Author Topic: Harder million point game, DKJr or DK3 TG Arcade settings? (Read 7588 times)

homerwannabee · « **on:** March 12, 2016, 11:10:10 am »

I have always thought Donkey Kong 3 on Hard settings is easier to get one million on than Donkey Kong Junior, but while watching Wes Copeland's replay he made mention to the fact he felt Donkey Kong 3 was harder to get one million on what is called Hard on MAME, and level (3) on Arcade on (marathon) settings which is three men to start, and an extra every 30,000 points up to one million. Ben Falls also thought getting one million was harder to do than getting one million on Donkey Kong Junior. I have also heard Mike Kasper say this as well.

So I was wondering how my fellow Donkey Kong forum people thought about the whole thing?

WCopeland · « **Reply #1 on:** March 12, 2016, 02:00:48 pm »

DKJr 1m in my opinion is a much lower bar than DK3 Hard Difficulty 1m.

Here's the best way I can explain it. If we think of DK 1m as being a 10/10 learning curve (not to say it's the highest curve of anything at all ever, we just need a baseline of comparison), then I'd say DKJr is a 3/10 and DK3 Hard is a 5/10.

I'd love to see a "superfecta" badge with the following requirements and reasoning:

DK 1.1m
Obvious benchmark for what is considered "high level play" in modern terms. A 1.1m score requires basic understanding and execution of all "modern" barrel strategies, strong decision making in all boards of the game, and willingness to push the boundaries of a start score beyond the basic 100k.

DKJr 1.3m
This is, in my opinion, the equivalent of a DK 1.1m for DKJr. Strong understanding of the strategies, basic patterns, common pattern variations, and ability to react to strategical novelties is required to get a score like this.

DK3 (Hard) 2.5m
This is an extremely high benchmark, but I believe it filters out people like myself using the "underachiever" strat of powering through every single blue screen. A 2.5m score, like the other DK benchmarks above, shows that the player has mastery of every screen and difficulty benchmark throughout the entire game.

ChrisP · « **Reply #2 on:** March 12, 2016, 02:50:49 pm »

Quote from: WCopeland on March 12, 2016, 02:00:48 pm

DKJr 1.3m
This is, in my opinion, the equivalent of a DK 1.1m for DKJr. Strong understanding of the strategies, basic patterns, common pattern variations, and ability to react to strategical novelties is required to get a score like this.

Better idea (IMO): 1M with spark-leeching completely banned.

A huge part of the stigma around this game is the tedious, almost skill-less aspect of point-pressing the hideout. Make people actually work for their points with fruit smashes and it makes the score (and I would say the game itself) a lot more respectable. Plus, it would make for a shorter and (much) more fun and exciting run!

ChrisP · « **Reply #3 on:** March 12, 2016, 03:49:03 pm »

oh, I didn't give my answer to your question.

I would say which one's harder between Junior and DK3 is kinda apples and oranges.

Games that give you a fixed number of lives are hard in a different way than games that give you lives at a steady drip.

"Limited lives" games are primarily a matter of staying focused and not screwing up. Games with a lot of random elements (like DK, and the chain board on Junior) add screwings and/or "much harder than they usually are" boards to the mix. Skill is actually secondary to focus in games like this. This is why you will have the raw skill/knowledge to get "x" score in DK a long time before you actually get the score (and one of the reasons why the game kinda turns me off nowadays). I'm *capable* of getting a million points, but is my brain going to be able to NOT shit its pants at least a few times over the course of two and a half hours of play? Not usually. So it's incredibly tedious to grind for scores on games like this. One distracting thought, one hand-slipped-off-the-joystick, one ridiculously hard board, and one [whatever else], and that's it. Game over, because you only get 4 chances in the 2-3 hours you'll be playing.

"Steady extras" games, though, are different, because they are more about pure skill. All you have to do is get good enough at the game to collect extra lives at a rate faster than the rate at which you lose them. Once you're at that point, you'll probably get the score that you're capable of in most of your runs. This is the beauty of that type of game, and why I've come to enjoy them more. If you make a momentary mistake or two or three, you can recover in a way that you can't in limited-lives games. If I die on the 10th board in DK3 or Robotron, it doesn't matter. If I die on the 10th board of DK or Junior, oh well, time to restart and slog through that boring grind again.

So I think DK3 1M requires the acquisition of a lot more skill, muscle memory, and reflex than DK Junior 1M, which is much more about simply learning and applying patterns. The difficulty on Junior is applying them perfectly for 80-odd boards in sequence, which is gonna come down more to how sharp your brain is that day.

syscrusher · « **Reply #4 on:** March 12, 2016, 07:09:33 pm »

I'd say DK3 (Hard) 1M is probably harder, but only at first. Once you play enough DK3, you're going to get 1M a higher percentage of times than you would DK Jr. This just goes back to the fact that DK Jr. only allows you 4 lives, as Chris mentioned. Plus, you just wanna fucking quit DK Jr. after awhile. DK3 has much more replay value.