Greetings All,
I really don't know where to start on this topic of King of Kong. But in my opinion, the movie was shaped for only one reason,......to make money... and that the film people did, the producers of TKOK sold it for $760,000 to Picture House/New Line. Well that was the obvious choice for why the movie was made, but in the duration of things, you really have to know what went on behind those scenes to get what footage they acquired.
Here are some examples.
(1)"The YOUTUBE Video"
That Youtube segment Texas GeeksTV "TGTV 003.(abridged)" implies that Steve Wiebe has the current world record, hell even on that clip Walter Day even looks/speaks like he is acknowledging, legitimizing the fact that Steve W is the new world record holder knowing full well that I officiated Billy’s achievement a full month earlier, SHAME ON WALTER, and with a certification that IMPLIES that the record was set on Aug,19 2007 when in fact, the showing of Cert in the video is when that CERT was typed, by WALTER and ONLY for Steve's previous 1.49 million attempt the world record that is now mentioned in Guinness, which the scores performance it self was questionable by some TG Refs including myself before it was approved by Walter and submitted to Guinness, but we will get into that later.....But in this video Walter for the sake of the Movie, Steve and Walters own personal gain for TG, makes it look like Steve has surpassed Billy's new world record of 1.50mil that was set in Orlando on July 13th 2007 where I was the senior Twin Galaxies ref that officiated, having that title with Twin Galaxies I don't need any video proof just my word alone for viewing the achievement and attending the event to verify it should have been enough to be recognized as a world record. Then in this (Abridged) video there is that little blurb at the end where Steve mentions that he didn't think that Billy would ply quietly, and then proceeds to say that he wanted to congratulate him on his new record not mentioning that Billy broke Steve's own high score on DK and then he says he thanks Billy for the competition with out mentioning his name, who is Steve kidding, Steve is Billy's competition, not the other way around.
(1b)Texas GeeksTv 003. (Directors Cut) makes note of the new record and Steve’s failed attempt and also gives a clearer shot at the Cert where it states that Steve made that 1.49mil on March of 2007 again not approved by myself but yet it gives a clearer shot of the whole cert, I'm glad at least they "The Texas Geeks TV" people took the time to show what was changed and made the necessary corrections in their video.
(1b)"Billy’s New World Record on DK"
I personally witnessed Billy performance LIVE at the F.A.M.B. show - "Florida Association of Mortgage Brokers" it was an 80's themed event, that was being held in Orlando where Billy achieved his 1,050,200pt score, Billy not only had me present to authenticate the attempt but he had a live feed showing his game play, and another camera on a tripod taping him sitting performing and a vcr recorder recording the game play.....AND....AND.... he sent his DK PCB off to Nintendo to have verified by an official tech rep, before the event so that is was on the correct settings and an authentic DK board, to top things off we had an impartial security firm lock and unlock the cabinet before and after his performance to have verified once again by Nintendo rep after his achievement, to show that it was the same PCB un-altered as before, this PCB was sent off personally by the security firm so no tampering would be involved with switching out PCB's. Talk about trying to legitimize ones performance.....would Steve W do that???? Who knows, and if he did I'm sure that the Picture House people would blow it up to sizable scales making it look like Twin Galaxies forced him to do so.
(2)"PICTURE HOUSE & Steve Wiebe"
Its nice to see that Picture House usually has there Q/A's after each screening of TKOK but the really strange thing is when there are people present in the audience that have knowledge of what went on behind the scenes that were filmed, that they automatically whisk Steve off the Q/A panel or Stage before he can answer any questions OR again if the Picture House people do notice someone else that appeared in the movie that’s in the audience, they just don't want those people to ask any questions and then they just don't have the Q/A at all....talk about raising an eyebrow, so what are they afraid of, possibly that their golden child isn't really all cracked up to what they allege in the movie????? Or that maybe the footage that they are showing so proudly has in fact been shaped with out an ounce of truth. Steve W knows all too well what and how they sculpted that movie and how to make him look so the viewing public will feel sorry for him, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that.
(2b) "Legitimize a Fake"
All I know is that if it were me in his shoes, I certainly wouldn't defend the fact that the movie people "Picture House & Launch Pad Productions" I.E. Seth Gordon, Ed Cunningham, had manipulated and pieced together segments to legitimize the film with, authentic footage -"Steve W's DK performance at Pompano" a legit DK board set, with pieced footage - "Steve's DK performance at his house" a questionable PCB, to make the movie more believable base on manipulated segments. Some of the segments that I’m talking about were Steve’s game play at his house being spliced with the pompano to make it look like the same continual game legitimizing Steve’s game play, because after all if you are playing on a doctored PCB board you wouldn't want that game play shown in the movie where people notice things that aren’t suppose to happen....right....
(2bb) "Stored High Score"
Here is an example, in the movie it shows Steve W turning on the power "plugging it in the wall" to his DK machine in his garage and he makes a comment after setting up his camera to tape, "its my high score - saved" it shows a 829,700pt score, "0:12:55 mark" and then the film crew zooms in a shot of his high score on the screen" well most DK gamers know that when you turn a machine on that your HS is lost and it shows only the default programmed HS, so this would indicate that maybe Steve W is playing on an altered board.
(2c)"If it were me"
Back to the IF IT WERE ME thing, my logic is this "It's my reputation that would be on the line and with all the history that I have I certainly wouldn't try to make myself more then what I am already just for the sake of 90 minutes of fame". But being that Steve W is this supposed underdog-no body and the movie wants everyone to relate to him and feel sorry for him I guess its ok in his eyes to go with the flow as the movie people tell him what to or how to act. But the truth of the matter is this, If I were the star character and I willingly knew that the movie people intentionally co-arced the movie to juice up a story just to compel the public to see it and make some money off of them, and in the same duration make one of my competitors look bad, and I mean so bad that you can tell that they added and spliced snippets together to make him look like a dirt dirtbag, I would say HELL NO, I'll just let my scores do the talking for myself at every event at any time. After all it’s about gaming competition not degrading my opponent’s home life and personal character.
(2cc) "Mis-Lead Scores"
Example, in the movie there is a segment where at the Pompano Steve Sanders is on the phone with Billy Mitchell, "1:01:34 mark" and Steve Sanders is telling Billy about some scores, the scores that he was stating were about Steve Sanders going against Donald Hayes on Joust in the order of score increments, but yet again the producers of the TKOK show it as Steve Sanders is talking about Steve Wiebes score attempts on DK, when you look at the top scores on the DK game later on in the movie that Steve W is playing none of the scores mentioned by Steve S were on the top list of the DK HS display. Again we are talking about the movie people being like illusionists, looking at one hand and doing the work with another hand, fooling the public, saying what you don't see wont hurt you mentality, but in this case what you do see hurts someone else.... put yourself in their shoes.
(3a) "Lead you on & Drive By"
Another little lead you by the nose segment is where in the latter part of the movie it shows Billy pulling up to the restaurant and meeting with Steve S, "1:06:41 mark" and the movie would make you believe that Billy doesn't want anything to do with entering the restaurant because Steve w is present, but the truth of this segment that is NOT shown was that Billy really did show up at his restaurant when Steve W was present, I have personal footage of this. Billy not only comes in to greet the group of all the gamers but Walter Day even introduces everyone including Steve W while the FILM people "Launch Pad Productions" are shooting, yes the movie people have this on tape too. The thing that gets me is , if Billy was such an a**hole or so full of himself like the film people would like you to believe, why would Billy pay for everyone’s tab at the table including Steve W's, if it were me, I sure as hell wouldn't have paid for my rival if I hated him so much as the movie portrays.
(4a) "The DK Game Play"
I'm not debating that Steve W is not a top notch DK gamer, because he is. I saw him achieve 985k at FunSpot I thought that it was pretty damn impressive considering that I've only reached around the 550k mark and the moves that Steve made in his game play were remarkable. I have also viewed Billy’s performances both by tape and live just like Steve W's, both players have decisively different tactics to attain what they achieve. But after seeing both gamers play, I have to lean more towards Billy as the superior DK gamer. My opinion is not just because I know of Billy longer, but the proof is in the pudding just watch both gamers games and make a decision on your own and then you’ll have better piece of mind. I have nothing against Steve W. but just his taped gaming submissions, they have been questionable on more then one occasion, that and the simple fact of that he knows what’s going on with the movie and doesn't speak out about it's true and untrue facts.
(5a) "The Supposed Break In"
Here is another example of lets bullsh*t'ya, In the beginning of the movie it shows both Steve W and his wife talking about the break in of their garage by two TG officials "at the "0:25:31 mark". If this were true where are the police reports of this occurrence, after all wouldn't one think that if his house or garage were indeed broke into that something would have been stolen or damaged by the intruders? Or most of all your privacy was violated. The truth here is that when Perry Rodgers and Brian Kuh showed up to the Wiebe's residence that both Perry and Brian were INVITED not forced and then lead in thru the garage entrance not the front door, by Steve’s mother-In-law and yes they were invited because the mother-in-law was feeling bad about the two sitting outside in the driveway waiting.... Ok.....with that in mind, here is something else that will blow your mind, Perry and Brian couldn't have accessed Steve's machine, as the movie would imply, the reason why they couldn't access the machine was they didn't have the key to open it, and just WHO had that key you may be asking.......Steve W..... After all it’s his machine. So waiting upon Steve's arrival, the only thing that Perry and Brian could do was just play the game, that’s if the game was set on free credits or there was a button on the game to add credits. When Steve arrived at his house, again No police report was filed and Steve did not kick out the TG officials OR should I say his guest gamers for trespassing, infact Perry, Brian and Steve had a friendly game of DK while visiting, and took photos of each other playing and having a good time. The only way that Brian or Perry could have taken inside shots of Steve's DK machine was when Steve unlocked the game and allowed them so they could take their photos, no mention of this was in the TKOK movie, why doesn't that surprise me. But let’s remember we have to keep the image of the underdog, we wouldn't want anyone to know how things really went down.
(6a) "The Walk Behind"
There is another segment in the latter part of the movie where Billy is walking with his wife behind Steve W while Steve is playing DK, the statement that Billy makes is " There are certain people that I don't want to spend too much time with" at the "1:08:43 mark" the part that the film people left out was the segment where Billy actually engaged in a short conversation with Steve behind him while Steve was playing HS DK game. Billy says something to this effect" Hello Steve, how is your game going, its good to see that your going for the record" Billy didn't want to speak too long with Steve for the fact of not wanting to disturb Steve's game play and also for the simple fact of Steve crying that Billy stood behind him too long while he was playing his DK game to steal his patterns. Which from a gamers stand point I can understand this same situation as Brian Kuh stood behind one of my Super Pac-Man games and I intentionally killed off my extra lives around 400K just so he couldn’t see my patterns after stage 36 because Brian is also a serious Sup-Pacman contender. Talk about throwing your money out the window for someone else to reap the benefits.
(7a) "Billy's infamous video tape submission"
In there is a segment where Billy is talking to Doris Self about the DK tape, he clearly says "its for only for fun" this of course is before the time frame of Billy knowing that Steve W would be attending the FunSpot event. The thing that no one knew other then Walter Day and the film crew, notice I say OTHER then Walter & the film crew, was that Steve W was attending the FunSpot event. But in the movie it suggested that the video tape was intended to take lime light away from Steve's performance intentionally while Steve is playing DK.
(7b) "The Million Point Screen Distortion"
It is perceived that the Million point mark that there was an intentional splice or doctored segment that looked like Billy had played a game of DK and sliced it with another start over, but when you look at the footage in the movie there are numerous takes on this segment.
(7c) #1 A close up of the distortion at"0:47:52" with a start score of 998,500 and after the distortion a score of 000,000 you can clearly see that the score rolled,
(7d) #2 Then there is another splice that shows a marginal distortion 0:50:08 with a start score of 15,800 and after the distortion a score of 16,000 on the screen,
(7e) #3 Yet another shows a little distortion at 0:50:19 with a start score of 26,300 and after the distortion a score of 28,600
(7f) #4 and yet another has a close up with minimal distortion at 0:50:30 with a start score of the 998,500 and after the distortion a score of 000,000,
(7g) #5 Toward the end of the movie at 1:09:23 yet another attempt at sabotaging Billy’s credibility, where again the start score is at 998,500 and a very small distortion and then the score of 000,000. Again suggesting that all of the above were the same distortion and implying that Billy faked his game.
Of course on Billy’s master copy there is no distortion I have seen that too, but after viewing the tape that was shown in the movie personally LIVE at the event among 20 or so other gamers it wasn't as bad as the movie had shown, I noticed a little bit of a tracking line but nothing to convince me that there was any tampering with a game splice or that a fraudulent score was made.
(8) "The mysterious phone call"
There is a segment where Steve W is in his garage and supposedly talking to Billy, but in this segment at "0:59:15" you can clearly see that there have been 3 edit splices where Steve was talking into the phone, but yet you hear no Billy on the other side, so tell me this why is it in most of the film, the film makers always bugged the phone to get both sides of a supposed conversation, but in this one particular scene there is only a one sided conversation. You would think that if Steve was really talking to Billy that they certainly would want to have that conversation on tape.....or is it like this that maybe ....just maybe... Steve was talking to Billy and that Billy only had good things to say to Steve about the upcoming competition and event and that the film makers didn't want the viewing public to hear how Billy really was.....maybe a nice guy...
(9) "The Drop off scene"
In this scene at 1:01:06 we have Billy dropping off Steve S with Walter at the front door to the event in Pompano asking Steve S was that Billy driving, and Steve replies yes that was Billy. Then there is this pause and screen shot from inside the building alluding to that Billy doesn’t want to appear in person at the event, continued with Walter welcoming Steve S to the event. The REAL reason why Billy couldn't attend right at that moment was that he had to pick up his wife and kids that were at another location, but not one mention of this was hinted in this clip.
(10) "The friend of Steve W Mike Thompson"
A smug cocky guy looking like a fat toad with a cigarette in his mouth as some would mention, who says in the movie that if ANYONE who makes 1 million pts on DK in public "1:18:34 Mark" that he will pay $10,000.00 to, so far nothing has been paid out to Billy after he made his new 1mil+ HS in public, hey here is a thought, maybe I should get a vig for authenticating his score???? I guess Mike was all talk hyping the public just like the movie did in hyping the public to hate a truly talented gamer in Billy. Mike mentions that there is all this talk about Billy’s performances and talk about these video taped submissions and no one has seen Billy play in person, but let me ask Mike this question - when the HELL was he at any live events recently- yeah like I thought NO response just sit on that couch and stuff your face and your head with empty thoughts about some more bogus films that you want to help make.
I think that the Picture House people think that we the pubic are as impressionable as the students that Steve W teaches in his classroom, and yet to think that they think we wouldn't find anything wrong with a lop-sided slanted movie.......I mean some will buy into the whole good vs bad thing, but for those of us who really know what went into this production it really was good vs good or gamer vs gamer. There wasn't any bad feelings going on when the movie was filmed, it was just that in certain times and certain places segments were carefully pieced together to make what you see on the screen.
The producers of TKOK did an incredible job at conveying what they wanted you to see, I’ve told Ed Cunningham personally "Hey Great movie, from a public view point, it really gets the crowd going" and it was done well enough to gain so much attention, but on the other hand I also told Ed that "That there were a lot of things taken out of context in that movie that needed to be changed".
Well after all I'm not the producer or director or even the camera guy for that matter, If we had a movie depicting the life and times of Todd Rogers, who would want to see it, I mean most everyone who knows who I am already on this forum and is aware of what I have done now and in the past and that a movie of me would have a minimal selling point of people wanting to see someone making high scores over and over again, yeah even I would say that would be a boring movie.
But when you put the into the plot, someone who is supposedly not recognized for his gaming skills and another who supposedly controls everything, there you have an entirely different scenario, especially when there is a lot of controversy and when people tell you ....ahhh don't go and see it, that its a bunch of crap, well heck then everyone wants to see what they aren’t suppose to see or maybe they see what they really want to see.....Who knows....all I know is that I hope that I have a little more exposure in the other documentary "Chasing Ghosts Beyond The Arcade"
I mean all of us that were filmed by both film crews were under the impression that both movies would capture the nature and the passion behind every gaming champion and every gaming enthusiast that can relate to what we all go thru as gamers being competitive, but what happened along the way, just look at those two movies and see what happened along the way, we were all dooped with the promises that these documentaries would show off the best side of the gaming world. But instead TKOK went into a different direction, above all and beyond I guess we all want to entertained and thats what Hollywood is for and now TKOK is a part of that world.
So let's Keep on gaming
-Todd Rogers
http://www.digitpress.com/ - go to Forums, Classic Gaming, then the thread called "Billy Mitchell reclaims Donkey Kong world record"
