The Most Bizarre Records In Gaming History

Gamers are a passionate bunch. Every gamer has a title they've invested a significant amount of time into, or a character they keep close to their heart. This adoration manifests as they spend months mastering mechanics or learning about the setting of their chosen fandom. There are some players, however, that take their love of the medium to a whole new level and achieve things the community never thought possible.

This unparalleled dedication has led some fans to break world records. While high scores and speedruns tend to dominate headlines, other milestones will make you stop in your tracks and question how someone determined to attempt such a feat, let alone master it. From pig rides to out of this world special editions, take a look the most bizarre records in gaming history.

While some people get worn out just at the thought of playing dance games for an extended period of time, there are gamers out there that have turned this into a powerful force for good. For example, California-based teacher Carrie Swidecki broke the world record for the longest video game marathon ever when she played Just Dance 4 for a staggering 138 hours.

Swidecki set the record during a marathon that raised money for children's charities. She livestreamed her Just Dance marathon on Periscope and social media pages and managed to raise $7,000 for the Children's Miracle Network.

According to Arcade Sushi, Swidecki has made a habit of breaking dance game records, including, "longest overall dance marathon ever, the longest marathon in a dance game and the most high scores set in a 24 hour period (and she has set dozens more)." She reportedly hosts Just Dance music events at schools throughout California, and plays the game for 50+ hours a week.

Jason Camberis earned the Guinness World Record for owning the world's largest arcade machine. What's even more impressive than that record is the fact that he built the unit himself. Over the course of two years, Camberis assembled the 14.47' tall machine, which plays titles like Rising Spirit on a screen so big players need a ladder to reach it.

In an interview with Metro, Camberis explained the thought process behind building the Arcade Deluxe was simple: he was tired of seeing so much negativity in the world and wanted to make something fun. Building the cabinet to such an oversized scale like this was also done "to recreate the feeling you had when you were a kid walking into an arcade from the '80s." 

In other words, Camberis wanted adults standing in front of the Arcade Deluxe to feel like they were a child again, peering at a Galaga or Pac-Man machine for the first time.

The Tomb Raider series has received some backlash over the years for how many different gruesome ways Lara Croft can meet her end. However, there's one game that features more unique fail state animations than any other. Though the gun-toting witch known as Bayonetta has become an icon in the gaming world, her first outing took home a Guinness World Record for "Most hero death animations in a game." In other words, when Bayonetta fails, she fails big, and there are an absurd number of ways to do so.

According to the Guinness World Records 2017 Gamer's Edition, 2009's Bayonetta "has 48 different post-death animations for for defeated gamers to savour, the most dramatic of all being 'Armageddon,' in which Earth itself explodes into pieces." Honestly, the planet never got blown apart whenever Lara Croft got shot by pirates, so let's just go ahead and let Bayonetta have this one, as morbid as it may be.

Grand Theft Auto 4 is a wild game, with Niko Bellic acting as one of the more level-headed protagonists in the series. It always feels a little weird to guide the character completely off the rails, but the game occasionally calls upon you to do just that. And, of course, breaking the law in a GTA game always results in a Wanted Level, which increases the amount of law enforcement officers that chase you. 

In Grand Theft Auto 4, the Wanted Level goes up to 6 stars, at which point the police are joined by the National Guard in their efforts to take Niko down. In other words, reaching 6 stars is basically a death sentence.

One fan holds the Guinness World Record for surviving at a full 6-star Wanted Level for over 16 minutes. How Henrik Lindholm managed to evade every piece of artillery that Liberty City could throw at him for that long is unclear, but it's very impressive. Most of players just ramp their motorcycles into the subway and wait for the heat to die down.

Back in 2002, keeping your mobile phone turned on during a flight was considered much more of a risk than it is now. That's why a fellow named Faiz Chopdat drew the ire of authorities when he refused to switch his phone off after repeated warnings from the flight crew. Apparently, Chopdat was way too invested in a game of Tetris to comply with their orders. 

When the plane landed, Chopdat was arrested and sentenced to four months in jail for the disruption. At the time, this was seen as a way for authorities to make an example of him and show people that the rules surrounding mobile device usage were taken very seriously. The incident was immortalized as a Guinness World Record for the "Longest prison sentence for playing a video game." More than anything else, you have to wonder what this conversation with Guinness was like. How did it even come to be recognized as a record someone could hold?