Arcade Heroes

This year several arcade development companies have revamped their websites and now Incredible Technologies has joined them. The new site design for IT is pretty good and it should be since they have been working on it for the past year, it looks like they have streamlined everything and made it sleeker as well as giving a better highlight to each one of their current games. It should be easier to get the information one would need about IT and its games, along with news and  some better screenshots of each game to the site. Now they just need to add some videos of each game in action (which I believe can be found on special sites for each game) and they’ll be set.

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AM-Net has posted a flyer for Sega’s latest light-gun extravaganza Rambo and it gives us a first look at both the cabinet and the game. The cabinet is a lot like the House of the Dead 4 Deluxe cabinet, as the guns are similar and the small shots from the game look quite good, with lots of explosions and flames which you expect to see in a Rambo game. I can’t wait to see this in action - I know it’s testing in Europe and the US (I have not idea what the locations are in the US though) and AM-Net says that it will be coming in September (usually the international release isn’t too far behind) and in yen the value of the cabinet is around $16k USD.

So Sega is still not learning how to price their games more competitively IF this price holds for an international release - I learned the other day that Big Buck Safari Deluxe has a new price of around $6000 for operators - so $10000 less than something like Rambo Deluxe or Primeval Hunt, it doesn’t take much to imagine which game operators will go for. Whether Sega will do a standard cabinet for Rambo remains to be seen but I hope that something is done as this looks really cool and I would love to carry it in my arcade later this year, but if I can’t afford it I’ll just have to wait.

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Raw Thrills and Play Mechanix continue to make the rounds with Big Buck Hunter Pro Online and Big Buck Safari by showing it to the media. The latest event in San Francisco brought in representatives from MTV, 1UP and Gamasutra and more to try out BBS. I haven’t seen any articles written by these organizations yet although 1UP’s Gamevideos site has a Big Buck Safari debut trailer that I hadn’t seen before. Either way it’s great that Raw Thrills is reaching out to media outlets to bring more attention to new arcade titles.

Speaking of Big Buck Safari, it looks like it is doing incredibly well in bars, earning around $400 a week average which is excellent as far as earnings go.

Hit the post break for the press release [via Betson]

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The new fighter by indie developer Galloping Ghost has been in the works for quite sometime and until now they have only revealed a couple of screenshots from the game but now we have the first footage of the game in action. It only shows one level panning from side to side and no characters in play but before you watch it, let me explain a couple of things about what is going on here. First off, I saw this in a much higher resolution beforehand and it looks much better in HiDef (naturally). But that file wouldn’t upload to the site so here is a lower rez version. Also, while it appears that everything is in 3D, it actually is in 2D but the 3D effect is achieved using Galloping Ghost’s custom parallax scrolling engine, which creates a pretty convincing 3D look. I also need to note that this video lacks the final animations which will be going on in the background, which will include spinning fans behind the fence, garbage blowing around on the ground, cans rolling around in the wind, light bulbs flickering and steam rising from grates on the ground. So now that I’ve established that this is just early footage from the game and has no characters to show yet, lets get to it.

We should have some footage with the characters soon and hopefully we’ll be able to show it in some better quality (as you know, WordPress quality video is basically the same as youtube quality).

EDIT- I had uploaded it to WordPress but the quality was too horrible so I uploaded it to Vimeo where it’s a tad better.

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One new technology that is gaining steam in the public eye is that of the multi-touch display. Some applications are being used for in home while others are for out of the home - this system is more for an out of the home environment from the information we have on it. I think that arcades could make better use of such technology although they have at least begun to do so with systems like LightSpace and TrioTech’s UFO Stomper. And to prove how good such a system could be for arcades, these guys retrofitted a system called Obscura Digital Multi-Touch wall to play Atari’s Missile Command, although they modified the game a bit to include unlimited ammo (which sure helps when this game gets crazy).

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In some other news for Sega that is a bit mroe positive than the post below, one of their games has been certified with a Guinness world record. The game is primarily seen in Japan and there Sega has held 100,297 tournaments for the game which have taken place between May 2003 and November 2007. The record is for “the arcade game for which the most official tournaments have been held”. I’m not sure what game would have held that beforehand (Tron maybe?) but of course I didn’t even know that this sort of record existed.

[Dengeki Online] [Discuss on the Forum]

It’s sad to say that all is not well in Sega land right now, with the company suffering a net loss of $505 million where last year they had been making a decent profit. This of course includes their console AND arcade /pachinko division and when it comes to their arcade facilities they took the same path as Namco Japan did recently and blamed it on high gas prices keeping people home and the allure of super powerful game systems. This will result in the closure of some 110 facilities but they do not state where; most likely they will happen in Japan.

I can’t say much about how things are going in the Japanese arcade market as it is a different beast but for the market I live in I can say something. There have been some changes in Sega Amusements USA recently but so far it’s too early to tell how they are going to turn out. I hope that that they understand one important thing when it comes to the market here: that you need compelling, exclusive games to drag people out of their homes, you need to market your games better and the prices need to be more competitive. As far as their newest line-up goes RaceTV just didn’t cut it for people; Ghost Squad Evolution barely made a wave and as I was told by another player that the game was “a complete joke as it’s the same thing as the original with a few extras”. Primeval Hunt seems to be doing well but again it’s facing a challenge as it is very expensive and operators are leery about the touch screen(I do give Sega kudos for trying something different at least, although they should consider giving 2Spicy a try again in the States). Now from what I know of the future of Sega’s arcade games, they might have a couple of great titles on the horizon including Rambo(which was our most popular post within the past month so the interest is there) and a new Sega Rally that we confirmed not too long ago was not cancelled. For me it’s going to be about the quality of the game and the price and I’ll be paying close attention to whether they deliver on both fronts. I do have high hopes for these two games but it’s a crowded market for both racers and light-gun shooters as we see those games from almost every arcade developer out there right now. I’d like to see them bring back some other franchises that have done well like Top Skater, Space Harrier, any of their scrolling fighters - i.e. something a little different from the norm.

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It’s no secret that the idea of “Eatertainment” - a restaurant venue that also seeks to entertain it’s clientèle with aspects other than just food, which may include arcade games. - is a valid idea that has worked for many different companies over the years including Chuck E. Cheese and Dave & Busters. Now here is a new venue opening up in Asia with a similar concept although it looks like their main coin-op focus will be crane games. The cranes look a lot like the cranes that Sega recently released for the UFO Catcher but whether or not these are just modified UFO Catcher cranes is unknown. The venue will also feature live performances and has a lot of attention focusing on sweets - some of them look pretty mouth watering. Click on the link below to check it all out.

[One on One Amusement Complex] [Discuss on the Forum]

Here’s another update of my progress on my arcade store that I am in the process of creating, The Game Grid Arcade in West Valley City, UT, at the Valley Fair Mall.

We’ve been working hard all week getting the ceiling tiles painted black but it takes a bit of time to get them painted well enough to look decent. You have to push the paint into the tiny holes of each tile and this not only takes up extra paint but also is a bit back-breaking. So far I’ve spent about $150 on black paint, and that is at a discount. I really appreciate the support I have received so far, from my family who has come and helped every day and also from someone who dropped by yesterday, Bert who read about the location here on AH. I also appreciate those who have contacted me offering support - this is an arcade for people that just love games and it’s exciting to not only live up to what I have dreamed about for what seems like forever now but to provide a fun place to play for others to enjoy. Anyways getting back to the store, Bert helped paint a good part of the walls yesterday and after it dries, the flat black paint looks great. Once the walls are done I am going to put up some artwork and paint some murals, probably using a light blue that will look good in black light.

As far as games go, I’ve still got to hammer out a final list but I did come across an Aliens: Extermination for $2700. Used games aren’t a bad way to go, especially when your budget is strict. I may also pick up a TMNT with that deal, which I hope to find a Turtles In Time board to put in there eventually.

Here is a video from yesterday that shows what progress has been made so far over the past week. In the next video, I hope to have a few games on site!

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We have mentioned Silver Strike Bowling 2009 a few times recently, as Incredible Technologies has been making a large effort to make the game attractive with the number of prizes that they are offering via contests with the game. I received a short list of some new items they are offering with the game, in addition to the $100,000 national championship - if you don’t get that you could end up winning a $10,000 Home Depot gift card or a brand new Jeep Wrangler. The more national tournaments like this with big money and big prizes (”I love it!”) are the sort of things we need to see with our arcade games.

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