Slashdot Mirror
Arcade Meets LAN party
Rylar writes "California Extreme is holding their annual classic arcade games show at the San Jose Convention Center September 7th and 8th. With paid admission you get free play on all the Pinball machines and old school upright arcade machines like Space Invaders, Asteroids, Centipede and Frogger to name a few. This year LANtrocity has joined the mix for an "old meets new" element. LANtrocity is providing a BYOC area and several free play computers on the 7th, one admission gets you into both the old style arcade free play area and the LAN party. Challenge your friends to a Biathlon; Galaga and SoF2."
BAUAHAHA
I miss Tempest. This is one game that just isn't the same on a PC or console, because it had this bigass heavy flywheel controller knob and there's just no substitute. Hope they have a Tempest machine!
Cantankerous old coot since 1957.
We were ass deep in iguanas during this period and I was seriously considering becoming a beekeeper.
You smell like ..
California Extreme is also your chance to play this guy's rare Marble Madness II prototype, which he assembled from parts over a period of time.
Why does all the cool stuff happen on the West Coast?
Galaxian was the best back in the old days! (Circa 1984-1985) I was constantly begging coins from my parents 'cause I NEEDED to play that game :) Would be nice to see it again.
Just get a few of your friends, some good music and some time to kill. Anyone who has played test drive on the ps2 has an idea of what i'm talking about. All of the sudden, those 15-second load times turned into 3+ minutes.
Why yes I am paranoid! Thanks for asking!
Nothing like short notice. Now I'll be out of town and miss it. Bugger!
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I am thinking about going to this event. How are the lines at it? Must you wait very long to play any old game?
its the sound of geeks everywhere becoming aroused
Jesus saves souls and redeems them for valuable cash prizes
Not bad, considering I used to shovel about that much in quarters into the old games.
Come to think of it, I spend more than that now at places like Dave & Buster's but I don't notice it as much since they have the swipe cards.
This game convention is such a great idea. The kind of idea you kick yourself for not coming up with and exploiting yourself.
Why...don't mind if I do!
XoXo
Linus
Admit it. These games inspired our young minds to become what they have. Their large pixelated mysteries drove our imaginations to the mysteries lurking beneath. What wasnt filled in by the game was created by our minds.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
After heavy Tempest action, I would sometimes have nightmares of being trapped, unable to fire, at the top of a glowing Tempest level, as the red death crabs inexorably slid toward me to slay. The lag of the knob definitely contributed to the feel of Tempest gameplay.
I loved these older games because they were easy for me to play without being too much into games. Things like frogger were basic and adults and kids alike could enjoy them. While I marvel at the newer games I cannot always enjoy them in the short time that I have to devote to such things. Even simple racer games on the Xbox take a few hours to get used to the controls. I think there is still a market for simple fun arcade games.
That is the game I missed.
My brother and I used to play these games to settle everything from arguments to where to head out on Friday nights...
Ahh, the people at the local grocery knew us well while their Defender and Stargate machines worked....
I just heard some sad news on talk radio - Horror/Sci Fi writer Stephen King was found dead in his Maine home this morning. There weren't any more details. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss him - even if you didn't enjoy his work, there's no denying his contributions to popular culture. Truly an American icon.
Nuclear weapons
1 President Bush's father, when he was in the White House, declared that the American bombing of Iraq's nuclear weapons sites had put "Saddam Hussein out of the nuclear bomb-building business for a long time to come". That was 11 years ago. Today, despite the systematic destruction by the International Atomic Energy Agency of Iraq's nuclear infrastructure, including 50,000 square metres of factory space, 2,000 pieces of equipment and 600 tons of special alloys, the CIA believes that Saddam has revived his programme and that his priority is to acquire a sufficient source of fissile material.
2 Before the 1991 Gulf War, Iraq was reported to be six months from making a crude nuclear device, based on an implosion design similar to the Nagasaki bomb. Two years ago the IAEA said that if Saddam started work again on a nuclear weapon, he could build one in about two years.
3 In testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee in February, George Tenet, Director of US Central Intelligence, said: "We believe Saddam never abandoned his nuclear weapons programme. Iraq retains a sufficient number of nuclear scientists, programme documentation, and probably some dual-use manufacturing infrastructure that could support a reinvigorated nuclear weapons programme."
4 Intelligence agencies are monitoring any attempts by Saddam's agents to buy key components for rebuilding Iraq's uranium enrichment machinery, necessary for creating bomb-grade nuclear material. In June Western intelligence agencies were warned that Iraq had acquired parts for "flow-forming" machines, which are used for producing components for uranium enrichment. However, Mr Tenet told the Intelligence Committee: "Our major near-term concern is the possibility that Saddam might gain access to fissile material (from a foreign country)."
Chemical warfare
1 Since 1991 United Nations weapons inspectors have overseen the destruction of 480,000 litres of chemical warfare agents and precursors, and 38,000 chemical munitions. However, according to intelligence assessments, much of Iraq's chemical warfare capability remains intact.
2 A report by the Pentagon last year said that Baghdad had rebuilt its industrial and chemical production infrastructure after the Gulf War bombing in 1991 and the joint American/British Desert Fox raids in December 1998.
3 In February this year George Tenet, the Director of US Central Intelligence, told the Senate: "Baghdad is expanding itscivilian chemical industry in ways that could be diverted quickly to CW (chemical weapons) production."
4 The UN Special Commission on Iraq (Unscom) reported in 1998 that Iraq was suspected of hiding about 6,000 chemical munitions from its inspectors.
5 While some doubts have been raised about Iraq's ability to produce an effective weapon system to deliver biological agents, there are no such doubts about Baghdad's ability to mount chemical attacks.
6 In the 1980s, during the Iran/Iraq war, Saddam's forces launched chemical weapons on at least ten occasions against Iranian or Kurdish targets, mostly using mustard gas, causing tens of thousands of casualties.
Biological weapons
1 Saddam is believed to have a substantial stock of biological warfare agents and is researching different ways of "weaponising" them.
2 Following revelations of Saddam's secret weapons of mass destruction programme made by Lieutenant-General Hussein Kamel, a son-in-law of the Iraqi leader who defected to the United States in 1995, Baghdad admitted for the first time that it had produced 30,000 litres of biological agents, including anthrax and botulinum toxins. Iraq claimed to have destroyed the agents.
3 Before the 1991 Gulf War, Iraq produced four tons of VX nerve agent, 19,000 litres of botulinum toxin, 8,400 litres of anthrax spores and an unknown amount of sarin. However, the UN weapons inspectors believe that Iraq had failed to account for more than 7,000lb of growth media, obtained from European firms, which would be sufficient to produce huge quantities of bacteriological weapons.
4 After the 1991 Gulf War, the inspectors found traces of anthrax in several warheads from long-range al-Hussein ballistic missiles. About 200 air-launched biological bombs were also discovered.
5 Iraq had carried out trials of a helicopter-borne insecticide sprayer which could have been used for biological attacks. Anthony Cordesman, of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, wrote in a report in June that Iraq had continued to convert its Czech-built L29 Delphin jet trainer aircraft into unpiloted drones, possibly for delivering biological warfare agents.
6 There are also fears that Iraq has developed large quantities of smallpox, Ebola virus, bubonic and pneumonic plague bacteria and the toxin, ricin.
Terrorism
1 Washington has strengthened its case for attacking Saddam by claiming links between Baghdad and al-Qaeda, the terrorist organisation.
2 Despite continued scepticism from British intelligence services, it has been claimed that Muhammad Atta, one of the principal leaders of the September 11 attacks, met a senior Iraqi intelligence officer in Prague in April last year, five months before the attacks. Although the meeting has never been confirmed, what is undisputed are the longstanding links between Saddam Hussein's security and intelligence apparatus and terrorist organisations
3 One of the fears expressed in the Whitehall dossier is that Saddam might use a proxy terrorist group, such as an extremist Palestinian organisation, to launch an attack against American or Israeli targets, using biological or radiological devices. Saddam has for years acted as the champion of the Palestinian cause, paying $25,000 (£16,500) to the families of suicide bombers and $10,000 to the families of other Palestinian intifada casualties.
4 There is also intelligence evidence that international terrorist groups have carried out training at a centre at Salman Pak, outside Baghdad. Salman Pak was one of the main biological weapons sites uncovered by the Unscom inspectors.
5 Prior to the 1991 Gulf War, there were fears in Britain that Saddam might send intelligence agents to London to launch a terror attack using anthrax or other biological agents, and special training exercises were carried out to meet the threat.
It was a seemingly ordinary night three years ago when Zahida Parveen, then 30, was asleep in a room with her two small children. Her family was poor, but she was happy with her life with Mehmood Iqbal, her husband of four years. All that changed in an instant when she was forced out of bed, viciously attacked and left for dead, her face mutilated beyond recognition. Her attacker: her 35 - year-old husband, who did it because he was convinced his wife was having an affair.
Holding her captive, Iqbal accused Parveen of having an affair. Parveen insisted that she had never been unfaithful to him, but Iqbal didn't listen. Instead, he gagged her, bound her feet and hands and hung her upside down from the ceiling. As he beat her with a wooden ax handle, blood began to drip from her arms and legs. Then Iqbal, a barber by profession, traded his ax for a razor. He cut off the lower lobes of her ears, then sliced her nose at the base. "He next used a metal rod to poke out my eyes," she continues, "and then put his finger inside each socket to make sure nothing was left." Parveen hooks her skinny index finger in the air, makes a half-circle motion for effect and then holds her head with both hands as if the memory hurts. When Iqbal finished mutilating her, he cut the rope, causing Parveen to fall to the floor like a limp rag doll "He left me for dead," Parveen says, " and then he took our daughter and left." Parveen crawled across the floor, found a blanket, wrapped it around herself and passed out.
Galaga & SoF2? How about an AMD processor that runs AC & DC?
ok..lame joke.
www.dreammachineonline.com
:)
Okay, I know it's a crappy site, but we have arcades and LANs (in the same building!) in four different cities: Portland, ME, Danvers, MA (near Boston), Burlington, VT, and Dartmouth, MA.
Come check it out!
And whats really cool is that they networked the old pinball machines together so that you can play head to head.
hee hee
"The television is the retina of the mind's eye" - Videodrome
Atari gave us some much of joy! Too bad it's dead now
If Atari is so dead, then who published Neverwinter Nights? At least one of the two Atari companies is alive and kicking as part of Infogrames. (The other got bought by a hard drive maker.)
Will I retire or break 10K?
I don't know if you are aware of this, but your sig seems to use smart quotes, something that my browsers (Mozilla , IE 5.2 Mac) don't interpret. Here's what I get:
Smart quotes are gaaaaay.
I miss the flying games. I recently visited an arcade attached to the local cinema and there were car races, bike races, skiing, fishing!, air hockey, grab the teddy bear, basketball and lots of kickem boxing fight kind of games. Not a single flight/spaceship, shoot and bomb game in the whole arcade. What are we? Grounded speed machines? How can a car simulator possibly be better than an aeroplane simulator?? I like a game I can learn in 30 seconds with one joystick and two buttons. I hate having to learn a manual the size of a phone book and then learn fifty different command sequences. I don't know how the rest of you do it but I die really quickly in the quake/doom games. still playing minesweeper and 50 varieties of solitaire - cos I don't die when I get distracted and have to start again from the beginning/bottom level. Is there a combination puzzle and co-ordination game out there?
-- it must be true, it's on the internet.
This would all be cool if LANtrocity wasn't ran by a sadistic half-wit. Do business relations with them (Kilgore); I dare ya!
They should have MAME setup with Kaillera on the LAN if they really want to bring the old and new together. Nothing like classic Gauntlet with each player on their own PC...
We are Setting up LaserMAME, on a 30 foot screen at CA Extreme... to save money we are using a Control panel that's already on the West Coast, I hope they have a Heavy Spinner on it... excuse the bad pic, it was taken during setup on a 40' x 60' Screen, before we tuned the projector.. at Six Flags Darien Lake, Buffalo http://download.lasers.org/tempest_masterof.jpg or Asteroids http://download.lasers.org/lasermamedusk.jpg
I meant to paste this URL. Sorry about that. :(
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Back a long time ago when we all hung at the mall and ruled the arcade everyone would have their b-day party there and the main machines would be turned to free-play.
It was awsome because we could eat and drink inside the arcade (for once, even though we hung with the workers they enforced this with a passion) and mortal kombat and street fighter after hours, for hours!
Get your Unix fortune now!
If anyone is interested in good old arcade action check out warblade at www.warblade.as. Excellent playability!!
I will try to attend mainly for the pinball clinics. It'll be nice to see just how poorly I've been playing all these years.
I've looked at wishlists of games on hand so far and one game I wouldn't mind seeing is Paperboy. Sure its been released on many classic formats one way or another but it isn't the same without the Bicycle controls (Complete with bike grips). Oh and hopefully a look at the fabled Marble Madness II machine!
R U M/F?
Thnx!
if you use edonkey..
http://www.sharereactor.com/release.php?id=2361
What if I don't want to bring my oldest child?
Now I'm using Mozilla and I still can't block all commercials.
go to the pub instead
What a cool idea. I'd love to have a go at Missile Command again. I can't even begin to imagine how many rolls of quarters I burned through at our local, small-town bowling alley on Friday's after school. That heavy, smooth-rolling trackball was JUST the greatest for both feel and accuracy. Playing PC ports of the game just doesn't come close to the original arcade version.
As for modern-day games that I "miss," Descent 1 still ranks as my all-time favourite game. I used to play that for so many hours that I'd get vertigo when I went to bed. And once Kali came out and head-to-head was possible over the 'net, sleepless nights became the norm.
Unfortunately for Descent 1, much of the joy of playing the game ended when my CH Flightstick Pro died an untimely death. The MS Sidewinder Precision 2 that replaced it just didn't offer the same feel and response.
I've never been much of a gamer, but those two really were it for me. *sigh*
this seems like _VERY_ cool. this is enough cool to be a slashdot article of it's own...
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Just because you don't live in CA doesn't mean that you can't make it to a show like this. Somewhere near you there's _probably_ a pinball/arcade game trade show. No, not an industry trade show, but a gathering of folks with their own machines who are looking to buy or sell. Usually some giant warehouse is rented out for this event. Free play? You bet. Every machine that's in working order will be playable for free. Hell, you might even decide you want to buy a machine, if the price is right.
These shows are a _lot_ of fun and I highly encourage everyone who wish they could go to CA Extreme to look around and find one of these trade shows.
this ain't a dream (at least I hope not)
Jesus saves souls and redeems them for valuable cash prizes
None of those game Galaga, PacMan, etc ever end. They just add up scores like fiddling with a calculator.
Guys, the more people set up MAME at PUBLIC FORUMS, the greater the chances that the companies that actually own the RIGHTS to those Roms are going to realize there is a market, and totally crack down on MAME in a way they haven't, as of yet.
I'm sure you think its cool to be able to show Tempest on a 30' screen, but at the same time when someone asks "How do you do that" and you reply "Well, we have an illegal copy of the Temptest ROM and we're using this freeware software..." someone is going to be pissed.