Untold tales of the arcade - and other nonsense

[Randorama]

As some of you may know, 1 and a half lives ago I used to write a column for an online game magazine, the gamers' quarter.. The column was entitled "Untold Tales from the arcade", and featured short articles about my arcade experiences. Most of my material has been "reprinted" on Insomnia's forum, as well (see here

I know that a few people enjoyed the column and over the years asked for more (say, Ghegs ). I was wondering if there are still some fans on this forum. If so, I'd like your feedback on your a few things.

1. If you liked the column, would you like its return on a 3 weeks/1 months basis?

My basic idea now is to write a more in-depth article (3/4 pages) covering 1 game, rather than 3-4 games, every installment. Any suggestions?

2. I am out of the loop re: blogs for a while. Can you suggest a blog format/system (whatever) in which I can easily add text and images and do a bit of layout without getting headaches? I would like that the final product looks good, but I don't want to spend a lot of time on it.
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3. As I played tons of arcade games, does anyone have special requests, regarding games that I should cover? Right Now, I plan to write columns about Black Tiger, Wolf Fang/Rohga, and possibly return to the Darius Games. Any requests?

[PC Engine Fan X!]

For Randorama,

Have you had the chance to check out, personally, some the cool arcades/game centers in the USA & Japan respectively?

You've probably heard of the world-famous California Extreme classic arcade game/pinball game show held every year in the Silicon Valley area of California. http://www.caxtreme.org You never know whom you might meet/run into at such a CAX show. Past arcade developer/founder guests include the ol' Atari Games crew like Nolan Bushnell, Al Alcorn, LX Rudis, Euguene Jarvis of Williams fame, and even Walter Day of Twin Galaxies fame (whom has made two appearances at the 2003 & 2004 CAX shows indeed).

Have any plans to cover the more recent Cave PCB releases like the SH-3 powered Akai Katana and it's similarities/differences between Progear No Arashi CPS2 PCB?

Yes, I've had LX Rudis personally watch me reach wave 100 on an Ultracade cab playing Klax at the 2001 CAX show during both days it was held. It was after 5:20pm on that Sunday evening, that he personally told me who he was (and how he had a hand in creating the cool sound effects on the original Klax PCB release circa 1990, developmental woes of the Tengen NES version of the same game title {the intial beta version of NES Klax had a horrible slow framerate but the folks at Tengen managed to boost up the framerate for the final release to the public, otherwise, it would haven't been released at all} along with a bit of background story of creating the cool BGM tunes & what was the driving inspiration/motivating factor to do it + creating the sound effects & BGM tune on the Atari Lynx version of Klax as well). He said that he had never seen anybody play Klax as well as I did on that eventful day and wanted to know my secret to playing it so well. I told him that I had a copy of the Tengen version of Klax on my NES and how I'd spend countless hours trying to clear each wave until one day after finally figuring out the proper way to play it for score came out of the blue -- practice does make perfect (if doing an serious 1CC WR attempt on a Klax PCB on default settings). Mr. Rudis even signed a piece of paper with his trademark "Bugsjik" nickname as well. How cool was that?

At the 2003 CAX show, I went up to Mr. Day & asked him if he could personally watch me attempt a WR score run on an arcade cab with a Klax PCB setup but no such cab was found on the game room floor. So it was no dice for me. Oh well...at least I tried. ^_~

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[BIL]

I'd love to read a Wolf Fang/Rohga Armor Force column from you, Randorama! Have you played Thunder Fox much (1990 Taito sidescroller)? I've been enjoying it quite a bit, getting near a 1CC. Would be interested to know what other arcade fans think of it.

[Randorama]

I played both, so let's say that at some point or another they will be published. I plan to have Wolf Fang up sometime around early November. I may sit down and write about Thunder Fox, which was an old favourite of mine too.

PC Fan: I need to play Akai Katana first. No arcade experience, no untold tale ^_~!