Category Archives: Arcade

New office – theme?

With our new home, I’m getting my own office. I really want to theme it, and I’m trying to decide what to go with. Note that there will be 3 arcade games in the office: Star Wars, Tron, and Discs of Tron. Some options:

  • Space: I have some beautiful space-themed canvas prints for the walls (Thanks, sister!) which would make a good start to the theme, and the Star Wars arcade game fits in.
  • Robots: I want to have a place to display my robot collection and this could be cool, especially with some robot-themed art work
  • Portal: I saw a cool Portal-themed office recently that really made me want to try. Do the wall, have some Portal knick-knacks around, and some Portal art on the walls. Could be cool.
  • Star Wars: I have a few Star Wars collectibles to display plus the Star Wars arcade game. Could be good if not overdone. I saw an office once (and have a picture somewhere) that looked like the cockpit of the Millenium Falcon – that would be cool.
  • Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: I have a framed and signed poster from Douglas Adams, a 42 towel, a C64 HHGTTG game, etc. This would be subtle but classy and my robots could fit in as long as I have a Marvin in there.
  • Tron: I’m leaning towards NOT doing Tron. The only way to do it right is glowing blue on black and that’s not the look I want.

Ideas? Leave a comment!

Your favorite 80s music

I’m finally nearing the end of finishing up my gameroom (maybe by the end of the month?). My MP3 jukebox is almost done too! I want to make sure I have a good variety of 80s music for everyone to choose from to play in the arcade. I have the top 100 songs from every year from 1982-1988 already, but what songs would *you* make sure you had for an arcade? Leave your suggestions in the comments.

[tags]geek, jukebox, arcade, music, 80s, mp3, mp3s[/tags]

Pinball Memories

NOTE: I actually wrote this the night after I got the pin, but am just now posting it. It’s still not perfect, but it’s close enough.

My dad died 26 years ago from injuries sustained in a motorcyle accident. I was 10 years old. He was a great dad. He taught me how to play baseball and always went to my little league games. My Mom says he would always say “That’s my boy!” when I played. He taught me to play pool and snooker at the recreation center on base (he was in the Army). We played Atari Basketball and Midway’s Sea Wolf at a place down the street… and we played pinball.

That place down the street had a Harlem Globetrotters pinball machine. I rememember playing it many times with my Dad. Was he any good? I honestly don’t remember, but it doesn’t matter. My Dad played pinball with me and that’s all that matters. It’s one of my fondest memories of him.

Now that I’m grown and have a gameroom of my own, I thought it would be really cool to see if I could get a Harlem Globetrotters pinball machine of my own. I poked around online a few years ago but didn’t find one in my price range. It came up again in my mind so I posted on a local mailing list a few weeks ago and as luck would have it, a local dealer, Donnie, had one and agreed to sell it to me 100% working and at a great price. I picked it up last night and on the drive there I actually teared up a few times thinking about my Dad and playing this game with him.

Tonight I set it up and played some games with my almost-5-year-old daughter. Hopefully I am giving her some great memories of playing the same pinball machine with her dad. So, the moral of the story? Enjoy your children. Play baseball, video games, chess, pinball or something with them. Make memories. You never know what memory will stay with them for a lifetime. I think I’ll own this pinball machine forever. And Dad, I’ll keep a credit in it for you.