Any VA/MD/DC area shmupmeets?

Blue Lander · Post by **Blue Lander** » Fri Feb 18, 2005 5:25 pm

Now, I'm not volunteering to host one, but it seems like quite a few people on these boards are from this area. Has there ever been a shmupmeet in this area? If somebody was willing to host one, would there be enough interest in attending it? I'd certainly attend, at least. I'd bring the X68000 stuff if people were interested, too.

One drawback is that we don't really have a shmuppy arcade around here that I know of. I know of one place with a Strikers 1945 cabinet, but that's it.

BrianC · Post by **BrianC** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 6:00 am

Yeah, last time I checked, the closest game in the nearby arcade in the Annapolis Mall/Westown Shopping Village to a shmup was the Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga machine. I know of a couple arcades in Ocean City that may have a couple shmups, but even those seem to be hit or miss.

There used to be a 19XX machine a few years ago in the mall, but it disappeared when the movie theater moved.

Kiken · Post by **Kiken** » Sun Feb 27, 2005 5:53 am

Springfield Mall in VA still has Gunbird 2.

nullstar · Post by **nullstar** » Sun Feb 27, 2005 10:25 pm

Crabtown USA (off 100 well east of Arundel Mills) has a sizeable arcade -- but if they have an SFII cab I think it would be their newest. The clientele seemed none-too-friendly when we stopped in to spend several dollars in quarters, either, and a bunch of the cabs had broken controls, near-dead monitors, etc. Worth a trip if you'd like to spend an hour in what might have been a decent arcade in the early, early 90s...

Neon · Post by **Neon** » Wed Mar 16, 2005 1:28 am

I'd attend, for sure I couldn't host though. Charlottesville here.

Zelikazi · Post by **Zelikazi** » Wed Mar 16, 2005 5:45 pm

Charlottesville, VA? NO WAY!!!

It's a great town, but I thought it was completely devoid of shooter fans. Which is not an uncommon thing for a town to be.

Blue Lander · Post by **Blue Lander** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 5:10 pm

I went to highschool just outside of Charlottesville. I visited there a few times, and suprisingly all the malls I went to had arcades. I don't remember if they had shmups or not, but the fact that they had anything at all was suprising.

Neon · Post by **Neon** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 5:18 am

Small world eh?

Blue, I'd be interested to know where you found those arcades. There was a metal slug 4 machine in Red Robin, that's all I've found locally. Funcoland might still have a few machines...I haven't been there since elementary school (and that was for the go karts).

Blue Lander · Post by **Blue Lander** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 4:44 pm

I don't think I could remember the name of the malls after all these years. That was like 7 years ago. I was at Fork Union Military Academy at the time, and every once in awhile they'd let us go into Charlottesville on the weekend. We were rarely allowed to leave the campus, so I never got too familiar with the surrounding area.

Zelikazi · Post by **Zelikazi** » Thu May 12, 2005 10:40 pm

Have any of you seen an arcade in D.C.? I'm alternating staying in Arlington and Charlottesville so I was hoping to find an arcade to kill a little of my free time, while I still have so much of it.

I hope some kinda meet can get organized in this area before October, else I'll be discussing shmupmeets in a very different location.

Metal Gear Okt · Post by **Metal Gear Okt** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 1:17 pm

Zelikazi wrote:Have any of you seen an arcade in D.C.? I'm alternating staying in Arlington and Charlottesville so I was hoping to find an arcade to kill a little of my free time, while I still have so much of it.

I hope some kinda meet can get organized in this area before October, else I'll be discussing shmupmeets in a very different location.

There used to be one in Silver Spring, but it closed down last year. There's always Dave & Busters. They've got a lot of lightgun games as well as one of those MAME cabs.

Kiken · Post by **Kiken** » Fri Jun 10, 2005 4:56 pm

Guys, how difficult is it for any of you to get to Springfield Mall?

I take 495 South and jump off at exit 55 (I believe) which is the 95 South exit and it's right there. I know for anyone around the Beltway, this shouldn't be an issue. Just wondering if any of you are up for some GB2 (and some Galaga, as they recently got a classic machine in).

I just ask because I'd like to start going there again given that I always seem to perform better on their arcade cabs than i do at home.

zakk · Post by **zakk** » Fri Jun 10, 2005 6:14 pm

Kiken wrote:Guys, how difficult is it for any of you to get to Springfield Mall?

I take 495 South and jump off at exit 55 (I believe) which is the 95 South exit and it's right there. I know for anyone around the Beltway, this shouldn't be an issue. Just wondering if any of you are up for some GB2 (and some Galaga, as they recently got a classic machine in).
.

Really easy for me, as I'm just a few exits down the beltway. I was thinking about going out there soonish (maybe even this weekend, assuming I wake up during the day...) I've only played GB2 via MAME on my cab, sorta curious how the PCB feels.

snap monkey · Post by **snap monkey** » Sun Jul 10, 2005 10:58 pm

Kiken wrote:Guys, how difficult is it for any of you to get to Springfield Mall?

I take 495 South and jump off at exit 55 (I believe) which is the 95 South exit and it's right there. I know for anyone around the Beltway, this shouldn't be an issue. Just wondering if any of you are up for some GB2 (and some Galaga, as they recently got a classic machine in).

I just ask because I'd like to start going there again given that I always seem to perform better on their arcade cabs than i do at home.

Close for me too. In fact, I just went there this afternoon to see this Gunbird 2 cab and had a blast playing it (Galaga too). I plan on making some more visits before I go back down to school in August. It was my first arcade shmup experience, so that was cool. Certainly different than playing it on MAME.

RippleScythe · Post by **RippleScythe** » Tue Jul 25, 2006 8:25 pm

I live in Virginia too.

Problem is I think I'm the only shmupper that lives south of Richmond. I'm kinda mad about that. All other Virginians I know that's into this stuff always seem to live either only around DC or in Virginia Beach which are both too far for me. I kinda live where the only gamers are only people who throw away their old school consoles when a new one comes out and plays Madden or Halo.

Damocles · Post by **Damocles** » Sat Aug 05, 2006 9:06 pm

Same here. I'm about an hour away from Dulles...though I currently lack a car...

*shrug*

NOSEAD · Post by **NOSEAD** » Fri Aug 11, 2006 3:11 pm

Hey guys, I live on southside Richmond. I might move to NOVA sometime in the future.

Strider77 · Post by **Strider77** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 7:42 am

I use to live in the DC area and I remember springfield mall's arcade. I was in there a few months ago. I live in Cary NC and work for American Airlines so flying to DC is like an hour and cost me about 14 bucks. I could get anywhere in the US for cheap...

JJG · Post by **JJG** » Sun Sep 17, 2006 1:19 am

I'm in the area and I'd definitely be interested in gaming.

The only other place I know would probably be CyberConXion in Rockville, MD. Not sure how much it cost but it could be rented out for fairly cheap I think and everyone could bring their own consoles and games.

Could run a tourney or something...

Kiken · Post by **Kiken** » Tue Sep 26, 2006 3:17 pm

JJG wrote:I'm in the area and I'd definitely be interested in gaming.

The only other place I know would probably be CyberConXion in Rockville, MD. Not sure how much it cost but it could be rented out for fairly cheap I think and everyone could bring their own consoles and games.

Could run a tourney or something...

You know, I have talked to a few guys about trying to set up something like this. I entered a small SFIII tourny that they held there and would have loved to do some competitive shmupping (I really want to play against some human opponents in TSS and TSS:LPP).

Please note though, they mostly only have wide-screens, so if you're looking to play anything tate, you'll have to bring your own monitors/tvs.

JJG · Post by **JJG** » Tue Sep 26, 2006 5:50 pm

I've emailed back and forth with them so I have prices if people are actually interested. I think it might be cool to even just rent their projector room and game, that probably wouldn't be too expensive.

I know I could get at least seven people I know to show...

JJG · Post by **JJG** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 2:43 pm

I'd really like to set something up in the near future, not sure where yet but we'll figure it out. Reply to this thread if you're in the area and you'd be interested in having a meet.

bay · Post by **bay** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 3:33 pm

JJG wrote:I'd really like to set something up in the near future, not sure where yet but we'll figure it out. Reply to this thread if you're in the area and you'd be interested in having a meet.

i'm down to make a drive on a weekend, baltimore and dc areas are close enough.

JJG · Post by **JJG** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 3:48 pm

I just wanna get a list of people together so I can throw out PM's when I come up with something.

Post by **nZero** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 2:10 am

VA Beach, here. I might be up for something, keep us posted huh?

JJG · Post by **JJG** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 1:23 pm

Sure thing, I'll PM all who responded to this post.

Kiken · Post by **Kiken** » Wed Oct 18, 2006 6:46 pm

Keep me posted.

Better, yet, if you can come up with some kind of venue for it I can always post about it in my LJ (there's a bunch of local gamers who read it)... I ought to be able to garner some more participants.

zakk · Post by **zakk** » Wed Oct 18, 2006 7:35 pm

If I get off my lazy ass and clean a bit, I could probably host one too, assuming you all aren't known kleptomaniacs.

I gotta do something with these three cabs...

JJG · Post by **JJG** » Wed Oct 18, 2006 8:13 pm

That would be awesome if you could host one, I'm maybe 45 minutes away so not too bad. Looks like we're getting some interest, it would be cool to set up a meet.

JJG · Post by **JJG** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 3:05 pm

I think I'm going to go to the NJ meet on November 18th, would anyone from VA or MD be interested in carpooling?