OREGON MAN SETS ALL-TIME 5TH PLACE 'ASTEROIDS' ARCADE RECORD WITH 12.7M !!
by Robert Mruczek
As reported March 17th, 2004
Hello fellow gamers:
In the history of recorded video game world records, no other record is as unique as that on the classic Atari game 'Asteroids' according to the Twin Galaxies Intergalactic Scoreboard. And the reason for that is simple. It is the oldest, unbeaten world record in our database, after more than 22 years of compiling and tracking world records on classic arcade, home console, pinball, hand-held and PC-based titles.
In fact, the prospect of attempting this particular record is so daunting that Twin Galaxies wasn't sure any gamer would even think about it. Scott Safran, the recognized world record holder, set his mark of more than 40 million points more than 20 years ago. Twin Galaxies estimates that Scott's game lasted approximately 72-80 hours in duration, as some aspects of his achievement are no longer recoverable due to a loss of Twin Galaxies records nearly as many years ago.
And now, more than 20 years later, another intrepid gamer set out to make his mark in the game of 'Asteroids', and in the annals of video game history. William Carlton, who hails from Oregon in the USA, set forth on the day of November 29th, 2003, at 12:15pm Oregon-time,
to boldly attempt this marathon task within the confines of 'Ground Kontrol' located in Portland, Oregon in the USA, which boasts such classic arcade titles such as 'Asteroids', 'Space Invaders', 'Missile Command', 'Ms Pacman', 'Joust', 'Star Wars', 'Donkey Kong Junior' and others, from what I can tell from the background noises as William played his marathon.
Marathon...that is the term that Twin Galaxies assigns to such attempts, as it appropriately describes what gamers that play the same video game credit for 12 or more hours are engaged in.
For starters, let me state that I actually received William's tapes (all four of them) more than three months ago. Due to the quality of the images, it was virtually impossible for me to accurately determine what his final score was. This was compounded by the fact that the displayed score 'Asteroids' will turn-over or roll-over, as the arcade expression
goes, at 100,000 points, meaning William was intent on doing this nearly 400 times during an estimated 3 day period. And consider if you will, that the average player has problems passing even the first 100K mark. Like I said, quite a daunting prospect.
I eventually discussed the situation with William, who luckily sent me a copy of the entire performance, which (as it turned out) lasted until 3:34.26pm on November 30th, or in other words, was 27 hours, 19 minutes and 26 seconds in duration. The second set was received, and
I only just recently completed annotating the entire run, re-watching it all over again. As chief referee for Twin Galaxies, it was my responsibility to do so, plus after what William went through, that was the least I could do !!
After completing the viewing and logging of his performance, I was able to determine his incontrovertible, final score as being 12,756,970 points, bringing him to 5th place on the Twin Galaxies all-time high score list for this title. But William's game did not come to an end due to fatigue. It ended when the game itself let him down. Somehow, for reasons not yet clear to us, the game physically came to an end. The graphics disappeared off the screen, the sound ended, and his world record attempt came to an unexpected conclusion. It is a little known fact that in this particular title, if you reach 257 ships in storage that your game will 'crash', yet few players have ever been able to reach that seemingly unattainable reserve goal. But being that he was past the previous extra ship mark (12.750M), that was clearly not the cause.
William is fully intend on attempting this yet again at some point. But for now, with the 2nd Edition of the Twin Galaxies Book of Records being prepared, he at least has made his mark.
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THE INTERVIEW
I had an opportunity to speak with William concerning his attempt, from his initial inquiry as to the proper settings and how to go about submitting a marathon performance to Twin Galaxies, and through the conclusion. Along the way, he provided some interesting historical information.
TG - Why did you do this ?
WC - I was informed about the Twin Galaxies website in early 2003. This was my incentive. Later, I pictured starting a gamer movement to break all records no matter how old and to do it on tape !! I've always known I could do this, but thanks to the game room 'Ground Kontrol' they helped make it possible.
TG - In what way ?
WC - 'Ground Kontrol' takes gaming seriously, and will go out of their way to help an interested gamer set a record. Plus the staff genuinely appreciates video games.
TG - Why this game ?
WC - Well, I can't do the marathon thing on every game. Of the few games that I can play forever, 'Asteroids' has the biggest name. There is another big-name Atari game from the 80's that I may attempt in the future.
TG - You've achieved a 5th place ranking on the all-time list. What do you ultimately hope to accomplish ? WC - If I can make it to at least 3rd place on my next attempt, I may put out a DVD showing different sections of the game with some extra footage.
TG - Sounds cool. As the man of the hour, anything else you wish to say ?
Wc - I would like to thank the owners of 'Ground Kontrol' for this opportunity, especially Anthony Ramos for maintaining the 'Asteroids' machine during the weeks leading up to the attempt. It would not have lasted as long or been possible without his help. Thank you, Twin Galaxies, for keeping all the records for all these years, and to the TG staff for providing advice over the phone on how to record and submit my marathon attempt before I began. Also, I'd like to thank a sponsor of mine who wrote the book 'Billiards on Broadway' available at www.1stbooks.com
I would also like to thanks Brian & Bill for teaching me to play 'Asteroids' marathon-style. Allan for acting as my chauffer, as I was in no condition to drive home !! Orlando, Doug, Jim, Chris, Jayson, Radcliff, Melissa & Scott for keeping me playing games for all these years. And of course, my Mom & Dad.
And finally, fellow gamers, here now is his performance recap, from the very beginning !!
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THE PATH TO VICTORY
12:14pm (Nov 29th, 2003) - William's buddies ready his video camera and ensure that it is properly fixed on the game screen. When they give him the green light, he holds up 'The Coin', the quarter that will hopefully enshrine him into video game history. It is inserted into the game, and the
timer is 12:14.54, and his friends count down 5...4...3...2...1 and the start button is pushed at exactly 12:15.00pm on the video camera timer display. His performance begins.
12:15.15pm - Amazingly, William loses a life almost immediately. He exclaims 'Not even 1,000 points !!'.
William loses his 2nd life at approx 25K, and leaves the 1st stage after 52K. He employs a strategy known as 'hunting', which for this particular title is a technique allowed under Twin Galaxies rules governing 'Asteroids' for many years now. In short, the gamer saves one or more rocks and drifts about waiting for the appearance of the 'command ship', which is worth either 200 points for the slow large ship, or 1,000 points for the smaller, faster ship. When the last rock of a given stage is destroyed, another wave appears, this time with more rocks than before up to a certain point.
Then, the gamer has approximately 30 seconds to clear off as many rocks as they can before the next 'command ship' appears. And unlike the 'command ship' in the classic title 'Space Invaders', these ships shoot back !!
12:25.38pm - the 100K barrier is broken, and the score turns-over for the first time this game. Before his game would come to an abrupt end, William would roll-over the score an additional 126 more times.
Before I continue with the next barriers broken, William's 3rd, 4th and 5th loss of ships came at 107K, 108K and 109K respectively. Twin Galaxies so often tracks some titles based on the first 5 lives that I felt it necessary to include this information in my report.
12:37.30pm - the 2nd roll-over at 200K occurs.
01:08.11pm - the half-million barrier is broken
01:31.30pm - William passes the 700K mark. Several minutes later at approx 740K, his row of reserve ships occupies half the distance from one end of the screen to the other.
02:04.18pm - the 1M barrier is passed !! William's score becomes one that is 7-digits in total, but this is just the beginning.
Through this point in his performance, he is averaging about 100K every 11 minutes, a pace that, if sustained, would mean he would have to play close to 78 more hours to reach Scott's mark. But if there's one thing I have learned from my own personal experience with video game marathons, including knowing other players who have done this before, it is that when a player is 'resolved' to perform a marathon, little can stand in their way other than what they have no control over.
In the past, marathons have come to premature conclusions for a number of reasons...power-outages, game-failure (either the controls, buttons or the machine itself), gamers succumbing to exhaustion,
and in a few rare (and distasteful) cases, someone pulling the plug on the gamer.
'Asteroids' is a title that is very conducive to marathoning. The player has the capacity to earn up to 256 extra ships in storage (a 257th would be disastrous, as I mentioned earlier), and with some clever strategy, it is possible to minimize the number of ships lost during a 'rest period'. Under
strict Twin Galaxies guidelines governing marathons as they now stand, a player is allowed to take up to 15 minutes in 'breaks' every 3 hours...providing their entire gameplay duration meets or exceeds 12 hours in length. Considering William's rate of point-acquisition, and rate of ship-loss during the few breaks that I carefully monitored for ship loss statistics, he averages approx 7-10 ships lost per minute, and gains approx 1 ship per minute. Based on how many ships he might be able
to accumulate during his performance, he is hardly in danger of running out of ships once he reaches a certain point...providing fatigue does not set in.
03:22.22pm - score just passed the 1.7M mark, and for the first time this game, William has achieved a full row of reserve ships. For gamers who have never seen an 'Asteroids' master at work, this is truly an impressive sight. I don't know the exact number myself, but somewhere between 50-60 ships are all in a row from left-to-right. Extra reserves beyond the displayed amount are kept in memory. Years back, when we used to gather after school to play the game, we took one look at the screen and the number of extra ships present. Anything more than 6 and we knew we had a wait, but if we saw a half-completed row across the top, we didn't even bother putting our quarters down to wait for our turn. We just picked another game. One kid in high school did this on almost a daily basis. Why, we never knew, as he always had to go back to school when lunch hour ended. But at least it freed up the other games !!
03:57.00pm (even) - the 2M barrier is broken. Still a long way to go, but William is on pace at approx 1M points every 2 hours.
04:57.51pm - reaches 2.5M points
06:00.02pm - the 3M barrier is passed. The pace slowed due to a one or two bathroom breaks along the way.
07:43.46pm - passed the 3.9M mark. William is currently being interviewed while he is playing and provides such responses as what he's been eating during his performance (his secret is 'Peanut butter and jelly
and fruit, nothing too heavy'...though I'm not sure if he ate them at the same time or not), and also where he was in the game ('I don't know what my score is right now, and I also don't know how many
ships I have'). He is about to explain to the interviewer what the objective(s) of 'Asteroids' is, but it is time for his buddy to stop tape 1 and insert tape 2. I missed what he said by the time the second
tape was inserted.
07:55.56pm - the 4M mark is reached. 'Welcome to tape 2', William says a few minutes later. He's a very conscientious gamer and whenever possible points to the screen with each roll-over of the score, and periodically 'talks' to the camera for the benefit of the historical recording of his attempt.
09:57.46pm - reaches the 5M mark. Not many other players have, mind you. And reaching 10 hours into his attempt.
12:03.03am - officially November 30th, 2003, he reached the 6M mark
12:14.47am - just about 12 hours into his now-definite marathon attempt, his score is 6.1M
02:13.33am - the 7M mark is passed...still on-par with a 1/2 M per hour pace
03:18.26am - reaches 7.5M...and a few minutes later at 3:29.23am announces that it's time to switch to tape number 3 in the series.
04:23.15am - asks his friends to put on some 'Stone Temple Pilots' music to help keep him awake and I guess entertained as well...not that playing the same game of 'Asteroids' for 16+ hours wasn't enough !!
A few seconds later, at 04:24.30am, he passes the 8M mark.
06:22.18am - the 9M mark is reached, though SLIGHTLY behind pace of 1M per two hours by about 7 minutes.
06:50.50am - for the benefit of the statisticians out there, at this precise moment, an even 9,200,000 is reached...the only time this entire game that this happens, where the score rolls-over to '00', which looks oddly out of place when seen next to an entire row of reserve ships.
08:43.19am - not sure what you were doing at this time back then, but William's score just passed the impressive 10M barrier, a feat even fewer gamers have achieved. After all, playing the same game credit for 20 hours is no small feat in and of itself !! His rate of point acquisition for the past million points has slowed, from 100K in approx 11 minutes to approx 14 minutes, largely due to a few much needed (and allowable) breaks under Twin Galaxies rules governing marathon gameplay.
11:09.57am - reaches the 11M mark. He's now talking to someone about how on the internet he found a bundle of web pages dedicated to the arcade game 'Asteroids' and how now, he's 'gonna be on ALL of them !!' once his mission is accomplished.
11:14.47am - tape (3) comes to an end, resuming at 11:15.19am, 23 hours after his marathon began.
11:25.11am - 11.1M - I thought this was amusing...all those 'one's'. Now if he did this about 14 minutes earlier, that would have been really scary, I think !!
12:15.00pm even - William's score after 24 hours of gameplay is 11,431,900 points (rounded)...a little less than a 1M per two hour pace, but close enough. After all, if it takes him an extra half-hour per day to makeup for lost points after potentially 3 days of gameplay, so be it. William won't lose any sleep over it. Pun intended !!
02:59.37pm - reached the 12.5M mark.
03:12.44pm - 12.6M points
03:27.45pm - 12.7M points
03:33.33pm (yes, exactly that !!) - 12,750,000 is passed. All those threes. Last time I saw so many was in a 'Star Trek' Next Generation' episode concerning a causality loop. I also noticed that if you treat this as a number '333333', split in half into two '333's' then add them up...whoa !! But all that just goes to show you that I must have too much time on my hands to be thinking about that.
03:34.26pm - Ironic that I should have said that, as William had no way to know how little time he had left in his game. You see, fellow gamers, the game betrayed him...it let him down. Somehow, at a final score of 12,756,970 points, in the beginning few seconds of a new wave, the display just 'disappeared'. Kaput, punto finale. 'Game over, man...game over !!', as Bill Paxton said in 'Aliens' in perhaps my favourite line from that movie.
William stared at the screen for a few seconds while his friends were still talking in the background, and no one seemed to know what to make out of it. The red light was still on the console, yet no picture of sound was detectable. He shook the game a few times, and then, after accepting what apparently had just happened, said (and I quote) 'And THAT'S how you get fifth place. FIFTH place !! Number five of ALL TIME !!'
He left his place at the game where he had just spent the last 27+ hours, and his friends checked it out. 'Sounds like it crashed', one of them said.
And so, fellow gamers, we see before us a rare example of where man outlasted machine.
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AFTERTHOUGHTS
I called William on Monday, March 15th, nearly four months after his marathon gameplay attempt, to let him know that his final score was under 13M after very close scrutiny. My findings were meticulously documented, and other than maybe the last 10's-digits of his score, his final outcome was definitely 12,756,9x0 points. I am 99% sure it's a '7', but more importantly I am positive it's 12.756M points.
William is deadset on trying this again at some point, and I wish him well when he does, and will be there for another verification when that happens.
In the history of Twin Galaxies, many marathons have taken place on a variety of titles. Yet amazingly, in all of years 2002 through 2003 combined, only a few verified marathons on arcade machines were accomplished. That is because the premise, and daunting outlook for attempting such a performance, is enough to turn away all but the most tenacious and hard-core of gamers. Just like the road-race that bears the name 'marathon', a video game marathon involves a lot of preparation, a few smaller-duration 'trial runs', and a little luck never hurts at all. In William's case, he had 2 out of the 3 going for him in the closing moments.
Twin Galaxies would like to congratulate William on his outstanding achievement and his time-honoured attempt at setting his own video game marathon world record. Can William reach Scott's mark ? Only time will tell, but we are confident that when he is ready, he will give it another go. And we will be there to proudly track his outcome.
Those interested may contact William at 'asteroidsmaster@yahoo.com'.
Robert
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Robert T Mruczek
Twin Galaxies - Editor and Chief referee
Star Wars classic arcade marathon champion
Robert Mruczek (work E-MAIL)