Awesome. It’s a word that gets used a lot these days. It’s been worn out, worn down, and repeated to the point of meaninglessness. But Richie Knucklez is Awesome. Awesome because he says so. Awesome because he told you so, and if you asked him why, he’ d tell you because he’s cocky, and good at everything he does. I know because I asked him.
Richie Knucklez, jammin' out on one of his many DK cabinets.
The Kong Off is a competition thrown by Knucklez to bring together the top 11 Donkey Kong players in the world, to all play side by side, each with their own cabinet and unlimited credits. The first day was a 10 hour marathon. I live blogged about it @NintendoLife.
Eric Howard, middle, scored the first kill screen
The first day an unknown from Cranston, Rhode Island took first place. His name is Eric Howard, and he reached the first kill screen of the event. He also had an extra life left. Though others would beat his score, nobody else at the event got to a kill screen with any of their guys in reserve. I swore he looked familiar, and as it turned out, I went to school with him at East Providence High School. Weird!
The Champs
Still, Wiebe scored a kill screen to beat Howard’s the following day, and left to fly home after achieving it. Perhaps he had to teach in the morning? He celebrated, and spun a disco ball:
The last time I had seen Hank Chien, he was plugging along nicely with some guys in reserve, so I went back to watch him finish the game, then this happened:
Hanks’s score lasted him the rest of the event, winning him one grand with his kill screen score of 994,400. Hank almost got a kill screen the previous day, so this must of been double-sweet for him.
The youngest player there, Vinny Lemay, also got a kill screen, and even beat out Billy Mitchell.
Before the second day kicked off, I interviewed Richie Knucklez, and you can read the whole thing over at Nintendo Life. Richie also filmed the interview, so you could watch it below too:
It was an awesome event, and I had a killer time. All-in-all I give it 24 out of 27 fireballs.
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