Very few games can be beaten with a perfect high score. But as of May 5th, 2016, Wes Copeland has achieved as close to a perfect high score as anyone has come for the 1981 arcade classic: Donkey Kong.

The video above features a 3-hour long video of the record-breaking feat with a final score of 1,218,000 points. This is 47,500 points more than Copeland's previous score of 1,170,500 points, and 45,900 points more than the previous record holder, Robbie Lakeman, with 1,172,100 points.

While many players have played Donkey Kong on re-releases, the arcade version is actually unique in that it actually has an "end" in the sense that a coding error results in a kill screen after a certain amount of repetitions. As a result, a maximum high score is possible with the original machines.

In an interview with IGN, Copeland told them that his latest high score was partially the result of luck.

“It could conceivably be beaten with a lot of luck [...] [...] I think that's what it's going to come down to. I've stopped playing because I think if I sat down and played every day for the next five years, I still don't think I'd be able to beat this score. It's the equivalent of playing poker and being dealt 10 royal flushes in a row.”

The aforementioned 'luck' aspect likely has to do with the game's random generation of obstacles. While stages and traps remain the same, the obstacles Donkey Kong throws at Jumpman -- as well as powerup spawns -- are at least in part randomly generated. As such, the score of 1,218,000 points may never be reached again.

That is... until someone decides to try to match it.

One way in which Just Cause 3 excels is its sheer scope: there's an absolutely massive gameplay area spread across a huge chain of islands broken into dozens of provinces. But how do you get around to reach your next destination or find one of the hundreds of collectibles spread across the game?

Sure, sports cars are fun, but they aren't super helpful in reaching another island on the other side of Medici. Stealing a helicopter is a better bet, but again can be lacking in certain situations. How do you land a helicopter on a rocky mountainside or on a tree-covered hilltop? You could land on the other end of the island and hoof it, but that sort of defeats the point.

That's where the ingenious wingsuit comes in, letting you gently glide around Medici, before landing and blowing up everything in sight. If you start from a high enough peak, it's actually possible to become your own perpetual motion machine, flying indefinitely without having to ever land. By carefully using the environment, you can easily rack up a massive Wingsuit Wonder score.

Preparing To Fly Forever In Just Cause 3

Before you try your hand at long-term flight you'll need the best equipment available, so make sure to unlock all the tether and traversal mods related to the wingsuit by completing the wingsuit challenges (see our challenge tips here). The Reel-In Boost mod and Slingsuit Boost mods in particular are helpful here.

Once you're buffed up and ready to go, it's time to find the top of a mountain and soar above Insula Dracon, Insula Fonte, and Insula Striate to find new locations in which to wreak absolute havoc! Where to start? The Montana province of Insula Striate has a some great peaks, but honestly anywhere will work if you just pay attention to your surroundings.

Spin around and find the highest peak nearby within your field of vision and start the trek up to the top. Leaping from a helicopter can work out alright, but only if you do so in a location with plenty of other terrain features to use to your advantage: don't attempt this in an area that's completely flat or only has short, squat buildings.

Making the leap from a mountain top

Using The Wingsuit To Fly Forever In Just Cause 3

While pulling up gives you increased maneuverability and a better view to survey the surroundings, it also slows you down and will eventually send you into a dive as you lose speed. You need to remain angled downward to keep your speed up and continue flying.

Unfortunately, you also need to reign in your urge to increase your speed to ludicrous levels or you'll just end up crashing into the ground or a building. There's a careful balancing act to maintain here as you head both forward and downward at an even balance.

If you have to keep flying downward to maintain speed and floating slowly will eventually end your flight, how exactly is Rico supposed to fly indefinitely? Easy: pull out that grappling hook and put it to good use!

Tethering to an object lets you propel yourself up for more momentum

Use the reticule while wingsuiting around to find anything you can tether with – the edge of a cliff, the side of a tall building, anything at all that's near your altitude. By tethering and then pushing off you actually change your center of gravity and give yourself more momentum. Effectively, you've given yourself a few more seconds of flight time as you can pull up and gain both more altitude and more speed to keep flying longer.

To keep this going for extremely long periods (and perhaps even fly across the majority of the game map without having to grab a helicopter), avoid flat areas without large rock outcroppings or tall buildings, as these are best for tethering. Keep practicing though, because with persistence you can even slingshot off passing cars or rocks on the ground and keep flying across relatively flat areas pretty much forever.

A classic video game from 1981 has a new world record holder by a player who did not even live to see the game released in arcades.

On Friday, Robbie Lakeman became the fifth person to break the all-time Donkey Kong arcade machine scoring record. He edged out New York plastic surgeon Hank “Dr. Kong” Chen’s previous record of 1,138,600 points by earning 1,141,800.

The previous record was set back in 2011, when Chen first took the title from The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters rivals Steve Wiebe and Billy Mitchell. He would later reclaim the title after Wiebe and Mitchell earned new high scores, and went on to improve his score three more times before his final total in Nov 2012.

Lakeman’s world record effort took over three hours to complete, and upon finishing the game, he personally called Chen to break the news.

Little is currently known about Lakeman. According to his PocketFives and WordPress account, updated through 2011, he was a 27-year-old Sport Management graduate student living in New Hampshire.

Donkey Kong’s latest record king began consistently playing the iconic game two and a half years ago after a bar bet was placed on earning a top 20 score.

The record has yet to be officially verified, but Donkey Blog is already declaring Lakeman the new title holder.

According to Examiner writer Patrick Scott Patterson, Chicago native Caitlin Oliver, 30, became the first woman to set an arcade game world record on Saturday, October 19 while she was at the Galloping Ghost Arcade, the largest video game arcade in the USA. 

The game she was playing was Splatterhouse, a 1988 beat'em up and horror arcade game developed and published by Namco. The previous record mark in the game was 373,100 points and it was set by Anthony Paparo at the same location. Oliver scored 493,700 points on Saturday making her the first woman in almost 30 years to set a world record on an arcade game.

Caitlin Oliver talks SplatterHouse 

Oliver reveals that she was first introduced to the game when she was very young. Her father bought her a TurboGrafx-16, the first video game console of the 16-bit era, and she went to the local store and rented SplatterHouse. She says, "Once I got it home I was totally hooked. Gross monsters, corpses, skeletons; it had it all." 

Achieving a World Record

As soon as Oliver realized she had achieved the new high score she describes that she felt like her "heart was going to pound straight through [her] chest."

 "It was possibly the most intense rush of adrenaline I've ever felt in my life. It was unreal to have decided to work to accomplish something and proceed to become the best in the world at something. Utterly incredible feeling. I nearly ran outside for a cigarette afterwards," Oliver adds. 

Pursuing a world record wasn't something Oliver intended on doing until one of her friends encouraged the idea. She says what helped her achieve this goal was her experience playing it for about 20 years on the TurboGrafx-16 her father bought her.