Dragster World Record Controversy (Todd Rogers) -  

Do you think more arcade and classic gaming records will be scrutinized because of this? ✅More info @bit.ly/2E4KFua & bit.ly/2BNBDMO ✅Support the podcast @ patreon.com/cupodcast ✅More #CUPodcast vids: bit.ly/1pOBDVH ✅Follow on twitter @ twitter.com/patthenespunk & twitter.com/pxlsicle

Holy shit I remember watching your flea market madness back when I was 14 or so. This brings back some memories.

My favorite is his Fathom high score. Todd's score is 1,110,500, and second place?.... *142!* Since it took 2.5 minutes for the second place score, Todd's run would take roughly 325+ hours to achieve. Todd apparently has the record for longest time awake too!

With Todd Rogers being removed from the TG leaderboard, I once again have the World Record for Lock'N'Chase on the Intellivision! He took the title away from me about 12 years ago when he quadrupled my score. With no evidence. I have a VHS tape of my run in my crawlspace...maybe I should digitize it.

He was on The Ben Heck show and Ben broke it down right in front of Todd's face how it wasn't true and be still said the computer just wasn't playing as well as he was. He's been lying so long he believes his own bullshit.

I started questioning Twin Galaxies the second they let Billy Mitchell submit the janky as fuck VHS tap where his Donkey Kong score inexplicably jumped after the screen glitched over his score.

I remember reading about Todd Rogers back in the 80s thinking something seems fishy, but there was very few sources of information back then so just forgot about it for a long time.

He didn't do a TAS. He decompiled the source code and analyzed it. He then built a sheet based on the logic of the game its self. There's no argument to even be made that the TAS is incomplete, because Omnigamer's findings were based off the actual source code of the game.

I think its a shame that despite the massive public outcry Twin Galaxies took so long to get this all taken care of. I feel they damaged their credibility a lot in doing so.

Fathom High Scores According to TG: 1st Place: 1,110,500 - Todd Rogers 2nd Place: 142 - Roger Edwin Blair 111 Todd Rogers supposed score is 7820 TIMES HIGHER than 2nd place lmao In order to even get that high of a score, Todd would have had to play the game for over 325 hours straight. Congratulations on yet another record, Todd because the world record time for staying awake is 264.4 hours (11 days 25 minutes) by Randy Gardner. or the Centipede High Score: 1st Place: 65,000,000 - Todd Rogers 2nd Place: 58,078 - John Marks Again a score that is 1120 TIMES higher than 2nd place.

To correct a point made in the video, Activision themselves did not claim you could get 5.54 in the game. They only theorized that it 'might' be possible to get 5.54. Todd's claimed 5.51 was even better than the theory that Activision had come up with. The REALITY is that nobody in the entire world has been able to break 5.57 legit and actually prove it. Now whats interesting to note is that Todd's original record according to Activision magazine was listed as 5.57. It wasn't until two other individuals got listed as having 5.51 times that Todd's record was 'updated' to 5.51 along with theirs. Even more mysterious is that the other two individuals that were given credit for being the first 5.51 times were then deleted from the roster in subsequent issues. So this got me to thinking what happened here: The original two 5.51 records were clerical error on Activision's part. Todd, not knowing the records were entered by mistake, was effectively forced to fudge a bogus picture of 5.51 to match it, and then since his record had photographic evidence to show 5.51, the other two clerical errors were deleted. This is why Todd's record stayed and the other two guys got deleted. It is very likely the other two guys got 5.57 just like Todd originally did, and clerical error forced Todd into a panic of having to match an impossible time. When you think about it in this context, it makes perfect sense. Todd got caught up in a lie that just happened to carry forward because he submitted a fake photo.

To me, Twin Galaxies hasn't been reputable since watching the King of Kong documentary when they kept screwing over Steve Wiebe so that Billy Mitchell always seemed to somehow be on top.

the best bit was how someone calculated how long he would've had to play to get some of these records and some of them were literally three days straight

I dunno if the coffee stain defense or the Rogue gamma ray defense is my favorite excuse. I would have to say the rogue gamma ray, that is just too funny.

The number 4 didn't exist in the 80s. It was invented in December 1993. 5 and 6 rounded to 7. And 2,3 and what we now consider 4 rounded down to 1.

A 20 minute CUPodcast segment followed by a 23 minute segment?! Thanks dudes! Always enjoy the longer segments after a long days work

I am honestly not even sure if Todd was ever even a “good player” or not. With hundreds of lazy, illogical fake scores, it’s almost as if he didn’t even play the game to understand what a believeable fake score would be... like DK or Wabbit

What's really shitty is that, after Todd's scores were removed, there were over 1,000 new world record holders that - many of which probably stopped playing years ago, or even worse, passed away, and never knew they had a world record. That's what's so scummy about that Todd did. He took away great moments from other people that earned it.

Even if all Todd Rogers' runs are faked, you have to admit he's certainly left an impact on the speedrunning community as a whole. His rampant cheating across multiple different records has taught people to be more careful when accepting runs, and is why so many long-standing runs are being discovered as fake. It's like the Scientific Revolution of speedrunning.

Yeah saw a video with Todd in an interview with the dragster game set up on the old system. Only got 5.57 and started saying, "The cameras are bugging me too much, [...] the lighting feels off [...] the controller is too sensitive..." You get the point. After said interview he sent the reporter a photo saying he finally got it. It looked blocky as 144p, except the last digit which looked like a photoshop 4.

Looking back on King of Kong is heartbreaking now. It was right there in front of our faces and nobody could possibly think Twin Galaxies are dirty bastards. They cheated that poor guy out of a score.

The one dislike must be Tod Rogers. Great segment.

If you've ever seen the movie Chasing Ghosts, you can see why this guy was holding on to his glory from the 80's. This guy's life is an absolute disaster.

Man, I guess you guys really... Dragged this one out.

I take all my high score business to Speedrun.com personally, because it's community moderated and not only are there very strict rules for how any score and speedrun can be submitted, but within that each game has communal rules agreed upon by the community, and your submissions are vetted by people who actually play the games.

Remember how much trouble Twin Galaxies made for Steve Wiebe, but seemed to give Billy Mitchell a free pass. Something is rotten in Denmark.

The only legit record Todd Rogers holds is most bullshit scores attempted to claim were legit

This was the beginning of Todd Rogers downfall, and boy it got really crazy after this lol.

Glad someone like Pat is putting this out here. Saw the reddit post a week ago, and haven’t heard much since. Hope Todd gets what’s coming to him

I admire the both of you fellows. Podcast is great for speeding up my day thanks alot

I am by no means defending Todd Rodgers, but the 2nd place Centipede score was pretty weak. I got close to that score recently after one night of playing the game. All I am saying is that you can't necessarily discount a first place score based on the shitty scores other players entered. That said, 65 million is ridiculous. There is obviously something up.

Really happy to see all these different sources exposing this topic now that the dispute has settled. It makes the grind for 5.57 worth that much more.

I think he probably managed a 5.57 and that smudged could easily look like a 5.51.

Awesome one guys! Keep up the good work.

was waiting for this one

I started listening instead of watching clips and now that I am watching a clip again it is blowing my mind....

This has always been a mystery of sorts to me, and hilarious! I can just envision this guy in the 70's and 80's REALLY REALLY wanting to get the high score NO MATTER WHAT.

Damn, now no one will believe my 2.3 billion Donkey Kong high score.

I'm so happy this whole thing is being talked about more and more now

That 2nd place on Centipede was mine...lol

Did you guys do a segment on dream? Or did i miss it lol

You guys will definitely be talking about Donkey Kong pretty soon. Billy Mitchell's scores were done on MAME. All people are waiting on now is to see how big of a hole he will dig in his efforts to double down.

Always love rewatching the classics, funny how a lot of things like this are similar - An insular community where the foxes are watching the hen houses - be it WATA or the old Twin Galaxies crew where they say what goes and who is in the in-crowd, and you aint invited! At least Jace Hall has tried to clean up that scoreboard no matter how much Billy Mitchell whines and throws a fit.

You guys got omnigamer's proof for 5.57 slightly wrong. Todd is actually correct in saying that a tool assisted run may not be the lowest time because new glitches can be discovered later that lower it. However, omnigamer actually exhausted all possibilities that the game can be played through code analysis.

“Some day on the far future, even Billy Mitchell might be questioned.” “Breaking news, Billy Mitchell’s score is probably fraudulent!”

Great stuff. I think part of the problem too is that most people didn't know records were kept and didn't achieve high enough to notice. Also people wouldn't think that the upper echelons would fake it too. Some of course one could figure out with a calculator.

I solved the Case ! During the original record keeping somebody mistook a "7" for a "1" with a serif. The score was officially recorded incorrectly due to the error and after so many years no one is willing to admit the fault.

What I think happened is that Todd Rodgers took a shitty picture, either by accident or on purpose, and said it was a 5.51. They bought it, and he either was lying in the first place, or he didn't intend to lie, but ran with it and lost his mind.

Technically it’s possible to defeat a tool assisted speed run if a new glitch or exploit is discovered but with a game this basic and old it’s highly unlikely that something of this nature has been unnoticed for so long.

I remember my best friend complaining of those rediculous scores 20 years ago. We suspect his system was glitched or modded.

Lying about your times on the internet is one of the most important parts of real drag racing too.

King of Kong was the absolute worst thing that happened to twin galaxies. They got way too much exposure. Notice the only guy in that movie associated with twin galaxies that wanted to see Steve succeed was the guy that got exposed as a cheat early back in the 80's.

Heard about it this morning, what some people won't do.

I've never even heard of Twin Galaxies before this whole thing exploded

Todd once said in an online forum that he got that score by activating some kind of glitch that aloud him to start the race in the second gear. Not outside the realm of possibility. But if its true he must of played the game poorly afterwards because you would of got a way less time then 5.51 starting in the second gear.

I’m glad to see you moved to the shore sm7b. but what are you powering those energy hungry beasts?

He's a cheater. There's no way to recreate the world record. The data-miners say it's not in the code or whatever. Look at the facts.

If Activision signed off on his claim for the records back in the day, surely David Crane was in the know how of what went down. As lead programmer for dragster he must know something, someone try to get a hold of him and ask.

Todd Rogers, once king of videogames, now holds a world record that surely can't be beaten, given out by Apollo Legend, of "greatest cheater in gaming history"... in the Twilight Zone

Youve gained a subscriber :)

haven't even heard of twin galaxies before this but yeah never hurts to double check especially when there is no physical evidence

billy Mitchell has some dodgy shit with glitchy videos when he got beat. twin galaxies should be turned into a museum and scores held elsewhere and added via a committee

Yeah, I recently voted to remove many of his scores from the website but it definitely took awhile. Many of them were Turbografx-16 records with so called perfect scores with zero evidence.

I remember this guy well from the various gaming mags/TV appearances at the time. (Born in 74 here.) Fraud Rogers. Also, 'Twin Galaxies' is more crooked than a roach leg....Billy Mitchell, anyone? Ugh.

Todd Rogers gets 15000000 in Donkey Kong. Second place is not even 400000... I'm dead.

18:58 keep your light on for me Ian.

I always blow up the engine ..LOL

they forgot to tell todd: they added a "human element" slider to the TAS kit

All scores on a digital system can relatively easily be manipulated, so unless the systems are checksummed sealed (not networked, no ports accessible) and played at the same time in a live event a score is suspect.

"It should be over in less than ten seconds". The motto of my sex life :'(

It would suck for people who actually might have some honest records. They might have practiced for years and spent all their childhood allowance practicing and now it gets taken away because of lying cheating bastards.

"Eeen!"

Twin Galaxies has always been a club for these guys. It is not surprising that they tried to deflect some of the SHAME associated with lying about a video game achievement...

My favorite score is the one where 2nd place is 142 and he had something like 1,115,000 which would take at least 2 weeks straight of playing

no one has ever seen Billy Mitchell get a perfect Pac Man score in person either! they were either video tapped or claimed collaborated by "friends"

I am going to say this to Twin Galaxies as well. All scores for the classic games (everything pre-2006) if it can't be verified on video and witness account, the score should be thrown out. You want to prove you have a top 10 all time score, let's have a tournament and prove you are legit. Twin Galaxies, reps from Nintendo, Sega, Atari and Activision have to be there. Pat, you should be there, so should James Rolfe and Mike as well. Both channels broadcasting this tournament on RU-vid. Home consoles set up, arcade versions set up, everything verified and in public. I am sorry if Billy Mitchell or Steve Weibe gets drug into this fray. But at this point, we need a new tournament to prove your scores are legit. It needs to be public. Gaming experts need to be on hand. Period. Set a date, some time this summer. Everyone who gives a damn about these scores, needs to be there. It needs to be broadcast live over several RU-vid channels. Otherwise, I say toss out the top 10 scores for all of them and make people prove it again.

I think I heard that Billy Mitchel is being looked at for using MAME on the first over 1M score of DK

My best time for flying a concorde from New York to London is 53 minutes. Prove me wrong . . .

I never followed this before the recent news of cheaters caught. But when I saw some of those supposed scores Todd Rodgers had... I don't care if you know nothing about a game in question. When a second place score is something like 60,000 and his first place score is 12,000,000.... seriously? Even knowing nothing about the game someone with common sense could tell you that isn't right. And coming up with scores that are impossible in a game because it scores in variables of 50 then your supposed score is something like 9,999,990... which is a number impossible to get in variables of 50... I mean did he even play these games before he made up a rediculous scores. And I know it is mean but how pathetic do you have to be to make up things like this thousands of times? What do you even gain? These people sure don't seem to be getting rich, are there 18 year old hotties for groupies... I mean why would you need that recognition so much you would lie to that degree just to keep getting it over and over again? 99.99% of the world not only doesn't care but would laugh at someone for thinking that is something to brag about in the first place... and he went to those extremes... how fragile is your ego? I mean if these people were making money, getting hot girls throwing themselves at them and living some rock star lifestyle off of these lies I would at least get why they did it... but unless I am missing a lot that isn't even remotely true... why live a lie for decades such a minimal return on all of it?

Funny this is being talked about. I just tried for a High Score with Twin Galaxies for my favorite game for the Sega Master System called Teddy Boy. I have never tried ever for a high score on this site or even cared about high scores. This was a game I played as a kid and adored. By the way I killed the high score easily and I am actually proud of it. Go check out Teddy Boy :)

Yup some of those records are in another Galaxy.

Lol ian: "make a band!" Funny because he just did

I feel sorry for the guys that should have had these records, he has cheated them out of the glory

Factor is to the power of. So factor of 2 is times 100. Factor of 100 would be 100 zeroes added to the score. I cant belive I corrected this and apologize for the broken part of my brain that urged me to do this.

if the game counts time in .03 ticks, it is impossible to get 5.51, 5.54 or even 5.57 .... 183X.03=5.49 184X.03=5.52 etc

You should never need to reverse engineer the original game, or run a TAS on it. It's meaningless. Just look at the original "evidence". If you find it lacking, you, me, everyone should not believe it to be valid. The evidence seems to be nothing more than word of mouth. Really? Who's standards are those? And should they be respected in any way?

Nice mic's

1:33 the obvious example being the "kill screen" on Pacman I don't care enough to call the man a liar, but based on the collected evidence and assuming that he wasn't using some official, but undumped variation of the game or something equally esoteric, it seems VERY unlikely that this is a legitimate score.

I don't get why someone would cheat on such record.

so bizzare that this bullshit is coming to light now, dude used to work for TG and went into the computer and edited in his own fake high scores, didnt even use his brain and make realistic scores

I can verify that there is at least one person who has shown that quite a few seemingly impossible 80's scores are actually possible and that's John McAllister. He has some of the most impressive raw skills I have ever witnessed in person. He makes some of the more brutal games a freaking cake walk. [Star Castle for another example.] Another such person is Donald Hayes. who has done some absolutely phenomenal stuff on games that blow everything away. So there ARE people out there who can prove a fair amount of validity.... but there's still most likely a fair amount that are indeed bunk.

talk about adventure island

I find it kinda funny that 551 people liked this video before I did.

Someone needs to look into Paul Dean's 9.5 million Spy Hunter score...

Even if king of kong was biased to steve weibe, some of the twin galaxies just didn't come across well at all, no matter how you edit it.

More shame than there ever was fame.

This kind of excites me because...does this mean open season on Atari 2600 records?

Will Billy Mitchel become the Guinness book or records hide and seek champion now?

Oh boy, a 20+ min video. Glad to see you guys cover this topic & go in on him lmao. What a fraud.

Just do it again and take a proper photo, or better yet, in front of live audience!