Arcade Jason and Arcade Hollywood are teaming up on a mission to find the truth. we are attempting to replicate the recording process that was done for Billy's DK score submissions
The finger on the third beam frame is never present in any of your tests, that is clearly present in Billys footage. That finger on beam three is only present when loading on mame. That is pretty conclusive.
Considering Billy has NEVER gotten close to a million point game live and yet he has all these magical direct feed tapes that have exceeded a million points then I'd say yes - he has something to prove. Also, his blue barrel smash stats are so much higher than anyone elses and thats a complete random part of the game. The ONLY explanation for that is using save states to get more barrels.
Having don't analog circuitry in the games might play part in how the game is displayed? Also, what about the color proms? Is it possible that different quality color proms might make a difference? Since the Griders are one color a poorly performing color prom might introduce the girder color displaying faster or slower? Did you test any 4 board DKs?
The problem is your recording at 60fps aimed at a tv. You need a hi speed camera. While your camera is recording, it is recording each scan line of the crt but the camera itself is also tracing a scanline and recording the pixels it sees. The are out of sync and will have this effect. Look up rolling shutter and then how do crts work and that should make things clear
it has been proven several times that the mame screens can be distinguished just by pointing a camera at a screen in fact most of all the evidence is provided in this manor
Deathamn Kenshi LCDs still display a scanline at a time. Search Slow Mo Guys for there hi speed captures of different types of displays. As of today, all displays are presented one scanline at a time. You still have to transfer image data from one location like a back buffer to another location like the front buffer in a modern display, and that is done in "chunks" you could say "scan lines"
I don't want to sound too harsh given how much effort you put into this (and I do appreciate the effort), but it doesn't seem to me that you are actually getting at the heart of the accusations against Mr Mitchell. For instance, I didn't see a single instance of this artifact present in Mr Mitchell's performances which, to the best of my knowledge, has only been reproduced (and reliably so) in MAME: i.imgur.com/wj6t4jH.jpg As to your point about not being able to replicate so-called "normal" footage. I would say in regards to the above artifact you did a fantastic job of replicating "normal" as I saw no instances of that particular artifact and all of your 4th beams were smoothly cut off. However, if you want better quality results I suspect the simplest way to achieve that is via direct capture. However, if you want to keep the "camera element" in the equation I would suggest recording at 60 fps. Cheers~
You should have looked in to it for this video. That is what the entire dispute is about. Do you happen to know Billy like that other guy who posted basically the exact same video? This is not what the dispute is about. Sorry for respond to so many different comments on here. Just very frustrated how no one seems to be getting what the actual dispute is about.
i understand what the dispute is about i was just trying to recreate it but some where in this process i can see several types of screens no 2 are the same which is interesting to me i have not seen a screen that looks exactly like billys nor a screen that looks exactly like the mame. thats all i have no more than that . this video is to give more video evidence to the community to do with what they please. i have not come to any conclusion in this video
I have to assume your examples are edited down for time then, other 60 fps examples I have seen have shown much more "in between" frames than what I saw here. Another possibility is that you are using a camera capable of 60 fps but have not actually set it to record at that rate. Also just to clarify my statement from above (which was needlessly ambiguous) : This statement: "For instance, I didn't see a single instance of this artifact present in Mr Mitchell's performances which, to the best of my knowledge, has only been reproduced (and reliably so) in MAME:" Is intended to say: I didn't see a single instance of the artifact, which was present in Mr Mitchell's performances, in your tests. Having re-read my wording now it was very easy to see how someone could draw the opposite conclusion due to poor wording. I am guessing you probably have access to even more aracde transitions than you showed in the video, perhaps you could review them and see if you find any examples in your footage. Then you could get a relevant version of MAME (v0.116 to v0.121) and test the same thing there. That is to say, those are some ideas you can look at if you are still actively pursuing this anyways. Cheers~
It doesn't matter if the rates are the same if the camera and TV aren't time synced. Remember that the camera will capture what the TV looks like at a point while the screen is being drawn. This means you usually end up capturing some combination of two frames with the camera. Digitally capturing the VCR output (or game output) will show you actual full frames.
Why do youtubers keep providing frame by frame analysis of arcade monitors recorded by external cameras? Billy Mitchell's score in dispute and the associated recording of that score, and recordings of 2 previous scores, are supposedly direct feed from an arcade board. At least thats what they were submitted as, for purposes of inclusion on the all-time arcade leaderboard. Yet they look like mame in terms of the screen renderings and progression. There are some distinctions when analyzed on a frame-by-frame basis, between arcade and mame. Very noticeable at 60fps, and even if captured at 30fps, the distinctions between the two can still be seen. There has yet to be proven any level of processing, compression, etc that effects an arcade direct feed capture to the degree that it will exactly resemble mame. Are we all now clear on the basis of the dispute? So pretty please, with sugar on top, stop providing analysis of arcade monitors recorded by external cameras, that level of analysis in no way speaks to the issue at hand.
Chris G direct feed is better I agree and I may do that in the future but it has been proven multiple times that it can also be seen in camera recordings
You all are confusing the shutter effect produced by cameras with the sliding door effect produced by arcade hardware. Yes, the shutter effect will produce a single frame that has pieces of the frame that are not truly from the same period of time (camera shutter effect). Unfortunately older versions of mame, circa the billy Mitchell tapes, also render frames with a similar appearance. One prime example is the oil barrel appearing at the beginning of the barrel stage before donkey Kong appears. This, however, will never occur in a direct feed from arcade hardware. The objects render onto the screen in a single frame on arcade hardware. We can go into much more technical explanations of why this happens (and those explanations exist on TG and DKF for anyone interested), but you will never see the oil can appear on screen before kong in a direct feed from arcade hardware. You will see it in certain versions of mame and you will see it as a result of external camera shutter. It exists on the billy tapes which are supposed to be a direct feed from arcade hardware and not mame or a camera recording. Another example is the 3rd girder rendering on the barrel stage. See the DK forums and Wes Copelands $1000 bounty for anyone that can produce this effect from arcade direct feed capture. donkeykongforum.com/index.php?topic=2179.0
Jason, Have you tried hooking up the converter to a DK cocktail. Since both monitor orientations would be represented by a 2 player game, they could be compared. Would there be any difference in output, since the cocktail uses a 13" monitor and the upright a 19"?
This didnt replicate the MAME beam glitch, and its using OG software. Im pretty sure it will never do it too. Its kind of obvious by now that Billy used MAME.
Those old boards had analog component(s) to them, correct? If true then you will get different results from different boards. But when it comes to MAME, that is 100% digital and that is where the contention is: that Billy Mitchell's submission in King of Kong had MAME artifacts.
Problems with older arcades and consoles are exactly this They can behave differently even when you use different lenght of wire to connect them Or replace faulty part (as it of course have different resistance rating for example) but use different material (alluminium vs copper etc) or have different purty from one used originaly
I think the issue here is that billies video loaded like mame. No one has seen original hardware load that way but has seen mame load that way. As a result its pretty good evidence.
The inconsistency you are seeing is caused by the camera shutter speeds and the monitor aka the annoying black bars you see when you record any CRT, Could you try this with an LCD monitor using the standard converter??
I was a big fan of Billy Mitchell but this doesn't surprise me. Looking back : the way he claimed he had never used MAME to play anything, the way everything was about his image. The way he rarely played live. The way he refused to believe Steve Weibe had beaten his score (in his own mind it clearly wasn't possible for someone to beat that score). The way he had massive influence inside Twin Galaxies....
Dans LEDepot you must be new to the speedrun scene. That would destroy a lot of games that don't have that kind of audience. Goldeneye elite used to be 5 dudes that lived literally oceans apart. All they had was sending tapes to one another.
For posterity - everything he showed was 100% consistent with what was discussed in the TG thread regarding the output of an original unmodified DK PCB. The only reason why any of the transitions "looked different" was due to filming CRT TV's with a video camera - it's all basically rolling shutter. All of the "different" transitions were just partial frames from the CRT being recorded onto single frames of the video, which is why there's always diagonal lines cutting through the middle of the screen. The camera sensor is scanning from top to bottom and the CRT TVs are scanning from left to right (they're turned on their side) and what happens when you have a horizontal line moving down intersecting with a horizontal line moving right? You get a diagonal line like this \ This testing was great, although the conclusion wasn't quite right. This is more evidence for how consistent arcade transitions are, while also being consistently different in the exact ways that we'd expect from MAME. :)
Finally someone making a video explain the tech which techs should be doing, not giving opinion about whether Billy was cheating which is what a referee would do. This is why you get a thumbs up from me. They mention you can get the same effect in MAME slowing down the CPU. Is this possible to do this in arcade hardware? Perhaps a dodge crystal causing the CPU to run slower than it should?
To reproduce the screens as they are "known to be" from legit hardware, you should record the VCR output directly through a capture card and frame step that. Pointing a camera at a CRT introduces too many variables like shutter speed, CMOS rolling shutter, etc.
i like the idea behind this, then it seemed like it fell apart, saying youtube doesnt allow 60 FPS when it does, lists it in your video infact 720/1080p60. Maybe go back on your video editor and play with "playback" rate to play the video in actual slow motion that you need it in. From the stills, why cant that be 10% playback with video in motion? In the video editor you can hit LEFT/RIGHT arrow cursor and scroll my frame to gradually advance the video as needed.
its not truly 60 fps from what i understand maybe i am wrong about that but that? i also recorded full speed so you can slow it down yourself if you want it would probably be best to download this vid instead of using y tube which i am told skips frames ect. i am using filmora as an editor i don't think i can do the left right thing your talking about
yeah not sure on editor and abilities and or how to tell you to perform them as itll probably be different. At least you should be able to render in 60fps, and set playback speed low enough to show frame by frame advance and let it play. Half tempted to do some testing myself I got a little cheapy camera thatll do 60fps proper, and 120fps for slow motion, so maybe i can find some smooth footage to capture myself over screen and see if I can see it myself. Some other guy recently did a video as well trying to see the "comparisons" on arcade and with his direct stream to a CRT tv right next to the arcade cab, the CRT TV was actually a few frames ahead of the arcade cab loading graphics up quicker. And he said basically if you were to hook up 2-3 tv's its possible to get ALL different results on all 3 TV's, just like you did.
You mention in the video that RU-vid only supports 20, 25, 30 frames a second? Yet your video here on RU-vid is 60fps. RU-vid supports 60fps obviously, and has for years now. Also, as to each screen looking slightly different when you show all 3 at once, look up "rolling shutter." You need a direct capture from the tape, not a camera pointed at the screens.
someone else brought up the 60 fps thing looks like i am wrong about that. direct capture would be best!!! these screens can also be seen with a camera pointed at a screen its been done several times but direct capture is much more consistent
Hey man, just stumbled on this video and I have an important question. What is going on with your Quantum marquee? I have the game and mine is just lit up, yours looks way cooler! Like you have LEDs in it. Can you share what's going on? Also, what was the conclusion? Is Billy a cheater or not? Either way, he's damn good at video games!
I've always thought that the only way to submit a new score is to have it played on an upright game. A watch with a sweeping second hand in view. The camera over the players shoulder.
why do both you and billy end up putting it on vhs when you said it is going to a pc through usb before hand? Is not a recording on a digital file much more superior? why go to the trouble of putting it on VHS after it goes on to a computer? That seems strange to me.
i didn't say its going to a pc before hand i found out about the capture device in the middle of the video and even said so. by now its common knowledge that billys footage is mame now anyways
just asking because thats what i understood you say at 8:34 i didnt think that sounded right. thanks for clearing that up. I think billy should play DK again properly, he would be able to better than anyone else. Maybe he is playing since his scores were deleted ?
wow. i couldnt see this being the end of his story, im surprised he allready didnt have another video hidden away to produce when this all happened lol
The problem with this video is you're filming the results from the CRT screens themselves. Keep in mind Billy's tapes/DVD are direct feed recordings. So any comparisons you try to make need to be frame by frame captures from the video feed itself, and not from the screen of the CRT.
Hey guys, don't you recognize me? I'm Shawne Vinson from Sacramento, California, and I'm the famous champion gamer and world record holder, when I was on Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition. And I just won a video game tournament 36 times in a row. Even I already know and Billy Mitchell, Stevie Webie, and Walter Day, when I was at the video game award ceremony too.
Your videos are all shots of a screen through a camera, and not direct recordings, correct? That method introduces many artifacts that are outside the scope of the dispute over Mitchell's video, particularly the 2005 video from KOK. Can you analyze a direct feed recording directly?
at this point it doesn't really matter also it has been proven several times that direct capture is not required and these screens can be seen with only a camera pointed at a screen in fact most of the evidence used to prove billy is guilty was done using this method. direct capture has a cleaner picture but is completely not necessary..
Proper analysis has to either be done with direct video capture (of either the RGB or composite video) or with a camera that can genlock to the sync that the cabinet outputs. I’d bet money it’d be easier to do the former. Even a camera without a rolling shutter isn’t assured to be synced to the cabinet’s vertical blank. And even still, due to the slight frame rate difference between DK and NTSC, there might be an occasional judder.
From a knucklehead off the street._. Remember that the original DK machine was a conversion of Radar Scope, an unsuccessful game Nintendo came out with in 1979. Does that have anything to do with the differering results? Maybe later machines had dedicated motherboards not related to Radar Scope._.?
You should maybe try a high speed camera to film the frame by frame loading for better results. They appear to be loading differently but I'm not totally convinced that they're all loading in a different way, just maybe slightly offset or delayed from one another for some reason. But they certainly do seem to be loading differently. Regardless, all the screens are still loading in a way more closely resembling an arcade cabinet (of course) and not like the suspect Billy Mitchel videos that appear to be running MAME.
Hard panning the mics like that are tripping me out, especially when you guys swapped sides, but the audio didn't. Jeff-Left, Jason-Right the whole time.
Actuall this whole Billy dispute is beneficial for him and Twin Galaxies and the whole classic arcade scene because it gives them all worldwide exposure.
I'm not that smart guy. You're boardring smart guy territory!! I'm glad you shared your knowledge, tested some theories and asked some great questions. Thank you Jason
any time you split a video signal you can get multiple differences...also nintendo monitor default is vertical whereas standard monitors are horizontal default...the difference is how the picture 'loads' because monitors 'draw' on the horizontal plane
The only way to get a reliable and reproducible result is from a direct capture. Connect the composite video directly to a capture card and capture it at 60 fps. Capture a Mame emulator at 60 fps. Compare the two frame by frame. Take 3 independend transitions of the level loading if you want to be absolutely sure. Camera capture of a CRT is expected to produce inconsistent results because very CRT will have a different timing on the blanking signal.
Jason, part of the problem is that the original video out of the DK PCB is interlaced 60 fields/sec which displays odd then even fields to "simulate" 30 frames/sec. NTSC capture boards usually use a frame buffer to grab whole frames thus converting 60 fields into 30 full frames. This process will introduce motion artifacts. In addition, the NTSC capture board is adding a color burst signal into an original RGB signal which has no color burst , which can cause some of the color artifacts you are seeing. If Billy used a USB capture board on his computer it probably coverted the NTSC video with color burst (composite) back to RGB once again to store it on the computer. Then, if Billy recorded that PC video onto a VHS tape, the signal once again was coverted from RGB to NTSC with a new color burst & introducing more motion artifacts from 30Fps into 60 fields/sec to be recorded on the VHS tape format. My conclusion is that you will NOT be able to replicate the Billy tape!
>the original video out of the DK PCB is interlaced 60 fields/sec No, it isn't. Donkey Kong, like nearly all other classic arcade machines and home consoles, outputs progressive video at ~60 frames per second.
MaximRecoil I agree that they are technically progressive frames. But, I can see where Chuck is coming from too... Originally, for TV broadcasts on a CRT (NTSC, PAL, SECAM etc.), they all of course used interlacing to save on bandwidth and also somewhat simplify the electronics in the TV. So, when recording say a sports event with a video camera, each field (of the 480i signal) would be captured during a slightly different time, so each field is essentially a unique "frame". When arcade systems and home computers / consoles started appearing, the vast majority of them output 240p, which (for want of a better word) "abused" how the CRT TVs normally worked, by displaying each original 240p frame as one complete "field", but without the "half line", which meant that each 240p "field" would perfectly overlap the previous one. So yeah, it's still progressive, but it's hard to break the habit of calling them fields. I think Chuck mispoke slightly when he said "interlaced". I made a similar mistake during a discussion on the AssemblerGames forum once - I had a complete brain fart, and forgot for a second that a 240p or 288p signal still displays true progressive frames on a CRT. lol I used to repair a lot of TVs and VCRs in the 90s / 00s, and it is common to still refer to them as "fields", even if it's a 240p signal from an arcade board etc. The mistake is calling 240p "interlaced", which of course it is not, but I do completely get why it's a fairly common slip of the tongue with TV engineers.
Anywho, yep - there's very little point trying to prove of disprove the whole BM thing by filming a CRT with a camcorder... As Chris G and others said above, Billy's tape was supposedly a direct capture, meaning that there were no framebuffers or other scan rate converters between the (alleged) DK arcade board and VCR. (although I believe there's still in question as to whether Billy ran the output of the NTSC Composite encoder into a capture device first, then back out via Composite on a TV-out gfx card or a VGA-to-composite converter before going to the VCR, but that makes very little sense, and only strengthens the allegation that an emulator was used.) The inverter board and NTSC encoder are VERY basic circuits / ICs, so don't store any part of the video signal at all, they simply do a direct conversion with imperceptible delay. (a miniscule amount of added delay will be observable via an oscilloscope of course, and some colour encoder chips may even add one or two lines of delay, which is only around 63.5uS per line for 240p / 480i, so could NEVER introduce the type of full-frame rendering artifacts shown on Billy's tape, assuming legit DK hardware and an official DK ROM set were used.) The DK arcade board uses a HARDWARE frame counter (old-skool TTL logic) which is clocked directly from the Vsync pulse... The DK ROM (Z80 code) reads that hardware counter to determine how many frames to wait before updating the sprite animations etc. That includes how many frames the code will display the title / game over / pre-stage screen before loading the background tiles for the level itself. So, the timing for when the graphics tiles for the girders start to load is VERY closely tied to VBLANK, and is extremely repeatable. (only varying a tiny amount during VBLANK, depending on which instructions the Z80 is running just before it checks the hardware frame counter.) The only way the legit DK arcade hardware and ROMs could produce that exact "girder finger" artifact is if there was a very rare and unique fault on the board which would cause the Z80 to run much faster or slower, but that would then cause other very noticeable glitches and artifacts throughout the whole game, so it's incredibly unlikely. Or, the ROMs would had to have been tampered with or corrupted in a very specific way, which is also a possibility, but equally as unlikely. Or, a software emulator or nonofficial clone board was used. All evidence points towards a version of MAME having been used, due to the unique way it updates the background tiles and main sprites vs the real arcade PCB. It's pretty much case closed on this one, but I still find it fascinating to delve into the hardware side. It's like doing electronic forensics. ;)
Jason, CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!! Without realizing it, you have absolutely proven that Billy used MAME and NOT original DK hardware!!!! So if you notice, when you play back the images from ORIGINAL DK hardware PCB on a normal TV (as you are showing in this video) you must rotate the TV COUNTERCLOCKWISE!!!! But if you do the same in MAME (older MAME versions before 2017) you would need to rotate the TV in CLOCKWISE direction!!!!!! This is the smoking gun that many people miss and you have shown the proof!!!!! If you go back and watch the King of Kong movie, when they show the Billy "DK record" tape at Fun Spot, you will see the TV rotated in the wrong direction (clockwise), where ALL ORIGINAL DK PCBs draw the images in the opposite direction (counterclockwise) - there is also an old video of Robert Mruczek showing Billy's video on a TV and that ALSO shows the image in the wrong direction. CONGRATS to you for proving that Billy used MAME!!
It's a bummer that all the sensationalized videos get so many views, and this one is only at 6k. This is a bit confusing in presentation, but incredibly informative.
being a sound engineer, just put the mic audio in the center as mono, putting the people left and right is more irritating then anything else. Besides this constructive criticism, very informative video so you got the content nailed apart from slight audio issue
Jux Mux we recorded the sound using Jeff's fancy equipment when I put the video together I had no way of combining the audio I my crappy editor it bothers me too man lol
maybe there is sort of a sound mixer in your editing software or somesuch, look for a knob called "panorama" or "balance" with the letters "L" and "R" next to them, put the knob in the 0 or center position for the mic channels. i.imgur.com/0te8bbJ.jpg just saying, maybe you can improve in future videos
While they all had a slightly different loading pattern, there were some common elements. For example a diagonal "black bar" going through all or part of the screen and nothing inside it. Which I noticed the Billy Mitchell videos don't have. Instead he had completed elements (ladders, girders, and so forth) springing up whole cloth. Is this definitive proof one way or another? No, it isn't. It's quite likely no two DK circuit boards will be 100% identical. But that pattern of common elements suggests he might not have used original hardware. Not proof of it, but it is suggestive.
I think you did a good job. Also; I think your machines are loading exactly how I thought the , "normal" arcade would. .. the platforms from the far right and far left load first. . .never from the top down (like on the earlier MAME software)
there were some screens that loaded top down but still none looked like billys. from what i am told the screen that is in question only happened 4 times in billys video thats why i had several shots i think the absolute smoking gun would be to fully replicate his recording methods.
The exact setup would need to be used. Converter boards can all act different in how they “convert frames” some may drop “x” number of frames and some could drop another number. Every time you convert video you create delay due to processing. To be scientific you would need to source the exact converter boards and firmware. There could be processing to the video in the vcr recording this would also create another variable. I suspect that your spitter is also creating delay which is why your not seeing three exact images.
i agree with using the exact setup. i believe the reason all 3 monitors are not exact is because all the monitors are not directly synced together therefore do not draw the same things at the same time even though the information is there the scan is not at that point yet .
www.amazon.com/Digital-Camera-EXILIM-ZR1000-EX-ZR1000WE/dp/B009EPMLKO -- use a 1000hz camera and you can record at 480hz which is probably the sweet spot for this project. Best of luck, but I'm pretty certain that there's a specific "finger" that is not being shown that is shown on Billy's footage. If nobody can show the finger on original hardware, then it's ridiculous to consider that Billy's footage is original arcade hardware. But I expect all that you're going to find is more details of what an arcade board generates with the ABC board, which is definitely not going to resemble the "finger" which is a result of specific artifact of MAME.
The problem I have is they discredit Steve Webbe for a tiny bit of gunk or glue on the board but billy Mitchell uses an elaborate recording set up running through a computer and that wasn’t an issue. Let’s face it that Billy Mitchell won’t play live cause he just doesn’t play to the standard of his own hype and ego
Without drawing conclusions, I think the following video is worth watching. It explains how artifacts on the screen can appear to be different at the same time even for identical video signal split to two CRTs : ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-s9gAPW9IQpU.html I believe the electron beam sweeps left-to-right, top-to-bottom on a CRT screen. Since DK is turned 90 degress, the beam sweep becomes bottom-to-top, left-to-right to the observer. As the video mentions, the frequency of the monitor and camera capture rates being out of sync can also cause effects.
i think your recording process and expectations are flawed here. can you even get 2 recordings from the same screen and same board to look the same? timing differences between the boards, monitors, and recorder are going to cause slightly different frames to get captured, so it will be impossible to reproduce the exact same result twice. with this set up, a better analysis would be to look at HOW the boards are being rendered (order of objects appearing on screen rather than what the screen looks like in any particular frame) and then compare that to other videos of true hardware vs mame.
Nearly all TVs build after 2000 are working digital. They try to reduce the noise and join the the half frames. This results in a delay and strange artifacts on "strange" signals. I think these are the differences we see between the TVs. Every manufacturer has their "secret sauce" to produce a "good" video image. The arcade monitor on the other hand is a very "stupid" thing. It directly shows the signals with out any processing. Also the video recorder is a factor. The old ones simply write the signal 1:1 on the tape. The more modern one try to convert the signals to get the "best" version of a video stream on the tape. They convert the images to "fit" the tape best. But the video signal of the arcade is alien to these algorithms and will produce strange recordings. You can tum the post processing of on high quality video recorders but i don't think you want to spend $5000 for such a project. :-)
Billy Mitchell is very very good at Donkey Kong... that's not in question. Can he set the record on a legit hardware screen in front of a live impartial audience?? That'd be cool if he did.
if he used mame why would they use some variation of a rf tv capture card was mame even available back in 2007??? either the case has a 5% tinted glass filter on it or your screens that are outside their cabinets have to much brightness and contrast and from what I saw on my 90's tv's that there is 2 ntsc standards and the later standard is incompatible with the newer standard and typically throw and B&W image.. you would opof been been better to get a tav that has component in and use that as the test.. 3.56 would throw b&Wb on 4.something capable screens
answer me this how the hell do you rf bleed from a composite or component connection ??? I would love to know because the only way I see a girder tail happening which appears in bill's so called run video is some variation of NES/Atari/c64/c128/trs-80 console port of some kind with the tv slightly out of channel phase.. Unless bill's video was completely shit.. on av either to a modern tv or crt with av most likely will not replicate in the setup bill claimed to use as from the actual girder glitch I have see it in person to there is only 2 ways to get it mess about with monitors height and width sync on the arcade monitor or channel tune a console to get the same results Not withstanding the mame use on top of that though I can't see the girder fault happening unless you introduce rf connection to the physical mix,, someone doing testing connected using bill's claimed method of connection and couldn't replicate the same seen in the video bill supplied and it is looking pretty damning evidence that something other than arcade hardware or pc hardware in general.. why would you go to the trouble recording mame on a vcr when you could likely do it on a pc??? as it is showing that it wasn't arcade that the score was made on.. I can't see av out reproducing the girder flaw any other way.. as for known mame glitches I have fuck all clue on as for av connected console and rf connected console and playing about with actual arcade machines to know what can cause the girder tail effect i can comment on as i was playing DK on a trs-80 when i was ten years old, circa 1987-91 not mention play coin op and nes and atari ports of the arcade game.. If MAME was 10 years old when the run was recorded that means mame was created around 1997, i was playing the game atleast 10-12 years before that time.. I believe the NES port of the arcade came out in 1986/87.. My initial dealing with rf ports started with a TRS-80 version at home, from there I also played both the atari and NES version of the game, And have played DK in the arcades and have worked on arcade cabs to know if you are interfacing with AV you will not rf issues in your recording. the girder tail I'm in speak of has nothing to do with loading screen, this related to physical game play after loading screen.. which can only be done by RF connection..
Where these boards not partially hand made? if so then not one will be the same.... you must remember these boards were not built like todays boards, todays boards are 100% the same, being lazer etched and fully machine made... late 70's boards and erly 80's boards.... not so much... each will play, and load slightly different.... a die could litterally change from one board to the next, or from batch to batch.... and the arcade cabnets themselves are all assembled by hand.... meaning yet again, the playability from one cabnet to the next could vary even more.... this video of yours just proved to me, and i hope others that.... billy might not have cheated... the board he used might have been slightly slower, making the graphics pop up slower (like on your extra monitors,due to more wiring, creating latency) then on one working 100% but these differances would only be noticable if you slowed it down.... que todays tech... it wouldent effect gameplay much, because the human eye can't see the differances.... i hope this comment helps with the confusion.... dude is a cocky basterd, but.... that doesent mean he should have his score removed... not because his machine was different then the one galaxy arcade tested, or the one that whoever noticed this, tested on... they should test no fewer then 10 machines, and note their differances... 1 or 2... or even 4, like you saw, is not enoff for a fair analisis.
In order to do it exactly how he was going to do it to see if you got the same results or different results if you don't have the exact same Hardware down to every little speck I dotted T cross all that then it can't be thought of as getting any type of results that are even somewhat close and it's already been verified that he did it on Meme anyways
This now is a soap opera But checking the video and actual records, this looks a 50% more suspect Do you say: "need more", yes, i'm think same Needed record in mame (0.35b16, 0.9x to 110 and from 111 to actual version)
"Why can't I get the same picture!?" Simple answer: because it's analog video. No two pieces of analog equipment are going to be exactly the same. For example, take two CRT monitors that are the same brand, same model, and with the same settings. All sorts of things can make them look different: the tint of phosphor used the day of manufacture, the thickness of the phosphor, how much has burned off, etc. Another example: cameras in a tv studio. 5 identical cameras (same brand, same model, under the same lights, aimed at the same thing) will all look a little different. An engineer will use a known reference signal (color bars) and a waveform monitor to make the signals match enough so the differences aren't too noticeable. But each camera has it's own color space. Then throw the NTSC video signal into the mix. I'll let you look up why it's joking called Never The Same Color.
agreed i want to spur others to ask questions all 3 monitors were recorded to show how all 3 are at different points of scan and are not synced together
The sync and how video works is not in question with the dispute. The dispute is how MAME generates Donkey Kong and how the videos Billy had of him scoring over a million points were generated on MAME. Your video is actually more evidence against Billy and his tapes. Thoroughly read the twin galaxies thread especially page 19 where the evidence is posted.
The only evidence that seems to be coming from people who know or are fans of Billy is about a month late and the twin galaxies forum members have already shown direct capture, direct capture to VCR, VCR tape of direct capture played on a CRT TV recorded by a camera in different FPS. If you had gone through the thread you would realize your evidence while appreciated and deserves a thank you for the hard work. It already exists and is on the record. Twin Galaxies has also gone through the trouble of getting a hold of a 6 thousand dollar VCR to analyze the VHS tapes of billy's million point games that are available. The evidence of billy producing his million point vhs tapes on MAME is from several different sources and is cited. It sucks, I was a pretty big fan of his. I will probably keep using his hot sauce though to be honest.
Great video Jason! This would probably never happen, but I would hope that Billy Mitchell would eventually just lay everything to rest by just playing on a legit DK cabinet in front of a live crowd, on live TV, with unbiased judges that would confirm the score, the boards, electronics, etc are legit and so on. Just let him play his best and prove once and for all he is one of if not THE best and beyond the shadow of a doubt worthy of his legendary status. Unless he does something like this to clear his name, people will continue to drag his name through the mud. That’s just my $0.02
Billy playing DK in 2018 has absolutely nothing to do with the question if his past scores were legit. he either cheated or not. scoring high in DK today is irrelevant.
This video was made to create doubt, these guys know exactly what they are doing , they want you to come up with the concussion that Billy Did not cheat without saying it themselves. It as all the same acting and video style as some of Billy Mitchell’s videos
create doubt? acting? if you had actually watched the video you would see that my experiment was a failure. i also say several times that i am not on any side
Arcade Jason from what I have seen from Billy Mitchell and I watched every video I could find, i know he lies as he claims Todd Rogers did not cheat and the board swapping video points to a guy that you can’t trust after that now if I see video showing how he cheated on Donkey Kong then I am going to believe that because in many other videos he is seen telling lies. This is the first video of you I have watched and I did skip a lot of it, i am ok with people challenging the idea if he did cheat but from what I have seen he is a lier and a cheat. I will watch some more of your videos later
Agreed, it's just something "inconclusive" that Billy's defenders can cling to in the face of mounting evidence against him that gets worse every day. This video isn't coming from an unbiased position as these two purport in the beginning. It's just more propaganda.
It was not a failure. Seems to me that the two inverters and the conversion board were creating lag on the screen refresh process (the recording was a cycle behind). Also your video show no "cheating finger" on the girder. That would be enough proof that the other videos were made on MAME
Just a few things that i noted after seeing this video for the second time; And a disclaimer; i dont give 2 fucks about this billy character nor "twin galaxies"; i played some arcade in the early 90s here in Norway, but never even heard about this person or this organization before some months ago. And i did not see a fake documentary that shows this character as the antagonist. 1) You are drawing 3 screens from the same output; did you check that such a strain did not impact the output you got? billy claims it was a VHS recorder + the screen he played on so its less of a load. If you have 3 screens connected and they show different frames in real-time then the reason for that explains itself. 2) the dispute is not about recorded video of a screen rendering the game; its about direct feed video showing mame-game and not arcade-game. That is just what got the newest wave of interest in this situation up and running; it was a starting point and after that more detailed investigations followed into far better sources. 3) your video clearly show transition-frames and mid-frames; these are not at the heart of things but show how out of sync the recording equipment and the video-output is. And with 3 screens running from the same board i can at least find 2 purely technical reasons that would happen. 4) You write that you are "attempting to replicate the recording process"; that is not what you are doing in any way. 5) Seems the new claim is that they recorded it not to a VHS as first claimed, but to a laptop; the same laptop seen in the background of the videos from "boomer" with video-editing software and donkey kong screen on it. Except for all that; historically "billy" and his referee buddies have gone out of their way to block other people from their scores being registered by using all kinds of small technicalities; when someone have done that for decades, they better sure be 1000% that their own evidence is far superior to everyone elses and can take far more scrutiny than what they have exposed others to. This cannot possibly be understated how important it is; if you are going to be leading on for decades against others, the eventual backlash will be extremely severe. And I know PR and the industry around it; clearly not as good as mister billy, but i do know 1 thing; if he had not cheated in any way he would be using this to the maximum to gather even more fame and invite everyone to show just how good he is; he would livestream looking through storages finding his VHS records, he would show the machine and game on it, he would do anything to show he wasnt a cheater and he would benefit greatly from it. As it stands now he does what every other cheater that has been caught have done; the historical precedences are obvious from real sports, to video games to literally every part of our society where confidence-men reign supreme. And with a mass-media that only leech on characters and personas; people like this is what you always get served. Luckily with the de-centralization of media that we have now, people who have been stepped over finally can voice their views without being sequestered by media-personas and their gang.
The whole thing is just a sad situation. Or maybe a good one, if we learn from what has caused this to be such a situation. Unfortunately we don’t have large sponsors like say NASCAR and the NFL does in our world of Gaming, thus no billions of dollars spent on large venues with properly managed departments and referees on the spot with millions watching.no rule books to whip out, no board of regulation to rip our motors apart after we win to make sure we didn’t cheat, no doctors to make sure we weren’t Juiced up to win the 500 yard dash.....until then what can we really rely on? Just someone’s word ? Do we need to set up an elympic event worldwide for everyone to get their chance at the high score..... practice all year to attend and get my chance? Sorry for the rant :( but this whole thing been chewing at me for a month. Who to trust?
Thanks for doing some professional, scientific investigations here. here's my two cents: I find it totally believable that billy would cheat. he's an egomaniac. I also would not be surprised if the people calling him out don't know their shit.
a lot of the people calling him out make mistakes because they don't know everything Jason does about electronics. They're just comparing MAME behavior to examples of arcade behavior. Few people have the expertise of Jason. That's all I'm saying.
It's interesting that the different screens display the loading differently, but none of them are consistent with TGs tape. They are a little bit more *similar* yes, but as of yet the loading footage from the Billy's tape hasn't been replicated on actual hardware. It HAS however been replicated in versions of MAME consistent with the timing of the record.
I was all for Billy Mitchell being a fraud. But this has put some doubt into my conclusions. There maybe something more going on with the video feed interpretation. We know that TV's can display things differently, we know that the heads of a vhs recorder can cause diagonal artifacts, and we don't really know what a USB composite recorder can do to manipulate the image. If a couple of donkey kong jamma boards were more affordable, I'd be willing to do some of my own testing. It would also be interesting to look deeper into it like triggering clock cycles and registers directly on the board to really analyze how frame transitions work on original hardware, vs emulated hardware. On that note though. Would you know where I could purchase Donkey Kong jamma boards? Even if they are broken and require repairs?
Obviously, I'm lacking in knowledge on the board types, even though I have a very familiar knowledge of electronics. I mentioned jamma cause I'm most familiar with street fighter arcades, I apologize for not being more diligent in the details. I'm actually seeking the arcade boards for donkey kong, and it seems original hardware is priced fairly high priced, being the TKG boards. I noticed a site mikesarcades which sells refurbished TKG4 boards which looks like a more reasonable price, and on ebay there are some listings. So, I'm going to follow up with this question. What is the hardware I should be looking for? Is it the TKG4 2 board set (CPU and video)? Are there replicas that exist? And I'm sure there might be different firmware versions, what should I be seeking in terms of that? From the power supply and video output related issues, I'm sure looking through the schematic and some general electronics hackery can get something up and running. For the recording methods, I have intentions to analyse the video feed directly, and then continue to move onto further senarios such as vhs recording, RGB monitors, etc.
TickyTack23 I would suggest that any tests you had in mind have already been tried and tested in the following thread: donkeykongforum.com/index.php?topic=2055.330
It is not really up for debate, the video Billy submitted was a mame recording. The only reason he would use mame is to use save states to make it super easy to get a good score. There really is no doubt he cheated at this point.
If computer gaming has become sport (e-sport), records should be obtained in public, live, during official contest. You dont beat 100m running in your private track and sending vid to judges, you do it on stadium. As simple as that. Otherwise, stop calling it sport and paying money.
