This week, we take a look at some examples of what are known in the trade as “Conversions”. But I’m talking bad ones. Real bad arcade conversions. The purists of the video arcade collecting community tend to collect dedicated cabs. These are totally original, unmolested arcade cabinets from the 70s and 80s. A level of…
Category: Article
Arcade Loft: The Making Of A Man Cave
Man Cave or Manspace: a male retreat or sanctuary in a home, such as a specially equipped spare room, media room, den or basement. The term “man cave” is a metaphor describing a room inside the house where “guys can do as they please” like a caveman, without fear of upsetting any female sensibility about…
Classic Arcade Games: Sex Sells But Who’s Buying?
In the 70s and 80s, the notion of “sex sells” had a lot of traction from what I can remember. It seemed that the lowest common denominator of advertising was to stick a scantily clad young lady in front of a product, photograph it, and it would fly off the shelf. Jeans, aftershave, cars, you…
The Development of Pac-Man
Much has been written about Pac-Man. This was a huge game for Namco back in the early eighties that would grow into a true 20th century icon. Everybody has at least heard of the game, because it was one of the first to enter the realms of popular culture. Indeed, merchandise and endorsements earned Namco…
Missile Command: talkin’ loud, sayin’ nothin’
I posted a couple of weeks back a talk I gave about the development and some background of the classic arcade game Missile Command. I thought I’d also share an old interview I gave to Manchester’s now defunct Channel M, back in 2008. Thankfully, some old wag uploaded much of their output for posterity to…
Arcade Auctions: expect the unexpected
Finding classic arcade machines is getting harder and harder here in the UK. More difficult still, is finding potential bargains. The hobby has gone nuts over the last few years, with many cabs now attracting four figure prices, as collectors hang on to their machines, and what’s left of the undiscovered, becomes discovered. It’s a…
Let’s talk about Missile Command
Well it was bound to happen sooner or later. I’ve clearly run out of things to say about other arcade games, so now I have to talk about myself. You knew it was coming. There’s a few videos out there of interviews I’ve given about Missile Command and arcade gaming, and I’d like to gradually…
Atari Arcade Concept Art: A glimpse of the future
Some interesting early concept artwork from Atari has surfaced in recent years. These brightly coloured, hand drawn sketches are really “of their time”. Atari’s arcade division employed several artists, who would create everything from Industrial cabinet designs, to the final artwork to adorn the various arcade cabinet designs. In the 70’s, Atari clearly had a…
Robotron: Enter the Time Machine
There’s nothing quite like a 35 year old restored arcade machine. Especially so when the restorer has sympathetically made the machine look brand new again. Many restorers have examples of cabs that are arguably better than new in terms of the parts, paints and artwork used. Let’s not forget, whilst today we look at these…
Pac-Man: Achieving The Perfect Game
After some 32 years in the making, UK player Jon Stoodley achieved a live perfect score on Pac-Man on August 22nd 2015. Here’s how Wikipedia describes a perfect game of Pac-Man: A perfect Pac-Man game occurs when the player achieves the maximum possible score on the first 255 levels (by eating every possible dot, power…
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