Todd Rogers

TODD ROGERS – CHAMPION OF THE ARCADE AGE

As the IVGHOF moves forward, taking on the immense responsibility of annually recognizing and honoring the luminaries of the video game age, it has chosen a theme for this first year – a theme that “Celebrates the History of Competitive Gaming.” And, upon examining the historical legacy of competitive video gaming, it is clear that the champions of the “arcade age” were the industry’s first athletes, as well as its first media celebrities who gave a voice and a face to this new form of entertainment.

In addition to honoring the gifted visionaries who created the gaming technology and launched the business side of the industry, we wish to also pay tribute to the immense contribution made by the Arcade Champions of the past. So, the IVGHOF dedicates this first class of inductees –The Class of 2010 - to those arcade champions who gave competitive gaming its first breath of life.

Among those arcade legends being honored in the Class of 2010 is Todd Roger, born on December 1, 1964, in Chicago, Illinois. Now living in Brooksville, Florida, Mr. Rogers has appeared in several feature films: Chasing Ghosts: Beyond the Arcade, The King of Kong, FRAG, High Score and Space Invaders: Americas Underground Arcade. Mr. Rogers gained local notoriety in 1982 at the Burbank (Illinois) Haunted Trails arcade for his world record on the arcade game Gorf. On November 24, 1982, he scored 653,990 points, a world record that stood for over 26 years on the Twin Galaxies scoreboard. Mr. Rogers is currently recognized as the only person to have beaten a time on home console game by Activision called Dragster where the computer was programed to do a certain run of a quarter mile. The computer's Dragster time was of a 5.54 and Todd beat the computer's time by 3 hundredths of a second with the quarter mile run of a 5.51. Rogers has held the Dragster world record title since December 1, 1980.

Mr. Rogers was one of the video game industry's earliest players to be hired for their playing skills. During 1980-1992, Mr. Rogers demonstrated games to the attendees at The International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) as well as other gaming exposition. Mr. Rogers was featured in many well-publicized "Beat The Champ" contests that pitted his skills against those of the public.

Mr. Rogers is recognized as the first paid pro video gamer and has represented over 40 major software publishers. One of the first publications that Mr. Rogers was featured in was a paper back book called "How To Master Home Video Games," by Tom Hirschfeld. This distinction was due to his Dragster skills.

Mr. Rogers has been featured in an assortment of other prominent publications such as Money Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and Joystik Magazine.  you can see more of Todd's exploits on the IMDB site where they list over 100 of his recognitions and interviews. On July 25, 1983, Walter Day founded the U.S. National Video Game Team. Iin 1986 Todd was accepted into this prestigious group of gamers.

By the mid-1980s, Nintendo and Sega had hired Mr. Rogers to do promotions on their new game releases. Mr. Rogers also helped promote games with celebrities on the games that they were featured in. These celebrities included Michael Jordan, Mike Tyson, Marina Sirtis, Robert Culp, Barbie Benton, and Bruce Jenner. On October 3-5, 2008 Todd joined the "Five Kings of Gaming" at the "E for All" Expo at the Los Angeles Convention Ctr to feed the homeless people of Los Angeles. Billed as "The League of Legendary Gamers," the "Kings" include some of the greatest names in gaming history, representing many different genre. The "Kings" are: Todd Rogers, Johnathan “Fatal1ty” Wendel, Billy Mitchell, Isaiah TriForce Johnson and Justin Wong. Also at the same venue Mr. Rogers was involved in a promotion with All Games Network presenting the “Meet, Greet, and Beat the Champs,” where Todd played Dragster against the public blindfolded. The prize offered to anyone who could beat him while he was blindfolded was $100.00.

In 1999 Mr. Rogers launched a monthly column with Twin Galaxies entitled "On the home front."  In 2000 Todd was designated an official Twin Galaxies Referee. In 2010 Mr. Rogers became Twin Galaxies' Chief Evangelist of Classic Gaming." Other noteworthy distinctions include: on March 5, 2001, Mr. Rogers was called "The King of Video Games" by numerous papers for his many world record high scores. On August 2004, Mr. Rogers was one of four select gamers that were featured on baseball card likenesses in the magazine SYNC. On September 1st 2007, Mr. Rogers was featured on a poster issued by Twin Galaxies commemorating his "Impossible Record" on the Dragster time of 5.51 achieved in 1980.