Am I the best all around player of the 3 Donkey Kongs?

[homerwannabee]

Yeah, I have a feeling that either A) I am going to get flamed for that comment, or B) This post will sink to the bottom not being answered.

About a year and a half ago I tried to lay claim to the all around greatest of Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Junior, and Donkey Kong 3, and got a firm rebuttal against said proclamation.   But then my high score was in the 200k range for Donkey Kong, 1.161 million for Donkey Kong Junior, and 3.538 million range for Donkey Kong 3.

Well since then a lot of things have changed, and I have drastically improved all of my scores for all 3 games.   I now have a 457k score for Donkey Kong, a 1.313 million score for Donkey Kong Junior, and a somewhat absurd 8.7 million score for Donkey Kong 3.

Now here is the surprising thing.  I am less confident in proclaiming that I am the all around greatest at these 3 games.  A 457k score for Donkey Kong is decent, but I feel like I should at least hit the killscreen before I should be able to say such a thing.    We all know the most important score of the 3 Kongs is the Donkey Kong score by far!  So while mathmatically I could make a claim of being the all around best of all 3 Kongs(Percentage of all 3 scores I am, and percentage of 2 of the best 3 scores I am as well), it falls hallow because by far my weakest score of the 3 is also the strongest score of the 3.

So what do you guys think if you dare.  Do I need to get a killscreen to lay such claims?  Do I need a million point score, or even a 1.1 million score?

[ChrisP]

I think you could easily make the claim right here and now. I would agree.

The problem is DK3. There's little competition around it, and I can't think of anybody besides yourself, and perhaps Brian Allen, who plays all three games at a serious level.

At this point there are a few players at the elite level of both DK and DK Jr.: Mark, Dean, Steve Wiebe, and Billy Mitchell come to mind. If one of them took up DK3 as well you'd have some formidable competition.

[homerwannabee]

I think you could easily make the claim right here and now. I would agree.

The problem is DK3. There's little competition around it, and I can't think of anybody besides yourself, and perhaps Brian Allen, who plays all three games at a serious level.

At this point there are a few players at the elite level of both DK and DK Jr.: Mark, Dean, Steve Wiebe, and Billy Mitchell come to mind. If one of them took up DK3 as well you'd have some formidable competition.

There are a couple of other names that are known to be at least good at all 3 Kongs.   Steve Wagner has a 900K game at Donkey Kong, an over 1 million game at Donkey Kong Junior, and at least a 1.5 million game on I think easy settings on Donkey Kong 3.  I think Steve could easily go higher on DK3 because he usually quits his games before losing all his men when it comes to Donkey Kong 3.

Ben Falls has a million point donkey kong game, a Donkey Kong Junior Killscreen, and actually got 1.3 million on Donkey Kong 3 easy settings in 1 hours time.

Dean Saglio as well as being the Donkey Kong record holder is also very good at Donkey Kong Junior.  I think he has a 800,000 point Donkey Kong Junior game, and a 1.1 million Donkey Kong 3 game on medium MAME settings.

So yeah, they do exist


One more thing.  Before I came along in the scene there were 3 different people who were seriously thinking about going after the Donkey Kong 3 record.  They stopped pursuing the record for various reasons, and the former record holder contemplated getting the record back until I played in front of him.  That for whatever reason seemed to kill his ambitions in the game.

[ChrisP]

OK. So it looks like those three are good examples of contenders.

The problem is being able to compare the scores of the three games, since they're all so different. I don't know how one would go about doing that...

Obviously you have them beat at DK Jr. and buried at DK3, so the question is whether their DK games balance it out. Hmm.

[marinomitch13]

Well, actually, George doesn't have Mark beat on DKjr.

Are TG settings for DK3 the 'easy' settings? I'm not familiar enough with the game to know, but those are the settings Ben has been playing on. It only took him like 3-4 days to get up to 1.3m/hr pace on DK3 on TG settings, so I imagine if he wanted to he could get very good at marathoning it too.

[homerwannabee]

Well, actually, George doesn't have Mark beat on DKjr.

Are TG settings for DK3 the 'easy' settings? I'm not familiar enough with the game to know, but those are the settings Ben has been playing on. It only took him like 3-4 days to get up to 1.3m/hr pace on DK3 on TG settings, so I imagine if he wanted to he could get very good at marathoning it too.

Easy settings are not Twin Galaxies settings. Twin Galaxies settings are two notches ahead of easy settings.  The 1.3 million is not on Twin Galaxies settings.  Also he played this game last tournament, and tried to prepare for it as well, and so the 3-4 days thing is a little off. 

[marinomitch13]

Have you watched Ben play on twitch? He was pretty insistent that he was on TG settings, and he got over 1.3m/hr probably a half dozen times while I was watching. He may have played the game a little bit before this last CADGC tourney when he started to practice for it, but I can at least say he got *significantly* better in just a matter of days. When he started I don't believe he was even making it the whole hour. If Ben sees this, he can correct me if I am wrong on anything. I'm almost certain Ben would be good at marathoning this game if he put some more time into it (maybe less risky pressing would have to be practiced for the marathon -since he was playing hard for the hour score).

[syscrusher]

All my tournament practice sessions were on default, which is not the TG setting.  I played one game offline on medium difficulty just to see how much harder it was and got 1.3M.  The difference is definitely noticeable.

[marinomitch13]

Ah... I was confused then. I keep assuming that default settings would be TG settings. Why is this not so for DK3?

[homerwannabee]

Ah... I was confused then. I keep assuming that default settings would be TG settings. Why is this not so for DK3?

I talked to Mark Alpiger about this, and this is what he told me.   He basically said that the manual does not state whether easy settings are default settings, and that usually video games back in the day were defaulted to medium. 

Here is where it gets super confusing.  MAME Twin Galaxies settings is NOT Arcade Twin galaxies settings.  Arcade settings are on what MAME would call Hard.  Medium, and what MAME would call hard are much harder to tell a difference, but a difference is still there.  It's about a 3 to 2 scoring ratio difference while MAME medium, and MAME easy is about a 2 to 1 ratio difference in scoring.

Now here is where I stand on this.  I would really would wish the settings were on easy settings.  These machines are old, and I worry that they may not fully recognize when a switch has been turned on or not.  Also the dip switches are super small, and I could see someone getting setting g(medium) confused with setting h.  Part of me wonders if the score I set at the Kong Off II was actually on setting g.   I was practicing before hand, and the highest I got on Keyboard on MAME hard was 6.1 million.  Yes, when I play with the joystick I tend to do much better, but I wasn't expecting it to be that much better.   

Also when I did tournament settings the next day it seemed harder to me.   This could be attributed to the fact I was exhausted from playing this game six and a half straight hours with no break whatsoever  I even asked Jourdan if he was positive the marathon settings were on the correct settings, and he seemed super sure about it, and so I left it at that.  Also, I told them before the tournament to make sure the Donkey Kong 3 settings were correct.  So I did it once before, and once after which puts my mind somewhat at ease.  Truth be told, maybe part of myself wants to prove myself again.  It's still hard for even me to believe that I put a score like that up.

If the settings for Donkey Kong 3 were on easy I wouldn't have to have any crazy doubts in my mind about this.  I really could see in the future someone playing this on the wrong easier settings.  So personally I think the record should be moved to easy.

[TheSunshineFund]

TY for mentioning me among these DK giants

[Simpsons99]

TY Chris

George needs to get his dk score alittle higher to be in that higher class for Dk Series players
But i've been there recently my self.
George will get there it's just a matter of time .  I belive in him.

I think you could easily make the claim right here and now. I would agree.

The problem is DK3. There's little competition around it, and I can't think of anybody besides yourself, and perhaps Brian Allen, who plays all three games at a serious level.

At this point there are a few players at the elite level of both DK and DK Jr.: Mark, Dean, Steve Wiebe, and Billy Mitchell come to mind. If one of them took up DK3 as well you'd have some formidable competition.

[homerwannabee]

TY Chris

George needs to get his dk score alittle higher to be in that higher class for Dk Series players
But i've been there recently my self.
George will get there it's just a matter of time .  I belive in him.

I think you could easily make the claim right here and now. I would agree.

The problem is DK3. There's little competition around it, and I can't think of anybody besides yourself, and perhaps Brian Allen, who plays all three games at a serious level.

At this point there are a few players at the elite level of both DK and DK Jr.: Mark, Dean, Steve Wiebe, and Billy Mitchell come to mind. If one of them took up DK3 as well you'd have some formidable competition.

Really, so your saying that your 687k Donkey Kong score, your 1.073 million Donkey Kong Junior score, and your 1.7 million Donkey Kong 3 score makes you in a higher class than my 457k Donkey Kong score, my 1.313 million Donkey Kong Junior score, and my 8.7 million Donkey Kong 3 Arcade score on harder settings me, and thusly makes me in a lower class than you.

Never knew that 230,000 points in difference in a non Donkey Kong killscreen game was that major.

Edit:
So yeah, you are definitely the first to even suggest that I don't even belong in the higher class of Donkey Kong series players.  Not being the best as an argument, I can understand, but to say I am not even in the upper class of Donkey Kong Series players seems to be almost an insult to me.   

Double Edit: 
Since you are a Washington native, maybe I can give you an example.  This would be like saying that Ichiro Suzuki should not be in the Hall of Fame because he doesn't have a lot of Home Runs, and Walks despite the fact that he is one of the greatest defensive Right Fielders of all time.  Has a .322 batting Average, exceptional at stealing bases, and has 10 consecutive 200 hit seasons.  Something that has never been done before.

[Simpsons99]

I say this to you as a friend .

I allso said the samething on CAG Before when this was posted.

Theres allways the topic  what if  DK3  had a KS?   Theres no way your getting 8 millon.

Or if DK,DKJR Gave free guys for  every 30k up to a Millon points without a KS?

I'm not saying your not an amazing Player.

[Simpsons99]

The way i see the top list of DK Series players

1 Marky D
2 Steve Wagner
3 Brian Allen
4 Ben Falls
5 Hank