by Guy Chapman – Navarro County Gazette
Lamund Henry doesn’t consider himself a professional video gamer. But the month of November has awarded him a unique honor within Corsicana’s local gaming community: Henry is now a member and record holder of Twin Galaxies, the official source of video game records for Guinness World Records.
Henry has been a gamer from as early as four years old, his first remembered title being Mega Man VI on the Nintendo Entertainment System. Since then, the rest, as they say, is history.
And history was indeed made this month when Henry took the undisputed first place record on SSX Tricky, a snowboarding title for the Playstation 2, racking up an impressive 675,910 points, and verified by Twin Galaxy staff through a video submission.
Despite his recent achievement, Henry still considers himself a casual gamer, though the idea of being a record holder seemed fun to try for.
“I’ve been hearing for the past couple of years that (Twin Galaxies) is one of the places you want to be to achieve world records in video games,” Henry said. “And I never really gave much thought to it at first, but after my family and friends said ‘You should give it a try. You’re really good at video games,’ you never know, you might actually achieve something there.”
“I gave some thought, and thought ‘Why not?”
Within a few days of signing up, Henry achieved his first documented record, an achievement proudly supported and celebrated by his family and fiancée.
“If someone had told me ‘Lamund, one day you’re going to be a world record holder in a video game’ when I was younger, I wouldn’t have believed them for a second,” he laughed. “I was speechless when I saw it was accepted.”
The Twin Galaxies organization has been around since 1981, recording arcade and video game scores and achievements since the days of Pac-Man and Donkey Kong. Its website describes itself as “the world’s most preeminent professional organization, community and social platform that is solely dedicated to the recognition, promotion, support and elevation of all video game players throughout the world!“
Henry has been a local power player the last few years in the local gaming scene, having won several competitions in the last few years. Among those highlights include:
- 2016 GameStop Mortal Kombat X Tournament (1st Place)
- 2017 GameStop Injustice: Gods Among Us Tournament (1st Place)
- 2017 Oiltown Comics Injustice 2 Tournament (1st Place)
- 2019 Oiltown Comics Mortal Kombat 11 Tournament (1st Place)
- 2020 Oiltown Comics Can of Salt Tournament (Super Smash Bros. Ultimate) (3rd Place)
The local gamer is already looking forward to breaking new records, having already submitted several new videos to Twin Galaxies that are under submission review for certification. Some of those submissions focus on completion speed, while others push for highest scores, a personal favorite goal of Henry’s.
For the other local gamers in the scene, Henry offers this motivational advice:
“When it comes to any games that you guys would want to try, whether it’s a fighting game, a racing game, or whatever genre, if there’s a tournament available, just give it a try,” Henry said. “You never know what could happen, and you might end up surprising a lot of people there by coming in first place. And if not first place, then doing very well. And if not that, you could use it as a learning experience.”
“Never let anyone tell you that you can’t do it, or there’s so many people out there better than you.”
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