Amusement Expo 2026: The Main Preview

Arcadian March 16, 2026 0
Amusement Expo 2026: The Main Preview

Welcome to our preview of all the big arcade names appearing at Amusement Expo 2026, which is set to kick off next week at the Las Vegas Convention Center. The main trade show side will be happening on the 18th and 19th, whilst the 16th (today) and 17th feature the event’s educational conference days. It is now taking place in the West Hall, which opened up back in 2021, with the host hotel changing from the Westgate to Resorts World. This is the first time the show will be held in that hall, so if you are attending, keep that in mind so you don’t get dropped off at the wrong entrance of the venue.

Last year’s show was a bigger one than usual, with the likes of Top Gun: Maverick, Cyberpunk 2077: Turf Wars and Maimai DX headlining the major manufacturers’ booths. We will have several games first appearing here too, but more from different names looking to make stronger marks on the scene.

If you would prefer to ingest all of this information in video form, stay tuned to the YouTube channel as there will be a full livestreamed rundown of this piece soon as well; it won’t be quite as deep as the two hour long one we did for IAAPA, since there isn’t as much to discuss. Onto the article itself now:

Amusement Expo 2026 – Advertisers

As always, we start with the advertisers that sponsor the website (we thank them for their continued support!) and are appearing at the show. Note that Wahlap won’t have their own booth here, but their product will be on hand nonetheless, generally via Amusement Source International and LAI Games.

Raw Thrills

Booths #2044, 2146 and 2555 (with Betson). Though both them and Play Mechanix are hard at work on new projects, it looks like Raw Thrills aren’t bringing anything new-new to this event. They could still spring a complete surprise on us, but outside of that possibility we’ll have to wait for future trade shows or location test sightings for whatever is next. They will however have the latest content updates for Minecraft Dungeons Arcade, Marvel: Contest of Champions, and Angry Birds Boom!, as well as returning recent titles like Godzilla Kaiju Wars Deluxe and Jackpot Racer that recently started shipping (the latter has a spotlight feature in this month’s RePlay Magazine). It was initially stated that Big Buck Hunter Reloaded‘s upcoming Mountain Goat update would be playable here too, but it looks like that won’t be the case now.

TouchMagix

Booth #2001. As can be seen from their banner ad at the top of the site and our recent piece publishing their press release for the show, TouchMagix are also offering a repeat of their IAAPA line-up, centered on their latest redemption games: Pickleball Toss, Treasure Chest, Boxed Up! and Minions Bullseye Mania. Note that Pickleball Toss has little to do with the popular court & paddle sport, with this just referring to the ball being used.

Alan-1

Booth #1855. This is not the first time that Alan-1 will be exhibiting at Amusement Expo, but it is by far their largest booth at any show to date, with a 40×40 space. They will have some pieces that were at IAAPA alongside some new debuts, as indicated by the asterisks here:

  • Asteroids: Recharged
  • Atari PONG Cocktail*
  • Avian Knights
  • Breakout: Recharged*
  • Butts On Things cranes & toys
  • Caverns of Mars: Recharged*
  • Gravitar: Recharged
  • Missile Command: Recharged
  • Yars’ Revenge: Recharged*

Note that in RePlay Magazine, it had been suggested that a new Butts on Things videmption game would also make its debut, however this is not happening at this time.

The three new Atari Recharged games use something I’ve been wanting to see (and personally advocating for with Alan-1) in arcades for a long time, that being the use of the “Pepper’s Ghost” effect. This is where an angled glass or half-silvered mirror bounces an image off it to appear holographic. How Alan-1 is going about it slightly different than when this was used with games like the original Space Invaders and Asteroids Deluxe, doing a present day version of Taito’s obscure Wyvern F-0, where you have two monitors, with foreground objects being overlaid the background monitor. It produces an effective glasses-free 3D effect and helps these games be set apart further from the console editions they are based on.

Also of note, they will be holding their annual Major League eSports World Championship, where eight players will compete on Alan-1 games (mostly Avian Knights) to win a hefty cash prize ($5k for 1st place).

Blue Motion Games

Booth #2265. For our fourth and freshest advertiser, Blue Motion Games made their Amusement Expo debut last year with the launch of Desert Strike and Cannonball Jam, but this year they’ve got a new gun game that is based on a major Hollywood IP that will be unveiled. We can’t say what it is at this precise moment, however stay tuned to this site for a special post reveal on Wednesday morning that will reveal all. Until then, their new ad on the upper right shows a tease.

Amusement Expo 2026 – Exhibitors

Now onto the rest of the exhibitors in arcade games that will be appearing at the show, or having their product represented by distributors in a one or two small cases. Note that several prize redemption and VR/AR/MXR names are also briefly covered at the end of the post.

Adrenaline Amusements

Booth #1513. Adrenaline have been pretty low-key recently, only using IAAPA 2025 to show a prototype Back to the Future spinner redemption game and an Angry Birds coin roll down game sourced from another company. As such, it’s anyone’s guess what they will have here besides their existing product line. Maybe their Hot Wheels: Victory Lap won’t be exclusive to Dave & Buster’s locations anymore?

Amusement Source International

Booth #1327 (also represented at Shaffer Distributing). ASI had a huge gamut of new games at IAAPA, mostly being of the redemption and vending variety, but for Amusement Expo they are also going to have Wahlap’s Storm Racer 2 and Storm Rider X on hand for the first time, as recently previewed. SR2 did already appear at Wahlap’s own IAAPA booth, however SRX didn’t, so the latter should be a nice North American debut for them. Alongside those will be a few other games, including some new ones from Ace Amusement that were not a part of ASI’s booth at IAAPA, but were at Ace’s own space.

For a list of what they have specifically mentioned:

  • Balloon Fest
  • Box Stack
  • Crossbow Fishing
  • DIY Souvenir Coin
  • Dragon Kingdom
  • Fortune Zombie
  • Print Cases
  • Rooster ‘N Bro 2DX
  • Storm Racer 2
  • Storm Rider X
  • The Container
  • Trick Pong
  • Wild Hunting

Andamiro USA

Booth #2445. Amusement Expo will mark the first chance for much of the industry to give Nickelodeon Kart Racers Arcade a play, after it skipped IAAPA and Andamiro chose to debut it at this year’s MAGFest and NJAA Expo instead. They will also have their Dragons pusher seen on location test and at NJAA recently, and their regular stable of redemption games (e.g. Star Wars) besides that.

Andamiro USA

Bandai Namco

Booths #1801 and 1900. Bandai Namco are among those that seem to be repeating their IAAPA line-up, as according to their previews we can expect GoldStorm Pirates, Speed Rider 4DX and the Pac-Man range of pieces, including its latest kiddie additions. It would be nice to see some surprises, like a smaller standard version of GoldStorm or even Resident Evil 2: Arcade, but don’t hold your breath on those (they didn’t have anything new-new at last year’s AEI, aside from the first US trade show appearance for Gashapon). We’ll also have to ask what the deal is with a game that has sort of disappeared since IAAPA, The Future, which had debuted alongside fellow Superwin shooter Mini World (one that does seem to be sticking around).

DSM Arcade

Booth #1353 (with AVS Companies). Though DSM won’t have a booth of their very own, they will be one of the main developers represented by their distributors at AVS again, through the recently-released Perfect Pour Pabst Blue Ribbon Edition. I will also check in with Dan there to see if there is anything to discuss on their next game in the pipeline, which they have been quietly working on for the past little while.

exA-Arcadia

Booth #1364. exA-Arcadia make their return to Amusement Expo this year after not being part of 2025’s, with their booth here being under the name of Show Me Holdings for those who’d like to find it on the maps. They have been surprisingly quiet on new releases lately (usually there have been one or two new launches every month), but that doesn’t mean that they haven’t been busy working away in the background.

exA will be unveiling two major new releases on the first day of the show (we will have posts up for both after Blue Motion Games’ reveal), alongside existing ones seen at IAAPA. It is also possible that they will have more new-new titles on hand, although the really big one to look for when it comes to exA will be EVO Japan later this year. There are some major announcements scheduled there that will be bigger than what we’re getting at AEI, but we’ll have to wait for May. I’d love to be in Japan for it, but that is unlikely for now.

Among other titles that will be available, expect to find:

Incredible Technologies

Booth #1813. IT unveiled their first non-Golden Tee piece in a little while, Silver Strike Bowling: League Night, back at IAAPA, and this will be here too. They have recently been promoting it through their partnership with Storm Products, who are aiding them with real bowling equipment in-game. This should naturally be joined again by the latest update to their long-running golfing game, as seen below.

Could there be something else shown off at their booth? Maybe, it’s rather large for just two games, although they have had larger booths for AEI historically than they do with IAAPA.

JET Games

Booth #2235. JET are among those that have been oddly quiet as to what they’ll have at the show; one certainty should be G.I. Joe Big Cannon, which is due to have some localization changes from the original Chinese game (Flamestone Cannon) seeing as that didn’t have the strongest of links to the licensed IP. Robert at JET also confirmed that it is on track to ship on May 1st, but no other details have been proffered about it so far. Other than that, it’s probable they’ll have recently-shipped titles like Giga Shot and Cyber Boxer, alongside a variety of their latest redemption pieces (e.g. Talking Tom Gold Rush).

LAI Games

Booth #1445. Whilst Amusement Expo 2025 saw them launch an early version of Cyberpunk 2077: Turf Wars to the world, this time LAI look set to be bringing their big IAAPA 2025 booth over in a slightly more condensed space, meaning they will have the recently-released Ubisoft All-Star VR and Wahlap/IGS/Gameloft’s Phantom Vanguard alongside Playmore’s Cube Clash pusher and the Hyper Grid social entertainment attraction from FOG (Future of Gaming). Alongside those should be a few others from their current portfolio of games, as well as the completed and improved version of Cyberpunk.

Pop-A-Shot

Booth #1245. Pop-A-Shot made their return to the industry last time around at AEI, thanks to Ryan Cravens (son of the late Bill Cravens, former Capcom USA VP) bringing back the name, and they return again here with their revived commercial basketball game in a bigger space. If they have something else to add to the product mix they haven’t said so, although that seems unlikely as this has been doing very well.

Sega Amusements

Booth #1833. Last year’s Amusement Expo saw the first US trade show appearance for Maimai DX garner a lot of attention, and though Sega Amusements seemingly won’t have any debuts on the level of that here, like Bandai Namco, Raw Thrills, and LAI, they will bring much of the same varied line-up found on their IAAPA 2025 booth, as well as a couple newer additions in redemption like Go Go Ducky that appeared at EAG in January. Maimai will be back again too, now running its recent Circle content update and also at Player One/Kiddleton’s booth (since they are giving it a hefty push at their locations), as well as Subsoccer Arcade.

Stern Pinball

Booth #2345. Once again, Stern will be the sole pinball representation at AEI, barring any surprise appearance of anything else on a distributor’s booth. Alongside other recent titles like Star Wars, the main attraction here will of course be Pokémon, making its first showing in front of the amusement industry after debuting at the New York Toy Fair and already shipping out in recent weeks. I have notably heard from an operator whose Pokémon made $70 in one day – he’s never seen a pin earn this well in 25 years.

It is also safe to assume that their other in-production games, such as Star Wars: Fall of the Empire, The Walking Dead Remastered, King Kong, and Dungeons & Dragons will also make an appearance.

UNIS

Booth #1606. UNIS is one of the companies that we know for certain will be bringing a few new pieces, and not just in redemption either. The biggest news of the bunch is the newly-announced Cyberpunk 2077 Chrome Rush biking game. As I mentioned in a video preview of this one, it reminds me of the classic 90s game Road Rash, put into the CP2077 universe. UNIS first released this trailer unlisted, then made it public:

Next is Ski Hero, which first popped up in previews ahead of IAAPA but has not appeared at any event until now. This is the first time we’ll have seen virtual skiing in a while. It is unknown how many units can link together (same with Cyberpunk), so that’s one piece of info we’ll need to ask about.

Last but not least is Pickleball Rivals, which is the first time that we’ll see the fast-growing tennis variation come to arcades (TouchMagix’s Pickelball Toss is unrelated). This uses motion controls and comes in a deluxe twin model.

UNIS will also have many of their latest redemption pieces and crane machines, although their AEI setup tends to be pared back from their IAAPA showings; here’s their most recent IAAPA booth if you are curious.

Redemption & Cranes

Speaking of such games, if they are your primary focus for these shows, check out our preview on those companies who are mainly focused on that here. A lot of them don’t appear to have any different setups from IAAPA, so we won’t rehash that all over again – but if you’re looking for Bay Tek Entertainment, Coastal Amusements, ICE, Smart Industries, Team Play, Zooom Studios, and so on, that’s where you can go. One thing of some special note there is that Toccata Gaming International are returning to the scene after a few years away from arcades, with this new Outbreak update to their Zombie Snatcher game:

Virtual/Augmented/Mixed Reality

Once upon a time, there were several VR-only companies gracing shows like this, but now there are fewer, and they can be grouped together with those pivoting to augmented/mixed reality instead. Perhaps that will make it easier to catch up on what is being offered in this sector though.

  • Axcitement Projected Gaming [Booth #2569]
  • DOF Robotics [Booth #1145] – They will introduce the Compact Flying Theater, a more FEC-friendly sized version of their popular theme park ride.
  • InstaVR Arena [Booth #1412]
  • Rilix [Booth #2169] – Mounted gun VR game they had at IAAPA (I nabbed some bad footage of this and didn’t get a chance to follow-up)
  • Valo Motion [Booth #2122]
  • Verse Immersive [Booth #1233]
  • VEX Solutions [Booth #2369, via Amusement Products] – Party Dash (clip below)

Of what will be there, it will be interesting to see if VEX’s Party Dash continues to have an impact:


That wraps things up for this preview, where I am surprised by how much new-new stuff there is this time around. 10 years ago, I could go to AEI and only see one new game that wasn’t at IAAPA. Either way, keep things locked to the website and our social media profiles to see those day one reveals from Blue Motion and exA. As always, we will write a full recap of the show up after it has concluded and most of the relevant booth tour/gameplay videos have been uploaded to the YouTube channel. In the meantime, what excites you most from our Amusement Expo 2026 preview?


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