PART 2 - MAIN DISHafter spending some time with charlotte's host family, it's already around 8 pm - time to head over to ravage's place! welcome to FUNTINGTON - arcade capital of the world
must be somewhere down that road!
because ravage's unit is difficult to find, he provided us with his home address. a quick door bell ring, a hop in the car - follow the leader!
a first peek inside
THE UNIT
for those of you who haven't been there, let's quickly walk the aisles
i
need to have a tapper - need to, need to, need to
unfortunately, q*bert wasn't working
look at this williams row
yes charlotte, that marquee really is three-dimensional - even without 3d glasses!
but before being sucked into some of those fabulous games, i mustn't forget that i'm here on a mission: fill that transporter up to the roof
rav had already lined up the games i've decided to bring over to germany and had sent me some pictures of the "ully row" right before our departure, but i don't want to show you those pictures just now in order to not spoil the fun of revealing my choices (which include some surprises)! the pictures of the individual cabs which are about to follow had been taken by rav in advance as well, but i'm going to use them to show you the condition of the cabs!
the first game i picked is a great addition to my pac-man row. i already have the original pac-man, ms pac-man and pac-mania. this game differs from the others because it's not a maze game anymore, but a nice side-scrolling jump'n'run game.
ladies and gentlemen:
PAC-LAND
apart from some damages to the yellow wooden parts, the cabinet is in pretty nice condition. the most important thing (besides the fact that it's working) is that the sidearts are both there. on most of the cabs i've seen / heard about they are either missing or destroyed and there are no reproductions available at the moment. i'm totally happy that i don't have to worry about that!
the overlay is also ok, magic eraser will make it look even better!
in it goes!
one down, many more to go ...
before i reveal the next game, a short story first: game number two was actually game number one
! wtf - you must be thinking! well, let me clear this up: the following game was the
VERY FIRST arcade game i ever played, it was put up on location outdoors at our annual wine festival - must have been around 1983. while i can't remember whether it was in an original cab or just a conversion, i remember the thrill it gave me very well. because of that, the following game was NUMBER ONE ON MY MUST-HAVE-LIST (guess i have to find a new number one now
)
ladies and gentlemen:
MOON PATROL
but wait a minute - didn't bruno just buy rav's moon patrol? well, he did, but when i contacted rav the first thing i asked was whether he had another moon patrol for sale, because from what i've heard he has a couple of defenders and three EDOTs - why not another moon patrol? unfortunately, he didn't
! just about two weeks later, rav contacted me again!
rav: "hey dude! wasn't there someone on the dragonslair forum looking for a moon patrol? when i got my moon patrol, we actually imported two of them from the usa. mine has been sold to bruno, but the second one is available now. do you know who that guy was?"
ully: "sure i do - it was me!"
sometimes you have to be extremely lucky in this hobby and ask the right questions. it got even better when rav told me that the cab was in great condition AND that it was working. of course, i couldn't resist!
the sides will only need some minor touchups - if any!
a new overlay, a williams joystick rebuild kit - i'm one happy camper!
bring it on, man!
those williams cabs aren't very heavy, rav was pretty impressed when i literally carried it into the van
two down, many more to go ...
up next is a game that you have to love for the sheer beauty of the cabinet (well, to be honest, the control panel could be much better, but the rest ...). i fell in love with the game twice: first because of the "front art" and second because of the game play. although it gets tough pretty fast, it's still one of those game you come back to to play another round!
ladies and gentlemen:
DOMINO MAN
can't wait to see this cleaned up and treated with my special nano-tech cockpit spray!
"waiter, one domino man please!"
rav told me that the cabinet was damaged during transport from the usa to england, which means the right side got a hit and has the tendency to fall off, that's why we have to be careful when lifting the game up!
where to put it? btw, we've reached the halfway point!
the next game is already in my possession, therefore i can totally understand the desire to have it. i'm bringing this one for an arcade friend from austria who responded to my "who's interested in some of ravage's games" call.
ladies and gentlemen:
TOOBINbecause ravage didn't know for sure whether the austrian guy was going to take the toobin or not, we have to "maneuver" it out first
freed from all those other cabinets
after OUT comes IN, right? four down, not many more to go ...
up next is a game which i have been looking for for quite a while as well and of which i thought i'd never get it. turns out rav had two of those as well.
ladies and gentlemen:
ZOO KEEPER
shaky picture, but it's good enough for a first impression. sideart is in good condition, however the pedestal of the game is destroyed - no wonder when you see which material those were made of. i'll have to rebuild it! the coin door is missing on the pictures, but it was included in the deal!
no complaints about the control panel
another shaky picture which gives me the chance to tell you that unfortunately both the game pcbs and the wiring harness are missing. i do have a spare qix harness which is almost identical to zoo keeper and which should work, and rav has a spare boardset (which is missing just a few chips), but i forgot to ak him about / for it. DAMN, i knew i would be forgetting something!
will the zoo keeper please appear on the stage?
because this is the last game i've picked to bring home from rav's place, we decide to slide the game in on its back - the damaged base makes it difficult to stand up!
"careful, dude, don't squeeze me in!"
just some more pushing ...
... and
in it is!
a shot from the outside (powered by auge autovermietung
)
now that all the games have been revealed, i can show you the pictures that ravage sent me the night prior to our departure along with the words "sweet dreams"
isn't that just a great row of games?
demonstration of pac-land working
"dude, moon patrol is running on 110 volts!"
yeah, moon patrol is finally mine!!!
more moon patrol posing!
what is
she doing here?
probably listening in on us talking about video games
what's that? another pac-man game? doesn't sound too interesting though: spin the wheel like hell, transport the ball from bottom to top - that's it
after the loading process, it's finally time to play some games, this one is called "two sweaty old dudes playing with tiny bubble blowing dragons"
we didn't take any more pictures of our gaming session - we just p-l-a-y-e-d!!!
before we left, ravage showed us something extremely cool: his ultimate goal (which is mine as well as you might already know) is to run all his game on tokens. however, he's not just using ANY tokens, but he had 3500 of his own tokens made - retrokade style of course!
unfortunately, because we've been up and on the road for such a long time and we've arranged to spend the night at charlotte's host family's place, we have to leave all that arcade fun behind and hit the road one more time (for today that is). thx a lot, ravage, we've had a wonderful time at your place and you're a great guy!
although the following pictures are blurry, they show exactly how charlotte and i both feel after such a long day! let's go to bed, the night won't be long
end of part 2 - to be continued ...
