When it comes to having your online presence, sometimes people disappear and just have to chalk it up to some non-descript life events. Well that is something I am juggling right now, nothing bad going on, just lots of things pulling me in different directions and trying to manage them all. As such I know the coverage on the site here has been a little on-and-off this month but I am trying to keep up with the flow.
Kevin Williams of The Stinger Report has sent me a few links with some arcade angles to them so let me use this post to catch up on all of them at once. Interestingly enough these are all from some big game news sources, not sure if we can call that a trend but it does seem like more news outlets are trying to give arcades some love. Now if they would just pay attention to the newest releases we’d be really be set.
Stinger Newsfeeds 1332-1336 via 
First is a new video at Wired.com that takes a look at the amazing Museum of Play. We have mentioned the Museum several times on the site before and this offers an updated look at the facility. Check it out here.
Second, Kotaku has a story on how a bureaucratic mess (redundant phrase, yes) has led Glendale California to sell around $100,000 worth of older arcade games that came into their possession. The games at one point had been in possession of of the Video West Arcade, which was one of the arcades that were not saved by Stride Gum’s “Save The Arcades” promotion. It was the arcade where actor Zachary Quinto joined in to make the saving pitch pictured here.
They probably should have given MvC2 a proper cleaning prior to the shoot
Third is something of interest for anyone that is a fan of the Stern game Berzerk (or game development history). Edge online interviewed the creator of Berzerk, Alan McNeil, about how the game came into being. That includes insight into how the mazes were created, the meaning of Evil Otto, and how the voice synthesis was developed. It’s messed up that an arcade operator kept his cabinet like that although I would have been making sure to know where it was and to get it back after a while. Make this another example of “Get everything in writing”.
The art found on the Atari 2600 home port would have made for some awesome arcade sideart instead.
Last but not least, Event Hubs has a post about an upcoming documentary called Quarter On a Ledge which is about the “last arcades in America”. From that I assume the focus is on places where video is king instead of redemption but even then we’ve had a nice surge in openings of classic arcades over the past few years. This Youtube video trailer for the documentary focuses on one of the longest running video arcades in the world, 8 On The Break. The gentleman speaking at the beginning is Chris Cotty, who has been involved in much more than just running a location, he has worked at Coast-To-Coast to get games onto the market, most recently titles like Friction and Rerave. Enjoy.
Right as I was about to publish this post I got another email from Kevin about a Sega Private Show that was recently held in Japan. There is little of interest to markets outside of Japan it seems, aside from the fighting game that we recently mentioned called Fighting Climax. They also have a new bug catching game using a table cabinet – those are all the rage in places like Japan and China and a similar game called Harpoon Lagoon has done well in the US. More details over at Gpara.com.
