Welcome to Newsbytes, the series of posts at AH that curates stories from across the worlds of arcade and pinball. Things have been “quiet” on the site this week since Amusement Expo has been going on, but there has been many other things happening – this should get us up to speed (no pun intended, considering the below Wangan Midnight Speed Ignition news…) with those items.
Wangan Midnight Speed Ignition Tests
The biggest arcade news not surrounding AEI of late started emanating from Japan right as that event finished up: the first location test period for Wangan Midnight Speed Ignition by Bandai Namco. Even though there was supposed to be a ban on most photos & video from the test, plenty of pictures got their way out onto Twitter/X anyways, so we have a good idea of how it’s going down.
As per general consensus, it seems to be mixed. The new game name and cabinets already foreshadowed this, but Bandai Namco are aiming for more revolution than evolution, so to speak: the overall aesthetic, setting and worldview all look a lot cleaner and brighter than Maximum Tune, the story mode has been replaced with a “Grand Prix”, the characters in the game are all new, and it appears that there is “commentary and instructions at any time” provided by them. The below video, which matches a slideshow of numerous screenshots taken at the test with an audio recording, shows how that works in practise at a few points (although it’s often hard to hear them). There are other notes in Japanese that can be seen here.
Having said all of that, the game (powered by the new “Advanced Enma” engine) and redesigned cabinet (named “VISION”, meaning “Vibration + Immersive + Sound + Image + Operation >> New”) look fantastic to me. There’s also some sort of mysterious new force feedback and/or horn (?) mechanism inside of the wheel, although aside from this post I’m not sure what that is all about.
On the other hand, some particularly negative impressions have gone as far as suggesting the game could indeed do a Gundam Pods Mk. II and fade away after just a few years. But, the longstanding Maximum Tune producer has rightly made a good point that anyone assuming this first location test is the final representation of what Wangan Midnight Speed Ignition is like should consider what these tests have historically always been for. Yes, some can be done as final checks, but this project is far from done, and feedback should be implemented accordingly if players have given it…
Portal Pinball
Seasoned arcade fans know that of Valve’s most successful PC and console games, Half Life 2, Left 4 Dead, and Counter Strike have all had special arcade editions (the former two by Taito, the latter by Namco – although all three only released in Japan). One that always sat this out was Portal, but it has finally joined the club with a coin-op release of sorts to its name in the form of a pinball table by Multimorphic. This will be an upgrade for their P3 platform, in the sense that it has more mechanical devices in both the upper field module and the lower field (which sits above the LCD) than any previous P3 title. Pinball News has a detailed breakdown of what’s been revealed so far, and there’s this feature trailer:
The game is at the Texas Pinball Festival this weekend; Multimorphic has no real interest in advertising their games to operators, at least through shows like Amusement Expo. However, you can definitely put one on location as you wish. Just don’t expect to see too many out there…
Gitadora Arena Model & Idolmaster Tours Release
The big news in Japan hasn’t just been the Wangan Midnight Speed Ignition tests that this post led with; as holidays like Golden Week near, late March is usually always a busy time for new releases over in the land of the rising sun, and this year is no different. Rhythm gamers have a lot to be pleased about there, as for one, Konami have just started rolling out the new Arena model of their Gitadora drum and guitar-based Bemani title. As mentioned previously on the site, this uses a whopping three screens (one landscape, two portrait to the left and right), with a special “Delta” edition of the series’ present update since last April, Galaxy Wave. As one can see, locations like this Round1 and the flagship GiGO have a lot of them already… but could it be part of a bigger push for the West that Konami are again rumored to be making?
Meanwhile, the folks at Bandai Namco are busy as they are about to launch their latest major Japanese release, The Idolm@ster Tours. The game hasn’t had a ton of coverage on here, but has been brought up once or twice, so for a quick refresher of it, this revival of their Asian idol group IP that started out in arcades was originally announced way back at JAEPO 2023. It’s since been through arduous testing (as seen in the below video), and now two years on is launching on the 26th. Though containing both rhythm and card game elements it sounds like the main draw is the latter, to the extent there are only seven songs to play (albeit more are promised in future updates). The property is a lot nicher than Taiko so it’s hard to see Bamco bringing this one to the West too; they may try it in one of their new Cross Store locations at best.
Sega are also just about to release the newest version of their Ongeki rhythm game on the 27th, though we covered the announcement of that extensively already back in the last Newsbytes post.
Turner Pinball Reveals Merlin’s Arcade
When I was at Pinball Expo 2024, I came across a boutique pinball maker by the name of Turner Pinball, who I had not heard of before. They were promoting their game Ninja Eclipse at that show, and now they have another original release that you can buy by the name of Merlin’s Arcade. Knapp Arcade, who are always on top of all of the pinball news and rumors, have a spread on this, and now all of the game details are up on Turner’s website. The aesthetic of it reminds me of Medieval Madness meets the newer Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland, with a vibrant color scheme throughout the game’s art and lighting.
Like other boutique pin makers, quantities are quite limited, but it’s nice to see that they are priced at the same level as Stern’s Pro and Premium machines. Whether they are of the same quality though, I don’t know – I’ve not spoken with anyone who has owned a Turner game at this point. That said, what I saw at the Expo looked very well done. I also appreciate that they are making original themes instead of rinsing licenses, although that doesn’t necessarily help earnings on a type of game that struggles to earn coins as it is. I have to believe that one of these days, something that is an original theme can break the curse.
Sega Amusements Ships Big Sea Fishing
The latest fishing videmption title, Big Sea Fishing, is now shipping out to locations via Sega Amusements. From SEA (who also made Hot Racers, which Sega used to sell), this takes the familiar format used by similar titles like those from UNIS, and gives it a few improvements. This includes spreading the action across two screens, interesting power-ups, and some neat 3D fish animations flashing across them to boot. From what was said following IAAPA, the On Target shooting range also sold by them should also be shipping around about now too, though there hasn’t been any news blip on that posted yet.
Pre-Orders Open For The Arcooda Arcade Foot Pedal
I was going to put this into the headlines, then after looking into it, this deserves more attention. Repro parts for the arcade business is a little bit spotty, but certain companies like Arcooda are constantly improving the selection of what’s available out there. Now, they’ve just opened pre-orders for a commercial-quality arcade foot pedal replacement. This works as a replacement for “Time Crisis 1/2/3/4, Razing Storm, Crisis Zone, and Blade of Honor” games, and it can also work for home arcade setups.
Note that there are two models – the Arcooda Pedal Assembly (features RGB LED effects; $249 after pre-orders are closed), and the Arcade Pedal Assembly version ($199 after pre-orders are closed).
After searching a little on eBay for Time Crisis foot pedal, I would also have to say that these are competitively priced (I can’t find any new at locations like ). Used ones are going for $116~$160, so to get a brand new one for $40 more, it’s kind of a no-brainer – although I don’t know what shipping might look like on these coming from Australia. For the LED model, the $50 upcharge on that could be worth it and that’s the version I’m strongly considering, as I have a TC2 and 3; the cabinets get a little lost up against my other gun games, all of which have LED effects on them, excepting Big Buck Hunter.
Amusement Expo 2025 Updates
While we are working on our ‘post-mortem’ for Amusement Expo, you can stay up-to-date with the videos I’ve been posting from the show by following this YouTube playlist, or just subscribing to the channel if you haven’t already and making sure notifications are on. I am typically posting at least three videos a day, but sometimes less on weekends. Highlights so far include several booth tours for the likes of Stern, Bandai Namco and Alan-1, plus footage of Top Gun Maverick, Maimai DX, and Cyberpunk 2077: Turf Wars.
At the moment, this video of Cyberpunk has decisively taken the lead over everything else in terms of views (mainstream consumer games media noticing it has helped), but most commenters sound unhappy with what they expected versus what is bring presented. Again, I would just mention that it’s still a little early to pass final judgment on the game as it has a few more months of development time to go, although I do hope that the dev team is looking over that feedback and looking at implementing polish.
And of course here’s Maimai DX, with a lot of interaction from fans underneath:
Headlines
Jack Guarineri Confirms That Harry Potter Is Next From Jersey Jack Pinball – Surprised it’d be done like this instead of the normal Big News Reveal, but then it has been rumored for a long time now
Initial D The Arcade’s 2nd Major Tournament Finals + Season 5 Announced
A 40-Min Tour Of The Texas Pinball Festival
Sega’s Sangokushi Taisen Card Game Celebrates 20 Years
Venom Pinball Accessories Trailer
Be Sure To Celebrate 45 Years Of Pac-Man This Year
Naruto Emblem Battle Season 2 Is Releasing Now Via Marvelous/XSEED
Singaporean Gamers Find Their Home In Arcades, Maimai & Pump It Up
Over One Hour Of AOU Show 2004 Footage, Including Early Maximum Tune
What’s Even Better Than DariusBurst? DariusBurst Battle Pod
Karl Urban Stars As Johnny Cage In The Next Mortal Kombat Film
Get The True Crazy Taxi Experience Out Of Your Car With This Hanging Green Arrow
NBC’s The Happy Place Has An Episode With Current Arcade Games, Including StepManiaX
SPREE Interactive Launches New Immersive Amusement Experience That Uses No Wearables
[Home Headlines]
Sony Was Working On A Space Shooter Game For The Nintendo/SNES PlayStation Platform
An Interview With Jeff Minter About The New I, Robot And Working For Atari (Again)
PaRapper The Rapper Was Originally Pitched To Sega And Turned Down
Sonic The Hedgehog Now Has An Official, Canonized Timeline
Sega To Open A Store In Shanghai Following Pop-Up
One Of The Worst Games Ever Made Is Coming To Steam – I’d rather play E.T. than this turd
The Guy Who Ported Doom 64 To The Dreamcast Is Now Porting Wipeout To The System
The Xbox 360 Can Now Be Hacked With A USB Drive
Atari Updates Their Owned IP List With Some Atari Jaguar Homebrew Games
The Super Mario Bros. Anime Movie Is Now On YouTube, Remastered In 4K
That’s it for this Newsbytes; which of the above stories (e.g. the Wangan Midnight Speed Ignition tests) interest you most?
