shmups.system11.org

Yeah 26th of may the biggest retrogaming expo of scandinavia once again goes off.

Arcades, pinball, just about every console you can think of, loads of activites with speedrunning, perlers, art, cosplay and competitions..

New this year is an 800m2 big indiegame dev area where devs from all over scandinavia will be showing off their coming stuff.

Also new are musical acts, a 100 man strong symphonic orchestra, Dunderpatrullen and Machinae supremacy will all come to deliver spectacular live shows.

Guest of the year is TMR (TheMexicanRunner) for those of you who want to meet one of the most charismatic speedrunners of the scene..

all info on www.retrospelsmassan.se

trailer: https://youtu.be/X_y7eVfjXE4

I loved it last year, and I was already planning on going again, as a regular guest this year - but holy crap, Dunderpatrullen!! Nice catch, I've never seen them play, and can't wait to experience that.

Glad to hear you liked it, I try to keep the grassroots vibe even tho the expo has balloned way past that point really (+4000 visitors last year).. I remember there was a lack of shmups last year so will try to up the ante a little this time

the music is gonna rock this year, awesome acts all of them!

On our way!

Arcade lineup: https://www.instagram.com/p/BjOw4yPFyP2/

What was that weird game with constant graphical glitches that was ripping off stages from Donkey Kong (barrels), DKJr (chains) and... puzzle bobble. I'm not sure if it was all the same game, or selectable. Someone was playing it all the time, so I never saw the title screen.

The idea of a co-op DKJr chain level actually looks really cool.

It was a 5-in-1 PCB with mini games. I haven't seen it before either. I think it was quite terrible, control-wise. China or Korea origin, I think.

It definitely looked Korean as hell.

Here's my pictures from this year. Forgot to take enough to cover all of the stuff going on, but there are at least a few good ones:
https://imgur.com/a/sXvG9KE

I really appreciate the use of the additional location for spreading out stuff, and people. It really helped alleviate the crowd and make both the seller stands and pinball setups easier to access. It also felt like it gave me more stuff to do all day, moving back and forth between the two locations.

Only downside for me personally with that arrangement was that I wasn't naturally led through a bunch of indie developer booths, exposing me to their games and getting into conversations with them - you had to actively seek out their stuff. It seems they did get a lot of attention from other visitors though, so if it worked out for them, that's still for the best.

Speedrunners had just as horrible accoustics at last year though, which made following it as a spectator very hard. I can understand the challenge in making it work in a hall like that though, as you don't want them to be so loud that they dominate everything else going on there. Meeting TMR was fun, he's a really friendly and talkative guy.

I won first place in the Tetris competition, which was also fun.
Unfortunate with the delay - it seems like no one had bothered actually testing the setup before the event, but as someone who has set up a bunch of stuff like that, I know that things don't always work out like you want, and unexpected things can always happen. It seemed no one at the place really had a lot of experience with making NTSC signals work though, which delayed stuff further, but fortunately it was resolved before we gave up waiting, so no worries here.
The format was a bit silly with best-of-one knockouts in a Tetris version that makes it possible for anyone to win through sheer luck, no matter how good the opponent's strategy is, due to the way lines are sent over.
However, I could tell hardly anyone in the competition really knew how to play Tetris, so anything more sensible would probably be a waste, and I did appreciate how fast everything went ahead.

What ever happened to the SMB speedrun competition though?

The orchestral concert was an amazing touch! It sounded really well, and aside from maybe a little too much Star Wars over actual video game music, I cannot say anything bad about it. Even if you weren't actively watching it, just having a live orchestra playing video game music as you walked around helped create an incredible atmosphere. I hope this will be a recurring thing in the future.

The other two concerts might not be as fortunate. Dunderpatrullen are always fun, and the sound was fine, but not a lot of people really seemed to be into it. I noticed a lot of people actually leaving the place at the time due to the loud music, which I guess wasn't really the intended effect. I enjoyed it, but I don't know if it worked out well.
Machinae Supremacy was unfortunately a disaster, but I doubt anyone needs me to tell them that. Personally I'm not a fan of their music, but I wouldn't have minded it if it at least had sounded alright. The sound was so horrible it was impossible to even stay inside the venue while they were playing, and I felt like my hearing was getting completely ravaged by the awfully loud and tinny drums. I can imagine that even if you are a fan, seeing them play like that must have been very disappointing. It ended up making us leave the place early.
I really appeciate the effort in bringing cool bands to the event, but making a rock band work in a location like that might just be an unforgiving task. I was really surprised just how well the symphonic orchestra worked in comparison, and no hard feelings against the good intentions in bringing the bands there.

Overall, the experience was even better than last year, and I definitely want to keep coming back to this event.

Thank you for the writeup and the great pics!

Congrats on winning the Tetris challenge aswell!, the organiser Heidi is a huge tetris fan and she said you displayed some impressive skills so dont sell the other (casual) competitors short

I can only agree with your feedback aswell, it will all be taken into concideration for next years event, perfection doesnt happen all at once and i think this years event surpassed last years in every aspect (not to say it doesnt still have its problems) so I am very happy with it, all indications so far are that the visitors are aswell

Super mario competition got cancelled last minute due to the most ridiculous of reasons, personal grudges, but for 2019 we will revamp the whole competition format so who knows if it will maybe show up again... see you then!

To be more precise, I could tell several people were struggling with the controls, as I also were myself. I don't really think there's a problem with the controls in SFC Tetris 3 (in fact it works really well), but if you are used to any other versions there are some quirks you really need to get over. It was obvious that some people knew well how to play, but kept making accidents due to several of the things I also experienced.
I was participating with my friend who is one of the best Tetris players I know, and much better than me, and he got knocked out in the first round. I was lucky to survive the learning process


I agree completely. My friend was so amazed that he was immediately dead set on going against next year, so I'm glad to hear you are planning another for 2019. I really hope to gather a group of people for a road trip.

Nice pics, Sumez!

Just a thought but why not use TGM3 for future Tetris competitions as it is the de facto competitive Tetris game to date?
A shame i couldn't attend but I was completely fucked after Stunfest with studies for final exams now.
Seems like it was a great event!

That's debatable, personally I greatly prefer TGM2 - I think the addition of a hold button essentially changes the puzzle, simplifying it a great deal and making it more about playing fast than dealing with the unexpected. In my book it's hardly even "Tetris", but I get why it's still a cool game.

I would love a TGM competition though, although I'd say there's a fair chance I was probably the only person there with any experience in that series, and it doesn't leave a lot of leeway for people who don't have a solid grip of it. Super Tetris 3 makes the outcome more accessible to casual attendees at a convention.

All that said, I'm certain it just came down to what was most accessible for the competition organizers, "Geeky Gals", and having two copies of the game allowed the competition to play out super fast.