Newsbag: Dog Loves Pinball; Paul’s Video Arcade Move; PvZ Whacker; Zone Dome; NTG# 18

Happy weekend Arcaders! Hopefully with an arcade near you, you can enjoy some great coin-operated entertainment before the workweek starts up again.

First item for the newsbag today is a fun video shared by Jersey Jack Pinball of a dog that loves pinball, in particular JJP’s Wizard of Oz Pinball. I’m not sure how well the site is going to handle embedding a Facebook post, so here is the link in case it doesn’t work for you right on the page

In Racine, WI, an arcade by the name of Paul’s Video Arcade is looking to move locations and cities, transitioning from Racine to Milwaukee. Paul has been in business since 2005 and has a sizable arcade but he is looking to make the jump to greener pastures. As such he has created a Kickstarter to raise funds for the move, set at an ambitious $200,000 goal. He has a ways to go with 20 days left, you can check out and donate to the campaign here. Good luck to Paul in that, moving locations is not a fun process and of course it is a big risk anytime you pull up those roots since some people might think you just went out of business.

You might recall that Sega had the Plants Vs. Zombies license for use in the coin-op space, releasing Plants Vs. Zombies: The Last Stand videmption game earlier this year. When I saw that game at Amusement Expo 2014, they had a Plants. Vs. Zombies whacker (whac-a-mole style) game nestled between the two video titles. Sega Amusements sent out a press release this week stating that the PvZ whacker game is now available for venues to pick up. I imagine if a location already has The Last Stand then this would be a no-brainer to place right next to that game. In the email Sega sent out about the release, they stated: “Our location test results prove the power of the zombie!   In a Chicago area Family Entertainment Center, our Plants vs. Zombies^TM Mallet Whacking Game earned 3 X as much as other late model mallet whacking games set at the same price per play clearly illustrating the power and value of the Plants vs. Zombies^TM franchise.“

Before we get to Name That Game, a “grasping at straws” item. I caught this on the DNA Association site where a small dome screen is combined with a treadmill. Now this would make those “endless runner” type games finally interesting – let’s see how far you can get as well as how long you can last while actually running. The product site by the manufacturer Running Unlimited doesn’t indicate that this is planned for the arcade sector, it’s more of a unique thing for gyms, but with the right game I imagine it could work just fine as coin-op technology. Even without the treadmill, I think a screen of that size could be a neat novelty display which could be used for a number of arcade game ideas.

Name That Game #18 – For Name That Game #17, it must have had too many obscure games, although I thought that the shooter game fans out there would have guessed on a couple. Your answers for what they were:

#1 – 1944: The Loop Master by Capcom

#2 – F-15 Strike Eagle by Microprose

#3 – Fantasy by Rock-Ola

For this week, I am going to try and keep the focus towards more horror/terror/Halloween games.