Atari VCS Log Book

Atari VCS Log Book 1982 rev 1

TOP 5 RECORD HOLDERS

Greg Degeneffe (95)
Scott Stilphen (62)
Garrett Holland (41)
Glen Sampson (31)
Steven Germershausen (24)

Mark Feldt

game 32, Difficulty A

Virender Dayal

game 28  video

game 30, Difficulty A

John McAllister

Greg Degeneffe

screenshot

George Riley

Peter Nadalin

Alex Lyons

Paul Zimmerman

Alan Hewston

Downhill  game 6, Difficulty AA  * Fastest time possible

Christian Keilback

Summer Games

Scott Stilphen

Winter Games

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Perry Brenkman - recognized by Twin Galaxies for a Grand Prix time of 01:34.93, but this video by Greg Degeneffe proves that specific time isn't possible.

Ron Corcoran - disgraced former Twin Galaxies chief referee who verified his own scores against TG's rules, and set most using an emulator (without making note of it).  He even added a score from at least one event he didn't even attend (one of John Marks' events link).   His scores were finally removed from TG's database... 11 years after I publicly called for former disgraced chief TG referee Mruczek to remove them (link).  He also imported some of Todd Rogers' scores and later vouched (i.e. lied) for him when some of them started to come under close scrutiny.  Corcoran failed at every game, including the most important one - life.

Tom Duncan - used his position as a Twin Galaxies referee to use other players' strategies and then beat their scores before they got entered into Twin Galaxies' database (link 1, link 2).  In 2017 he asked to have all of his scores removed.  From 2005-2009 he amassed well over 5,000 records (link).  This was during the Mruczek era of allowing referees to self-enter their own scores.  Make of that what you will.

Rodrigo Lopes - used PAL versions (and an emulator) to tie or break several Twin Galaxies scores on prominent titles like Decathlon and Pitfall.  He refused to answer when repeatedly asked what platform (NTSC, PAL, or emulator) he used (link), and when he claimed he only used NTSC versions of ROMS, I pointed out a half-dozen records of his were on games only released in PAL format.  Years later, someone else claimed he was cheating on several games (link 1, link 2, link 3).  And who was the ref who verified all of these questionable scores?  None other than Robert T. Mruczek.  In fact, Rodrigo would only submit his scores to Mruczek, even once waiting for him to return for vacation before submitting some scores!

UPDATE: TG finally banned Lopes in December 2019 when he refused to respond over the latest dispute regarding one of his scores, but the decision wasn't without controversy (link), much like TG's decision with Todd Rogers.

Robert T. Mruczek - disgraced former Twin Galaxies chief referee who was eventually banned from TG (under Water Day's ownership).  The list of his corrupt behavior through the years continues to grow.  He:

• Supported known cheaters like Corcoran, Lopes, Todd Rogers, and Billy Mitchell, and refused to completely remove their scores, but instead praised them while erasing countless scores from others and entire database tracks for his own frivolous whims, without legitimate reasons or proof.  John Marks personally contacted him in 2007 regarding a score Corcoran self-entered from one of Marks' events that Corcoran didn't even attend (link), and Mruczek refused to remove it.

• Backdated his VCS Kaboom score (and possibly more) soon after becoming the chief ref at TG.  As of 2-20-01, his high score was 51,849 (recorded 10-20-99 link), but during his time as chief ref, his score was changed to 999,999 and backdated 7-1-85 (link)!

• Made false claims (such as there being 2 different ROM versions of Donkey Kong and Berzerk, which there aren't - link 1, link 2, link 3), which in many cases left himself with the top score; he actually claimed his DK cart was somehow different than everyone else's, when it was HIS score that should have been removed!

• Treated PAL and emulator scores as being equal to NTSC, which allowed players like Lopes to receive credit for breaking several long-standing records (link), and felt keeping them separate was a "waste of time and resources"; when Walter Day ordered him to,  it soon became a disaster when he re-labeled countless verified scores as being done on different platforms - based on nothing more than his own, personal definition of how 'rare' a game was (link).

• Has a history of removing scores and tracks, often based on nothing more than his own, spurious opinions.  Right before he was kicked out of TG, he wiped out the entire database of NES scores, because some of them apparently came from the Nintendo Power magazine, and he simply didn't fee like taking the time to research which specific scores they were.  Even as recently as 2020 (link), he was looking to get a score removed - this time one of his own (and for a track he originally created) - yet when a similar request was made by someone else 5 years earlier, he had the opposite opinion, calling the removal of scores historical revisionism (link).

• Recently admitted most TG refs self-entered their own scores (again, continuing with Corcoran's corrupt approach).  He even admits he was self-entering his own scores as far back as 2001.  After Corcoran was arrested, his own record count jumped from 152 (at the end of December 2004) to 397 (at the end of February 2005 link).  When the suggestion was made to dump all scores from Corcoran, he was against it (as recent as 2017) because it might set a precedent for removing all scores sent to Corcoran for verification, including his.  And yet, 2 months later he created a thread on TG, asking for all of Corcoran's scores to be removed.

• Recently suggested "rounding down" questionable scores to correct suspected typos, proving he's still very much part of the 'old guard' at TG, where doing whatever it took to make issues "go away" took precedent over doing the right thing.

• Recently claimed TG had a rule against exploiting the Space Invaders double-firing glitch and that he never supported the use of it, yet 3 years earlier he approved of someone else using it.

It's unknown how many scores were "Mruczek'd" up during his 4 years as chief ref there.  I could probably devote an entire page to 'Murczek madness'.  You would be hard-pressed to find a more stubborn, hypocritical, and insulting person in this hobby, and one totally ignorant of technical aspects (ex: differences between NTSC and PAL games), not to mention his other "hobby" of objectifying women (NSFW).  Between Corcoran's disastrous policies and Mruczek's decision to not only continue with them but to expand on them and create new ones while ignoring any and all criticism regarding them, it will be many years before TG's corrupted database will be fully corrected, if ever.  If TG truly wants a clean slate for their database, they need to scrape off the remaining residue from that era of corruption, and that means him.  Much like Corcoran's scores, not only does Mruczek's VCS Donkey Kong score need to be removed, but ALL of his scores as well, due to the years of his corrupt and unethical behavior.  TG's self-appointed title of official video game score keeper demands every gamer be held to the same standards, and unfortunately for much of its history, that wasn't the case.  There's a new era of TG now (with the real experts - the gamers - having a say in how their database is maintained) and it's clear Mruczek and those like him who continue to push their old agendas will never adapt to it.

UPDATE: Mruczek is now banned again from TG for the 2nd time.  You might say he's !!

Wilson Oyama  - caught using emulator save states on another scoreboard, under the name "oyamafamily".  He's long been suspected of editing his videos and thanks to Garrett Holland's video, we now have evidence.

Todd Rogers - disgraced early 1980s video game "star" and former Twin Galaxies referee who often billed himself as the world's first professional gamer but ended up being the world's first professional video game liar.  There has been years of speculation regarding some of his scores, and throughout it all, every time a score was questioned, there was always a litany of excuses (he used a different cartridge version, or a prototype, or his score was entered incorrectly, or there was a smudge on his paperwork, etc).  He's also claimed marathon times that weren't close to what others have shown.  It seems the "world's greatest home video game player" did whatever he could to be on top.  In late 2017, I removed all of his scores from my site.

UPDATE: Thanks largely to the work of Eric “Omnigamer” Koziel, to those on TG for recognizing Rogers' fake Activision Dragster 5.51 certificate, and to Benjamin “Apollo Legend” Smith for a pair of YouTube videos (#1 and #2), TG was left with no choice but to remove all of his scores and ban him (which should have been done 6 months earlier).  2 days later, Guinness dropped Rogers' Dragster record as well.  Koziel posted his comments about this on his Twitter page, which includes a link to Rogers' statement.  Meanwhile, Rogers continues to post fake evidence (this time to Reddit with a Photoshopped photo from 10 years ago) and offer different excuses for his fake scores (recently with this interview).  The thread on TG regarding the months-long discussion about Rogers' fake scores was removed without warning in February 2022.  When someone pointed it out to the TG community, Hall's response was that it "administratively archived"; in other words, it's now only available to TG admins.  This is apparently the new way to 'sweep things under the rug' at TG - out of sight, out of mind.

It's worth noting that 5 of the 7 people on this list were former Twin Galaxies referees.  If Walter Day and Billy Mitchell played Atari VCS/2600 games competitively, their names would be listed here as well.  It's unfortunate TG's history is rife with those with such immoral behavior who also held high positions within it.  I had hoped a change of ownership would bring with it a genuine attempt to undo decades of corruption, but while progress has been made in some areas, it's sorely lacking in others.  The same axiom still applies - TG needs players far more than players will ever need TG.  Until TG's current owner, Jace Hall, truly understands that and makes a concerted effort to completely break away from "old" TG (and those responsible for it), that negative reputation will hang over them forever; it would be a shame if that continued, because the current top players there now are some of the best TG has ever had, and they deserve a better platform.  Unfortunately, Hall made it very clear that scores proven or highly suspected to be fake would remain, particularly any of Mruczek's (link).  Back in 2018, a rather damning article (and accompanying Reddit thread) about Hall's involvement with the H1Z1 professional gaming league fiasco and some of the serious claims leveled against him should give anybody involved with him or TG pause for concern.

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