So, yeah, at some point I just need to take a minute anyway, so that’s what I’m doing.  With luck I’ll get into a habit of doing this…

Currently state of repairs:

Star Wars trilogy:  I _think_ I’ve figure out a fix for the problems plaguing Star Wars Trilogy.  Spending some time making sure, and need to get another project out of the shop before I have the space to finish it up, but I _hope_ to have it back in the arcade in a few weeks.  By the way, playing the game on an out if sync 19″ screen sitting on the floor next to the game is even weirder than you’d think.  I need to see if I can get enough light to take a picture to post.

Point Blank 2:  The second gun continues to not work.  Three replacement boards later, and consulting with a professional tech, we’re positive the replacement boards are defective.  Not HAPPy.  Not sure if we’re going to take another stab at trying to convince the supplier that they need to test the boards, or what.  If nothing else they refunded us the first two times, so no complaints about their sales department, but this is getting frustrating.  Will try to keep you posted.

Donkey Kong:  As soon as I have space, I’ll be fixing the joystick.  It’s playable now, but could be better, and I finally found the box of spare parts.

The project that’s taking up space in my shop:  Would a picture do?

There is a lot of work to do on this game, but I have most of the parts, have the rest on the way, and am probably about 1/4 done.  I will be so happy to have this working again after 11-12 years!

Thank you for reading and playing, I should be back with more updates within a week (or sooner, if I can get a picture of the current test setup for Star Wars).

Forgot to post a picture of Rampage, so here it is on location:

Upcoming events and tournaments:

This evening (Feb. 14th) starting at 10 PM, Docking Bay 93 will be hosting a release event for Marvel vs. Capcom 3.  For more details, contact the store.  We should be adding MvC3 to the LAN soon, watch this blog or the Facebook page for updates.

Sunday, February 20th, Pac Man Battle Royale tournament.  No entry fee, just the cost of games played (3-5 at 50 cents each, depending on number of participants), first prize will be a vintage trucker-style Pac Man hat and a card for some free games.

My mouse is randomly clicking, which is making this…fun…to type, so more updates in the next few days.

First, Guitar Hero has sadly left the arcade.  There are a variety of reasons for this, and I will try to sum them up in a later post (no promises).  Primarily, without the online feature and new songs promised when it came out, it wasn’t making as much money as it needed to.

Second, we knew we needed a big game to physically fill the void Guitar Hero left.  Deep in the dark corners of my garage, there lurked just such a game.  The first game we ever bought, which died BEFORE the store opened.  The game that almost killed Scott W.*  Rampage!

Of course, there was a tiny little problem.  Not only did it not work, but we had traded away the parts long ago, leaving the cabinet behind as an empty shell.  While sorting through our spare game boards, we found we still had the non-working Rampage board we had picked up for parts.  We kludged some wiring up, piggybacking from a second game’s power and monitor, and found out that the dead board (mostly) worked.  After around 16 years, I can finally say that after some minor repairs, a few more parts, and a LOT or wiring, RAMPAGE LIVES!

There is a third big change, but that will be posted later this evening.

Finally, Marble Madness has been removed.  Again.  It will not return until we are absolutely sure it is fixed, and would like to thank everyone who played it for your patience.  Thanks to it being in the arcade, we _think_ we have figured out why it worked in my shop, but not on location, but are making absolutely no promises on when it will return.  Especially since I have an Atari vector monitor ahead of it on the repair list…anyone who knows which games that could go to, keep your fingers crossed!

*He was removing the power chassis from the unplugged game, and somehow it shocked him.  Badly.  No permanent damage, but he had a small burn and numb hand, and I heard the zap from across the room.  Always be careful when working with electronics!

This tournament will have a first prize consisting of HALO:  2600 and (tentatively) an ATARI 2600 to play it on.

Updates coming soon!

Tentatively, we are planning to have two or three tournaments a month on the LAN.  The next HALO tournament will be in a few weeks, and have a first prize consisting of HALO 2600, and an Atari 2600 to play it on (tentatively.  I have to verify that the 2600 works first).

Interested in more tournaments?  Besides playing in the tournament (and playing on the LAN and in the arcade outside of tournaments), please let Dan know what you are interested in.  And if you want to volunteer to run a tournament or two, we’d be interested in hearing what you have in mind!

(side note, I know I am …er… a _little_ late with the updates promised in the last post.  Life got rather spectacularly more in the way than I expected.  No guarantees, but an update should be coming soon)

To everyone who has supported the store and arcade, whether for 15 years or one day, I’m sure we speak for Dan as well as ourselves when we say THANK YOU!!!

In catching-up news, some major upheaval in our lives has put this blog on the back-burner, as well as all the project games into storage (Addams Family…>sigh<), but rest assured we are getting back into things finally, and I _should_ have news about the future of the arcade to post over the week-end.  Thank you for your perpetual patience!

This is a multi-ball oriented game, featuring two magnets and a large Iron Monger toy that rises out of the center of the playfield during play.  I was pleasantly surprised that Stern was able to release this game before the movie came out, and hope that this continues for movie licenses.

The other pinball machines were all given a basic cleaning and had some lights changed and minor repairs done, so they should all be playing a lot better now.  I currently plan to rotate through them giving them a thorough cleaning and maintenance check when I’m done restoring Addams Family.

Second, a subtle hint that if you enjoy the Episode 1 pinball machine, you should get your fill of playing it now.  It is soon to be rotated out of the arcade in favor of…well, let me keep some suprises, although if you follow news on the pinball industry it shouldn’t be too hard to figure out...

Trying to figure out if the Marvel vs. Capcom 2 board is worth sending out for repair.  Whatever is wrong with it is beyond my abilities (it uses surface-mount components, which I am not good enough with a soldering iron to work on beyond the big parts.)  Will update when I know more.

Screen is a warped line across the screen.  (insert colorful metaphor here)!  However, the game booted, so I figure I must have done something right.  Try to coin the game up, and no sound.  I did exactly nothing that in any way should have been able to affect the sound system.  With no picture beyond the thin line, I can’t tell if it took the credit without sound.

So my brain starts chewing on the latest problems.  Need to pull the monitor for further testing, and jump the game board to an external monitor and see what I get on the screen.  No problem.

Except that my fist won’t unclench.  This is what is called ‘hitting the wall.’  I was actually getting angry at the game for not working.  I’ve got several difficult projects going currently (needing to learn playfield repair for Addams Family, among other things.  I didn’t post about the small fire in one of the pins I’m working on, did I?  Hmm, next post, then) and really thought Marvel vs. Capcom 2 would be easy.

So to make a long story short, I’m taking a break.  I love arcade games and pinball.  I LOVE working on them.  I spend a heck of a lot of time reading about arcade repair and restoration.  In a few days, I’ll go back to work on the game, and post an update.