Arcade Lounge

surface tension will be at r3play - the arcade, retro and video gaming expo in Blackpool on the 6th and 7th November.

R3PLAY is a brand new show celebrating four decades of gaming history. Presented in association with Retro Gamer and gamesTM magazines, this unique event will offer gamers of all ages the chance to experience gaming systems from the 1970s to present day.

Hosted by TV personality and videogame fanatic Gail Porter, the R3PLAY Expo will take place at The Norbreck Castle Exhibition Centre in Blackpool on 6/7 November 2010 – the final weekend of this year’s famous Illuminations.

So if you’re up in Blackpool for the weekend, live in that neck of the woods or want to discuss any possibilities, come see us on the stand on the Saturday or Sunday.

From Arcadeheroes.com…

Bandai Namco isn’t done gearing up for the 30th anniversary of their signature character Pac-Man yet, as they have now launched two websites (which include a countdown to that anniversary) dedicated to the iconic guy. PacMan.com can be found in both English and Japanese, with the sites differing quite a bit depending upon the language. Currently the Japanese site has a better design with more content but both cover a history of the game, let you download PC-based or mobile Pac-Man games and even provide a source for official Pac-Man gear. Hopefully the English site will soon add the historical look at the game that the Japanese site has, which covers every Pac-Man game released since it was called Puckman.

At the moment both sites feature a countdown (currently set at 45 days) for the arrival of the anniversary, where I imagine that they will then update the sites to include information on the new Pac-Man Battle Royale arcade game and perhaps some other things.

Pacman.com

I’ll let the picture do the talking…

A 45° twist, followed by a slide of what appears to be the L-shaped tetris block and voila!

via :: Geekologie

Well, it’s taken me a few days to get around to posting about the show. All in all it was a great success. Alan, Grant and their team did a great job in getting all the machines together. On the day (well, the day before) it seemed everything was against them and the show was almost a non-starter. All of the Egrets were stuck at customs and after being released late on the Friday afternoon, half of them reached their destination at about 9 o’clock at night. The rest of them were due in at 6am Saturday! When we arrived at 11pm on Friday to set up, the electrician was setting up the supply for the hall whilst PCBs were installed in the machines. It was an all-nighter for most of the IC’09 team.

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Well it’s just over 2 weeks away now. The first Insert Coin arcade show will be held in Northampton at Northampton Saints on the 18th and 19th July.

It is 2 days of gaming, events, tournaments and prizes. There will be a couple of candy cabs up for grabs, a tech repair talk, PCB and spare parts for sale and much more.

surface tension will have a stand there. Come say hi and have a seat on the couch for a game of Track & Field!

If you pre-order your ticket online, you can gain entry at 10:00 rather than 12:00.

Insert coin ‘09

On April 2009 Steve Wiebe will be on Coinopspace.com, participating in a live group chat even with Donkey Kong fans and general coin-op enthusiasts.  Steve is the latest in a monthly series of live chat sessions that has seen the likes of Tim Skelly, Owen Rubin, Jeff Kulczycki and Brian Colin.

If you aren’t a Donkey Kong fan, and somehow have been living under a rock for the past two years, Steve Wiebe is one of the best Donkey Kong players in the world and starred in the movie King of Kong, a documentary about his quest for the top score.  Steve has one of the only 1,000,000 point scores ever recorded in public, and is one heck of a nice guy to boot.

Coinopspace.com is a brand new website for arcade, pinball and console enthusiasts to connect and share stories.  Coinopspace.com isn’t just a forum based website, but has every feature for sharing your collection and restoration hobby that you could possibly imagine.  There are advanced customizable profiles, photo hosting, a live chat section obviously, hosted blogs, videos and so much more.  In the coming months we hope to connect collectors with more arcade game and pinball creators to ask those questions about your favorite games you’ve been dying to know.

To participate in the Steve Wiebe chat you need to sign up for the website and then you can RVSP for the event at the following link.

http://www.coinopspace.com/events/creator-chat-steve-wiebe

You can view all upcoming creator chats and events on the events page at

http://www.coinopspace.com/events

Ask Steve all those questions you have after watching King of Kong, there may be no other better time!

I mentioned some time ago about the Nibbler record from back in the 80’s by Tim McVey. This was beaten earlier this year…

Anyway, he’s going for it again… hoping to get it in around 36 hours this time, instead of 44!

Not sure how long is left, but it’s well worth a look at the live feed…

ustream nibbler world record attempt

Made in Holland, this is a modern take on Nolan Bushnell’s computer space arcade machine. Also reminiscent of the original Pong machine in my eye.

I really like the style of the cabinet, but I’m not sure it would fit in anywhere with my decor.

I’m also a fan of the control panel, but I think that’s a given if you’ve seen the surface tension control panel.

retro space

source :: retro thing

Retro thing has an interesting article the Guinness World Record holder, Tim McVey (not the bomber). He is in there for being the first person to reach one billion points on an arcade game. The author, Bohus, met him over the weekend at a convention in Illinois.

The record was achieved at the age of 17 back in 1984 in Iowa. Now you can’t really put one billion points into perspective without a reference. Which is the part I just can’t get my head around. It took 44 hours. 44! I wouldn’t be able to stay awake for that long… especially without the likes of Red Bull.

He won a free Nibbler cabinet, but according to a recent post in the Twin Galaxies Forums, he sold it on shortly after. Shame.
source :: Retro Thing

UK-based manufacturer, Zombie Arcades have recently launched their sleek new upright arcade cabinet which now also has a brand new website to show it all off.

Each system is fitted with market-leading Samsung screens, top-of-the-range PC, Sanwa sticks and Ultimarc illuminated buttons… well, Zombies play at night, right?

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