Arcade memories

[Sgt GrizZ]

As a kid in the 70s my Granny and Grandad had a caravan on the coast on N.Ireland in a little seaside place called Millisle. We used to spend a lot of time down there in the summer months - shivering on the beach

and hanging out in the 2 or 3 arcades that were there.



Anyway something got me thinking about this the other day and I went online and was amazed to see that the Joyland arcade was still there !!! Over 30 years later ! Unfortunately it has recently been put up for sale due to retirement of owner

http://www.propertypal.com/75-main-street-millisle/152741



I have very vivid memories of playing the likes of Asteroids, Pac Man, Battlezone when those machines first appeared. I also clearly remember going there c.1984 with my cousins and being blown away by Atari's 'I Robot' ! The one and only time I ever saw one of those in the wild. Also remember Pole Position and thinking it was the greatest thing ever.



They had a bunch of what even then were older machines also - some sort of mechanical game where you pulled levers and a rocketship took off and you could win some bubblegum sticks in my mind. I can picture it clearly. Would love to know the name of it.



They prob had some pinball too but I never paid that much attention back then.



Happy days.



Anyone else got fond memories of 'their' arcade ?

GrizZ ....feeling all nostalgic today

 

[JT.]

Playing Pengo in some pub in Wells next to the Sea for hours on end on a family holiday. Seem to remember it was accompanied by the tune Popcorn by Hot Butter (which is now stuck in my head, and linked to below for your enjoyment) - will dl the game ROM on MAME later and check

Also, playing Outrun and Operation Wolf at the local Sports Centre every Sunday, after my dad had taken me and my bro swimming and while he was no doubt getting a crafty beer in the bar (do they still have bars in sports centres now?)....

 

[Thory]

It's got to be Yie-Ar Kung Fu at the local pool every saturday after swimming. I could make it to Tonfun but never beat him. It made that locker money go a long way though!

 

[Paul]

For me it's either Weston super mare on a saturday, or Weymouth for a week staying with My Aunt in the summer holidays. I used to say that i was off doing some shopping or walking. In reality i would go walking for 10 minutes and spend the other 2 hours in the Grand pier penny arcade

Love the old arcade stuff. More so the bandits, other than Pacman, invaders or Defender. Later in life i used to spend £££ on "1942" at college. Always preferred the puggies to the Vids tho

 

[ronsplooter]

Weymouth for a week staying with My Aunt

Weymouth for me too

Used to go there every year as a kid. My arcade was at the Osmington Mills holiday camp where they had a separate little building with all the vids in. Parents would all go in the main bar and I'd be in the arcade all night except when I ran out of money and had to go ask my dad for more. Put a ton of 10p's into Gauntlet, Enduro Racer and Paperboy

I had my best ever arcade moment in there on Karate Champ when I got through all 12 rounds to complete the game, had a crowd of other kids watching me crowded round the machine.....it was an awesome feeling

 

[Guddler]

My fond memories are of where I am now (Minehead) but back before I left school. I have clear memories (as a very young kid) of the day one of the biggest arcades opened. Then called The Carousel as they had the Disney characters wandering about. Mickey, Minnie, Pluto and Goofey at least and at that age I was blown away (they were the real deal to me then!). That place was really cool back then. Loads of Taito style table tops with stuff life Cosmic Guerilla and Galaxian and the screech of Cosmic Alien particularly stands out.



I'd really like to do some homework on this and get pictures and stuff but my photos of the opening are gone and it would seem most other people seem to consider the heyday to actually be the 'bad old days' so footage and info is sparse. Everyone claims the arcades were drug dens but frankly, as a kid, I can honestly say that if they were then it truly was possible to enjoy them as arcades and have no knowledge of anything else going on. I didn't even know what drugs were back then!



Minehead was a great place to be back then (it's not bad now, apart from the monstrosity that is Butlins!). Between all the arcades and Butlins it's very rare for me to come across a game that I don't remember seeing and probably playing 'back in the day'. My folks had split up and I lived with my mother. On many occasions my father would storm in, throw me in the back of the car and escort me home as I was 2 hours late for dinner. They always knew where I was

Video games are my first love and probably always will be but I distinctly remember playing Gorgar and Black Knight a LOT, and also to a lesser degree, Space Invaders (pin).

 

[Sgt GrizZ]

They had a bunch of what even then were older machines also - some sort of mechanical game where you pulled levers and a rocketship took off and you could win some bubblegum sticks in my mind. I can picture it clearly. Would love to know the name of it.

WOW !! Here is the machine

.....years since I have seen one. That is the game I was remembering. How strange this pops up now. I'm almost tempted as its local to me. Almost

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/RARE-CROM...Operated_MJ&hash=item460057d063#ht_500wt_1415

 

[Dave2084]

Wicksteed park, Kettering was my stoping ground as a kid. There used to be three arcades there:



1. Next to the double pirate ship.

2. Above the skateboard park which are both long gone.

3. In the function room where the UK pinball show was held for a couple of years.



I have fond memories of playing pinball and video games there.



When the pinball show was there I believe they had issues with the earth being slightly off between the different phases of the electrics. This isn't new, we always used to get a laugh out of getting in unsuspecting victims to put a hand on the lockdown bars of two adjacent pins ... They'd then get a bit of a belt from the iffy electrics! (I think the pins in question were Space Invaders and Mr & Mrs Pacman)



Happy days!

 

[cooldan]

i used to go into central London, to the big place on Wardour St where i'd happily play Salamander, Galaga and zombie shootemups



the arcade is still there but nowadays just full of crappy slots and £5 a go pool tables

 

[Sgt GrizZ]

i used to go into central London, to the big place on Wardour St where i'd happily play Salamander, Galaga and zombie shootemups



the arcade is still there but nowadays just full of crappy slots and £5 a go pool tables

Salamander is one of my favourite games ever Dan !! They had it in our local arcade when I was at school - without blowing my own trumpet I was awesome at the game, a lot of my dinner money went into that bad boy, memorising the attack patterns, perfecting techniques.. Completed it on several occasions on just 1 credit One time with a sizeable crowd of schoolkids around me shouting and cheering ...yeah just like some 80s movie - hilarious

In the mid 90s I used to go to an arcade on Leicester Square, downstairs they had 3 or 4 pins - spent a lot of time on Roadshow, Guns n Roses down there.

 

[cooldan]

[attachment=456:ntu.jpg]

I can't sleep now for thinking about Salamander - those blue dots that multiplied your ship, those scary tongues of fire from top or bottom that wiped you out, those brains (brains, brains...... brains) with the scary moving eyes on stalks, that spectacular weapon with the snaking beam of stripey blue lasers........ awesome stuff!!



I was always **** at it though, felt smug if I completed one or even two Bosses, don't think I ever got to the end (was that five Bosses?). I never had much money, though my friends had loads - don't remember ever seeing them finish it though, not even with loads of credits lined up on the glass........



I'll post some pictures of the gameplay tomorrow for reminders, dunno how to do it using my phone.



edit: here you go

What would be the chances of seeing Salamander at the Slam? Has anyone got one?

 

[Sgt GrizZ]

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What would be the chances of seeing Salamander at the Slam? Has anyone got one?

One coming <fingers crossed>

Not sure if its original machine or board running in a cab but either way a chance to see if I can remember the moves

 

[Sgt GrizZ]

View attachment 540View attachment 541 View attachment 539

I can't sleep now for thinking about Salamander - those blue dots that multiplied your ship, those scary tongues of fire from top or bottom that wiped you out, those brains (brains, brains...... brains) with the scary moving eyes on stalks, that spectacular weapon with the snaking beam of stripey blue lasers........ awesome stuff!!



I was always **** at it though, felt smug if I completed one or even two Bosses, don't think I ever got to the end (was that five Bosses?). I never had much money, though my friends had loads - don't remember ever seeing them finish it though, not even with loads of credits lined up on the glass........

Dan - great Walkthrough of all 6 levels here



http://strategywiki.org/wiki/Salamander/Walkthrough



The Boss at the end of Level 4 was always the crunch time for me - if you started badly on that encounter death was almost guananteed, you would lose yr weapons etc and prob struggle to defeat it.



Level 5 I remember being a nightmare also . Required very careful positioning of yr extra guns.orb thingys.



Awesome , absolutely hard as nails, beautiful epic game, the Apocalypse Now of scrolling shooters

 

[Poibug]

I used to love playing power drift(would prob even buy an upright one),NARC was great,and loved the full sit down three screen Round Up 5.All were is Rhyl in an ace arcade called MINT.

Used to go to Rhyl a lot as a kid,and Verns had loadsa pins over the years.

Even 10 year ago Verns had a few pins-CV,SWars,RFM,DW,STTNG,Taxi plus maybe one or two more.Sadly not any more : (

 

[teachp8]

Used to spend a lot of time in The Pier and The Carousel in Felixstowe. Games that got all my coins were: Cyclone - 720 - Street Fighter (where you had to punch the cab - using your elbows for greater force) - Double Dragon - Super Sprint (best racing game ever made IMHO!). Three of you round Super Sprint was a great way to spend 10p each. Awesome times!

 

[Sgt GrizZ]

Used to spend a lot of time in The Pier and The Carousel in Felixstowe. Games that got all my coins were: Cyclone - 720 - Street Fighter (where you had to punch the cab - using your elbows for greater force) - Double Dragon - Super Sprint (best racing game ever made IMHO!). Three of you round Super Sprint was a great way to spend 10p each. Awesome times!

Mark - I still hit the arcades in Felixstowe a few times a year when I visit the outlaws. Not much beyond the usual cranes, pushers and fruities though now. Some shooting and driving games. Tom and I usually have a game of Big Buck Hunter and maybe Pac Man Ball but thats about it. No pinball of course

Super Sprint was awesome fun yes !

 

[teachp8]

Not much beyond the usual cranes, pushers and fruities though now.

I was in there this summer - shockingly poor effort, but still, they were all packed! Hey ho.



Damn, I sound like a grumpy old man!!





Mark

 

[Jon]

Finding NARC at 10p in skeggy and putting enough in to complete it.

Getting 3x £10 repeater off £1 after someone won the jackpot but didn't put another quid in. Again in Skegness.

Loved NBA Jam and Smash TV, or a bit of bubble bobble, 2 player to get plenty of game time of minimum coinage.

G-lock, the full revolving version or was it afterburner? Can't remember.

And finally time crisis or terminator, just don't take shooter too seriously like this guy

http://www.viralviralvideos.com/2011/10/13/asian-gamer-takes-arcade-gun-game-very-seriously/

 

[john bud]

for me it all started in ginos cafe, they only had pinballs back then. we would skip school and spend all day playing pinball. as i got older we would venture out into the unknown. as the video era kicked in and pinballs started disappearing, my interest in video started blooming. we would walk for miles to play video cabs, it was all over the news about the game known as space invaders. the japanese government were worried that the yen coins were running out, mass hysteria had kicked in. the video era had begun although still very young we would walk for an hour maybe 2, just to save some money, for the arcade in glasgow. if we were very lucky we could get a free ride on a bus, it just depended on the conductor. we all had our fave games, usually a game that we had semi-mastered, allowing maximum time on a cab. we moved from the south side of glasgow to the west side, i was now 14 years old. the local school shop supplied us with all we needed "single cigarettes" and a moon cresta as i was from a poor family i got free school meals. generally we would snaffle a pie from the dining hall and sell it on, for video money

by the age of 16 i had joined the army and left scotland. at our camp just outside newcastle, we had another moon cresta cab in the naafi. by this point i had discovered the many uses of those fancy electronic lighters

yes indeedy no more wasted cash on video games, simply click and play

and of course fag machines were taking 10p pieces wrapped in tape, to cut the price down on smoking lol. after 10 months of basic training, it was off to catterick garrison for trade training. we had a robotron in the naafi, it was a joy to behold "2 joysticks you say" yes no more hammering buttons, this was surely the way forward. it broke my heart when it was taken away untill i tried the new somewhat less used "missile command" it was pretty apt, as at this point the russians and nato had now accumulated enough missiles to wipe out every living creature on the planet "3 times over" after many years kicking about i came back home to scotland. by this time the video scene was being overtaken by the home market. fast forward a few years and i have managed to score a video cab. i now had my very own arcade yowsa. by now pinballs were very sparse on the ground. the only play with pinballs was glasgow city centre. i collected several video machines over the next few years, and even discovered online forums. and then by chance i met a fellow glaswegian called john aka hijon whats that you say, you have a collection of pinballs. tbh it didnt take much for jon to let me play a few credits on his pinballs. a new era had begun, life had come full circle, i had now discovered pinballs again. im lucky enough to have space for cabs, and also lucky enough to have met some of you fellow collectors. i say fellow collectors but i dont consider myself a collector, im a player. im the guy with the pint glass, you will find at the back door doing the origami bit with rizlas lol.



as i drink my coffee, i offer a toast to all you video and pinball nuts out there.



" never give up, and dont stop playing. we are the guardians of gaming history ".



cheers.

john bud

 

[Sgt GrizZ]

as i drink my coffee, i offer a toast to all you video and pinball nuts out there.



" never give up, and dont stop playing. we are the guardians of gaming history ".



cheers.

john bud

Nice story John ! Cheers

 

[Jon]

by this point i had discovered the many uses of those fancy electronic lighters

yes indeedy no more wasted cash on video games, simply click and play

So that Piezo lighter trick works/ed? I read about doing this on fruit machines but always thought it was just a myth.

You live and learn



Does any one know about the shining a laser up the payout hole on a fruity when you win? I've heard thus will give a bigger payout that it's supposed to as the level of coins in the tube are monitored by a laser and you interfere with it, so it doesn't know when to stop.



I also read you now need to solder longer wires to the contacts of a piezo lighter and put the wires down the pay in slot as they have made all the initial entry plastic so there's no conduction.



Would test these, but the fruity at my local is right in front of the bar, so in view all the time.

Good to know it actually used to work though. I'm fascinated by stuff like that.



Post you play for free / get a go for free scams here!

 

[Jon]

Except the paper bags in the pool table pockets one, thats too obvious!

 

[cooldan]

i love scam stories too, always try them out as soon as i hear about them, usually too late as the loophole has already been closed. phone hacks, videogame button sequences, smoking the inside of a banana skin to try and 'make the world go silver' etc.....



we managed to find out that you could go to a payphone, dial 1471 and then hang up and run off, then watch as it rang and someone picked it up. hilarious not, but at the time it was almost as good as calling random phone numbers and screaming "are you on the line? well get off, there's a train coming!!!!" etc etc etc.



closest i got to proper scams was knowing which buttons to press in which order on a vending machine at the local train station, that would pay our free cans of Quatro (qua-qua-qua-qua- quatro) or packets of Football Crazy or Fizz Bombs. my memory isn't what it was once, so perhaps it was a ****ter scam than i now recall, maybe if you paid for one, you got two or something like that - but we all thought we were cool badboy rebels, a collection of Scarfaces and Men with No Name. pop your collar, aiiiight?



ah the teenage years.

 

[Jon]

I can remember watching a house mate do a phone box pay phone scam. Had to be one of those old style ones in the nineties with the volume buttons. You had to turn the volume full the dial your number and have a chat with a quid in, then before you had less than 10p left dial something like 191191191 # and you'd get your pound back, or what ever money you'd put in.



Most recent one I've seen is the coke machines with the conveyer belt to the door where you get the drink out. You choose a drink that means the conveyer belt goes above the hatch, then once its above hold the door open. The drink is deposited, but the conveyer can't get back down to the start position to give you your drink, it tries a few times, then gives up and give you your money back. So do it again and get your paid for and free drink,or keep repeating the process.

Problem is there aren't many of those vending machines about, usually airports and mainly in the states.



Final one I know is there is a button combination on most Coke machines that opens the engineer menu, sometimes, if your lucky the can dispense test option is left unlocked or it's sometimes rumoured the cash dispense test mode, though I've only ever seen the normal menus to do with sales quantity and price.

Check here http://www.eeggs.com/

And here

http://www.i-hacked.com/

Some good sources for appliance hacking fun, if seeing the engineer name credits of your hotpoint washer is your thing!

 

[retrogamerdaz]

Weymouth for me too

Used to go there every year as a kid. My arcade was at the Osmington Mills holiday camp where they had a separate little building with all the vids in. Parents would all go in the main bar and I'd be in the arcade all night except when I ran out of money and had to go ask my dad for more. Put a ton of 10p's into Gauntlet, Enduro Racer and Paperboy

I had my best ever arcade moment in there on Karate Champ when I got through all 12 rounds to complete the game, had a crowd of other kids watching me crowded round the machine.....it was an awesome feeling

I used to go to that camp in osmington mills when I was a kid as well. Every year we'd also go to ports awl. That had some amazon arcades.

 

[Matt Vince]

So that Piezo lighter trick works/ed? I read about doing this on fruit machines but always thought it was just a myth.

You live and learn



Does any one know about the shining a laser up the payout hole on a fruity when you win? I've heard thus will give a bigger payout that it's supposed to as the level of coins in the tube are monitored by a laser and you interfere with it, so it doesn't know when to stop.



I also read you now need to solder longer wires to the contacts of a piezo lighter and put the wires down the pay in slot as they have made all the initial entry plastic so there's no conduction.



Would test these, but the fruity at my local is right in front of the bar, so in view all the time.

Good to know it actually used to work though. I'm fascinated by stuff like that.



Post you play for free / get a go for free scams here!

Modern fruities use hoppers rather than tubes, the opto sensor is enclosed and would not be affected by a laser. The electrical lighter trick (with extended wires or not) only works on older machines and can cost you your health!

 

[Matt Vince]

My earliest arcade memories are from Winchelsea near Rye, we used to stay in my Uncles caravan once a year and pretty much all there was to do was spend the little money we had i the arcade or play table tennis!! In those days my brother and i put evry penny we could beg, borrow or steal into Final Fight, we played that game over and over. Last year i bought a Mame cabinet with Final fight on it, called my brother and got him round for some nostalgia. The only problem was we completed it first time, its not the same when you have an unlimited amount of credits!!

 

[Moonraker]

That had some amazon arcades.

Cue, images of Amazon women manning the arcades!

 

[ronsplooter]

I used to go to that camp in osmington mills when I was a kid as well

Small world

Did you go to the Smugglers Inn at the bottom of the road too? I remember they had Double Dragon and Track and Field in a little hut in the beer garden.

 

[jagman]

for me it was the usual blackpool arcades in the early 90s, the stand out game that sticks in my mind was the lazer disc,dragons lair with the super hero dirk, i could usually get past the front gate before some hillarious death, was fortunate enough one day to see a young lad complete it so at least i could see what the game was about, the video game that i really got good at was in the local working mens club which only had the one machine, pleiads,got my 10p worth out of that one, got the bug for pins when in blackpool watching a brand new in the box BSD being delivered