[HN Gopher] Donkey Kong cheating case rocked by photos of illici...
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Donkey Kong cheating case rocked by photos of illicit joystick
modification
Author : stalfosknight
Score : 76 points
Date : 2023-02-03 18:48 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (arstechnica.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (arstechnica.com)
| Y_Y wrote:
| > The photos in question were taken at the Florida Association of
| Mortgage Brokers (FAMB) Convention, which hosted Mitchell as part
| of its "80s Arcade Night" promotion in July 2007.
|
| Seems like those guys had more money than they knew what to do
| with. Hope it turned out ok for them.
| nostromo wrote:
| I'm just amused that there was an actual lawsuit filed for
| defamation over Donkey Kong high scores.
| CTDOCodebases wrote:
| If you are interested there was a whole documentary made about
| the competitive world of Donkey Kong some time ago called "King
| of Kong".
| Manuel_D wrote:
| A similar debate exists in fighting games with all button
| controllers. Interestingly, the control stick ultimately actuates
| button contacts under the hood. But all button controllers can do
| things like simultaneously supply left and right activated
| inputs, or up and down and some games respond to these inputs in
| a way that gives players an advantage. That said, it'd be trivial
| to install electrical interlocks prohibiting such simultaneous
| inputs.
| bhickey wrote:
| I built exactly this board for a homebrew (S)NES controller.
| Simultaneous L+R inputs are converted to neutral and U+D are
| converted to U.
|
| Even with the interlock a player can gain an advantage by
| buffering inputs.
| tee_0 wrote:
| [flagged]
| pcwalton wrote:
| Then flag or ignore them?
|
| For me, the interesting story here isn't so much who got what
| record in a 42 year old arcade game but rather how
| frighteningly easy it remains to intimidate people over bogus
| nonsense by abusing the legal system. If rich weirdos suing for
| defamation over ancient video game scores doesn't motivate more
| adoption of anti-SLAPP statutes, I don't know what will.
| LocalH wrote:
| Mitchell very much seems to be losing his reality distortion
| field
| Minor49er wrote:
| Speedrunner Karl Jobst made a good overview video of this last
| week. He is no stranger to Mitchell's shenanigans:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHK0Jg2R7SQ
| bak3y wrote:
| He's also been sued by Mitchell - multiple times now I think?
| bhickey wrote:
| Karl is wrong in his claim that the stick appears to be an
| 8-way stick. Directionality is determined by a restrictor plate
| mounted on the underside of joystick assembly. Here's an
| example: https://www.ultimarc.com/arcade-controls/joystick-
| accessorie...
|
| It's impossible to tell which plate is installed by looking at
| the top of the panel.
|
| Edit: He does get some things right. My point is that this is
| surprisingly technical. Even some of the best players in the
| world don't know how the game works.
| sschueller wrote:
| I still find it hilarious that every time I see Billy Mitchell I
| think of Peter Dinklage's hilarious character in Pixels although
| the movie itself wasn't that great.
| jhbadger wrote:
| I always think of Mitchell himself in 2007's "King of Kong" in
| which Mitchell was viewed as the villain (perhaps unfairly at
| the time) but he didn't do himself any favors in making himself
| seem like a sympathetic character.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| I remember seeing that a long time ago. Is he the one who
| came across as a pretty bad husband and father?
| tootie wrote:
| He was painted as the villain, but the filmmaker has been
| accused of editing the story to make him look worse than he
| was. He was definitely a hateable character, but a lot of
| the details and timeline were messed with.
| bhickey wrote:
| > Is he the one who came across as a pretty bad husband and
| father?
|
| I don't think so. The film had footage of Steve Wiebe
| telling his kid he couldn't help with the potty because he
| was busy gaming.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| Ohh that rings a bell.
| JustLurking2022 wrote:
| Why are we still talking about this guy?
| RamRodification wrote:
| Because photos of illicit joystick modification rocked a Donkey
| Kong cheating case he is involved in. It's a very unique and
| interesting story.
| hijinks wrote:
| I have a feeling he's lived this lie so long he just believes it
| as true at this point.
| joezydeco wrote:
| The Costanza Principle
| JohnFen wrote:
| The best conmen are the ones who earnestly believe their own
| BS.
| jrockway wrote:
| This is one case that's warming me up to binding arbitration. I'd
| say that in an ideal world, we'd spend $0 of taxes on court
| disputes over video game cheating.
| ketralnis wrote:
| It's rough because while I agree that I don't want to see a
| bunch of court time wasted on video game cheating, this isn't a
| case about video game cheating. It's a case about defamation, a
| defence to which is the accuracy of the claims (in some
| countries), and then yes suddenly it's a case about video game
| cheating.
|
| I do think that you should have legal remedies to defamation,
| and in most cases of defamation the two of you are unlikely to
| have had a prior contract that could have included an
| arbitration clause. (In this particular case they could
| potentially have but I suspect that's uncommon.)
| SQueeeeeL wrote:
| I mean, we spend lots of time using the legal system to resolve
| marital and land issues. Ultimately most legal issues are
| interpersonal issues, I don't see why the perception of a
| conflict as silly should preclude a judge from helping mediate
| jfengel wrote:
| This is a defamation case. There isn't really room for binding
| arbitration; there's no contract to bind.
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(page generated 2023-02-03 23:01 UTC)