Score
Billy Mitchell, a competitive video gamer who is best known for his perfect Pac-Man score, has threatened legal action against the Guinness World Records and Twin Galaxies scoreboard.
The record keepers removed his high scores after several people within the gaming community last year accused Mitchell of doctoring evidence of his wins.
The controversy has roiled the arcade game community.
Competitive video gamer Billy Mitchell, who once held a Donkey Kong high score record—1,062,800 points on July 31, 2010—before it was removed last year, is threatening to seek legal action against Guinness World Records and Twin Galaxies, a scoreboard that tracks video game high scores.
The legendary gamer, who is perhaps best known for being the first to play a perfect game of Pac-Man, plans to file suit if the record keepers don’t retract “defamatory statements” regarding his scores. It’s the latest move in a years-long saga that has shaken the gaming community.
“Witnesses, documents, everything will be made available to you. Nothing will be withheld,” said Mitchell said at the time of the removal in a video interview with Old School Gamer Magazine. Now, Mitchell released a 156-page evidence packet and four-page summary detailing the claim to keep his name on the Donkey Kong Forum leaderboard.
In February 2018, Donkey Kong Forum removed Mitchell’s name from their scoreboard after its moderator, Jeremy Young, brought forward evidence that the record-holder had used a separate gaming system than what was allowed by Guinness World Records rules. Mitchell was also banned from being featured on the leaderboard ever again.
Then, several days later, fellow gamer Wes Copeland alleged via Twitter that the champion had inflated his score by patching together his win from a series of separate games, per Ars Technica. Later that year, the Twin Galaxies scoreboard and Guinness World Records struck multiple of Mitchell’s high score records related to the game.
In the two years that the drama has unfolded, Mitchell’s scores have been surpassed by a number of other gamers. At this point, it’s simply a fight to remain on the leaderboard. And oh, what a fight it is.
Source: Ars Technica
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