How?
To the point, what needs to be done first is having a difficulty that is challenging, but isn't making you lose your lives within the first few levels. One of my picks for best arcade game ever is Galaga. They ease you in with the aliens being adequate and then by the fifth round, you're in for the fight of your life and getting through a few more before getting a game over. Namco is a good example of giving you a chance but making you earn your right to beat a game or get far compared to others.
There's other things. One is not making graphics blend in with shots in shooters or shots being very small. That's not good design. Neither is overloading your game with enemies. Yes, the point is to get people to spend more quarters back then, but you don't want someone getting frustrated within a few minutes. A game like Robotron can be a bit overwhelming but compared to most, it's not trying to be purposefully pissing you off.
Last is some variety of shaking things up in a game to keep it fresh. No one wants to be bored. Maybe a level goes a different direction. Or that playing with a friend can even the odds. Whatever the case, the best kind of games give you a lot to offer within a ten minute span or more if you're that good in something like Ninja Turtles or driving games such as Daytona USA or Ridge Racer.
Those are some of my thoughts on what makes an arcade game good. What are some of your favorites?
Showing posts with label daytona usa. Show all posts
Showing posts with label daytona usa. Show all posts
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Thursday, March 30, 2017
Arcades, Part II: Beyond Home
This blog now will be about arcades I went to, whether vacation or other reasons. In the early 2000s, arcades were still a place to go to. A place we stayed at had a handful of games. It had Crusi'n USA, The Simpsons, X-Men, Thunder Blade. There was a police training game. Even one of those NES PlayChoice 10 systems, where I played NES games for the first time since 1994. That was long before getting an actual NES in 2009. We went back there in 2006 and they were gone. A motel had a few arcade games. There was the 1989 Ninja Turtle game and that same police training game.
In the town where we stayed, there was an arcade area, and it was a combination of an arcade and a fair. There was a target shooting game. Skee ball was in this location. I don't really remember much for the actual games, but they did have The Simpsons and some Sega driving games, mostly Daytona USA. A couple towns away was an indoor arcade with an outdoor kart racing area. It had some driving games, a couple shooting games. One example was Silent Scope. We haven't been up in that area in a decade, but it wouldn't surprise me if most of that stuff is gone. Arcades are dead everywhere in the world except maybe in Japan. There are exceptions like that place in Illinois called the Galloping Ghost, but the odds of finding something like that is very slim and will require a lot of gas to go to these places if you're not close to them.
My family has a camp area and that's where they spend their vacation time in the summer there. There is a pool, playground type stuff around the vicinity, a place to fish. You can buy stuff, rent films. One thing they have is a little arcade area. It's changed a lot in the last few years and for the worst. Early on it was some racing, a couple other games and maybe a pinball machine. It had at times throughout the years Frogger, X-Men, Revolution X, Cruis'n USA, Outrunners, Die Hard Arcade, a RUSH racing game, a Tekken game and a couple other Sega racing games. I've seen 1942 and 1943 in recent years, but it's become kind of like the generic stuff you see at a mall or place that gives out tickets. I get they are trying to adapt to different things, but they have done a pretty poor job of taking care of the machines. Unfortunately, it's a sign of the times. People are more interested in playing Bingo and getting drunk.
When you're in school, you'll have a trip somewhere if you are in something like with your band for example. I went on a few of these trips and one of these was an indoor skating rink. It also had mini-golf, a water slide, and arcade games. There wasn't much, but it had The Simpsons and Crazy Taxi along with a maybe a few other racing games. One of the trips a couple years later was to a water park, and they had quite a bit of arcade games around the area. It had a RUSH: Alcatraz Edition game, The Simpsons, and X-Men. They also had Frogger, Thunder Blade, and Altered Beast. They had a decent combo of older and newer arcade games. That was one of the better experiences, especially trying to beat the Frogger high score that was seen on Seinfeld and failing miserably. Another park had some arcade stuff, but all I saw was Daytona USA.
A casino that is about 70-80 miles away from where I am has arcade games, but similar to the baseball park I worked at, it has mostly Raw Thrills games. Games like Terminator, Jurassic Park, and one or two others. At one point, it had Time Crisis 2 or 3, a Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga combo machine. It also had some pinball from time to time such as Indiana Jones. There was also a hotel that had I think a laundry area with one or two arcade games around 2000. It was Clutch Hitter, an arcade baseball game from Sega and I remember playing maybe half an inning or a full inning and not wanting to continue putting quarters in.
Going to Disney World when you're a teenager, you will remember a lot of things at around that age frame than you would at 5 years old around that age frame. They had rides, attractions, little stuff that goes on at certain points of the day and evenings. It really was a nice place when going there in 2009 on vacation. The arcade stuff was all around the place but it was a little different. There was a mix of stuff that related to the park and stuff that you would see at an actual arcade. One game I got a chance to try was the original Space Invaders. I knew about it a little bit from a game parody sequence in Futurama. It's tough as nails, I'll give it that. Other games there included Centipede, Millipede, Star Wars Trilogy from Sega, Crazy Taxi, Tekken 6, and F355 Challenge. Being able to play some of them is an experience that can never be replicated.
Then there's PAX East, which I'll end the blog with this. Going there for two years in 2011 and 2012, it was a nice place. Some of the food was expensive, but overall, a good place. It covered a lot of stuff was gaming, Lots of consoles from Atari up until at the time the original Xbox were in one room. Modern systems were in another. The same is said for PC gaming. Then there is the arcade room. If you grew up in the 80s during the big arcade boom (I didn't. By the time I was 8 years old arcades were on its deathbed and dying very quickly), this would be a major nostalgia overload. They had Dragon's Lair playing on a projector. A lot of Atari games like Food Fight. Some of the Nintendo games like Donkey Kong and Punch-Out!! were represented. A number of Pac-Man franchise machines saw a bit of love. Racing games like Turbo were a lot of fun. They tried to cover all of the big name games and the convention did an excellent job of bringing those titles that were enjoyed by many. It would have been nice if 90s games were represented. Stuff like Turtles in Time, Mortal Kombat, and some other arcade. Still though, they did well.
That's it for arcade experiences. Maybe sometime down the road, I'll talk about the experience of playing older games at PAX and what they have you do. In the mean time, check out the Part I blog of arcades. I hope it brings back memories for some people of their arcade experiences.
http://sullivanentertainment.blogspot.com/2017/03/arcades-part-i-local-places.html
In the town where we stayed, there was an arcade area, and it was a combination of an arcade and a fair. There was a target shooting game. Skee ball was in this location. I don't really remember much for the actual games, but they did have The Simpsons and some Sega driving games, mostly Daytona USA. A couple towns away was an indoor arcade with an outdoor kart racing area. It had some driving games, a couple shooting games. One example was Silent Scope. We haven't been up in that area in a decade, but it wouldn't surprise me if most of that stuff is gone. Arcades are dead everywhere in the world except maybe in Japan. There are exceptions like that place in Illinois called the Galloping Ghost, but the odds of finding something like that is very slim and will require a lot of gas to go to these places if you're not close to them.
My family has a camp area and that's where they spend their vacation time in the summer there. There is a pool, playground type stuff around the vicinity, a place to fish. You can buy stuff, rent films. One thing they have is a little arcade area. It's changed a lot in the last few years and for the worst. Early on it was some racing, a couple other games and maybe a pinball machine. It had at times throughout the years Frogger, X-Men, Revolution X, Cruis'n USA, Outrunners, Die Hard Arcade, a RUSH racing game, a Tekken game and a couple other Sega racing games. I've seen 1942 and 1943 in recent years, but it's become kind of like the generic stuff you see at a mall or place that gives out tickets. I get they are trying to adapt to different things, but they have done a pretty poor job of taking care of the machines. Unfortunately, it's a sign of the times. People are more interested in playing Bingo and getting drunk.
When you're in school, you'll have a trip somewhere if you are in something like with your band for example. I went on a few of these trips and one of these was an indoor skating rink. It also had mini-golf, a water slide, and arcade games. There wasn't much, but it had The Simpsons and Crazy Taxi along with a maybe a few other racing games. One of the trips a couple years later was to a water park, and they had quite a bit of arcade games around the area. It had a RUSH: Alcatraz Edition game, The Simpsons, and X-Men. They also had Frogger, Thunder Blade, and Altered Beast. They had a decent combo of older and newer arcade games. That was one of the better experiences, especially trying to beat the Frogger high score that was seen on Seinfeld and failing miserably. Another park had some arcade stuff, but all I saw was Daytona USA.
A casino that is about 70-80 miles away from where I am has arcade games, but similar to the baseball park I worked at, it has mostly Raw Thrills games. Games like Terminator, Jurassic Park, and one or two others. At one point, it had Time Crisis 2 or 3, a Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga combo machine. It also had some pinball from time to time such as Indiana Jones. There was also a hotel that had I think a laundry area with one or two arcade games around 2000. It was Clutch Hitter, an arcade baseball game from Sega and I remember playing maybe half an inning or a full inning and not wanting to continue putting quarters in.
Going to Disney World when you're a teenager, you will remember a lot of things at around that age frame than you would at 5 years old around that age frame. They had rides, attractions, little stuff that goes on at certain points of the day and evenings. It really was a nice place when going there in 2009 on vacation. The arcade stuff was all around the place but it was a little different. There was a mix of stuff that related to the park and stuff that you would see at an actual arcade. One game I got a chance to try was the original Space Invaders. I knew about it a little bit from a game parody sequence in Futurama. It's tough as nails, I'll give it that. Other games there included Centipede, Millipede, Star Wars Trilogy from Sega, Crazy Taxi, Tekken 6, and F355 Challenge. Being able to play some of them is an experience that can never be replicated.
Then there's PAX East, which I'll end the blog with this. Going there for two years in 2011 and 2012, it was a nice place. Some of the food was expensive, but overall, a good place. It covered a lot of stuff was gaming, Lots of consoles from Atari up until at the time the original Xbox were in one room. Modern systems were in another. The same is said for PC gaming. Then there is the arcade room. If you grew up in the 80s during the big arcade boom (I didn't. By the time I was 8 years old arcades were on its deathbed and dying very quickly), this would be a major nostalgia overload. They had Dragon's Lair playing on a projector. A lot of Atari games like Food Fight. Some of the Nintendo games like Donkey Kong and Punch-Out!! were represented. A number of Pac-Man franchise machines saw a bit of love. Racing games like Turbo were a lot of fun. They tried to cover all of the big name games and the convention did an excellent job of bringing those titles that were enjoyed by many. It would have been nice if 90s games were represented. Stuff like Turtles in Time, Mortal Kombat, and some other arcade. Still though, they did well.
That's it for arcade experiences. Maybe sometime down the road, I'll talk about the experience of playing older games at PAX and what they have you do. In the mean time, check out the Part I blog of arcades. I hope it brings back memories for some people of their arcade experiences.
http://sullivanentertainment.blogspot.com/2017/03/arcades-part-i-local-places.html
Saturday, March 11, 2017
Experiencing Sega Saturn
Although it did a lot of things wrong from it's launch in May 1995 to its death in 1998, the Sega Saturn is one of the most high regarded systems today due to the library it had, especially in Japan. Like millions of others, I never owned one. I was too busy playing Genesis and eventually PlayStation. Probably nobody I knew outside of family had one. The funny thing is my only times before finding one in 2015 were as a kid and in college.
My memory is a little fuzzy on playing the system as a kid. I want to say it was around the spring or summer of 98. My family went to visit my older sister and her boyfriend. It was one of those visits that was being there for a few hours. One of the things they had was a Saturn and it would be the first time I ever played it. They didn't have too many titles. There was Mortal Kombat, College Slam, Daytona USA and a few others. My eye was set on Sonic 3D Blast, which I had for the Genesis for a year and half at the time. I remember getting pretty far and making it about halfway through the game. I might have also played Daytona and Mortal Kombat (Ultimate 3 to be exact), and that was really the only time I tried the system as a kid. Visits after that, I think they wound up getting a PlayStation, which my family had for half a year.
I then went to college in 2010. Like most people, you meet new ones and you get acquainted with them. My first college had a game club and within the first two months, they were planning on a convention of their own on a Saturday. To keep people occupied when they were waiting on tournaments on PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360, a few others including myself brought up older systems. I brought up my Sega Genesis and SNES. Another brought PS2 and to my surprise, Sega Saturn. Unfortunately, the thing is Saturn is probably the last thing people remember when it comes to the big mainstream companies.
Because of that, I was the only one that really played the Saturn. The friend that brought it played it a few times and with that, he didn't bring it up the next year. One game that intrigued me was Die Hard Trilogy. The action felt very frantic and controlling John McClane was a breeze. Only thing I didn't really care for was Vengeance and its driving. Nevertheless I loved it and I would a year later buy the PlayStation version. I wound up playing Daytona USA a few times and playing real well. A game that got me curious was Black Fire. A helicopter game developed by NovaLogic, I had a little difficulty figuring out what to do. I probably played it for 10 minutes and then stopped.
After that, I didn't play Saturn again until 2015. Going through a yard sale vendor, a person was selling various game systems, accessories and controllers. Unlike the ones you find on Ebay, this was pretty cheap and getting one with a Model 1 Genesis really made it worth while. I've picked up almost 20 games. Some of the notables are Sega Rally, Daytona USA, Gex, Panzer Dragoon, and Dragon Force. I do think it is one of the more underrated systems. The main controllers are good and I feel comfortable when I play each game.
That being said, I would be careful with how much you spend on the system. A number of their heavy hitters cost quite a bit of money. Some of which is near or above 100 dollars. Unless you got a trust fund or are very rich, take a bit of caution when going after them online. If you can find a Saturn, you're in for a treat with a library that has that Sega flair and brings out the strength of being a 2D powerhouse. Happy hunting.
My memory is a little fuzzy on playing the system as a kid. I want to say it was around the spring or summer of 98. My family went to visit my older sister and her boyfriend. It was one of those visits that was being there for a few hours. One of the things they had was a Saturn and it would be the first time I ever played it. They didn't have too many titles. There was Mortal Kombat, College Slam, Daytona USA and a few others. My eye was set on Sonic 3D Blast, which I had for the Genesis for a year and half at the time. I remember getting pretty far and making it about halfway through the game. I might have also played Daytona and Mortal Kombat (Ultimate 3 to be exact), and that was really the only time I tried the system as a kid. Visits after that, I think they wound up getting a PlayStation, which my family had for half a year.
I then went to college in 2010. Like most people, you meet new ones and you get acquainted with them. My first college had a game club and within the first two months, they were planning on a convention of their own on a Saturday. To keep people occupied when they were waiting on tournaments on PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360, a few others including myself brought up older systems. I brought up my Sega Genesis and SNES. Another brought PS2 and to my surprise, Sega Saturn. Unfortunately, the thing is Saturn is probably the last thing people remember when it comes to the big mainstream companies.
Because of that, I was the only one that really played the Saturn. The friend that brought it played it a few times and with that, he didn't bring it up the next year. One game that intrigued me was Die Hard Trilogy. The action felt very frantic and controlling John McClane was a breeze. Only thing I didn't really care for was Vengeance and its driving. Nevertheless I loved it and I would a year later buy the PlayStation version. I wound up playing Daytona USA a few times and playing real well. A game that got me curious was Black Fire. A helicopter game developed by NovaLogic, I had a little difficulty figuring out what to do. I probably played it for 10 minutes and then stopped.
After that, I didn't play Saturn again until 2015. Going through a yard sale vendor, a person was selling various game systems, accessories and controllers. Unlike the ones you find on Ebay, this was pretty cheap and getting one with a Model 1 Genesis really made it worth while. I've picked up almost 20 games. Some of the notables are Sega Rally, Daytona USA, Gex, Panzer Dragoon, and Dragon Force. I do think it is one of the more underrated systems. The main controllers are good and I feel comfortable when I play each game.
That being said, I would be careful with how much you spend on the system. A number of their heavy hitters cost quite a bit of money. Some of which is near or above 100 dollars. Unless you got a trust fund or are very rich, take a bit of caution when going after them online. If you can find a Saturn, you're in for a treat with a library that has that Sega flair and brings out the strength of being a 2D powerhouse. Happy hunting.
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