Article - Why I’ve Stopped Obsessing About Secret DDP Score Glitch // Looking Towards the Future

*Update  - I ended up not giving up on knowing and launched the Score Glitch  Bounty along with a group of fellow shmup players and we eventually  uncovered what the glitch was.*

First  thing I want to make clear is that I am not mad at the  Japanese shmup  community or have any negative feelings towards them at  all. It is not  my intention for this article to attack them or cause any  sort of bad  blood. Instead, what the focus of this article is about is  how the  Western shmup community (I know people don’t like the term  “western”,  but I’m going to use it until we come up with a better one)  thinks  about itself, in relation to the Japanese community, as well as  how we  should look towards the future, rather than the past.

As  many of you are aware, I am a newcomer to the shmup community and   haven’t been around very long. So by no means am I a complete expert on   this topic; but, for the past year, I have been pretty involved and  have  been paying attention to things, so these are my observations.

Overall,  I think we are too influenced by the practices and the rules  of the  Japanese shmup community, to the point where I think it is  holding us  back. There are a number of different examples I have  noticed, but the  one I think that is causing quite a bit of tension is  the Dodonpachi  score glitch. In case you haven’t picked up on it in my  recent podcast  episodes, or haven’t seen me talking about it on discord,  I have  developed a bit of an obsession about this glitch. To the point  where  there were nights where I was literally dreaming about it  (probably as  my unconscious mind was trying to come up with answers).  I’ll explain  more about why I have become so focused on this glitch in a  bit, but I  don’t think I am totally alone in that regard.

Basically  I see this glitch and its place in the community as a  lose-lose  situation. On one side we have some of the western players who  know  about the glitch, but can’t talk about it because of promises they  have  made. These people are important and I think having positive   relationships and interactions with the Japanese players is extremely   valuable, much more so than figuring out the glitch. However, for people   who don’t know the glitch, it is difficult not to become salty because   of its secretive nature.

I don’t  like this sort of division. I also don’t like sensitive  topics if they  can be resolved because I have a tendency to talk about  what I want to  talk about and stepping on people’s toes. It’s not my  intention to  cause friction, but it’s just my nature to speak my mind.  So hopefully  this article is tactful.

From what  I understand, both the Japanese and western players who  know about the  glitch are not fond of having to continue to keep it a  secret, but  really have no other choice because of promises made in the  past and  all that kind of stuff. So basically until someone really  lucky, or  really clever, or a combination of the two, finds the glitch   independently, the situation is just stuck in this awkward position.

Recently,  I have been feeling like the person who will need to  dedicate himself  to finding the glitch is myself. Primarily due to my  unrelenting  fixation on the topic.

As for why  the glitch has become such a sticking point for me, it is  essentially  because I think it is unfair, creates negativity, and  discourages  people from playing DDP. Dodonpachi, I should clarify, is  one of my  favorite shmups and I have put quite a lot of time into it at  this  point.

Another reason why this  glitch bothers me is because of the attitudes  that end up forming  around its existence. These attitudes being either  anger towards the  Japanese players for being secretive, or pessimism  towards the Western  community’s abilities to achieve world records.  Comments saying things  like it’s not worth worrying about anyway, because we cannot beat Japanese records bother  me. Even if comments like that are true-ish, I am not a  pessimistic  person and I am not persuaded by a lack of confidence.  Plus, western  players can change and improve and there are some  talented names that  can challenge the Japanese scores. A dominant Japan  has been defeated in  other games and genres, so I don’t see why we are  so quick to shrug off  our potential.

In  the case of DDP though, until the glitch is either shared or   rediscovered, no matter what the west does, the world records will   continue to be haunted by this big mysterious secret.

Here’s  some information about myself, I bring it up because it  relates to  this article. I value fair play, I value cooperation, I’m  prideful, and  I’m stubborn. What does this mean? This means that the  secret DDP  glitch is uniquely designed to short circuit my Gaijin brain.  Nothing  in my life of playing video games has caused me this much  cognitive  dissonance. I don’t want to look for  the glitch anymore …  but I can’t give up. I want to be mad at the  Japanese players … but I  also want to understand and cooperate with  them. I want to say doesn’t  matter because I’m a scrub … but my pride  refuses.

So where does this leave me? Well yesterday I had an enough is enough  type moment and busted out the debugger in MAME. I was determined to   look through all of stage 6’s code, even though I had no idea what I was   looking for. After about a half hour of doing this I heard a small but   sane voice in my head. The voice said: What  are you doing? Your time  is more valuable than this. You should be  spending this time playing  shmups … not banging your head against a  keyboard.

Prior to  yesterday’s frustration, I had a previous conversation with  my discord  about why the Japanese players don’t just ban the glitch, if  they  dislike its existence as well. Based on the feedback I received,  the  reason why the Japanese don’t ban the glitch is because of the way  they  verify scores. As I understand, verified scores have to be played  on a  verified cabinet and then approved by the arcade owner or what have   you. However, the arcade owner doesn’t actually watch the player do the   run, he just checks on the results screen when the player achieves the   score. So by this system, the arcade owner has no way of knowing  whether  or not the player used the glitch; thus the glitch cannot be  banned.

Yes, I do see how this  makes sense … in Japan, but this goes back to  what I was getting at  earlier. I don’t live in Japan. None of my scores  or any of the other  western players’ scores that I compete with are ever  going to be  considered legitimate by the Japanese. If I ever get the  chance to  visit Japan, I plan on using that time having fun and meeting  people,  not grinding out PB attempts. As things stand right now, the  Japanese  shmup scene might as well be the moon. It also doesn’t help  that I’m a  max level Gaijin, completely ignorant of their language and  social  graces, so I don’t know if they would be that comfortable around  me in  the first place. For me, the Japanese scene is not like the French   scene, where I can make an account and post my scores alongside theirs.   Instead, JPN STG just feels completely inaccessible.

Ironically  enough, I do have to mention that I am fairly close to  Japan  geographically and have quite a bit of experience playing Japanese  3rd  Strike players on Fightcade, but that’s a whole different situation.

Like  I said, I hope this doesn’t come across as bitter or anything  like  that. I have no resentment towards the Japanese shmup scene and its   rules. That’s not what I am writing about. I’m just saying that, when   you look at the situation realistically and practically, basing our   rules on what the Japanese do is holding our scene back from progressing   and gaining more players. If you think about it, the Japanese model of   tracking scores and keeping records is not only unsuitable for the  rest  of the world, but will soon collapse in on itself in Japan. A day  will  come where these arcades with DDP verified cabinets will either go  out  of business, or have to remove the cabinets to make room for more   profitable games. Just look at Green Arcade in South Korea. Tekken is   more popular than it has ever been and Green Arcade was the home of many   legendary Korean Tekken players. And yet, last year, Green Arcade   closed down during the height of Tekken 7’s popularity.

With  all this in mind I have come to a decision that has honestly  been a  big source of relief. I recognize that I have no authority over  what  other Western players think and do, so don’t take this as me trying  to  impose my own rules. But, in my mind, I have decided that I am no   longer going to worry about the DDP score glitch because, as of today,   it is now a separate scoring category. Moving forward, I will consider   all DDP scores achieved using the glitch in one category, and all scores   achieved not using the glitch in another. Honestly, based on what I   have heard about the glitch, I think this makes the most sense, even if   the glitch was known. Plus this has zero impact on the western scene,   because none of us playing DDP know what the glitch is or have scores   using it anyway.

Again, I  understand this sounds out of left field, due to the  Japanese typically  being the standard we looked towards, but I think we  need to make a  change. As I said earlier, I think it’s more important to  look towards  the future and make decisions based on what is beneficial  for our  community of players, rather than what lines up with the  Japanese  community’s rules.

Who knows,  there may come a day in the future when the last arcade  closes and  Japan STG needs to look towards us as an example of what to  do.

Thanks for reading!

Hopefully I haven’t offended any of my fellow discord members, who I think are awesome and an important part of this community.

–Mark MSX