As I'm now starting to get back into my DK Quest for the Kill Screen, I wanted to document my progress, lack thereof, or just the general madness of trying it in the first place.
Who am I? Well, "retro" gaming and I came of age at the same time. I was 10 during the summer of 1981, and I think that's around when my local skating rink got the area's first DK machine. But it was Set 2, so the I learned the game using the ladder trick to keep barrels from dropping on my head. I was short for my age, and my dad had actually made me a custom footstool, so I could see high enough to play. I was the first at the rink to hit 100,000. I remember the sheer luck in getting by the freaking elevators at last. I think at that time, the strategy was somehow wait for 4 straight springs after she screams "help", and go after the 4th. Of course, it only worked when you randomly got lucky. I was the only person to top 200,000, which was probably the middle of '82 when I was 11.
I loved DK from the start - the music, the color scheme, the physics. Everything was perfect. The arcade inside the rink had maybe 20 machines by then, and they were golden - Scramble, Wizard of Wor, Gorf, Pac and Ms Pac, Asteroids, Space Invaders, Star Wars Cockpit, Ladybug, Mr. Do!, to name a few. DK was the only one I was putting my quarter on for next game, and putting my quarters in, in hopes of advancing.
So, here we were 3 or so years ago, when I found DKF, and found there was a lot of method to the DK madness. OF course, it's not a patterned, predictable game, but there are patterns of behavior and certain actions can be influenced. Reading Spring Theory was a revelation. Aside from that, starting to watch Wes, Robbie, Dean, and others play every day was the best way to learn what to do and what not to do.
I'm often a goal-driven person (I'm a Federal IT project manager in my spare time), so my goal became KILLSCREEN OR BUST. I've managed to get over 540k so far, but haven't had much time to play over the past couple of years. I've had two kids graduate from high school and start college, and work has become increasingly demanding as we're all expected to do more with less.While I've enjoyed Crap Tourneys, IGBYs, and others, I'm focusing more on DK, now that those are dying off.
My biggest problem is finding the time and environment conducive to getting better. I'm in a house with my daughter and son right now, a wife, and SEVEN cats. Invariably, my wife needs something every 20 minutes, or like today, a cat will jump up in front of the monitor when I'm cruising along at 250k. If I can't find a way to get some uninterrupted time, I will never make any progress.
So, today's adventure was working on getting better Starts. I was cruising along at 85k, just starting the pies, when I made a bad decision and died at the top. That would have been a decent start for me (115-120 maybe).
I found out about the MGL starting up again, so I went to Crazy Kong - I haven't played since I kill screened it last year. Happy with my 334,400, mostly because 2 deaths were direct results of one of the damn cats jumping on the desk and standing in front of the monitor. Once my son goes to college, i'm moving my stuff upstairs to be ALONE, which should help.
As for strats and problems, I'm doing really well learning. I still have some issues on Lvl 4, for some reason, and I still have some issues on the 3rd girder from the top on barrel boards. For the most part, though, I've learned the hard jumps, what to do in certain complicated situations, and how to survive just about anything survivable. Watching the giants play has done that for sure.
I try to stream whenever I'm doing DK runs, so please stop on in, and if you have any advice at all (other than "quit, you'll never do it"), I'd love to hear it.
Tim
