The "What Are You Doing This Moment" Thread

[jimmy101]

I went to the arcades a few times, we definitely had that here, and I had some friends growing up who were into the whole arcade thing. I was just too dirt poor to ever do any of it lmao.

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Oh cool. Guess I never noticed it, I grew up in a country town & was more into riding my BMX around like a little derelict.

 

[CiG]

Oh cool. Guess I never noticed it, I grew up in a country town & was more into riding my BMX around like a little derelict.

Crusty Demons bruz.

I grew up in dark arcades filled cigarette smoke and sluts, lol. Not events but sometimes there would be like 20 of us huddled up around the same machine for hours having our own little tourneys with everyone watching like it was some spectacle. I remember when they first brought in the 2 Mortal Kombat II(one of the best fighting games ever) machines to Pac Man Arcade(the name of our old OG spot), that plays went bonkers.

edit: Ive went to a bunch of events in recent years, but local ones. And i dont wanna brag, but im pretty fucking good.

That's awesome! Honestly as much as events can be pretty cool (FGC seems to have gotten less fun and more corporate these days though) I will always prefer just a bunch of people doing their own group games. Some of the best times of my life were times me and my friends did massive LAN events in my buddy's backyard unit we built to fit 12 computers in there, so we could play StarCraft until the early morning, destroying pizza, or cook up meat on the BBQ and shit. Good times.

They were massive nerds though and never got into fighters, but a few of us would do Tekken tournies and my girlfriend at the time usually dominated lmao.

Also I had to go and make this clip into a gif, so good:

 

[Satanstoenail]

Think that was more of an American thing in general. Don't think we ever had that arcade culture down here.

I went to the arcades a few times, we definitely had that here, and I had some friends growing up who were into the whole arcade thing. I was just too dirt poor to ever do any of it lmao.

Yeah it was definitely huge when I was a kid. I never had enough cash to hang around them for long either.

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

they costed just 25 cents a game back then for you guys too right?

 

[jimmy101]

Doubtful, we don't have "quarters".

 

[Slammed]

My old man used to fix pinballs and tables tops back in the late 70's early 80's. At that point they were so popular in bars, clubs and pool halls that the mob making them had a 24 hour call out to all techs so they could be fixed within the hour of any call. Often the problem was just that the hopper was full and wouldn't take any more coins, so my old man would be heading out at all hours of the night emptying hoppers which had also been emptied before knock off time. The company actually petitioned the government make round 50c piece because the coin mechanism at the time couldn't handle anything but round coins and they wanted to increase the game price from 20c a game, obviously they were successful.

 

[jimmy101]

Hahaha, can't believe those morons didn't even think to empty the hopper.

 

[Slammed]

They weren't allowed to it was all under agreement. The machines were all rented and the venues got a percentage of the hopper, they weren't allowed to open any machine. Every machine had trip wires and hair thin tell tales that the techs had to check before and during emptying and if any were not in place the venue forfeited their cut because they'd tampered with the machine.

 

[jimmy101]

Ah, yeah that makes heaps of sense.

 

[CiG]

they costed just 25 cents a game back then for you guys too right?

Just going by memory I'm pretty sure some games were 20 cents, most of the best games were 50 cents though. Then they started jacking the price up, I think the last time I went to an arcade was when I went to see a movie and the arcade was adjoined and it was like a 2 dollar coin to play Time Crisis with the guns. That was maybe 8 years ago at this point.

 

[Sophii]

What console do you play on?

PS4 actually.

MK11 and Diablo 3 have been my main plays here lately.

 

[Sophii]

I wish Microsoft didnt fuckiny destroy Killer Instinct. That is my favorite retro fighter.

 

[Onder]

Just arrived at work. What a weird commute. The bus was nearly empty, the streets are nearly empty, is this is a working day? It's like that Amrucan comic book movie where some dude erases one half of population and it cleans up the city quite nicely.

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

Out here the arcades where where most of the poor kids who couldn't afford consoles hung out at. They also had a machine or two almost everywhere in the early to mid 90's.

PS4 actually.

MK11 and Diablo 3 have been my main plays here lately.

nice. I have Diablo 3 on the PS3, another one of those games i stopped playing because something popped up and i just never got back into. I plan on picking up MK once i'm done playing through the Borderlands games again so maybe we can get some games in.

I wish Microsoft didnt fuckiny destroy Killer Instinct. That is my favorite retro fighter.

the original KI was the shit. They had a machine right outside my middle school in some little snack shop and we used to always be on it.

Just going by memory I'm pretty sure some games were 20 cents, most of the best games were 50 cents though. Then they started jacking the price up, I think the last time I went to an arcade was when I went to see a movie and the arcade was adjoined and it was like a 2 dollar coin to play Time Crisis with the guns. That was maybe 8 years ago at this point.

yea the cunts jacked up the prices out here too. The fake "arcades" they have nowadays have machines that charge like a dollar or someshit

 

[CiG]

yea the cunts jacked up the prices out here too. The fake "arcades" they have nowadays have machines that charge like a dollar or someshit

Out here the arcades where where most of the poor kids who couldn't afford consoles hung out at. They also had a machine or two almost everywhere in the early to mid 90's.

Stingy fuckers man. Yeah that's true about arcades being a place for poor kids to hang out, I was usually one of the poor kids just spectating, and ever since then I've always just enjoyed watching others play vidya games. I watch my younger brother play all the time.

I've been thinking about buying a machine of my own lately, just for the fun of it.

 

[Slammed]

A pinball is not worth it these days. They are nearly all propriety parts that only come from the manufacturer, the only techs who really know how to fix them are the techs from the manufacturer and anything from the service call to parts are fucken expensive. My brother in law has a $6500 dust collector in his possession these days because the parts and labour to fix a 5 year old machine are nearly $2500.

For cabinet games there is a couple of mobs in Sydney who really do a good job of full size cabs with licensed software but the hand crafted work and the license doesn't come that cheap. For the average mug the Aldi cabinet that came down to $250 last year are hard to beat, 2 games, the screen, an emulation board, all the controllers and about 2 hours work. But then if one isn't worried about paying licenses for 30 year old games they are all available for download, as is the emulator and you can make your own cab (without the cab graphics) running a standard PC, decent monitor, even go as fas as getting the car seat for racing games and you'd easily come out of it for $500 with a thousand games.

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

I've been thinking about buying a machine of my own lately, just for the fun of it.

Arcade 1UP has released a few "mini" cabinets (Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat II, Final Fight, Rampage, Pac-Man, Gallaga, etc). Havent played on one but ive heard a lot of good things, especially about the new MKII cabinet they put out a few weeks ago.

 

[CiG]

That sounds interesting, will have to look into them. SF2 and MK2 would be about all I'd need for essentials, anything extra would simply be a bonus.

 

[Slammed]

I think from memory the Aldi ones last year, which were basically just imported as complete cabs from overseas, were Gauntlet and Street Fighter in one and Galaga and something else in another and there has been quite a few hit the second hand market since. There was quite a few people complaining that they are 'kid size' and need to be sat on something like a milk crate for adult use, also that two player is cramped and that the controllers were not the best quality but most of those complaints came from people who paid full price of $499. Those who waited for the stores to discount them and waited for the first buyers to iron out the kinks got a bargain win they came down under $300. Otherwise you're looking at about $2000 for a full size cab made locally with all the right graphics and licensing.

 

[Satanstoenail]

A pinball is not worth it these days. They are nearly all propriety parts that only come from the manufacturer, the only techs who really know how to fix them are the techs from the manufacturer and anything from the service call to parts are fucken expensive. My brother in law has a $6500 dust collector in his possession these days because the parts and labour to fix a 5 year old machine are nearly $2500.

I’ve had a few customers with home machines that didn’t have these problems. One of them said he’d done a bit of maintenance work on it himself. I refuse to give up the dream of one day owning my own.

For cabinet games there is a couple of mobs in Sydney who really do a good job of full size cabs with licensed software but the hand crafted work and the license doesn't come that cheap. For the average mug the Aldi cabinet that came down to $250 last year are hard to beat, 2 games, the screen, an emulation board, all the controllers and about 2 hours work. But then if one isn't worried about paying licenses for 30 year old games they are all available for download, as is the emulator and you can make your own cab (without the cab graphics) running a standard PC, decent monitor, even go as fas as getting the car seat for racing games and you'd easily come out of it for $500 with a thousand games.

Do you know if Daytona machines are high maintenance? Owning one is one of my other dreams.