Week 1: Those Games We Play.......King of Kong

That video clip/movie that we got to watch in class was so great; it was a great example about the games we play. It really got down to the nitty gritty about the ins and outs of video games. Especially in regards to what people go through to be the best they can be out there. Especially in the one and great video out there: “Donkey Kong” (where you climb up ladders and fight the monkey to save the lady, and earn all those great points/high scores).

And watching the villain “Billy Mitchell", mess around with the good guy “Steve Wiebe". Billy came off as such a prejudice jerk (Similar to being the monkey-Kong) and Steve is a really simple nice guy (like Mario-the hero in the game). Billy also comes off like he thinks he is such a Hero (like Superman or Mario). When in reality he was really such a self-centered person (like Kong) who thought that the rules didn't apply towards his playing.

Look at Steve; who had such low esteem about himself and ten getting laid off from his job at Boeing (where he was an Engineer, he then later went on to become a Science Teacher). With video game playing, he found something that he felt good at (he used his math and engineer skills) and was very good at, thus he built up his confidence in himself and went on to bypass Billy's high score and that "Jerk (Billy of course) tried to make it seem like Steve had cheated, and worked on getting the officials from Twin Galaxies not to accept it.

Billy has his great friend and protégé "Brian Kuh" to go investigate it (where they discover the board was provided by “Roy Shildt, who is Billy’s nemeses for years/unknown to Steve of course). They work it till they get Twin Galaxies to state that "No video entries are valid". (But, hmmm how did Billy enter his; "Wow via video" and they took it as gold, even when there was all that fuzziness on it)
This man "Billy", wears interesting ties (that everyone think that they are betokening American Patriotism) all though the video (these actually stem from his 1999 race to become the first person to achieve a perfect score of Pac-Man-I discovered this fact during my research on this video) he is portrayed through the movie is as an over bearing "King of Video's" with a wife that is slightly well endowed. Then there is Steve; poor man who lost his job, and is so stressed out on making something of himself and taking care of his family, his wife is running around all stressed out chasing Steve and their children all over the place. And even with all the head games and such done on Steve, he made it to the top. While interestingly; Billy's kids are never really seen in the video nor does he ever really play at the championship play off's.
With all that Steve Wiebe had to go through just to be recognized as one of the "Top Video Game/Donkey Kong Player's it's a amazing show of faith and determination of what someone can do if they want to. He fought hard and got his place in the spotlight, even through was just brief moment in time. Because of course “Billy Mitchell" had to rush out and proof that he was the King of Video Playing. And imagine this, he (Billy) was allowed to enter in a video of his playing and accomplishing the higher score. Wasn't it interesting how fuzzy and not realistic like that the video was and hmmm, they had of course accepted it as a valid entry and score.
But, the ending of the video was the best of all; it showed that there are still some honest people out there in the world. When Wiebe learned that the Guinness World Records wants to publish several Twin Galaxies records-including Mitchells latest score, and he gather his family travel all the way to Hollywood Florida, near Mitchells home to challenge him in a public competition. But, of course Mitchell refused to accept it and Wiebe failed to surpass a million points (he went ahead and played anyway). And Day (the head of Twin Galaxies), went ahead and finally acknowledges Wiebe's integrity and credibility. Posting his (Wiebes) scores and making him officially a high score contender in the game of "Donkey Kong". Giving him the credit he deserved and had for a long time.
The rivally between Billy Mitchell and Steve Wiebe continues on even in today’s world. Wiebe has made four (4) well published attempts at regaining the Donkey Kong title. They were on 08/19/2007, 03/06/2008, 07/17/2008, and the most current one was 10/2008 at the 2008 E for All Expo, where he was close in regaining the title (he scored 1,00,200 in front of a large public crowd-making this the 2nd time a 1 million point score has been made in public). Steve is planning on attempting again to beat Billy's record (and regain the title) at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) 2009 on June 2nd, 2009 from the Los Angeles Convention Center.
The event will be officiated by Twin Galaxies Rep's and will be on National Cable Television. They will be on-hand for this historic first time live airing on national television of a World Record attempt, and will be airing on the G4 Network.
Twin Galaxies is the official scorekeeping organization for the world of video and pinball games! Recognized as such by Guinness World Records, numerous films and television shows, and the

Twin Galaxies is the official scorekeeping organization for the world of video and pinball games. And they are recognized as such by Guinness World Records.