Even though I no longer update the Games of the World section on HG101, that doesn't mean interesting things aren't happening around the world. This photo, of an "arcade" in Thailand comes from GameFAN's Facebook page, courtesy of Charlie Maib, aka HCK, of Studio Happy Chicken Pink. I'm sure you'll agree it's pretty cool! As he put said in the original entry: Hey everybody, HCK here in THAILAND (yeah, I get around). While walking around the city of Pattaya, I stumbled onto an arcade, and it's nothing like I've seen in Japan or the States. Every cabinet was running off modified PS2 units, and 95% of them didn't even work. The biggest game they had? Ultraman 3. Take a look. The cabinet in the middle is stuck on the BIOS configure screen -HCK
Also, it might be interesting to hear what the founder of Home of the Underdogs, Sarinee Achavanuntakul could tell about the gaming in Thailand.
ReplyDeleteCertain acquaintance of mine had a girlfriend (now a wife) from Thailand and she certainly recognized Mario when I started up SMB3 on emulator.
I saw a similiar "PS2 Arcade" setup at a McDonalds (!) once and most of those games didn't work either.
ReplyDeleteI was always curious about those old NES "arcade games", I'd see em at pizza places. You put in a quarter, select an NES game, and it let you play for like 5 minutes, and then it shut off. Anyone remember that shit?
Is that what you have in mind?
Deletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_M82
"I was always curious about those old NES "arcade games", I'd see em at pizza places. You put in a quarter, select an NES game, and it let you play for like 5 minutes, and then it shut off. Anyone remember that shit?"
ReplyDeleteYou may be referring to this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayChoice-10
PlayChoice-10 is actually quite well-known among the NES players and arcade enthusiastics. Other arcade platforms based on the home computers/consoles in the 80's included Arcadia (Mastertronic's unsuccessful effort to use the hardware of Commodore Amiga for arcade games) and Max-A-Flex (Exidy's unsuccessful effort to use the hardware of Atari's 8-bit family for arcade games - are we seeing a pattern here?).
I saw a Unit like this in Spain in our hotel a few years ago. But it was a original Xbox that you could pick games to play for a certain amount of time for. They was no way to tell what games it had instaled though they just had a demo of some racing game probally Project Gotham Racing or Forza running all the time.
ReplyDeleteAt least they have a arcade. I don't think I've ever seen one near the place I live. : /
ReplyDeleteI spent a few months in Thailand back in the summer of 1986. Me and my cousin (R.I.P.) would walk down to a local shop, I think it was some sort of bar and grill, where they had a couple handheld LCD game systems, the kind that Tiger used to make. They were modified with a box that could be fed a coin to start the game.
ReplyDeleteThere are some proper arcade halls if you look for them in a large malls like Tesco.
ReplyDeleteBut this one is a good find. Reminds me of "arcade" I visited when I was a child (1988-1989). It was a pay per play time service equipped with BK-0010-01
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elektronika_BK
It was in Russia of course )