Slashdot Mirror
America's First Video Game Museum Is Trying To Level Up
martiniturbide writes: Did you ever dreamed of a Museum where you can take your kid and show him/her what you used to play when young? This museum exists and it is called "The Museum of Art and Digital Entertainment (MADE)" in Oakland, California. This is non-profit videogame museum that preserves old games, has playable exhibitions, give free classes to learn to code using Scratch and host several kinds of gaming events. This museum has over 5,000 games and over 100 consoles and computers and hosted free classes for more than 400 students. Now they are launching a Kickstarter campaign because they need a bigger space.
>> Did you ever dreamed of a Museum where you can take your kid and show him/her what you used to play when young?
No, I have YouTube, emulators and in some cases, the actual consoles and games I used to play.
No, because I have managed to master at least the basic fundamentals of English grammar...
It's called a nickel arcade. Vintage arcade machines for a nickel per play.
I think the appeal that museums like this would provide is the old style arcade cabinets, physical console devices (including much maligned yet now rare devices like ROB) and other accessories that can't be had from an emulator or a youtube clip.
One thing that they might also be able to provide, is the old 80's style arcades, maybe even 90's style (not much difference other than better graphics.) Sure, modern arcades exist, but they aren't quite the same atmosphere that was found back then.
Again, if you wanted that kind of thing.
although I wouldn't exactly call it a museum, I'd call it a fucking leech, it costs a fucking fortune to get in (£9 for a non-member!) and half the "exhibits" are either hand-off or locked in demo mode, or nonfunctional. In fact I was so disappointed in it when I went last month I won't even bother linking the website.
Political debates have me rolling my eyes so much I think I got optical whiplash. I should sue. - Foamy The Squirrel
... Now they are launching a Kickstarter campaign because they need a bigger space.
No, they don't need a "bigger" space; they just need to recreate themselves within the worlds which they celebrate. That is to say, create a virtual museum using the Unreal Engine, and then release it on every platform that supports UE. You'd be guaranteed to increase your audience dramatically.
To wit: eat your own dog food, as they say.
The two links that apply in your situation are:
http://gamecity.org/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Please. Do not subject your kid to this. It brings back nostalgia for you, it will bore them to death and you'll probably get in a huge fight because they don't want to be there and leave pissed off at each other. It'd be like my dad taking me to the Internation Museum of Board Games. Or Wooden Toys.
Your kids would rather spend that time playing current games. Take the money you would have blown on this and buy a PS4. Take the time you would have spent going there and visiting and play some games with your kid. Let them win (you may not have a choice). It'll end much better and they'll probably remember it longer.
It's called "my closet".
I bet a lot of other people on here do as well.
Son, we used to pay money for this crap. Per play.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
They should aim a little higher. Right now the MADE is basically a cheap office space with some folding tables and stuff. Hats off to them that they are trying but ... for some aspirational goals they should really check out places like:
The National Videogame Arcade in Nottingham
The Game Science Center in Berlin
The Computer Game Museum in Berlin
If the MADE was called the Oakland Game Club or something it would be fine as is but something called "The Museum of Art and Digital Entertainment" really needs to set up their game ;)
They have tens of thousands of dollars worth of rare videogame stuff in a walk-up in Oakland and they haven't been robbed??
Shit, I'm impressed! KUDOS!
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
The might want to level up their website host as well.
Ah it's extremely slow, but will come up eventually. Their gopher server is faster. Yes they have one of those too. You'll need a gopher to web proxy, the OverbiteFF addon or something like lynx to see that:
gopher://themade.org/
Or you could just show them the games using an emulator...
I think the appeal that museums like this would provide is the old style arcade cabinets, physical console devices (including much maligned yet now rare devices like ROB) and other accessories that can't be had from an emulator or a youtube clip.
There's appeal to that? I remember them smelling bad (like burnt caps) and being full of a whole shitload of dust, which also smelled bad and to which I'm allergic. Still went to them a lot anyway, because video games, man. Attic arcade in Soquel. The SC Beach Boardwalk obviously still has a pretty great arcade, with a nice mix of new and older games.
To me, the only real reason to go to an arcade as an adult is if your favorite game doesn't emulate properly, and is too expensive to track down, and/or you don't have room for it.
These days you can score a big tilt monitor for $50, I've got two 25.5" IPS displays. One has burn in along the bottom which you can only see on a big screen of solid color and the other has four dead pixels which are horrible during gaming (is that an enemy, or a dead pixel? oh.) but fine during video-watching... Maybe you want to spend $100. Mount it on the wall, build yourself one or more controller boxes... tilt the monitor for games with the other aspect ratio. If you feel really inspired, build something that'll do that for you. Holy crap, now that's tempting. I've got a cute little pneumatic cylinder which would do the job nicely, if only I had fittings to match it...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I think a fun project to get a young kid interested in technology would be to build an arcade cabinet yourself. There's a lot of how-to guides out there even if you're not the most technical person yourself and it's the kind of project that combines both software and hardware (even more so if you build that cabinet frame from scratch as well) aspects that can get kids interested in all kinds of different stuff.
Eight-year-old me thought arcades were really cool and would have been stoked to built an arcade machine for at home.
Did you ever dreamed that hm you had um you would you can you do you want uh you can do some you do um you want it so much that you can do anything - like proper word usage down?
Just across the estuary, in the city of Alameda, is the High Scores Interactive Arcade Museum. They've been there for over 2 years now.
http://www.highscoresarcade.co...
Very cool joint.
This isn't anything new. I went to a video game exhibit a few years ago at the Ontario Science Centre in Toronto. The exhibit was called Game On 2.0 It was a history of video games, and had over 500 playable games. Ranging from Pong to Call of Duty. It was a lot of fun if you still don't have the system as all the games were on the real consoles and controllers, not emulation. Some of the PC games were emulated via Dosbox (Doom, Dune 2, Commander Keen etc,) understandably.
There was a club in Toronto who was offering every console to have come out to that day and every personal computer platform that had been popular in Canada.
They went under because people simply were not interested in the early 90s in vintage games.
I had the same problem in Montreal when I was building my collection to start exactly the same concept 2 years earlier, I never got off the ground so I personally cannot have the claim. Just curious since I had not heard of anyone else trying the concept back then.
I'll have to see if I can remember the name of the place, I'm drawing a blank right now... Any gamers from the 80s, 90s in Toronto? Anyone else remembers?
It may be the first that's dedicated to just video games, but the Strong Museum of Play (http://www.museumofplay.org) in Rochester, NY has been Preserving games via the International Center for the History of Electronic Games (http://icheg.org/) on top of traditional games / books and stories for many years.
So why is there appeal in preserving anything?
So why is there appeal in preserving anything?
Some things have more appeal than others. I don't see the appeal in preserving video games which can be faithfully emulated, aside from "ooh, rare thing from the past". And I do see the appeal there, but only if people can actually enjoy the things. Otherwise, recycle them, make new things.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
It's painful to compare this with something like the Pinball Hall of Fame in Las Vegas, which is like a Mecca for gamers.
I know too many people that have collections like this in their basements. Which probably is dating myself.
So many pinball machines, so little time...! And all of them are playable! A quarter a pop!
For Amusement Only e.V. has a large hall of pinball games, arcade games, and lots of old mechanical and electromechanical treasures. The majority is in playable state. They open once a month to the public and for a flat fee you can play everything you want to. I think they have hosted international pinball championships a few times as well.
The "Computerspielemuseum" (video game museum) in Berlin has been around since 1997. It's quite cool, and they have everything from early arcade machines to modern stuff. They claim that they were the first with a permanent exhibition worldwide.
http://www.movingimage.us/
It's not a huge section, but it's a real (and terrific) museum, and has a well maintained and curated section of the museum.
I kinda agree with this sad summation:
"You mightn't have noticed, and probably don't care, but some note should be made of the death of the video arcade: peacefully at home, aged about 30, dearly missed by his millions of illegitimate, misguided children. Donations, in 10p coins please, to Atari and Namco corporations..."
the title and continue it in the body?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
etarded title field limit that doesn't even stretch to the end of the box?
as the point I was making.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
What about a museum where the blind can "see" and interact with the art? https://vimeo.com/137003139 (video of blind people experiencing visual art)