The Pop-Culture E-Zine
Social media scrolling at 4am is usually fraught with danger as you flick your finger up the screen. We are happy to report that on this occasion, it wasn’t all doom and gloom!
We stumbled upon these very cool Star Wars inspired bookends, which are quite clever in capturing the spirit and theme of Star Wars.
Which one is your favourite?
This Star Wars fan desperately needs some of these bookends 😉
source: Star Wars always via Facebook
This creation has to be seen (and played) to be believed!
This Centaur pintable (pinball machine coffee table) is no ordinary and boring coffee table. Designed and made by Loren (BuildXYZ), this amazing creation consists of a real fully functioning Centaur pinball playfield, albeit in a coffee table format. Loren created this in time for Rockler Woodworking and Hardware’s 2021 #RocklerHobbyChallenge.
Ahhhhh, feet-up on the glorious Centaur pinball coffee table
The different skills and disciplines required to make such a labour-intensive creation should not be underestimated. From the beautiful carpentry, artwork and playfield restoration, to the coding, engineering the custom score decoder chip, Loren left no stone unturned.
We reckon BuildXYZ could not have picked a better classic pinball than Bally’s 1981 early solid-state machine, Centaur. The labour of love is evident in every little detail on this one-off coffee table. To be able to use it as your lounge room’s coffee table and be able to play Centaur, we reckon it doesn’t get any better than this!
source: buildxyz
Popping the hood! Be sure to not spill your coffee!
Rotisserie, baby!
Ooh la la, this is a beauty!
We’d be proud too if we created such a masterpiece!
story & image source: BuildXYZ
We have always admired the Run-DMD clock and RPI2DMD arcade wall clocks, but getting one always proved elusive.
In October last year we serendipitously stumbled upon a new post on a UK pinball forum advertising a limited run of these DMD retro arcade clocks. We immediately registered our interest and the rest as they say, is history! The maker of these was going to do a run of about 30 units, so we definitely got lucky, as they got snapped up within minutes of the post going live!
Let the build begin!
We received our meticulously handmade RPI2DMD Retro Arcade Wall Clock in early January, which was amazing, considering all the international shipping disruptions due to the pandemic.
We must say, this amazing DMD panel is eye-poppingly gorgeous in real life and is quite large – which is a good thing. The DMD clock is connected via WiFi (it also has an Ethernet/RJ45 port), allowing us to login and configure our location (for time and weather information) and the animations we want to cycle through.
Speaking of animations, this thing is loaded! It has 5235 animations to be exact. The animations range from arcade and pinball attraction screens, logos, consoles, computers, to Christmas and Halloween GIFs to name just a few. There were also some *ahem* questionable adult animations, but we switched those off for obvious reasons.
Setting up the RPI2DMD
And of course, to do all of this, ideally you would need a Wifi Connection, or wired Ethernet (although not essential, highly recommended – the Weather forecast does NOT work without an internet connection).
The wait to get one of these was definitely worth it. It looks absolutely amazing and is always a great conversation starter.
Testing the RPI2DMD
Are you of a certain vintage that you can recall battling archaic and extremely frustrating requirements/configs to get your DOS games playing on your PC?
If you answered yes, then eXoDOS (version 5) is here to help make things a lot easier. In a nutshell, eXoDOS obtains and catalogues games to make them playable for DOS and PC Booter platforms.
The eXoDOS v5.0 games collection is vast and can be played on any modern Windows PC without the frustrating configurations we used to endure and deal with back in the 286/386/486 days!
This platform is really cool, with awesome features like CD audio and 3dfx support. To play any game in the library, you just click on the title, and that’s it! Oh yeah, there is also a cool physical big box version too! Go on, go and have some DOS gaming fun.
If you were in the market for an Atari STE and were stumped on how to use, then this 28 minute promo film from 1990 may help!
The cheese factor is off the scale in this video, but we couldn’t look away, as there were some things we actually learned or were reminded of that we had forgotten about our 16-bit Atari!
Watch it, as you may learn something new too (or at least rejog your memory) 😉
source: Computer History Archives Project
By: D.C. Cutler, U.S.A.
This summer, legendary director George Miller, at 77-years-old, has been working on “Furiosa,” his fifth film that takes place in the “Mad Max” movie universe.
Will we get a pinball machine or an epic video game when the film is released in 2024? When Miller’s masterpiece “Mad Max: Fury Road” was release in 2015, a video game was released along with the hit film. Was Avalanche Studio’s “Mad Max” any good? I found parts of the game fun, but other parts extremely boring. The graphics were amazing, and the driving gameplay was the game’s highlight. What’s not fun about vehicular combat, “Mad Max” style?
I watched “Mad Max: Fury Road” again the other night, and as I was watching it, I asked myself, “How the hell did George Miller not win the Academy Award for Best Director for this iconic film?” It’s easily one of the most visually stunning motion pictures I’ve ever seen. There’s really not that much story; the film is a big chase, and then, a chase back from where they just came from.
image sources: Flickering Myth – Cinema Solace on Twitter – Films Newsfeed
Charlize Theron’s performance as Imperator Furiosa was phenomenal. Anya Taylor-Joy will play a younger Furiosa in the 2024 film. I’m okay with the casting change, because Anya Taylor-Joy has been terrific in so many recent films and the Netflix miniseries “The Queen’s Gambit.” I hope Charlize has a cameo; or perhaps the Oscar winning actress narrates the film?
George Miller is one of the greatest filmmakers who’s ever peered through a viewfinder and yelled “Action!’” When I was little, I must’ve watched “Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior,” an action film that influenced a generation, five times in a row when I first watched it. “The Road Warrior” and “Fury Road” are masterpieces. You can say the same for 1995’s “Babe” and his segment of 1983’s “The Twilight Zone; The Movie,” “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet.” “Nightmare” is a remake of an episode of the original “The Twilight Zone” series, written by the great Richard Matheson. Playing the frightened passenger, John Lithgow gets the slight edge over William Shatner in acting. The segment in which a gremlin is on the wing of a commercial airliner during a thunderstorm, is still terrifying and suspenseful.
One of Miller’s great gifts as a director: he always knows where to put the camera when the tension is palpable. There are shots from “The Road Warrior” that I still don’t know how he captured. His signature chase sequences seem chaotic, but Miller has meticulously crafted them so well using storyboards and models, they become beautiful, choreographed anarchy.
If we get a pinball machine out of Miller’s “Furiosa,” I’ll be satisfied, but a video game…Miller will surely create an immersive world to play in.
The Homebrew Mad Max pinball machine is awesome. A commercial Furiosa pinball machine would be even better!
Say what? Yep, you read that title properly, you can legitimately download and install emulation open source apps from the Microsoft Store for your Xbox One or Xbox Series X|S consoles!
Sick of setting up emulation on multiple devices? Do you want to centralise all your gaming, both modern and retro, on the one console? If you have an Xbox One or Xbox Series X|S, this is now a reality!
Thanks to gamr13 and the rest of the clever dev community, the process to turn your Xbox into an emulation beast is simpler and does not need any funky bypassing with whitelisting, going into dev mode or other illegitimate modifications.
If you have an Xbox One, you can play everything from the 8-bit era all the way up to the 32-bit consoles, like the PS1. If you are part of the crowd that has an Xbox Series X|S then you can play old school games from the dawn of video gaming all the way up to the Dreamcast, GameCube/Wii, PS2 (limited) and PSP! You’re basically making your Xbox console into a RetroPie killer!! Woohoo, we can finally play Virtua Tennis 3 (PSP) on our Xbox Series S!!!
We know what you are thinking, how complicated is it? Do you have to fiddle with controller configuration? Well, it actually isn’t complicated at all and the controller configs are done for you – even we were able to get it setup in less than 15 minutes – obviously this depends on how many retro games you have – which we will not discuss here.
Oh yeah, if you are having troubles playing your PS1 or PSP games in RetroArch, then check out the DuckStation or PPSSPP Gold standalone apps respectively. DuckStation has the added benefit of upscaling PS1 games to 1080p at 60fps, making PS1 games look absolutely amazing. The standalone FlyCast emulator works great for Dreamcast, just in case you can’t get your DC games going on RetroArch.
If you prefer video instructions, then you can follow gamr13’s tutorial here.
RetroArch setup
RetriX Setup
NOTE: This post is informational only. The reader accepts all risk and responsibility in installing and configuring any of the applications/tools/emulators mentioned in this article. These are all open source retail apps available on the Microsoft Store.
Wish we were as clever as programmer Phil Ashby.
DOOM seems to be able to run on anything electronic with a screen, so Phil didn’t want to miss out. He took his electronic Tidal badge from the 2022 ElectroMagnetic Field Festival (aka EMFCamp) in the UK and got it to run DOOM, yes, DOOM!
source: HonekaiMedia
story source: technabob
We still remember the day when we visited Treasureway (defunct now) store in 1982 and seeing He-Man and Skeletor on the shelf for the first time – we were immediately drawn to the action figures and the MOTU universe in general. It would seem that Mattel knew exactly how to market these muscle-bound toys to kids. We begged to get one and after some incessant begging, we were told that we could choose one that day. It was a tough choice, but our very first MOTU action figure was He-Man! Our second one was Zodac, closely followed by Stratos. We didn’t get Skeletor till well after.
source: Masters Of The Universe on Facebook
Over the course of the early to mid 80s, we had a modest collection of MOTU action figures, so when we finally got Castle Grayskull for Christmas in 1984, we felt like we had completed our MOTU journey. Upon hearing that there was going to be a cartoon based on Masters Of The Universe, we couldn’t contain our excitement. The cartoon couldn’t come fast enough! Saturday mornings on the couch with the doona (duvet to our UK friends) over us, watching He-Man battle Skeletor and his evil minions was a perfect way to start our weekend!
40 years on and Treasureway may no longer exists, but we still have our collection of original He-Man and the Masters of the Universe action figures – long live MOTU!
Some of our original MOTU collection
When it comes to villains, we reckon no one tops Darth Vader. He has been our fave antagonist from the first time we saw him wield his lightsaber and force choke his underlings.
The story of Darth Vader has evolved since we were kids in the late 70s and early 80s, but that doesn’t diminish our love for the character, on the contrary, the latest Obi-Wan Kenobi Disney+ series cemented Lord Vader as our favourite villain of all time.
With that said, here are some awesome Lord Vader artwork!
image source: Star Wars Always (Facebook) – Stern Pinball Inc.- Fine Art America – Pinterest – myhotposters – comicbookmovie – Artsper – disneyartonmain – Robert Voisenni