Slashdot Mirror
Play Classic Video Games In NY, At Home
Iphtashu Fitz writes "If you'd like to play classic arcade games from the 1980s, then it might be time for you to take a trip to New York, according to Wired News, since the American Museum of the Moving Image is holding an exhibition called Blip! where you can play a selection of the classics, including some of those referenced in an earlier exhibition. Also mentioned on their site is the X-Arcade cabinet for playing arcade-style classics at home through emulation." Much easier than building your own cabinet.
I read in Wired that the Pac Man people wouldn't agree to being in it.
As part of my Ghosts of Slashdot project, I grabbed a copy of this article before it went "live". There was a Slashdot outage at about that time, so I don't know if CmdrTaco & co. decided to change the text, or if it was lost and had to be re-created.
Same submitter, same "dept."... just the title and story text has changed.
Play Those Classic Video Games Virtually Anywhere
Posted by CmdrTaco in The Mysterious Future!
from the emulating-the-classics dept.
Iphtashu Fitz writes "If you're like me your introduction to video games decades ago was something like the Atari 2600, and you also pumped untold hundreds of quarters into arcade games like Space Invaders, Defender, and Asteroids. Well according to a Wired News article you can now play these and many more of those classic games in their original format on your PC, Mac, Playstation, XBox, or Gamecube. X-Arcade has an emulator & arcade-style interface that they claim will let you play over 4000 of the classic games on any of these modern gaming systems. Or if you'd prefer to play the actual arcade games from the 1980's then it might be time for you to take a trip to New York where the American Museum of the Moving Image is holding an exhibition where you can play these classics. Game emulators can be found linked from the museums website as well as through Retrogames." Much easier than building your own Cabinet.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Rescue an unloved genuine arcade cabinet, pop in a PC made out of all those bits and pieces you have lying around your house and join them together with bits from http://www.ultimarc.com/
Appreciate that special aroma in your home and the genuine cigartte burns around the joysticks.
The X-Arcade cab is basically just a big wooden box, plus a nastily looking inserted X-Arcade double stick. (You can see the outlines of the arcade-shaped panel in the giant blocky panel. Ugh.) No PC or monitor are included. All that for 1000 bucks.
You might be better off buying an ancient cab and gutting it, or building your own. I built a wooden cab right to my size (I have a physical disability, dwarfism) and it kicks much booty as a result. Having a customized cab, or an authentic cab with new guts, seems a better way to go than a generic black cab branded with X-Arcade logos and a somewhat questionable price tag.
hah you can buy an arcade with a MUCH bigger screen for half the price at www.arcade-infinity.com. Looks like the site is down at the moment - if it doesn't return you can google for "Japanese JAMMA cabinet" and that should find you something useful.
the guy that runs http://arcade.madsmurf.com/ can probably point you towards a cabinet vendor.
I'm not an owner of that company or investor or anything other than a very happy customer.
shipping is kind of expensive but the arcade cabs are very cheap in my experience. slap a windows PC in there and a couple bits from www.ultimarc.com (arcadeVGA adapter and the J-PAC) and you have every thing you need but the roms to play thousands of arcade games on this arcade.
and there are a lot more than one type of cabinet - there are stand-up cabs, sit down cabs, two seater sega cabs, cabinets with dual monitors, cabinets with giant projection screen monitors, all kinds of stuff.
have a look. they're good stuff.
That I know of is at Weirs Beach at FunSpot You name a game, they have it there most likely. From old school Asteroids to new games that you actually have to move your body to play. Anytime I go there it's a blast!
You can buy a scrapped cabinet for less than $100, or free if you know where to look. They typically include a coin door which is a real eye catcher, and just need a washing up. Attach a pre-made control panel ($100?) or make your own, drop in a TV + PC and Bob's your uncle.