Newsbag: Dave Corriveau Passing; Stinger Report; Amusement Expo; NTG#35

Well it is not every newsbag that it lands on a holiday. Happy Valentine’s Day everyone! Bonus: It is also the birthday of Ken Masters from Street Fighter II, who would be 50 years old today if he were real. 😛

With JAEPO soaking up most of the headlines, today’s newsbag is going to be a little sparse and maybe a little depressing since we have to start off with a death in the industry. For the JAEPO stuff, here is a link to part 1 / link to part 2.

Dave Corriveau Passes Away – the individual responsible for the “Dave” in Dave & Busters, passed away last Saturday at the age of 63. His influence on the arcade industry is obvious from the effect that D&B currently has in driving trends and providing an accessible venue for people to enjoy arcade entertainment. His funeral is being held tomorrow tomorrow in Dallas; our condolences to his family.

The Stinger Report Gets a Revamp – The Stinger Report has been a partner of Arcade Heroes since the beginning of this site, providing news tips and media to us over the years. In interest of full disclosure, I was hired to redesign the 20+ year running newsletter, which launched with the February 9th edition of the newsletter. When it comes to diving into the nitty gritty of the industry, TSR is a great resource and it is free to boot so sign up for it if you haven’t already 😉

Amusement Expo Coming Soon – We are over a month away from the next US based arcade trade show but as such, a couple of companies are starting to spread the word as to what they will have on hand. This is an annual event that is held in Las Vegas, usually in conjunction with a couple of other trade shows such as the International Pizza Expo (fascinating to see what the latest ideas are for the pizza industry) and the Nightclub and Bar Show (where most attendees seem to wander off to after a little while at AE). Here is a round-up of the videos from the show last year.

First Bandai Namco Amusements is promoting that this is the event where Time Crisis 5 will be playable. It was first shown last month in the UK at EAG so this will mark the first industry promotion of it in the US but March is when the game will also be hitting the production lines.

Universal Space (UNIS) has announced their line-up of games, which is strong on the redemption side and includes videmption content like their Duo Drive (pictured below) and Safari Ranger. No mention of Armed Resistance, which was one of the best games at IAAPA for me, hopefully a pair will find their way to AE.

While not mentioned yet, I imagine that this is where we will see some interesting pinball as well – WrestleMania will certainly be there, Medival Madness, The Hobbit and likely the irreverent Whoa Nellie! Big Juicy Melons that Stern is producing. It would also be cool if Heighway Pinball’s Full Throttle and Dutch Pinball’s The Big Lebowski make an appearance, if so it would become the most pinball-centric event I will have seen since I started going to these trade shows back in ’08.

Name That Game #35 – For NTG#34 last week we went with games that had some sort of love component to them and being that today is Valentines Day, that will continue. First, your answers from last week:

#1 – Let’s Go Island by Sega

#2 – Chack ‘N Pop By Taito

#3 – Marine Date by Taito

And this week’s games to guess on: