Better late than never, here's a little report of my philippines travel. on the arcade side.
Philippines is rather unknown here,i got to know that country because i had the chance to get married to a filipina. And as her family is living there, our vacation is always the same destination (can be worst
).
This vacation was special , because my wife didn't see her family for 4 years and we gonna introduce our 1 year old son to his grand'ma & grand pa (lola & lolo in their dialect).
So in may, we took the royal dutch airline company to fly there. and believe it or not it was one of the cheapest and one of the best flight we ever took (way better than airfrance and lufthansa imho).
After an exhausting 15 hrs trip, we arrived to my wife's parents's house. Nicely located. Here's the street view:
our ride, a mitsubichi lancer 1979. If the people would not have the 'road rage' (one taxi driver, overtook on the sidewalk O_o), i'd have enjoyed driving it
so we headed to a local mall , my wife wanted a hair cut and manicure... but to my suprise, i could kill the time, not with one arcade... but with 2 on the same floor !
'take your time honey'
the arcades were full with kids rides , games ,... fun for the family
here the arcade are dedicated toward family, no smoking, flashy colors and lots of redeem cabs
and the best... the token is worth 0.08€
(1 token per game)
the versus fight corner
poor customisation skills... Ully i gave them your phone number
arcade game for kids
Noooooo, they started to be invaded by coins pushers ... i hate those cabs
i spent lots of time on this Street fighter 4 cab, i could show my skills to the local champions
:D this didn't prevent me to get my butt kicked several times.
once you go out of the arcade, here's the view
The state of the cabs was really great for a "province" arcade and the ambiance was nice. the european fun fair owner, should take some lesson
if USA is the "maximized me" country, philippines is the "minimized me" one....
hopefully they didn't minimzed the burgers
So after one week there, we went to the beach.
a 'farniente' week
in the morning, the low tide left a weird sand drawing
Once that week was over, we headed to Manila. Manila is really crowded and noisy. And full of contrasts
You have "states of the art" air conditionned malls , located just besides slumbs area... You got shiny hotels, with people sleeping in the streets
The current filipino hero is Manny pacquiao
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manny_Pacquiao , he's a boxing champion. You can see his face on almost every manila building.
and his part time job is ... congress man ... (hope his brain doesn't got hitted and damaged too much if he need to vote important laws,... sorry, i hate boxing
). That guy is so popular that i'll not be surprised if he become president. what's the point with arcade you'll tell ? well , his nick name is
pacman and his website title pacland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manny_Pacquiao So back to HUUUGE mall with theirs arcade, that's why i'm in the philippines
off course , no classic games, they look like japanese game center
tekken, the locals favourite
Konami Dance Maniax, pretty unknown Benami game, but really fun (my wife wants it for the gameroom)
Terminator is the guard of the service room
And our son tried his first driving cab, look how he's concentrated
Time to eat now !! but seriously, who gonna have dinner in a so poorly named restaurant..
Finaly whe prefered this one
This ended our vacation, bye bye philippines , see you in 3 to 4 years (the time to save again
)
