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Masters of the Universe: The Board Game – Clash For Eternia

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We made a promise that we would stop posting Kickstarter campaigns, but for this particular one, we made an exception. Oh, if you want to blame anyone, blame Alex Kidman, he got us onto this one!

If you are like us and have been living in a cave lately (lockdown will do that to you), you may not have known that there is an awesome Kickstarter for a new Masters Of The Universe – Clash of Eternia board game! Consider yourself informed!

This Kickstarter is quite straight forward with two different pledge rewards, the US$110 Master of The Universe pledge or the US$220 Defender of Grayskull pledge. The Kickstarter has smashed through a number of stretch goals, so you will be assured that you get all the Kickstarter exclusive bonuses, like additional models, tokens and cards! If you are MOTU fans, you may need this board game in your life!

PS: Now someone please make a MOTU themed pinball machine 🙂

source: Kickstarter and CMON



 

GAME ON! THE PUMA X ANIMAL CROSSING: NEW HORIZONS

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Get ready to go on an island getaway with this latest collaboration between PUMA and Animal Crossing™: New Horizons. Tom Nook and other favourite characters from the popular franchise are featured in a variety of styles, including apparel and footwear for adults and kids. You won’t trade your new outfit for anything.

The PUMA x Animal Crossing: New Horizons crossover takes cues from the beloved game; the collection’s streetwear silhouettes are reimagined with natural colours and authentic graphics from the fun franchise. The resulting collaboration is ready for anything, with styles for both adults and kids, including some of PUMA’s most distinctive shoe silhouettes, Suede, Wild Rider, and Future Rider.

PUMA’s timeless style, the Suede, features a beige hairy suede upper, triple formstrip with printed graphics on the top layer, translucent sole with graphic imprint, tongue label with debossed co-branding, a leaf hangtag, and a canvas lace bag inspired by the bell bag with additional laces.

The Wild Rider silhouette is inspired by the movement and motion of city life. The collab version has a beige nylon upper adorned with an Animal Crossing resident print with green, blue, and sand suede overlays, a translucent formstrip on the side, an embroidered leaf on the heel and a debossed lace tag with PUMA’s logo.

The pack is not complete without the Future Rider. Constructed with nylon, canvas and suede overlays, this silhouette features a debossed leaf graphic on the heel, taken directly from the iconic Animal Crossing logo. The side TPU piece includes a graphic which alludes to the game’s design elements, as well as the canvas lace bag with additional laces to customise your look.

Your island escape wouldn’t be complete without some sharp adventure-ready outfits; short and long sleeve tees, hoodies, shorts, and sweatpants all in the signature colour palette of the game, in addition to spotlighting some of its most well-known residents and elements. Just don’t forget your boarding pass.

Tom Nook is waiting for you, so prepare for the most amazing trip with the new PUMA x Animal Crossing: New Horizons Collection. Available starting 18th September on PUMA.com and select retailers worldwide.

To learn more about Animal Crossing™: New Horizons click HERE

image source: Puma AU



Press Release supplied by: Nintendo Australia

Godzilla Pinball – The King of Monsters Is Unleashed by Stern Pinball

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The King of Monsters is back and this time he is conquering pinball! 

Stern Pinball and Toho International have joined forces to take Godzilla from the swap to pinball, and boy are we glad that they did!

This awesome collaboration between two powerhouses has resulted in the creation of three Godzilla pinball machine models; Pro, Premium and the already sold out Limited Edition! Before we get into the nuts and bolts of this new cornerstone title, Godzilla pinball marks the debut of Stern’s Insider Connected system, which includes a QR code reader (bottom arch) that enables players to interact with the game and other cool platform features in a variety of new ways.


source: Godzilla Official by TOHO

As already mentioned, being a cornerstone title, Godzilla Pinball will come in a three model range, starting with the street level Pro, home collector Premium and the Limited Edition for the hardcore collectors – as at the time of writing, the LE is sold out! From what we have seen so far, this is a monster-packed pinball machine straight from the mind of Keith Elwin, arguably the hottest contemporary pinball designer on the planet. Coupled with Zombie Yeti’s gorgeous and eye-popping hand-drawn artwork, this complete package will satisfy Godzilla and pinball fans alike.

From the video and images, we reckon that Keith Elwin has been dreaming a lot about Kaiju and has captured the essence of Toho’s Godzilla, pulling material from the ten earliest, campiest and most iconic films. In this game, the players takes control of Godzilla, ridding the earth of the evil Xiliens, while rampaging and trashing cities along the way. The game consists of classic Godzilla sets, including a skyscraper that has a virtual lock for one of the six multi-balls. According to Stern, this title has an industry first ‘Magna Grab’ magnetic Newton ball directing the ball from 5 different directions, often setting the ball up for the upper (3rd) flipper – pure chaos, as it should be! Godzilla also has a scoop to change cities, 3 spinning targets, mind-blowing chrome wireform ramps, 13 RGB lights, and a new return lane chase lights that strobe as balls return to the flippers, just to name a few. The theme immersion is complete with movie scenes and audio from ten Toho Showa Era movies, the original 1954 Godzilla film score, iconic title song “Godzilla” by Blue Oyster Cult and custom speech in English and Japanese (with subtitles).

But wait, the rampaging isn’t over yet! The additions and changes on Godzilla Premium and LE models are substantial. The aforementioned skyscraper is motorised to collapse down multiple levels, with 3 balls locked on its roof by a vertical upkick skyway ramp. A breakaway bridge ramp that collapses to drop pinballs onto the playfield. The Premium and LE models have another motorised device – a rotating 3 bank of targets that reveal a spinning target and jump ramp. There is a 2nd magnet in a sculpted Mechagodzilla to catch the ball. Oh yeah, the game wouldn’t be complete without the star itself, so there is a Godzilla sculpted toy on the playfield too. You can check out the full feature matrix of each model here.

Pricing and availability:

  • Pro Model: $US 6,899 / $AU 10,650
  • Premium Model: $US 8,999 / $AU 13,250
  • Limited Edition Model: $US 10,499 / $AU 15,500 (limited to 1,000 machines – sold out!)

The Pro model will start rolling off the Stern assembly line next week, with the LE model to follow and then the Premium machines in October – these should start arriving in Australia in early Jan 2022.

If you are interested in grabbing your very own Godzilla pinball machine, please contact the good folks at Amusement Machine Distributors or Zax Amusements.

Now, enough words, time to feast your eyes on the awesome Godzilla pinball machines – scroll slowly and please mind your drool 😉

image source: Stern Pinball



Gravitic Mines Is Landing On The Atari Jaguar

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It is always great to see the Atari Jaguar homebrew and independent developer scene going from strength to strength. With a number of awesomely talented and prolific developers, like Reboot, we always get excited when a new Jag game is about to drop, like Gravitic Mines!

In development since 2019, Gravitic Mines is best described as a love letter to iconic games like Thrust, Lunar Lander and Gravitar, with an injection of contemporary flavour like Gravity Crash plus a lot more! This new and exclusive Atari Jaguar title was painstakingly developed by the Reboot team, with the full version containing 32 campaign missions, 8 training missions, 40 minutes of music, 8 boss encounters, online scores and achievements amongst a plethora of other cool features.


source: AtariAge

According to Reboot, the game is now complete and will be available to purchase in a few months via the AtariAge store – so keep an eye out for it! In the meantime, if you have a Skunk Board (Ed: yay, we do!) or RetroHQ’s Jaguar GameDrive, then you can download the Gravitic Mines demo from here. The Demo ROM is a short teaser, featuring a few levels of the game to whet your appetite.

To say we are excited for the final Gravitic Mines game would be the greatest understatement! Our Jaguar is hungry, so we can’t wait to give it a taste of Gravitic Mines!



Chibi Coin Collection Street Fighter Series – Ryu Silver Coin

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We love the NZ Mint gaming related silver coins, so their latest release, the Street Fighter – Ryu Chibi Coin is so cool (and cute)!

Made from 1oz of pure silver, this new Chibi® Coin features experienced martial artist Ryu – the main protagonist in the video game Street Fighter™. The coin has been shaped and coloured in the Chibi art style to resemble Ryu. He is shown in his most recognisable attire consisting of a tattered white karate gi, long red headband, red martial arts gloves and bare feet. The Ian Rank Broadley effigy of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II can be found on the opposite side to confirm it as a legal tender coin.

The coin is protected inside a specially designed case, moulded to the coin’s shape. The outer box is Street Fighter-themed, incorporating images of Ryu as he appears in the game, and includes a large window so you can easily display this precious collectable.

A maximum of 2,000 coins will be produced. This is confirmed by the Certificate of Authenticity printed on the box, along with the coin’s unique serial number. Don’t miss out on this officially licensed coin for Street Fighter!

PS: We can also exclusively reveal that there will also be Ken silver coin in the very near future!


source: NZ Mint



The Future Is Here – Stern Pinball Launches Insider Connected Online Platform

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The world’s largest pinball manufacturer, Stern Pinball, have launched their new online platform, Insider Connected!

According to their press release, Insider Connected is a comprehensive technology initiative to connect the universe of Stern pinball machines. The platform is designed to enhance and extend player engagement with the games across both home and commercial environments. It also presents operators of pinball machines with a robust set of tools to drive location play, build player loyalty, analyze performance, make adjustments remotely and maintain the machines.

Registration for Insider Connected is free; players can either scan a QR code at the games or go to the Stern Pinball website where they will need to enter an email address and create a password. Once players register for Insider Connected, they are issued a unique QR Code that can be used to identify that player at any connected Stern pinball machine, anywhere in the world. When a player logs into the machine, they can track their progress, earn new game specific achievements, engage with the player community and participate in promotions and Challenge Quests.

Challenge Quests can be issued by operators to drive play at their locations and build player loyalty or by Stern Pinball to highlight a game title or engage the community. When players complete quests, they receive loyalty rewards.

Key launch features of the Insider Connected platform include:

  • Gameplay up to 4+ players – friends or foes
  • Game achievements and promotions
  • Stern authorized Quests and Operator authorized Quests
  • Loads on loads of free play, pay to play games, rewards and treasure chests


source: Stern Pinball

All Stern Spike® 2 LCD games produced after the September 2021 launch will ship with the Insider Connected system installed; this includes new runs of previously released titles. Any existing Stern LCD game can be added to Insider Connected by installing a simple, inexpensive retrofit kit available from Stern distributors, dealers and the Stern Store® – we have asked Stern to provide more details about this kit. We will update this post once we receive their response.

By the end of the year, all 17 Stern Spike 2 LCD system titles will be added to Insider Connected, which means we’ll be able to connect our Star Wars Comic Art Premium machine! At launch seven titles will be supported, with the remaining Spike 2 LCD machines added over the next year.  with full system with added features will be rolled out. Once again, we have reached out to Stern to confirm the seven titles that be supported at launch – we will keep you posted!

We have written about internet connected pinball machines in the past, so it is great to see Stern Pinball finally enter this new age of online pinball play and cool tools to interact with pinball machines. This is a game changer for sure, so we will keep an eye out on the evolving feature set and will report back on what more we can find out from Stern Pinball about their Insider Connected platform – so stay tuned!



PS: We have reached out to Stern Pinball with a number of questions relating to their Insider Connected platform, so look out for a future update!

The Amiga 500 Mini Is Coming in 2022

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It was bound to happen! After the success of TheC64 Mini, Retro Games Ltd has announced that they will be releasing an Amiga 500 Mini in early 2022.

Based on Commodore’s iconic 16-bit Amiga 500 (A500), the new The A500 Mini will be able to emulate the original A500/A600 chipset and the Advanced Graphics Architecture (AGA) of the latter Amiga model, the Amiga 1200 – pretty darn cool indeed.


source: Retro Games Ltd

The Amiga 500 Mini will come with a 2-button mouse and 8-button game-pad, as well as USB inputs to plug in a standard keyboard and the ability to add your own games (with WHDLoad support). Speaking of games, The A500 Mini will be bundled with 25 games, with the following 12 titles being confirmed at this stage:

  • Alien Breed 3D
  • Another World
  • ATR: All Terrain Racing
  • Battle Chess
  • Cadaver
  • Kick Off 2
  • Pinball Dreams
  • Simon The Sorcerer
  • Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe
  • The Chaos Engine
  • Worms: The Director’s Cut
  • Zool: Ninja Of The Nth Dimension

Other features include the ability to save and resume games, flick between 50Hz and 60Hz screen refreshes and various CRT filters and scaling options.

With a retail price of £119.99 / €129.99 / US$139.99, we won’t be expecting TheA500 Mini to be less than $200 Aussie dollars, which is quite a bit for a Mini, even for an iconic one like the Amiga!



The Force Is Strong in these Unofficial Nike Star Wars Runners

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According to our friends at Kotaku, Nike is releasing three pairs of runners (or sneakers for our US friends – Ed) in a line that’s an unlicensed tribute to Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.

The Boba Fett, Darth Vader and Rebel Pilot* (* not their model names) are quite impressive, even if they are known by other model names to avoid any potential licensing issues. In case you wanted to know, Adidas has the Star Wars license, so it is interesting that Nike is releasing a line of runners with Star Wars inspired themes and colourways – surely this is just a coincidence!

Nike has scheduled to release these runners November 2021, with the best part being that they will not be in limited quantity!

source: Kotaku



Slow Mole: 8-bit Platformer For The NES

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Slow MoleErik Rosenlund, take a bow! Erik has created and released, SLOW MOLE, an awesome speedrunning platformer for the NES!

Playable on both real hardware and other modern devices, Slow Mole challenges your speedrunner skills to the max with a unique checkpoint mechanic that will only award a checkpoint when the player proves their mastery! The game provides the player with two difficulty options which affects the timer, thus making an impact on game play. For those that have twitch skills who can truly master the game, the game ramps up its mechanical challenge to nightmare levels!

Grab Slow Mole for free (or for a small token of appreciation for Erik) from here and get running!

Slow Mole (NES) Trailer – The 80s NES claymation trailer that never was



Chip’s Challenge is coming to the SNES and Sega Genesis/Mega Drive!

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Chip's Challenge for SNES and SEGA GENESIS

Chip’s Challenge for SNES and Sega Genesis/Mega Drive Pre-Orders Now Live

Top-down tile-based puzzle game

Independent publisher The Retro Room Games has recently announced that the pre-orders for Chip’s Challenge on Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) and Sega Genesis/Mega Drive are now open!

Play as Nerdy Chip McCallahan, who navigates through a series of increasingly difficult puzzles in 148 two-dimensional levels, in order to prove himself and gain membership to the very exclusive Bit Busters Club.

Chip's Challenge

Originally developed by Epyx, Chip’s Challenge is a classic top-down tile-based puzzle game launched on Atari Lynx in 1989. The game was also ported to MS-DOS, Atari ST, Amiga, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, and the Amstrad CPC back in the 90s.

Chip’s Challenge was also released on Steam 6 years ago featuring 90% of positive reviews. This will be the first time that the game will be available on Nintendo and Sega platforms.

Chip’s Challenge will be available on 16-bit consoles including a cartridge in both PAL and NTSC versions, a box and an instruction booklet. Pre-orders for the game can be found here.


source: The Retro Room Roo

Features:

  • 148 two-dimensional levels
  • Block-pushing puzzles
  • Dodging enemies
  • Skip to the next level option

Price: US$24.99 (cart only) / US$49.99 (Complete In Box)