High score

The high score of a video game, arcade game, or computer game is usually the highest logged point value. Many times a game will have a list of several high scores, called the high score table.

History

The high score first achieved cultural significance with the rise in popularity of pinball machines. Players who achieve a high score are often greeted with a congratulatory message and are able to enter their initials or name into the machine. Their score and name will remain there until someone "knocks" them off the high score list by achieving a higher score. This functioning has caused high scores of popular games to carry a certain amount of "bragging rights" as it is proof of excellence in a game.

The high score has a close association to the "free game." When in an arcade, many games will offer a player a free chance at another game if they achieve a high score. This has declined in popularity in recent years, as players are often allowed to play for as long as they can without losing, but not given free games even if they achieve a high score.

The first video game to have a high score was "Sea Wolf" (1976), but what made it take off was the personalized high scores introduced in "Star Fire" (1979). This meant that players now could compete with each other over who had the highest score.

The popularity of the high score has made it nearly ubiquitous among modern video games. In fact, the high score has become a defining feature of many games. Magazines such as Nintendo Power and Sega Visions would often publish high scores submitted by their readers. The high score became most popular when, starting in 1982, the Twin Galaxies Scoreboard began to appear in the pages of Video Games Magazine, Joystik Magazine, Computer Games Magazine, VideoGiochi Magazine (Milano, Italy), Video Games Player Magazine and Electronic Fun Magazine. Later, under Twin Galaxies direction in the 1990s, all performances would have to be videotaped to verify the achievement. The high score also exists in online games in various forms.

Many games include default "high scores" that do not actually represent real players, but are displayed whenever the machine's memory is reset, often with generic initials such as "AAA." These scores often represent certain levels of achievement for a player to aspire to. As a player still needs to knock these off in order to get his own score and initials listed, the default high scores ensure that there is always something for players to compete with (and keep them putting in coins). Many computer games also have default high scores built in, sometimes attributed to fictitious entities (e.g. "Commander Keen") or to members of the game's development team.

Internet influence

While on old games the high score would only be visible on one particular machine, the spread of the Internet has made it possible to compete with the rest of the world. A lot of modern games have the ability to post his/her high score to a central webpage. Online multiplayer games, especially first person shooters, real time strategies, and RPGs often have ranking systems. These new high score lists and ranking systems often are more complex than conventional high score lists. Some are based on tournaments, while others track game servers continuously, keeping statistics for all players.

High score in popular culture

The high score's prominence in video game culture, and even mainstream society has led to various pieces of art and entertainment. There is a cartoon titled "High Score". There is also a book entitled '. A 2007 documentary, ', follows the attempts to beat the high score in "Donkey Kong".Fact|date=April 2008

In an episode of the TV series "Seinfeld", George is astonished to find that the "Frogger" machine he played as a teen still retains his high score. With the owners wanting to get rid of it, George decides to keep the machine for posterity, the catch being that he has to move the game without unplugging it, because if he unplugs the game the high score will be erased. Unfortunately the machine is destroyed when George unsuccessfully tries to move it across the street in a spoof of the gameplay.Fact|date=April 2008

On September 24, 2005, Twin Galaxies issued Poster #59, which publicized a $1,000 prize to the first gamer who could break George Costanza's fictitious Frogger high score of 863,050 points. [ [http://www.twingalaxies.com/images/generalinfo/poster_frogger_reward_600.jpgTwin Galaxies' Poster #59, September 24, 2005] ]

On August 1, 1982, the Twin Galaxies Intergalactic Scoreboard issued a colorful poster that listed the world record high scores for more than two dozen arcade video games. The poster was distributed among arcades in the U.S., Canada and abroad. This was the first poster (#1) in a series of colorful posters that continues today, with poster #131 issued in October, 2008. [ [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=19&id=1191 Twin Galaxies' Tradition of Video Game Posters, 1982-2008] ]

The Portuguese band Mundo Lego (myspace.com/mundolego) has a song called "High Score". Fact|date=April 2008

In an episode of "Friends" Chandler Bing puts in dirty words on all the high score positions on a PacMan machine. He then finds out that they are not blanked when the machine is reset so he has to break all his highscores to remove the offending words. (This is not possible on an actual PacMan machine; such machines only record one high score and do not allow the winning player to enter initials.) Fact|date=April 2008

The Impact of the High Score on the Media

According to the Twin Galaxies Intergalactic Scoreboard, "high-score" attempts enjoyed as much press coverage as any other video-game-related topic reported in the media during the 1982-1985 period. Though the media was often focused on the amazing growth of the video game industry, it was equally as fascinated with the human side of gaming, as typified by the "player vs machine" showdowns that led to new world record high scores set on nearly a daily basis. In fact, Twin Galaxies reports that during that early era it was not unusual for there to be multiple new world records reported in the media on a single day. To illustrate the media's love for the high-score phenomenon, here is a brief sampling of news stories reproduced from the following Historical News Resources:
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=368 Record try aborted in video game - Arizona Republic, March 9, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=1081 1-token spree sets record at video game - Charlotte News, Charlotte, NC, September 9, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=436 Man could crunch U.S. Pac-Man record - Charlotte Observer, Charlotte, NC, July 17, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=729 Video game enthusiast gets highest score ever - Kansas City Times, August 18, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=1389 Video champ blasts his way into record book - San Francisco Examiner, September 6, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=727 Resident saves earth, claims world record - Chapel Hill News, Chapel Hill, NC, November 10, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=1386 Texas gamer works toward high score - Abilene Reporter-News, Abilene, TX, November 12, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=731 Central student one to beat playing Defender - Wyoming Tribune-Eagle, Cheyenne, WY, December 18, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=732 Video game champ gets recognition - St. Petersburg Times, St. Petersburg, FL, December 31, 1982]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=1385 Contests offer players tokens, recognition - Dallas Morning News, January 15, 1983]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/images/generalinfo/syracuse_herald-journal_1_17_1983_700.jpgVideo Game champion vows he'll never play again - Syracuse Herald-Journal, January 17, 1983]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=748 Videogame records - USA Today, April 22, 1983]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=1102 Pac-Man Record? - Washington Post, Washington D.C., May 26, 1983]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=746 Teenager going for video game record - Dublin Courier-Herald, Dublin, GA, June 22, 1983]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=749 Records, like promises, are not always meant to be broken - USA Today, July 7, 1983]
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=18&id=1302 Competitors' lives filled with joysticks - Wilmington Morning Star, Wilmington, NC, June 30, 1984]

Score Attack

Some games feature a 'Score Attack' mode, which charges the player with gathering the highest score possible. Games with a mode like this include, for example, "Rez" and "Gradius IV Fukkatsu". Some games do not include this mode but keep a record of the score, in which the players can choose whether they Score Attack the game, or continue normally.

See also

*Time attack
*Speedrun
*Twin Galaxies

References

External links

* [http://www.tagscores.com/ Tag Scores] - Video game high scores
* [http://www.vgr-fr.com/ Video Games Records] - Video Games High score and Time attack
* [http://www.archive.org/details/game_replays Collection of high score replays] at the Internet Archive
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=19&id=1191 Twin Galaxies' series of Posters]
* [http://www.cyberscore.net Cyberscore] - High score and time attack competition
* [http://www.vortiginous.com/ Video Game Ownage] - Speedruns and other game videos
* [http://www.twingalaxies.com/ Twin Galaxies] - The closest thing to an official video game world record authority
* [http://recordedamigagames.ath.cx/modules/myalbum/viewcat.php?cid=1 Amiga Highscores] - Highscores from Amiga games
* [http://www.elitescores.com/ EliteScores] - Super Monkey Ball and Wii game high scores