Growing Up In Arcades

Hundreds of photos taken in and around arcades during the late '70s and the 1980s. Pull on your pinstriped tube socks and piclick, cuz we're doing the time warp, baby!




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The 5ish Doctors

For those of you whom I know are fans of the BBC show Doctor Who (1970s-1980s "Classic Period" that is, not this modern drek), I thought you might get a kick out of this short film made by 5th Doctor Peter Davidson.  The MadAngel and I saw Peter, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy last weekend at a local Convention along with the "lost 8th Doctor" Paul McGann.  It was a really cool experience and Peter told about how he and Doctors 6, 7, and 8 decided to make their own Dr Who 50th Anniversary film.  The result was actually quite funny with a good many unexpected cameos from folks that rang him up asking to be part of it all once world got out.  Enough said...push play, have some jelly babies, and enjoy (running time 30 mins).

Wallowing in Nostalgia

2 Warps to Neptune, a 70s-80s nostalgia site for video games, toys, movies, and general reminiscence. As Mad Builders puts it, if the site was made of sugar you'd turn into a diabetic just reading it. Of course there's some amusing snark with the nostalgia:

Speaking of BSG, I had the Viper before that kid choked on the red missile and they were recalled and reissued with a missile that popped out only about half an inch, like a sad, tiny boner.

That's right, kiddies: we used to have toys that actually did cool things. Then some retard stuffed the end of the viper into his mouth -- I suspect he would have grown up queer... I mean... LOOK:



...and then pushed the button, launching the, um... projectile into his throat and conveniently removing himself from the gene pool. Unfortunately, we don't celebrate Uncle Chuck's successes the way we should, so all the "missile" launchers were pulled from the shelves. Now we have toys that are more suited for for limp-wristed future polesmokers.

And if all that offended you, GOOD. It was meant to.


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Hat tip to Mad Builder

Star Trek Continues - Continues

As was previously posted here, some rather talented folks are doing a 4th Season of Star Trek TOS on the web.  Well they have just released Episode 2 and still manage to capture the TOS look.  This time with guests Lou Ferrigno (The Incredible Hulk) and Erin Gray (Col. Wilma Derring on Buck Rodgers).

For those interested here is Season 4, Episode 2 -

Loyaulte me lie

Talk about getting thrown under the bus:

DNA tests have confirmed that human remains found buried beneath an English car park are those of the country's King Richard III.

Vilified by the Tudors, Richard III was nothing like the evil hunchback of Shakespeare. I studied him for a project during my second run through college. Miraculously, many of his accusers, if you will, recieved gracious gifts and promotions from the Tudors. My favourite quote of the article:

"He was a medieval man. If you put him back into the 15th century, he's exactly as the others are -- princes, dukes, nobles, they're all doing exactly the same things, and he's better than some."

More Old Calculators

I had one of these as a kid:





And later one of these. It was a pain in the ass to use but I still liked it, mainly because it reminded me of the incredible edible wonderousness that was the Marathon bar.





I did not, however, own one of these awesome antiquarian adding machines...



...though some of our more elderly seasoned contributors such as Fundy and Curmudgeon may very well have used such a device in their youth.

More here.



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Recent Acquisition

A few of you will likely recall this....

A "new" acquisition of mine.  The other day I stumbled across this excellent condition copy original 80's edition of the Palladium RPG which I hadn't see since...well...the 80's.  I recall it being a very interesting and complex system (especially when it came to magic) so I had to add it to my collection.  I had never see the Supplement book before.  It was apparently published many years later to add new character classes and rules for seafaring adventures [Jar(egg)head was more knowledgeable of the Palladium products than I].  Looks to be interesting though.

Call it nostalgia or whathaveyou, there is something to be said for the more clean and simple typeset style of the old RPG manuals with plain b&w line drawn artwork; compared to the colorful painted, glossy and slick style of most pro RPG publications today.

Weekend Timewaster

If you're a fan of the classic Matthew Broderick movie Wargames, go buy this right now.

Wargames: WOPR is a game for Android (also available on the FruitPhone), based around the iconic '80s movie. It's a matching puzzle type game, so don't get too excited about turning the world into a smoking cinder, but it is absolutely chock full of '80s retro-chic from the movie, including all the sound effects, vector graphics, and cheesy music you can eat. Just add some popcorn and a constant, low-grade fear of nuclear annihilation gnawing at your gut and it's like you're right back in 1983.


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Game over man...game over!

For those of you lucky enough to live in Houston (or a few other select cities in Texas) I ran across a shop that will speak to your retro gaming soul. They had a booth at this year's ComicPalooza which is how I stumbled across them. With a selection of old consoles and games from the 2600, Intellivision, C64, Segas, Nintendos, to 3do, TI-99, and other obscure systems. New stuff coming in frequently apparently and they do do mail order. Click here to have a look.

Corgi

You remember the Corgi cars -- those wonderfully detailed toys with all the moving parts. Piclick for scans of their old catalogs from the 60s and 70s.



I owned both of those Bond cars, by the way. The passenger seat on the DB-V would actually eject the little plastic bad guy with some force. After my friend Simon and I performed some, ahem... modifications, it would shoot him into the ceiling fan.

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Dark Tower

Some folks on here may recall, or perhaps even owned, this game from around 1981.  A game for 1-4 in which the solo play was actually surprisingly entertaining.  Basic premise was (with the primitive computer contained in the Tower determining encounters, combat etc) the player explored 4 kingdoms with their small army, fought brigands, explored ruins and tombs, lost troops to battle and plague, looted treasure and magical items, bought supplies, etc.  The goal being to find 3 keys, mass a large enough army, and then storm the tower and defeat the evil hoard therein.  An original game complete in full working order has become somewhat of a collectors item due to it's popularity and it's production run being cut short soon after its release when Milton Bradley was successfully sued for theft of intellectual property.

Well someone has now created what is, to my aging memory, a very faithful recreation of the the boardgame in Flash (solo play only) complete with proper images and sounds.  This game is brutal, I died really quickly the first few games.

Click HERE to check it out.

Computers of Yore

More vintage computer ads for your enjoyment, with Issac Asimov and Elvira. (Putting those two people in the same sentence is just... weird.) Piclick.

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Sunset Billboards

You know it's old when Steve Tyler is referred to as the "new generation." From a photostream of billboards on Sunset Boulevard, circa 1975. Piclick for the stream.

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Friday Timewaster

Scramble.

Cuz I'm like totally havin' 80s flashbacks again.

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Christmas Arcade Awesomeness

It's clear that my wife and my step-daughter know me well based on one of the Christmas gifts they went in on for me this year.

The iCade is just what it appears to be, a cabinet and set of old arcade controls for your iPad that lets you play 80's arcade games like Tempest, Asteroids, Gravitar, Lunar Lander in style. This thing is a blast! You still have to buy the games from the AppStore but the pack of 100 games is cheap. Now my biggest problem is finding where to keep the thing. I may finally be forced to clean up my home-office. Hmmmm...perhaps there was a subtle sub-plot involved here that I didn't realize until now....

Anyway, you can read more about it on Ars Technica here.

Enjoy!

Momma don't take my Kodachrome...

Color movie of VJ Day in Honolulu, 1945. It was filmed on Kodachrome 16mm, very high tech stuff for the day. It's a rare high-definition glimpse into the world of our grandparents.

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101 Classic Computer Ads

Piclick for more.

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Friday Timewaster

Wizard of Wor

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Game Ads from Yesteryear

A gallery of 80s videogame magazine ads. Pretty cool, but I wish to take exception to the author's commentary:

[When] I say vintage, I really mean vintage. When you see names like Parker Brothers you know you’re going way way back.

Why you impertinent, snot-nosed whippersnapper! Get off my lawn! If I could catch you, I'd beat you with my cane!

Anyways, piclick for more -- provided you can manage to get your gnarled, decrepit, forty-something hand to move the mouse, of course...


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Prelinger Archives

The Prelinger Archives is a collection of thousands of American industrial, educational, and government films from the early to mid-20th century. It's absolutely chock-full of nostalgia, and they're all narrated by That Guy, (if you grew up watching classroom science films about the nocturnal habits of desert mice, shown on that clackety-clackety projector, you know the guy I'm talking about).

A couple of examples of what's available: Combat America, a 1945 U.S. Army Air Corps film following the deployment of a B-17 squadron to Germany. Or perhaps you'd prefer Chevrolet's 1960 promotional short for the Corvair, (which Ralph Nader should be made to watch Clockwork Orange-style until his eyes pop out of his empty skull).

So go ye forth and enjoy moving pictures of the America that was, but shall never be again.


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