Part 4. The return.
By TT

It's been while since I last wrote about Missile Command. In the first two parts, I told you about my experiences with this great game, from playing it in my local café when I was in my teens, to mastering the machine and discovering "The Bug" that blighted play over 810,000 points. In part three, I wrote about the end of the line for the particular machine I used to play on, and, following my Missile Command ‘Wilderness Years’ I finally found a machine of my own – all ready and waiting for restoration.

Well, I took delivery of the machine in October last year. And she's a beauty – the whole thing has been lovingly and painstakingly restored to absolute mint condition. It takes pride of place in the lounge and is used regularly.

Guess what's coming...

Shortly after it arrived, I decided to investigate the world record score. On standard settings, according to www.twingalaxies.com, the world record score is 80 million. Given that it takes about 45 minutes to score a million points that means the record-holder (Victor Ali) must have played the machine for the best part of two days non-stop. Am I motivated to do that? Not on your PSP matey boy. Besides, given that the game gets a bit silly after ‘the Bug’ kicks in it becomes a competition of endurance rather than pure skill.

Bollocks to that.

Reading-on at Twin Galaxies, I see that another score challenge is set for ‘Missile Command Tournament Settings (MCTS)’. It’s a challenge that was introduced so as to tackle the marathon play problem. As people have got better and better at games, long play sittings have become a bit silly (and difficult to monitor and record). Hence MCTS was introduced. This sees the player playing as normal, but with NO bonus lives (or in our case, cities).

At all.

And guess what? That means no ‘Bug’ either.

So, six cities, and no bonuses. Play as normal until you lose all six. I'd never heard of this setting before, and wasn't even aware that this setting could be applied on the circuit board. Out came the manual, and my head was then buried in the back of the machine while my fingers played with jumper settings and the like.

The MCTS world record score comes surrounded by lots of controversy. The larger than life character who holds the world record (1.69 million points) is Roy Schildt (Roy Awesome – you have to see it to believe it). He has taken a lot of stick about the record over the years, and there has been a real feud between him and Twin Galaxies regarding the recognition of his score. I could write for years about it (if you want to dig into it further go here). The biggest cloud over his ‘achievement’ is that no-one watched the whole game from start to finish, and furthermore, no-one has come near to it in 22-odd years (there are no other scores of over a million on MCTS – or there weren’t...) But there's no point wasting energy on decrying the Schildt score here because that's the recognised standard, and actually, all the aggro surrounding it is even more incentive to beat it anyway. Roy has set a phenomenal target, and no one has stepped up to the plate since.

So here I am, 20 years later, sat in front of my own Missile Command arcade machine, playing it again in completely new territory. I've been playing on Tournament Settings for about four months now. Missile Command is a tough game. Missile Command on Tournament Settings is a FUCKING tough game. There is no escape, it is absolutely relentless. Previously, you could progress by making sure you scored 10,000 points on every screen, thus guaranteeing survival. Sod the cities, just score the points!

Not any more.

My whole game tactic has had to change – every missile now counts, you need to be very aware of what is going on around the screen and you must trust your instincts. I wrote previously about the hypnotic state I got into when playing – I simply cannot do that any more, it is now too intense to relax like that. On Tournament Settings, it's more like an adrenaline-fuelled deep state of concentration.

Every missile cunts. I mean counts. No, right the first time come to think of it.

And progress has been good.

I've unofficially submitted a videotaped score of 1.3 million to Twin Galaxies that I've asked them not to formally recognise at this stage (cause I'd rather get in the ring having beaten Roy’s score in practise first - which I think they understand). So there has been a bit of an underground stir amongst those in the know – oooh another guy from across the water potentially taking another long-standing world record score back to Old Blighty. Too right – and I'll be glad to do it too. I've even had emails from several people, including Gary ‘Sandinista’ Wheelan and Walter Day himself, of Twin Galaxies, offering me encouragement in the challenge.

The biggest obstacle is your state of mind – it's a really interesting place to be mentally. The whole process really is a big head fuck. You can score 850,000 one game, and then score 250,000 the next. The machine and game play really is that unpredictable and consistently difficult. It also doesn't feel right to be disappointed with a score of over 1,000,000 on Tournament Settings knowing it's the second best score in the world. I've tumbled over a million points on about 4 occasions – and of course, what enters your head? A little Swith-like fucker saying ‘You are close to that world record, you're going to do it, you're going to do it!’ Gaaah! Voices! And of course, you then make a silly mistake and it’s all over. Rewind videotape and try again. The score counts for nothing, it isn't the world record. This is absolutely nuts. But such is the challenge, even in vintage-videogame-high-score-chasery.

I'm sorry, I can't remember why Tony asked me to put this picture in. My
ear is a lot hairier than the one in the picture though, I do know that.

Having said all that I'm confident I'll do it soon. I'm playing consistently well, it’s just a case of getting the odd lucky break when a wave goes horribly wrong, holding my nerve and concentration after an hour and a half of intense playing. The 1.3 million has proved to me that the old score is beatable. Another 10 minutes there and I'd have done it. Fuck me that really is annoying.

Anyway, if you want to read more about Roy Schildt and his achievement, buy the upcoming May edition of Retro Gamer magazine in which he is interviewed by Paul Drury: Roy’s a great character so it should be a gem of a piece – rumour has it you might even see my ugly mug in there too.

So there it is. As one of you reminded me last year, it is deeply moving that this whole thing has come full circle. Before writing all this stuff about Missile Command, I never realised just what a large part of my life it took up during my teenage years and why I played the thing so intently in the first place. And here I am 20 years later, back on it, and gunning for the post of World Champion.

A bug. Yesterday.

I've found a solution to ‘The Bug’.

May 2005

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