The Pop-Culture E-Zine
We keep sounding like a broken record, but geez there are some really clever and talented people out there. Take djmdesign‘s awesome Pointless Arcade Cabinets gallery on Imgur as a prime example – all the Photoshopped cabs are so darn cool, exceptionally clever and most importantly, very funny! We love them all, but the ‘Can YOU make it work?’ MS Windows arcade cabinet and the Operation Wolf stylised Instagram cabinet are our faves. Which one is your favourite?
source: djmdesign on Imgur
This year will be the year of Virtual Reality (VR). If you have been gaming as long as we have, you’ll know that this isn’t the first time we have all gone gaga over VR!
Long before the Playstation VR, the biggest name in virtual reality gaming was the Virtuality Group. Their ‘Virtuality’ arcade gaming machines promised and delivered immersive gaming via their stereoscopic visor (aka: the visette) while standing on a platform in a huge round pod waving your hands around like you were swatting flies – ah, how we miss the good old days of VR.
The popularity and mass media coverage of VR meant that it would always make its way into our homes. In 1994, Virtuality signed an agreement with Atari to develop a head-mounted-display (HMD) unit for use with Atari’s 64-bit Jaguar console. The agreement was expected to lead to the production and sale of the Jaguar VR HMDs in 1995. Sadly, it all went belly-up between Atari and Virtuality, with all Jaguar VR prototypes headed for the scrapheap.
Alas, the salvaged Jaguar VR prototype(s) have now become the most sought after and holiest of gaming grails, with the last known prototype selling for $14,500 on ebay in 2013.
source: eBay
From the ashes of the Jaguar VR HMD technology arose Takara’s HMD DynoVisor and Philip’s Scuba Visor. The DynoVisor sported the Pupil Projection System with a ground breaking 120-degree field of view (FOV) display using Sony’s Active TFT and LCD lenses. Coupled with Hi-Fi stereo and Inter Pupil Distance (IPD) focus adjustment, these consumer products quickly sold-out upon release in Japan.
Even though the Takara HMD DynoVisor is considered to be laughable, their uniqueness and rarity in the wild makes them highly desirable among gamers and collectors alike. At a fraction of the cost of the Jaguar VR headset and being indentical in technology, Takara’s HMD DynoVisor has become a retro gaming grail itself.
To finally find the Takara HMD DynoVisor and be able to play the Atari Jaguar (and any NTSC console with composite / AV output) with a VR headset, has truly been a unique experience, one that every old school gamer should encounter! Viva la VR!
Holding tight onto the first retro gaming holy grail for 2016!
Takara’s HMD DynoVisor arose from the ashes of Atari’s Jaguar VR
Made from high impact ABS moulded components, this is one tough headset!
The DynoVisor can connect to any NTSC composite / AV console
Luckily Virtuality’s work wasn’t wasted
Contrast, Brightness and IPD control is within reach
Immersing myself in some old school VR on the PlayStation
Peeking into the VR abyss!
Christmas is always a great time to reflect. We usually reflect on the year that had just gone by, but for this year, let’s change that and go back a bit further, like back to the 80s when Atari was still king of the video gaming market.
Grab your eggnog and reflect on these early 80s Atari Christmas commercials compiled by haikarate4.
source: haikarate4
Just in case you wanted to know which commercials made up this great compilation, here they are:
• E.T. Commercial Atari 2600
• Atari 5200 Ms Pac Man and Jungle Hunt
• Atari 2600 Atlantis Commercial By Imagic
• Cosmic Ark By Imagic Featuring the kid from A Christmas Story
• Atari 5200 Super System Commercial
My affinity for Masters Of The Universe has no limit! Just when I thought I grabbed my MOTU holy grail at the Toy Shack store in Las Vegas back in August, BAM, the MOTU Limited Edition Collector Series vinyl gets gazumped by The Power Of He-Man video game!
Yep, you read that right, the holy grail of my MOTU collection is not a board game nor a limited edition vinyl, it’s a (damn awesome) video game. MOTU: The Power Of He-Man video game (Intellivision) has been elusive to find complete (Ed: and at a reasonable price). This game, and its Atari 2600 counterpart, are the crown jewels of MOTU video games. The key motivator to obtain this game was my absolute affection for MOTU, and secondly, it is a pretty decent video game based on the franchise. Oh yeh, the Mattel link between the console and toy line was a nice touch too. Game on!
Ho, Ho, Ho, Merry Christmas! It’s just Daz and Alex for the final episode of Press Play On Tape for 2015 – it’s so strange that it’s just them two! Before there is any sitting on Santa’s knee and looking into his big red sack, the lads get all misty-eyed in their reflection of the year that was and then get excited about the year that will be. Alex gets excited about a few Kickstarters coming to fruition, while Daz gets excited about the unknown!
Press play on tape one final time for 2015 to hear the lads reminisce about their favourite old Xmas magazine issues and what they wish Santa will leave under the Christmas tree for them. Oh yeh, they even ask the audience what they wish Santa will bring them this Christmas! So be merry, stay safe and enjoy!
PRESS PLAY ON TAPE podcasts are available on iTunes and Podbean.
Long before Walter Day established his Twin Galaxies scoreboard and way before eSports were created, there were video games competitions taking place all over North America, with the first tournament staged in New York City in 1980 by Atari. The First National Space Invaders Competition proved quite popular with 10,000 participants, with regional events taking place in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Fort Worth, Chicago, and New York City. The tournament had widespread print and television coverage, ensuring that the video gaming craze reached the masses.
Space Invaders competition, circa 1980–1981
Following on from the success of the Space Invaders tournament, Atari enlisted Tournament Games Inc. (TGI was a successful foosball tournament organisation) to help it establish the Atari $50,000 World Championships to be held in Chicago at the end of 1981. To say that this tournament ended up being a total disaster for all parties, including the handful of participants, would be a gross understatement.
The event was promoted as a major sporting contest which would attract 10,000 to 15,000 of the world’s best video game players to go head-to-head on a single arcade game, Centipede. Well, the event only attracted 138 players, well under the projected participation levels expected. The low participation rate was due to contestants expected to foot the bill for their own transportation, accommodation to the event, and then pay a $60 entry fee and feed their own quarters to play the tournament Centipede arcade machines – the cost being way out of reach for the typical video game player of the day! Adding insult to injury, many of the contestants were not advised that Centipede would be the only game in the Championship, many of whom were there to compete on Asteroids and other Atari arcade games (Asteroids Deluxe, Battlezone, Warlords and Red Baron).
Sadly, there were no winners at the Atari $50,000 World Championships, not even the eventual winners, with their cheques bouncing, they left empty handed and totally jaded. The championship was an unmitigated disaster, a blight on the history of video gaming tournaments.
The Atari $50,000 World Championships farce flyer
source: The Golden Age Arcade Historian
Space Invaders competition image source: International Journal Of Communication
Oh my gawd! Just in time for Christmas, well, they aren’t available just as yet, but anyway, where were we? Oh yeh, those awesome people at NECA (creators of cool toys and collectibles!) have announced that they will release (April 2016) a special edition 2-pack action figure tribute set of fan favourite Contra video game characters, Bill ‘Mad Dog’ Rizer and Lance ‘Scorpion’ Bean!
For those of you that don’t know, Contra was also known as Gryzor and Probotector. Anyway, this Bill and Lance 2-pack action figure set will be the first appearance of non-movie-based characters in the NECA series, which will pay homage to Konami’s 8-bit glory days. Standing approximately 7” tall, the figures have all new head sculpts and “pixelated” paint deco. The set includes custom-designed weapons based on the classic game; detachable blast effects for the weapons; and that infamous power-up capsule with a clear support stand for “floating” effect.
For those collectors among you that will not open their packaging, a special window box package will be used to recreate the look of the classic game cartridge – which will look damn fine on your shelf!
April 2016 can not come fast enough! Here are a few more pics to whet your insatiable appetite:
image source: NECA
If you thought that Nelsonic and Nintendo were the only ones making games on digital watches, then think again! Casio wasn’t going to sit on the sidelines and watch (Ed: pun intended!) Nintendo reap the benefit of this new gaming phenomenon.
With their pedigree in making fine time pieces, it was natural for Casio to jump in on the whole games-on-watches craze in the early 1980s. These games were mainly a left-right (two button) affair, but boy, they were so cool to have (Ed: If you were lucky enough to have one). Remember, this was all before we started killing time playing games on our smartphones. Some things never change.
If you were one of the unlucky ones (Ed: just like us!) to not have experienced Casio’s game watches, then here is a sample of their finest gaming pieces:
Aero Batics (GA-7)
Super Slalomer (GS-2)
Football (GS-12)
Space Hero (GH-17)
Space Warrior (GS-16)
Zoomnzap (GZ-1)
Champion Racer (GR-15)
Super Windsurfing (GS-20)
Egg Panic (GE-6)
Moon Fight Robot (GR-3)
Scramble Fighter (GF-2)
Car Race (GD-8)
Game-10
Soccer (GS-11)
Hustle Monira (GM-5)
Golf (GG-9)
image source: supplied
Hey peeps, prepare to be absolutely gobsmacked! John’s Arcade together with Greg from Arcade Impossible, go on an exclusive access-all-areas tour of the new Stern Pinball Inc. factory in Elk Grove, IL.
This already awesome tour is made even more awesomer by having the famed pinball designer, George Gomez, as the personal tour guide – it doesn’t get any better than that! Whether you are a pinball fan or not, you will appreciate the behind-the-scenes of how pinball machines are made and distributed around the world. Grab the pop-corn as this great feature runs for 1:37:56 (to be exact), settle in and enjoy!
It is no secret that I am a huge fan of Mattel’s original Masters Of The Universe (MOTU) toy series. I have been a fan since I first encountered the MOTU action figure line at my local Treasureway store (similar to Target / Kmart) in 1983. I remember being mesmerised by the He-Man figure in a big blister pack emblazoned with the MOTU logo. However, $15.99 was a lot of money in 1983 and it was going to require a big effort to convince mum I needed this toy. I got to work (in convincing my mum) and just a few weeks later I was the proud owner of my very own He-Man, but on the back of the packaging were the other figures in the series and I knew I had to have more – and just like that, I was hooked!
My ingenious (as I thought at the time) plan to expand my MOTU collection involved the argument that I needed an even split between ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’ to be able to play out my (imaginary) battle on Eternia (a.k.a. the couch). I continued to collect more original MOTU action figures over the years, and although I never completed the set, I was very grateful for and thoroughly enjoyed playing with the figures I had.
Fast forward three decades, and my original MOTU collection is proudly displayed in the home office. I am so glad I kept the action figures all this time – they provide an important link to my childhood, a time where my imagination took me to wondrous places in the universe, thanks to Masters of The Universe.
The most powerful toy line in the universe!
Yo DJ, spin that MOTU wheel!
Cel shenanigans
In the most powerful club in the universe!
The MOTU story books (latter ones became comics) were damn awesome!
Very hot MOTU wheels
Show-bag full of MOTU weapons of mass fun!
Man-At-Arms vs Skeletor!
The most awesomest books in the universe!
Don’t get bored playing Monopoly. Play to save He-Man!
Laser blasting with the man with Man-E-Faces
Evil lurks in many corners. Watch out Hulk!
Great pants Brutus! Oh wait……
Trouble setting up Castle Grayskull? Don’t worry, this scary looking He-Man will help!
Oh, so that’s how the labels are applied!
The showcasing rig
Giddy-up Cringer! Oops, I mean Battle Cat!
