Twin Galaxies is the official supplier of video game scores to the Guinness World Records books.
Twin Galaxies is the world authority on player rankings, gaming statistics and championship tournaments, with pinball statistics dating from the 1930s and video game statistics from the early 1970s.
OUR HISTORY
In 1951, Sir Hugh Beaver, then the managing director of the Guinness Brewery, realised that a book supplying the answers to this sort of question might prove popular. He was right!
Guinness World Records Takes Over Funspot
After four furious days of classic gaming, gamers from across the globe achieved record after record at the Tenth Annual Classic Videogame and Pinball Tournament at Funspot, the world’s largest arcade, in Laconia, New Hampshire, USA. With over 160 gamers competing to set new Guinness World Records, it was an unprecedented day of record breaking achievements. With far more attempts being made than adjudicators present, gamers relied on videotapes and witnesses to record their attempts, ensuring they are held up to the strictest Guinness World Records guidelines. As these tapes are watched, new records will be announced, and Guinness World Records and Twin Galaxies judges estimate the total number of records broken to be well over 20.
Attending his 10th Funspot tournament, Patrick Laffaye from Westport, Connecticut turned in the highest profile performance of the weekend, taking over the crown for the highest score on the classic game Frogger. Patrick’s attempt took nearly four hours to complete, and his 599,110 points put him within a few flies of the mythical 600,000 point mark.
Another classic title, Wizard of Wor, saw its previous record shattered, as Joshua Powell, traveling all the way from Illinois to showcase his talents in front of an official Guinness World Records judge, doubled the previous Wizard of Wor record, scoring 478,600 points on the seven man setting.
Both titles appear in the Guinness World Records: Gamer’s Edition 2008 list of the top 100 arcade games of all time.
The main event of the weekend saw Tony Temple, the current world record holder for Missile Command try and best his phenomenal score of 1,967,830 points. After flying across the globe from Derbyshire, England, the waves of attackers proved too tough, but Tony still provided the attendees with the rare opportunity to see the points roll back to zero as he tallied numerous million+ point games.
Another rarely seen achievement came from an unheralded source. To many gamers, Funspot is synonymous with the film The King of Kong, and while neither Billy Mitchell nor Steve Wiebe could attend this year, the spirit of the film lived on as Scott Kessler, a newcomer to the Donkey Kong scene, having only started playing the game last August, became the third person ever to achieve a kill screen in the classic game, essentially beating the game by progressing further than the programmers ever thought any person could. While Scott’s score did not set a new world record, the gaming world definitely has a new Donkey Kong contender in its midst.
As the tapes are reviewed and the scores are updated, Guinness World Records will continue to provide even more news from this historical record setting weekend.
For arcade game high scores, and countless other facts and figures from the videogame industry, from its beginnings until today, purchase the the all-new Guinness World Records: Gamer's Edition 2008, the first Guinness World Records book devoted solely to the world of gaming, is on shelves now and bursting with new records, high score statistics and fascinating facts.
03rd June 2008