Robbie Lakeman

Last updated
Robbie Lakeman
Personal information
Born1986 (age 37–38)
NationalityAmerican
Career information
Games

Robbie Lakeman is a competitive video game player who holds the world record for the arcade games Donkey Kong (1981), Stratovox (1980), and Super Pac-Man (1982). [1] He also formerly held the record score for the 1976 arcade game Death Race .

After regularly livestreaming attempts at the Donkey Kong record, Lakeman first took the record after beating Hank Chien's 2012 world record of 1,138,600 points with a score of 1,141,800 on September 4, 2014. [2] Lakeman subsequently exchanged the world record several times with Wes Copeland. [3] [4] [5] He has broken the record eight times, including the world record score of 1,272,800 on an original Nintendo Donkey Kong arcade cabinet on June 8, 2021. [6] [7]

Controversy

Robbie Lakeman has made a number of controversial statements and accusations in recent years.

Lakeman has claimed numerous times that fellow competitive video game player Billy Mitchell has extorted him. [8] [9] [10] [11] In addition, Lakeman has publicly accused Mitchell of using his son's military connections and technology to take down personal enemies on U.S. soil for profit. [12] This controversy was the subject of a Karl Jobst video which received nearly a million views. [13] In response, Mitchell's legal team disputed the claims, stating that "the words and imputations are disgraceful, untrue, and are grossly defamatory." [14] It is not clear what evidence, if any, supports these accusations.

Lakeman has also accused other members of the classic gaming community, including Billy Mitchell and Jace Hall, of being responsible for the deaths of other people. [15] [16] It is not clear what evidence, if any, supports these accusations.

In 2021, Lakeman submitted a new high score for the classic arcade game Donkey Kong to various leaderboards, including Twin Galaxies [17] and Donkey Kong Forum. [18] The score was accepted by Twin Galaxies and Guinness World Records. However, Donkey Kong Forum, a community-run leaderboard, did not accept the score because the forum's high score moderator, Jeremy Young, claimed[ citation needed ] that although Lakeman achieved his record legitimately, Lakeman's true intention was to gain an unfair advantage. According to Young, this was in violation of "the spirit of fair play." [19] Despite widespread support for the score from the community, Young did not accept it, stating that "it's more important to me to do the right thing than it is to do the popular thing." [20] Community members have disputed Young's decision, arguing that the use of hardware modifications did not give Lakeman an unfair advantage and that the score should be accepted. [21]

Related Research Articles

<i>Pac-Man</i> 1980 video game

Pac-Man, originally called Puck Man in Japan, is a 1980 maze video game developed and released by Namco for arcades. In North America, the game was released by Midway Manufacturing as part of its licensing agreement with Namco America. The player controls Pac-Man, who must eat all the dots inside an enclosed maze while avoiding four colored ghosts. Eating large flashing dots called "Power Pellets" causes the ghosts to temporarily turn blue, allowing Pac-Man to eat them for bonus points.

<i>Galaxian</i> 1979 video game

Galaxian is a 1979 fixed shooter arcade video game developed and published by Namco. The player assumes control of the Galaxip starfighter in its mission to protect Earth from waves of aliens. Gameplay involves destroying each formation of aliens, who dive down towards the player in an attempt to hit them.

<i>Popeye</i> (video game) 1982 video game

Popeye is a 1982 platform game developed and released by Nintendo as an arcade video game. It is based on the comic strip of the same name created by E. C. Segar and licensed from King Features Syndicate. Some sources claim that Ikegami Tsushinki did programming work on the game. As Popeye, the player must collect hearts thrown by Olive Oyl from the top of the screen while being chased by Bluto. Popeye can punch bottles thrown at him, but can only hurt Bluto after eating the one can of spinach present in each level. Unlike Nintendo's earlier Donkey Kong games, there is no jump button. There are three screens.

<i>Donkey Kong Jr.</i> 1982 video game

Donkey Kong Jr. is a 1982 arcade platform game that was released by Nintendo. It is the sequel to Donkey Kong, but with the roles reversed compared to its predecessor: Mario is now the villain and Donkey Kong Jr. is trying to save his kidnapped father. It first released in arcades and, over the course of the decade, was released for a variety of home platforms. The game's title is written out as Donkey Kong Junior in the North American arcade version and various conversions to non-Nintendo systems.

The golden age of arcade video games was the period of rapid growth, technological development, and cultural influence of arcade video games from the late 1970s to the early 1980s. The release of Space Invaders in 1978 led to a wave of shoot-'em-up games such as Galaxian and the vector graphics-based Asteroids in 1979, made possible by new computing technology that had greater power and lower costs. Arcade video games switched from black-and-white to color, with titles such as Frogger and Centipede taking advantage of the visual opportunities of bright palettes.

<i>Donkey Kong</i> (1981 video game) 1981 video game

Donkey Kong is a 1981 arcade video game developed and published by Nintendo. As Mario, the player runs and jumps on platforms and climbs ladders to ascend a construction site and rescue Pauline from a giant gorilla, Donkey Kong. It is the first game in the Donkey Kong series and Mario's first appearance in a video game.

Twin Galaxies is a social media platform and video game database. Twin Galaxies is the official supplier of video game records to Guinness World Records.

<i>Saturday Supercade</i> 1983 American TV series or program

Saturday Supercade is an American animated television series produced for Saturday mornings by Ruby-Spears Productions. It ran for two seasons on CBS.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Score (game)</span> Abstract quantity associated with a player or team in a game

In games, score refers to an abstract quantity associated with a player or team. Score is usually measured in the abstract unit of points, and events in the game can raise or lower the score of different parties. Most games with score use it as a quantitative indicator of success in the game, and in competitive games, a goal is often made of attaining a better score than one's opponents in order to win.

<i>The King of Kong</i> 2007 documentary by Seth Gordon

The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters is a 2007 American documentary film about competitive arcade gaming directed by Seth Gordon. It follows Steve Wiebe in his attempts to take the high score record for the 1981 arcade game Donkey Kong from Billy Mitchell. The film premiered at the 2007 Slamdance Film Festival and was released in U.S. theaters in August 2007. It received positive reviews.

Chasing Ghosts: Beyond the Arcade is a documentary film directed by Lincoln Ruchti about the golden age of video arcade games. The film premiered January 22, 2007 at the Sundance Film Festival and has also been shown at the 2007 Los Angeles Film Festival, as well as other film festivals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steve Wiebe</span> American video game player (born 1969)

Steven J. Wiebe is an American two-time world champion of the video game Donkey Kong, most recently holding the title from September 20, 2010, to January 10, 2011, with a high score of 1,064,500. Wiebe was the first person to achieve over a million points on Donkey Kong, with 1,006,600 on July 4, 2004. He is one of the primary subjects of the 2007 documentary The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters. Like his Donkey Kong rival Billy Mitchell, Wiebe was put in a Topps Allen & Ginter baseball set, which is featured in the 2009 edition of the baseball product.

Todd Rogers is an American video game player who has been described as the first professional video game player. In 1986, he was invited to be part of the U.S. National Video Game Team. He had claimed to be recognized by Activision for having achieved many record-setting high scores, but many of his records were later disputed for a lack of verifying evidence or found to be impossible to achieve. In January 2018, the Twin Galaxies record database removed all of his scores from their leaderboards and banned him permanently, and Guinness World Records stripped his records.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Billy Mitchell (gamer)</span> American video game player (born 1965)

William James Mitchell Jr. is an American video game player. He achieved fame throughout the 1980s and 1990s by claiming numerous records on classic video games, including a perfect score on Pac-Man. Twin Galaxies and Guinness World Records recognized Mitchell as the holder of several records earned playing classic video games, and he has appeared in several documentaries on competitive gaming and retrogaming. However, in 2017, the legitimacy of a number of his records was called into question, leading to Twin Galaxies stripping Mitchell of his records.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show</span>

The Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show is an annual pinball and arcade game festival held in Tacoma, Washington, United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hank Chien</span> Taiwanese electronic sports player

Hank Chien is a former world record holder and two-time "Kong-Off" Champion of the video game Donkey Kong. As of January 2016, his personal best sits at 1,138,600. Chien won the first Kong-Off, a Donkey Kong competition which occurred on March 19–20, 2011. The competition featured Steve Wiebe, Billy Mitchell and eight other competitors. Chien won with a score of 994,400.

<i>Pixels</i> (2015 film) 2015 film by Chris Columbus

Pixels is a 2015 science fiction action comedy film directed by Chris Columbus and written by Tim Herlihy and Timothy Dowling and based on a story by the former. Loosely adapted from the 2010 short film Pixels by Patrick Jean, the film stars Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Michelle Monaghan, Peter Dinklage, Josh Gad and Brian Cox. Combining animated video game characters and visual effects, the film involves an alien force misinterpreting video feeds of classic arcade games as a declaration of war, to which they respond by attacking Earth with technological recreations of icons from the games. The President of the United States assembles a team of former arcade champions to lead the planet's defense.

Players have competed for the highest score for the video game Donkey Kong since its release in 1981. The competition became more prominent after it was covered in the 2007 documentary The King of Kong.

Michael Zyda is an American computer scientist, video game designer, and former Professor of Computer Science Practice at USC Viterbi School of Engineering, University of Southern California. He was named an IEEE Fellow in 2019 and an ACM Fellow in 2020 for his research contributions in video game design and virtual reality. He is also the founding director of the Computer Science (Games) degree programs at USC Viterbi. Michael received his bachelor's degree in bioengineering from University of California, San Diego, master's degree in computer science from University of Massachusetts Amherst and doctoral degree in computer science from Washington University in St. Louis.

Karl Jobst is an Australian GoldenEye 007 and Perfect Dark speedrunner, YouTuber, and investigative journalist whose work has primarily focused on exposing cheating and fraud in the gaming community. He also covers other speedrunning and challenge-related feats, including world record histories. As of February 2024, he has over one million subscribers on YouTube.

References

  1. ↑ Guinness World Records 2016 Gamer's Edition. Macmillan. September 1, 2015. p. 190. ISBN   9781910561133.
  2. ↑ Fahey, Mike (6 September 2014). "A New World Record Ends Hank Chien's Reign As Donkey Kong Champion". Kotaku. Retrieved 23 January 2016.
  3. ↑ Good, Owen S. (9 January 2016). "New Donkey Kong world record set, and there's not much room left for another". Polygon. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 24 July 2016.
  4. ↑ "Dramatic Escalation In Donkey Kong World Record Rivalry Between Champions Wes Copeland and Robbie Lakeman!". Twin Galaxies. Retrieved 23 January 2016.
  5. ↑ "All-time Donkey Kong world record beaten twice in less than a day". Polygon . 19 September 2015.
  6. ↑ "Highest Score on Donkey Kong". guinnessworldrecords.
  7. ↑ "Robbie Lakeman Sets New Donkey Kong World Record Live on Twitch".
  8. ↑ Robbie Lakeman [@robert_lakeman] (Oct 26, 2022). "There's a lot to dislike about @BillyPacman, like this little yapping chihuahua thing he brings around named Neil. Running around extorting people, and poorly fixing games. If I were @stoolpresidente, I would have given him a 1 star on @Uber just from all the "Natta means" alone" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  9. ↑ Robbie Lakeman [@robert_lakeman] (Aug 30, 2022). "@BillyPacman doxxed my life. He is a low life POS wannabe gangster who is the walking example of everything wrong with the 20th Century. He needs to knock it off before things get really ugly for him. Stop having people show up to my work. Brian Kuh works at Half Moon Weirs Beach" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  10. ↑ Robbie Lakeman [@robert_lakeman] (Aug 17, 2022). "@BillyPacman IS AN EXTORTIONIST WITH ZERO SHAME, AND HIRES STALKERS THAT HARASS ME AT WORK, AND ON A DAILY BASIS" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  11. ↑ Robbie Lakeman [@robert_lakeman] (Aug 14, 2022). "Extortion is a crime built for losers. Just ask @BillyPacman and his #LonelyLosersClub" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  12. ↑ Robbie Lakeman [@robert_lakeman] (Aug 9, 2022). "@BillyPacman is a liar, a fraud, a joke, and is one of the most corrupt people you'll ever meet. @TuckerCarlson What's the penalty for someone using their sons military connections and technology to take down personal enemies on US soil for profit?" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  13. ↑ Jobst, Karl (Apr 9, 2022). "Disgraced Gamer Billy Mitchell Accused of Extortion!" (video). youtube.com. Retrieved 2022-12-30.
  14. ↑ Jobst, Karl (Nov 5, 2022). "Billy Mitchell Has Gone Insane And I Need Your Help" (video). youtube.com. Retrieved 2022-12-30.
  15. ↑ "Robbie "Purge Master" Lakeman on Twitter: "Can't let these people get away with their lies, deceit, and bullshit going. They WANTED me to die, and now they're responsible for other people's deaths instead. Like Rudy, his ex, Jeff Harrist, Apollo Legend. These people have zero shame in taking advantage of others for profit" / Twitter". 2022-12-16. Archived from the original on 2022-12-16. Retrieved 2022-12-30.
  16. ↑ Robbie Lakeman [@robert_lakeman] (Nov 30, 2022). "A bad look is getting greedy to the point that several people get killed, and cryptos crashing the moment we're allowed to Ask App Not to Track, but I'm sure those all are coincidences too. I'm just glad I'm not that corrupt like Billy, Wes, and Jace to the point where people die" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  17. ↑ "Twin Galaxies Arcade - Donkey Kong - Points [Hammer Allowed] - 1,272,800 - Robbie Lakeman". www.twingalaxies.com. Retrieved 2022-12-30.
  18. ↑ Robbie Lakeman (June 8, 2021). "Robbie's 1.272". donkeykongforum.net. Retrieved 2022-12-30.
  19. ↑ Jeremy Young (June 9, 2021). "Robbie's 1.272 (Reply #3)". donkeykongforum.net. Retrieved 2022-12-30.
  20. ↑ Jeremy Young (June 13, 2021). "Robbie's 1.272 (Reply #74)". donkeykongforum.net. Retrieved 2022-12-30.
  21. ↑ "Robbie's 1.272 (Page 7)". donkeykongforum.net. June 14, 2021. Retrieved 2022-12-30.


This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.