7 ms·

This game was so perfect. One thing I miss about this era was the cacophony of various games as you walked into the arcade. All those machines blaring their sin

by nmg 4y ago

This game was so perfect. One thing I miss about this era was the cacophony of various games as you walked into the arcade. All those machines blaring their sinusoidal siren songs at once. The audio design of Galaga was extraordinary and a huge part of its charm in my opinion, but to truly experience it, you really need to be standing at the machine, fully bathed in it, with a backing chorus of all the other machines chirping and crooning their tunes.

prox 4y ago
Galaga also has that nice polyphonic stereo effect that is really cool.
beebeepka 4y ago
I also miss having a crowd looking at what you do. Some would cheer, others would try and get you killed. Practically grew up at the arcades.
- darkwater 4y ago
  Every time someone asks how's possible Twitch got so popular (or watching recorded videogames play on YT), I tell people how being in an arcade as a child in the '80s / '90s was.
- zxcvbn4038 4y ago
  If your in the US there are a surprising number of arcades around that are loaded with the classic games. Just Google and you’ll find them. If you are willing to travel then probably the best two are https://www.gallopingghostarcade.com/ https://www.gallopingghostarcade.com/ (Illinois), https://www.classicarcademuseum.org/ https://www.classicarcademuseum.org/ (New Hampshire). There is very little parking at Galloping Ghost, suggest you take Lyft to get there. Plan to spend the day for either. If your into pinball then https://roanokepinball.org/ https://roanokepinball.org/ (Virginia) Limited paid parking, take Lyft to get there. You can play everything in 4-6 hours. All three are free-play, pay per head for admission, ok to leave and come back same day.
  - johnnymorgan 4y ago
    Yeah but do they have the sketchy banger guy in acid wash jeans selling hash?? Like I want the fully experience :) Loved arcades back in the day
    - ourmandave 4y ago
      My arcade back in the '80s was in the mall (which has long since died) and only a few stores down from the Marines recruiter, so they were always popping in.
  - anotheruser13 4y ago
    There's also the National Videogame Museum in Frisco, TX.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
    There are at least 3 of these in my city and unfortunately all of them kinda suck for one reason or another. Two of them are basically just noisy f'ing bars with a lot of arcade machines you have to pay for and the third, which operates as per your description, has a lot of slightly-broken cabs and uses emulation for several of them. But what's worse is that when you don't have to pay for it, it turns out most arcade games really suck.
    - coldpie 4y ago
      That's not an unfair take. One thing I really enjoy, as someone born in the late 80s and missing out on the arcade scene entirely, is experiencing the old games that I've heard so much about. I always try to hit up the local classic arcade whenever I'm out of town. It's fun to search for an arcade that finally has that game I've been hunting down to experience. For example just a month ago, I went to an arcade here in the Twin Cities for the first time, and they had both a Super Breakout (1976) and an Asteroids (1979). I've always heard about how eye-piercingly bright the weapons fire in Asteroids is, but never got to experience the real vector graphics machine until just last month. It was a treat! And Breakout has this huge, physical knob that you use to change game modes -- kchunk, kchunk. Great stuff, very memorable. One day I'd really like to experience an original Pong :) But I think they're quite rare these days. The shine does wear off if you keep hitting the same arcade, for sure. But it's fun to explore new ones in other cities, or new ones as they pop up in your hometown. And it's always great to bring along a friend who is new to the scene and show them the sights.
- Eleison23 4y ago
  [dead]
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  I got good enough at playing Xevious that I could (i) play for 30 minutes+ on a quarter and (ii) people would give me the quarter to watch a good player play.
jamespo 4y ago
Perhaps you’d enjoy these tracks recreating that: http://arcade.hofle.com/ http://arcade.hofle.com/
cainxinth 4y ago
The mechanic where you have to potentially sacrifice one of your lives by letting it be captured so that you can try and get it back later for double firing is a stroke of genius. It’s the perfect balance of risk and reward to make things exciting.
Waterluvian 4y ago
The video game equivalent of a live show vs. an album.
deltarholamda 4y ago
>other machines chirping and crooning their tunes Except the Sinistar game shouting at you "RUN, COWARD!"
- ourmandave 4y ago
  And the Wizard of Wor's barely understandable taunts.
- CWuestefeld 4y ago
  Gorf's "Bad move, space cadet!" was one of my faves.
  - cpeterso 4y ago
    Or the Centaur pinball game's "Bad move, human!"
- donretag 4y ago
  "Warrior needs food badly" "Wizard is about to die"
tenebrisalietum 4y ago
A retro arcade near me has all kinds of old machines on and running (and in freeplay mode!) and it is wonderful. Indeed it is an important part of the magic
spudlyo 4y ago
I grew up in Lacey Washington, and our local arcade "Star Base One" was a wonderful place, with lots of video games, pinball machines, foosball and pool tables. There was a magical moment when the arcade first opened, when the attendant flipped the breaker and all the machines turned on at once. There was an explosion of light and sound as the machines sprung to life and started blasting their siren songs. I was often the kid waiting outside of the arcade for it to open, so I got to witness it a number of times, and it was always memorable.
JohnBooty 4y ago
Those old arcade games almost always had a boomy, bassy sound that made explosions in particular sound amazing. Emulators rarely capture this. My sense is that they more or less perfectly recreate the sound being output by the sound chips. But they are (understandably) not recreating the physical speaker drivers in the cabinets or other analog filtering steps (if any)
- layer8 4y ago
  Emulators could provide audio filters similar to how they provide CRT graphics filters.
  - porkbeer 4y ago
    The crt filters are pretty terrible though. None of the good aspects, just raster lines amd saturated colors it seems.
    - JohnBooty 4y ago
      There are some good ones! CRT Royale is pretty decent! I agree with you: most of them get it badly wrong.
  - JohnBooty 4y ago
    Yeah! From a technical perspective, it's relatively trivial. However, I'm not aware of this feature existing in any emulators. (But it's been years since I really looked into it)

by nmg 4y ago

prox 4y ago

Galaga also has that nice polyphonic stereo effect that is really cool.

beebeepka 4y ago

I also miss having a crowd looking at what you do. Some would cheer, others would try and get you killed. Practically grew up at the arcades.

darkwater 4y ago
Every time someone asks how's possible Twitch got so popular (or watching recorded videogames play on YT), I tell people how being in an arcade as a child in the '80s / '90s was.
zxcvbn4038 4y ago
If your in the US there are a surprising number of arcades around that are loaded with the classic games. Just Google and you’ll find them. If you are willing to travel then probably the best two are https://www.gallopingghostarcade.com/ https://www.gallopingghostarcade.com/ (Illinois), https://www.classicarcademuseum.org/ https://www.classicarcademuseum.org/ (New Hampshire). There is very little parking at Galloping Ghost, suggest you take Lyft to get there. Plan to spend the day for either. If your into pinball then https://roanokepinball.org/ https://roanokepinball.org/ (Virginia) Limited paid parking, take Lyft to get there. You can play everything in 4-6 hours. All three are free-play, pay per head for admission, ok to leave and come back same day.
- johnnymorgan 4y ago
  Yeah but do they have the sketchy banger guy in acid wash jeans selling hash?? Like I want the fully experience :) Loved arcades back in the day
  - ourmandave 4y ago
    My arcade back in the '80s was in the mall (which has long since died) and only a few stores down from the Marines recruiter, so they were always popping in.
- anotheruser13 4y ago
  There's also the National Videogame Museum in Frisco, TX.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
  There are at least 3 of these in my city and unfortunately all of them kinda suck for one reason or another. Two of them are basically just noisy f'ing bars with a lot of arcade machines you have to pay for and the third, which operates as per your description, has a lot of slightly-broken cabs and uses emulation for several of them. But what's worse is that when you don't have to pay for it, it turns out most arcade games really suck.
  - coldpie 4y ago
    That's not an unfair take. One thing I really enjoy, as someone born in the late 80s and missing out on the arcade scene entirely, is experiencing the old games that I've heard so much about. I always try to hit up the local classic arcade whenever I'm out of town. It's fun to search for an arcade that finally has that game I've been hunting down to experience. For example just a month ago, I went to an arcade here in the Twin Cities for the first time, and they had both a Super Breakout (1976) and an Asteroids (1979). I've always heard about how eye-piercingly bright the weapons fire in Asteroids is, but never got to experience the real vector graphics machine until just last month. It was a treat! And Breakout has this huge, physical knob that you use to change game modes -- kchunk, kchunk. Great stuff, very memorable. One day I'd really like to experience an original Pong :) But I think they're quite rare these days. The shine does wear off if you keep hitting the same arcade, for sure. But it's fun to explore new ones in other cities, or new ones as they pop up in your hometown. And it's always great to bring along a friend who is new to the scene and show them the sights.
Eleison23 4y ago
[dead]
PaulHoule 4y ago
I got good enough at playing Xevious that I could (i) play for 30 minutes+ on a quarter and (ii) people would give me the quarter to watch a good player play.

jamespo 4y ago

Perhaps you’d enjoy these tracks recreating that: http://arcade.hofle.com/ http://arcade.hofle.com/

cainxinth 4y ago

The mechanic where you have to potentially sacrifice one of your lives by letting it be captured so that you can try and get it back later for double firing is a stroke of genius. It’s the perfect balance of risk and reward to make things exciting.

Waterluvian 4y ago

The video game equivalent of a live show vs. an album.

deltarholamda 4y ago

>other machines chirping and crooning their tunes Except the Sinistar game shouting at you "RUN, COWARD!"

ourmandave 4y ago
And the Wizard of Wor's barely understandable taunts.
CWuestefeld 4y ago
Gorf's "Bad move, space cadet!" was one of my faves.
- cpeterso 4y ago
  Or the Centaur pinball game's "Bad move, human!"
donretag 4y ago
"Warrior needs food badly" "Wizard is about to die"

tenebrisalietum 4y ago

A retro arcade near me has all kinds of old machines on and running (and in freeplay mode!) and it is wonderful. Indeed it is an important part of the magic

spudlyo 4y ago

I grew up in Lacey Washington, and our local arcade "Star Base One" was a wonderful place, with lots of video games, pinball machines, foosball and pool tables. There was a magical moment when the arcade first opened, when the attendant flipped the breaker and all the machines turned on at once. There was an explosion of light and sound as the machines sprung to life and started blasting their siren songs. I was often the kid waiting outside of the arcade for it to open, so I got to witness it a number of times, and it was always memorable.

JohnBooty 4y ago

Those old arcade games almost always had a boomy, bassy sound that made explosions in particular sound amazing. Emulators rarely capture this. My sense is that they more or less perfectly recreate the sound being output by the sound chips. But they are (understandably) not recreating the physical speaker drivers in the cabinets or other analog filtering steps (if any)

layer8 4y ago
Emulators could provide audio filters similar to how they provide CRT graphics filters.
- porkbeer 4y ago
  The crt filters are pretty terrible though. None of the good aspects, just raster lines amd saturated colors it seems.
  - JohnBooty 4y ago
    There are some good ones! CRT Royale is pretty decent! I agree with you: most of them get it badly wrong.
- JohnBooty 4y ago
  Yeah! From a technical perspective, it's relatively trivial. However, I'm not aware of this feature existing in any emulators. (But it's been years since I really looked into it)