Jolt Country

He has been here for less than 24 hours and already grabbed the hi-score on the following games in my home arcade:

(Note: most of these games are on my multigame thing; I do not have 40-some-odd standup games downstairs.)


- Asteroids. An astounding performance. My best score was 34,000... and Pinback got to 150,000 before we had to run to the Indian place.

- Galaga. I did not have the high score on it, a guy from Bundy's bachelor party did. I believe Ben got round... 130K on this? I have the rapid fire setting active, for information purposes.

- Time Pilot. I cared about this one! I had ... 80K? Ben had well over 100K, if not 120K before I scratched my eyes out.

- Tank Battalion. It is not that I cared about this high score, really, it is that he got it on his second game.

- King & Balloon. I believe he destroyed the previous high. I would need to double-check.

- Gyruss. Ben did not get the best score (I don't even have that, it belongs to Rob Carrol of New England, who fixed my board) but he did walk up to the machine and drop the 3rd best score. One of the Bruces did a similar thing a year or so ago: he got the 5th best score on his first try. Apparently... I fucking suck at Gyruss!

- Jr. Pac-Man. Ben got to the 4th board. I have never made it off the first board.

So there we are. This is what I am doing from memory. I would rank the following games in terms of SAFETY LEVEL:

- Donkey Kong: Fairly safe. I have 78,000. I have the cheapest Happ joystick on my multi-game, so the CONTROLLER may frustrate his efforts. Verdict: SOMEWHAT SAFE

- Zoo Keeper: He hates this game. Verdict :EXTREMELY SAFE.

- Ms. Pac-Man: Seeing how Jason Scott set the high score on his third try, I would think that Pinback, who is similarly talented, will be able to destroy the high I have on it. (I did end up passing Jason a few days after he visited. I think he still has the #3 score on it, almost two years later.) Verdict: EXTREME FUCKING TROUBLE

- Crystal Castles: Well, let's not get silly. Unless Ben learns about the level warp. Verdict: HMM YES

Frogger: set the high score the first time
Pac-Man: My high was 146,000. He dropped 230,000 when I had to look away.
Donkey Kong Jr. : He got it on his first try
Scramble, Crush Roller, Mr. Do's Castle, TNT... first try.

He also set a higher score on Galaga.

I'll be honest. This isn't good. We don't have a lot of games left here. I am not sure how this is all going to play out, but here we are:

BurgerTime: STILL SAFE. I believe this is because he simply ran out of time, setting high scores on all the other games.

Zoo Keeper: LESS SAFE THAN BEFORE. I showed him out to play this game, and I suspect that if he wanted to, he could get more than 627K in a day.

Spy Hunter: Ben drives in Spy Hunter like I do in real life. THE ONLY SAFE ONE DOWN THERE

Donkey Kong: Well, he's into the 50K range now. Seeing how it took me a month to get to 78K, I don't hold out much hope for this.

Like I said: this isn't good. Dark times are ahead. I've taken to not even turning Tempest on, that's how bad it is. I am not sure if Tiger is going to be able to get player of the FUCK YOU LEFTY.

My Gyruss score is 2nd, not 3rd, and just a few thousand shy of the top spot. That shit is going down.

I had #2 on Q*Bert until Robb proved that he can get 40K on that whenever he wants, whereas I have to really try to get 40K, so this might take some work.

The funny thing is, when all these games first came out, I was terrible at them.

All I can deduce from this is that the key to becoming good at arcade games is years of chronic alcohol abuse.

It's the key to so many things, isn't it?

It's like the odd couple meets Time-Out over there.

welcome to Jonsey's House


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AARDVARK

Hey, whats the high score on Mouse Trap?




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AARDVARK

pinback wrote:All I can deduce from this is that the key to becoming good at arcade games is years of chronic alcohol abuse.

It's the key to so many things, isn't it?

Amen.

Preach it, brother.

Bruce

Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:BurgerTime: STILL SAFE. I believe this is because he simply ran out of time, setting high scores on all the other games.

I'll be there in a few weeks!

Yeah, it ain't looking good for me holding anything on BurgerTime aside from the pickle's BALLS. I suspect you will break 29,000 while holding a conversation and/or consuming a beverage, half-paying attention to the screen.

I am basically, at this point, down to:

Mappy. I feel this game is not interesting enough for Ben. It's like a game for a small child or ferret.

Zoo Keeper. I can play a lot better than I have been playing recently. I dropped 337K on it last night just messing around.

Spy Hunter. Only because there is some issue with the sound causing it to blast static at about 300db, so it will just flat-out pulp anyone playing with a soundwave if they try to stick around for 125K.

Here are the major games that I have not dominated yet, and the chances (in parens) I will do so:
--------------------------

BURGER TIME (1%): I think I would rather make actual cheeseburgers, is the problem here.

CRYSTAL CASTLES (0.5%): MAYBE if I spent all day on it, I could beat Robb's score, but I almost certainly will not do either.

SPY HUNTER (0%): For some reason I remember being good at this as a child. Perhaps I was simply good at playing the theme song on the bass guitar.

ANIMAL JUMPER (5%): I would have said 0% until last night, until Robb blew away his own personal high score by over 100,000 points. You would think this would make me feel like I had LESS chance, but when I saw how he DID it, it made me realize that ANIMAL JUMPER is a steaming pile of crap, that anyone can set a high score on with a little strategy, a lot of luck, and one single lucky jump. If you can set the high score with a single press of a single button, that is not a game that belongs on an all-time best list. ANIMAL JUMPER is a joke.

TEMPEST (0%): Just because he won't turn it on.

MS. PAC MAN (10%): This is the last of the games that I think I might actually have a shot at, that wouldn't take hours and hours of dedicated practice. Do I have the guts? Do I have the will? Do I have the stamina to prove it? 10% chance.

GYRUSS (0%): I was 8K short of the high score before, and could probably beat it, but I dislike the game so intensely that it's not even worth going back to it.

DONKEY KONG (0%): This may be the one I genuinely feel I have no shot to beat, even if I tried all day. I dunno what it is. I got a Kong Mental Block.

GET THE LASER (0%): I don't even know what the high score is on GET THE LASER -- I may have set it already? -- but the game is so deadly boring and one-dimensional, I mean, the goal is right there in the title! I won't go back.

Q*BERT (6%): After my first night, I put this at about 50%, but unless something magical happens, I don't think I have a shot.

BURGER TIME (1%): I think I would rather make actual cheeseburgers, is the problem here.

Yeah, this is so easily Greg's game to get the high score on, nobody will even touch it out of respect.

CRYSTAL CASTLES (0.5%): MAYBE if I spent all day on it, I could beat Robb's score, but I almost certainly will not do either.

Well, plug that bitch in and get going!

SPY HUNTER (0%): For some reason I remember being good at this as a child. Perhaps I was simply good at playing the theme song on the bass guitar.

I'm not going to lie to you. I have seen numerous people walk up to my Spy Hunter machine, and they all drive like they've never seen a pictoral representation of a car before. The steering pedal is analog, everyone.

ANIMAL JUMPER (5%): I would have said 0% until last night, until Robb blew away his own personal high score by over 100,000 points. You would think this would make me feel like I had LESS chance, but when I saw how he DID it, it made me realize that ANIMAL JUMPER is a steaming pile of crap, that anyone can set a high score on with a little strategy, a lot of luck, and one single lucky jump. If you can set the high score with a single press of a single button, that is not a game that belongs on an all-time best list. ANIMAL JUMPER is a joke.

How is it a joke? You think there isn't any strategy? It's a strategy game, Pinner. Why do you think the same five guys make it to the Twin Galaxies final table of Zoo Keeper every YEAR? What, are they the luckiest guys at Funspot? Do you think the veritable ZOO of animals I had lined up to jump over just happened by a lucky fucking accident? Do you know how long I have been playing Zoo Keeper, and/or coding a text game called Cryptozookeeper? Every goddamn night of my life for the last two and a half years (for one or the other) (I've only had the arcade game for a year). TWO AND A HALF YEARS! And that just "happened" because of a "lucky joke"??? I am actually - I am smiling. I am FUCKING smiling with rage right now, spittle going everywhere, in unblinking incomprehension.

TEMPEST (0%): Just because he won't turn it on.

Because of how the world has treated me, there are only two things in my life that can happen that would genuinely piss me off.

1. My cats escape.
2. The monitor on Tempest goes out.

I'll turn on Tempest this weekend. I just like being around when it is active.

MS. PAC MAN (10%): This is the last of the games that I think I might actually have a shot at, that wouldn't take hours and hours of dedicated practice. Do I have the guts? Do I have the will? Do I have the stamina to prove it? 10% chance.

Jason Scott of the clan Scott managed to set a high score in THREE tries. It is on speed-up! Look, I fucking suck. Check, check, check - all night long. Ice water veins, pay this myan his myonyey. Just set it already. 186K on Ms. Pac? You dropped 230K on regular Pac with extreme disinterest.

GYRUSS (0%): I was 8K short of the high score before, and could probably beat it, but I dislike the game so intensely that it's not even worth going back to it.

I'll turn up the music then. It rocks hard when the music is loud.

GET THE LASER (0%): I don't even know what the high score is on GET THE LASER -- I may have set it already? -- but the game is so deadly boring and one-dimensional, I mean, the goal is right there in the title! I won't go back.

My high score on Arkanoid, for a single quarter, starting from the beginning, is 130K. I honestly feel that of all the arcade games ever made, I could possibly set the world record on Arkanoid, if I had 5 years to practice.

... And I see that we have glossed over Mr. Do!. There's gonna be some Mr. Do! being played this weekend. Funnily enough, now that the garden at my house has become a cacophony of broken dreams, symbol of crushed hope and earthy bed of rejection, I feel more bonded with Mr. Do! than ever before. I'm gonna get me a sleeping cap.

Then I shall update.

GET THE LASER (0%): Robb rules at this game.

MR. DO (0%): Reminds me, I set the high score on Dig Dug, a far superior (and yet still terrible) game.

Regarding ANIMAL JUMPER, it is a skill/strategy game if you want to set world records. To set the record in this house, THIS house, requires a bit of strategy, a bit of skill, and one, single, fortunate press of the "jump" button.

I'm not denigrating your accomplishment -- I saw it, and was properly amazed and impressed. I am denigrating the game.

Well, I guess I am denigrating your accomplishment a little, by association, but that was not my intent.

This thread makes me look like a dick now.

THREAD OVER.

I will also say this in defense of Zoo Keeper.

I have constantly stated that it should have been a spinner game and, in fact, it is poorer for not being on a spinner.

But if it were, the player would lose the very real thrill of freaking the fuck out, with his entire body, treating the very cabinet itself like it was a rag doll that owed you - the player - a sizable sum of money.

There is just something undeniably entertaining, from a hardwired caveman standpoint, about moving Zeke (the player character in Zoo Keeper) around the zoo, finding and anticipating the exact pixel that is "safe" for him to touch down, before launching him up again. It's like - it's like, we do this mental calculus to determine the speed of the animals and determine their position along the zoo when Zeke touches down WHILE physically slamming the joystick around, rocking the entire cab. Math and gym, merging at the same time. It's a credit, a feature that the game is on a relatively lightweight Taito cab, which weigh less than the average arcade cabinet.

That's true. In that sense, I like the game, or at least I like BRICK ADVENTURE, the 1/3 of the game that isn't unbelievably tedious and stupid.

I just object to the idea that one single ANIMAL JUMP is enough to give you ten times more points than you'd earned up to that point. It invalidates all that came before.

If someone gets, let's say, 150,000 on Asteroids, you know they got there 20, 50, 100, 500, and 1000 points at a time.

As ANIMAL JUMPER stands, you might as well remove the first six boards.

Well, yeah. The first few boards suck.

What would have been nice if they did a sequel would be if they had the "crow" animal, that exclusively flew along the top of the zoo when it got out, and picked your eyes apart (read: killed you) if you touched it. Thus making the area above the zoo not necessarily completely safe.

pinback wrote:This thread makes me look like a dick now.

This thread? Look like? Now?

Bruce

Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:IIt's a credit, a feature that the game is on a relatively lightweight Taito cab, which weigh less than the average arcade cabinet.

Let alone the average 2008 arcade gamer.

Bruce

AArdvark wrote:Hey, whats the high score on Mouse Trap?




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AARDVARK

In fact, I don't have that one. And it is not on the multigame. I got Make Trax, though. Is that close enough? I am pretty sure Ben demolished the score in it. Make Trax psh, more like MAKE JONSEY CRY.

ALso, Ben finished with 278,000 on Galaga. That might survive for a while.

Galaga is hard. Galaxian is easier because there is no trying to get beamed up for double-ship play.

I used to play mouse trap quite a bit. Probably because I spent so much time at Putt Putt and it was a 'new' game.


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AARDVARK