How to be a winner. Even when you’re a loser.

This is a happy story. Of the time that I kicked the motherloving ass out of Gradius, and how it has become an incredibly moot point in the development of my own personal character.

—

It looks and plays just as awesome as this image presents itself.

The game that started a legacy of games and is synonymous with scrolling right and shooting everything you see, the way that Super Mario Bros.…established the platformer,  or The Legend of Zelda created the modern console adventure genre, or GTA III established the a Sandbox game in which soliciting and murdering prostitutes became a viable option of things to do whenever you’re not having to follow a mission in a video game.

—

“Hey, kids! Pay for something you’ve already got in your house!” apparently worked for a short time.

Saving face, I collected myself, let out a sigh, inflated my Reebok “The Pump” shoes a couple of squeezes, jumped off the stool, and went home. I didn’t think about the game until more than seventeen years later.

I check the online scoreboard vehemently to see if a listing exists. No. They don’t even have it registered, because officially, there wasn’t an official Gradius US Arcade release. However, there WAS one for Nemesis, being the UK’s version of Gradius, (which is basically the same thing, except I will note that it is way more more difficult than it’s Japanese counterpart with the bullets and the hey and all.)

And the last guy to set THIS score was back in 1985 – the release year of the game. A guy named Paul Ashworth in the UK set this score of 1,194,500 sometime back then, probably at some pub, to impress his mates, while they watched Are You Being Served, and eating Fish and Chips and Bob’s your Uncle and all of that British shit.

I read the number to myself. My top score that I just played in this game a few minutes ago was 26,000. But you know what? I had fun. I got way farther than I did as a kid, and felt, if there was a game to get that attention, this was going to be it.

I cracked my knuckles and tightened my headband. This was going to be the game that I broke apart, and would forever be known for taking down.

Valhalla was in my crosshairs. And warrior poets would sing my praises.

Nothing like dignity to keep this whole story going.

—

Reaping the rewards in Nemesis was an incredibly painstaking experience.

To give you an idea, to complete the entire game takes fifteen solid minutes of time. For the record, you must get this score in ONE virtual (or real, if I was on a real cabinet) quarter. There’s no continuing. If you fuck up, you gotta start it over. Since I was playing it through a variant version of MAME called Wolfmame, I was able to save my commands through an .input file, which was included with my game submission, in which a judge (a dude who I later became good Facebook friends with, named Matthew Timothy Walters, in light of his persistent and obnoxious New York Rangers fan status) would load up the game, and the .inp file, and make sure I wasn’t cheating as the game played itself using my key inputs recorded through out the playthrough.

I eventually tackled and beat the top score for the MAME record, it was done when I had scored 424,000 points (this happened about two months after excessively practising in my home, wearing headband, playing at least twice a night. Every night).

But I wanted the “Nobody has gotten this many goddamn points in Nemesis record.” Record. And that would take a solid three playthroughs on one quarter. (I had determined that I was usually rounding out each game clear at 350,000 points.)

Did I mention this game, already balls hard, gets balls harder each time you beat it? Oh, because it does. Konami must’ve had some hi-larious programmer come up with the idea of having certain enemies, after death, send a single shot fixed on your last location your way, after you beat it once. And then when you do it twice – EVERY enemy does that. Bullet Hell hadn’t been invented in 1985, and while it’s no Mushihimefutari (mouthful), it’s still a right bastard to deal with.

It was the most motivated I’ve ever been to completing something. This game that I struggled with as an awkward youth was something I was blowing away as an even more awkward adult. This time figuring out patterns. Being able to shoot enemies before they appear on screen. Knowing safe spots to set up and space out my options/missiles for optimum effect. Hell, I found an entire point in the game where I could keep tapping a button, turn, and have a two minute conversation without even looking at the screen based on the sounds of the game music alone.

The kind of attention a human being would give important matters, such as getting in shape, breaking the grip of alcoholism, mastering a foreign language – I had accomplished in the form of pulverizing a video game that basically nobody has ever heard of.

 —

In 2009, something…unprecedented happened. I had broken the ceiling of all my former scores (now ranking in at about 788,500, still short of endgame), and was feeling a bit dejected about accomplishing my goal.

I got an email. Well, rather, a message. Directly. On my former webcomic’s message board even. Not a big deal, except…it’s from someone I’ve never heard of.

And not only that, they were from the UK.

Power AND prestige!

Martyn Carroll, of Retro Gamer magazine (if you haven’t read it, you really should. It’s aspensive in the US, but it’s easily the greatest video game magazine you can possibly get your hands on, especially for those of us who are old, crotchety, and abject to accepting new things and games) had sent me an inquiry. He was putting together a feature story on Gradius, and saw that I was actively going for the score  (and had provided my website on my Twin Galaxies profile), and wanted to do an interview, and, get this, even get five tips I could give new people who are playing this game.

This would be printed IN the magazine. With my picture, even.

As I told many people upon delivery of this news, if I could go back in time, to tell kid me “yoyo, SOMETHING you do video game related is going to be PRINT WORTHY, and you’re gonna be published. IN A GAME MAGAZINE.”, I would have rocket-shit my pants with such violent force, you might be able to find my frozen corpse somewhere in high orbit of Mars right now.

It was just the thing I needed to reinvigorate myself, and validate the close to three years I’ve put into this.

Again. Dignity.
I wore a lot of these hats then, which is strange for living in a state not known for being cold. Ever.

(For those curious, the full interview can be found in Retro Gamer 72, and is available online at https://www.imagineshop.co.uk/magazines/retrogamer.html)

—

January 26^th, 2010. I was at home. I’m 28 years old, in my cramped living conditions with my arduous beast of an arcade cabinet taking up the bulk of the teeny-tiny living space I was contending with. (I moved home with parents. Let’s not get into that stigma. The important thing is that, as a grown up, I’m not there now.)

My recent employment dilemma meant that I had a lot of time spent in this warm, unpleasant dungeon, and I spent the bulk of it not endeavouring to escape, but in the cradling arms of retro gaming entertainment. My Facebook was frequent reports of numbers achieved in daily attempts. I was running on caffeine alone and was depressed about a great many situations and circumstances at the moment.

Something had to improve. And that’s when I noticed I had broken a million.

I had grown to loathe Gradius at this point. I usually played it with headphones on, so it’s catchy, fun MIDI tracks would be awash out to various Drum and Bass tracks that seemed to increase my anxiety, and, through some bizarre self-assurance, made me a better gamer. But I was sick of doing the same goddamn thing to just fail at the end.

It became the thing I hated the most. Until this moment. When I realized I broke a million. And not only that. I had lives left. I was on my third playthrough, and something had kicked in.

The comp copy of Retro Gamer magazine 72 had come in a week beforehand, and the enthusiasm of explaining “Yeah, I got in here, because I am ultimately the second best there ever was at this game” to people had washed out to commentary of “Oh. So you haven’t done it yet.”

I had accomplished so much, and yet, it had escaped me all. UNTIL now.

1,193,500. 1,194,200. Holy dogshit. I was about to do it. The reality of the situation that all of these moments invested in pattern recognition, lightning fast hand eye coordination, and fury at the Japanese Shoot’ Em Up industry, were about to pay off. I felt my blood turn to ice, and the weight of the world came down on the inset candy-like shoot button on the console. The discovery of fire. The exploration of the new world. The ushering in of the atomic era. This was a turning point in time that could only compare to the majesty of such similar events.

It was moments after that I completely fucked up, and slammed into one of the game’s teeny-tiny bullets….at this point, the momentum of picking up where I left out was shot. My final score?

BOOM!

1,196,400.

Artist’s Rendition of me, in my moment of triumph!

I had beaten that motherfucker by 900 points. I blinked. And I think a Ric Flair “Whoooooooo!” actually escaped my lungs.

—

It was verified weeks later. My persistent checking of the scoreboard was accompanied by more self-reverence and acclaim to the disinterest of others. And I shelled out the seventeen bucks to get my OFFICIALLY recognized certificate.

And here it is.

I’m outside? Yeah. Stranger things have happened.

Since I’m using a a low resolution image (in one of my less flattering personal appearance in public moments.), I’ll transcribe my fortune and glory for you, the reader.

VIDEO GAME WORLD CHAMPION.

By the authority invested in Twin Galaxies since 1982, as the official scorekeeper for the world of electronic game playing, we have verified this player’s scored and hereby recognize the player’s claims as being true and valid. To commemorate the important of this historical contribution to the long tradition of electronic game playing, this player will be recorded in the historical archives published in Twin Galaxies’ Official Video Game & Pinball Book of World Records and will be forever honored for the following accomplishment.

JOE MARTIN

World Champion on Nemesis.

Proclaimed the World Champion on Nemesis for the MAME platform for achieving the World’s Highest Score of 1,196,400 points on January 28, 2010 as verified by INP submission. As the historical scorekeeper of the world, Twin Galaies confirms that Joe Martin, of Sebring, FL, will be listed in any forthcoming Arcade edition of Twin Galaxies’ Official Video Game & Pinball Book of World Records as well as in the Twin Galaxies Online Database. Issued in Fairfield, Iowa, USA, on February 10, 2010.

–Signed. Walter Day, Chief Scorekeeper.

There you have it.

It sat on my desk for almost a year before anyone noticed it, and other people assumed it was some kind of certificate for something retarded like “College” (or whatever.) And very rarely do people have anything to say other than “Oh.” Whenever I’ve mentioned that I hold (even currently, I might add) a Guinness authorized World Record in a video game. And I can personally verify that it has gotten me laid approximately ZERO times since the issuing of said certificate.

That being said, I’d like to close out my story with a few key points to being a badass.

1) Never give up. Never surrender. I lifted this from Galaxy Quest, but found it to be an apt feeling if you’re going for any goal, no matter how ridiculous others make it seem. It doesn’t matter if five people out of 100 knew what Gradius (or Nemesis) is. I still went for it, and wanted it. I wanted that personal satisfaction. And would have been willing to put another three years into it, ultimately, even in the face of dejection to do it.

2) If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything. I lifted this from Back to the Future. I went into this game knowing absolute dick. And trained myself into being some kind of retarded badass with gameplay burned into my subconscious. There’s days I’ll sit idly at my desk, and will remember exact patterns that bad guys fly in and even inadvertently twitch to respond out of some kind of muscle memory. Practice is everything. And that’s not just with any game. It’s with anything. Serious.

If you think you can’t draw, draw until you can. This is a universal rule.

If you think you can’t punch the shit out of rapist Biff Tannen so hard that you knock him completely loopy fruity in the year 1985, just go ahead and punch the shit out of rapist Biff Tannen so hard that you knock him completely loopy fruity in the year 1985 until it happens.

3) I ain’t your pal, dickface. I lifted this from Bloodsport. Which you should see. It’s a pretty great movie, especially because it isn’t. But it does have Bolo Yeung in it. And it did inspire Mortal Kombat. And as far as movies goes, it does have a pretty badass training montage that basically is what I’ve been talking about in the previous paragraphs.

And this is how you become a winner. Even when you’re a loser.

Excuse me. I think I might actually see if I can break 1,000.

—joerocks1981.