Night fever, Night Fe-ver,......
Posted on 08/14/2004 12:47:49 PM PDT by qam1
The video game industry is on alert. A challenger is gobbling up players -- and her name is "Ms. Pac-Man."
Yes, the classic games of the 1980s are making a comeback, from the beribboned pink Ms. to those "Super Mario Bros." and the one-and-only "Donkey Kong." Vintage and reissued video games are the hottest trend in the usually forward-thinking $7 billion-per-year gaming industry. Gamers are expected to spend an estimated $250 million to $300 million on retro games this year.
"They're huge," says Lee Eisenberg, owner of game hub Fun City in Parma, Ohio, and a retro gamer himself. "Our older stuff is outselling our new stuff. I've never seen anything like this."
Eisenberg carries both vintage and reissued games and systems, but says the old ones outsell the new products. He has a hard time keeping those big, clunky two-decade-old Nintendo, Atari and Intellivision systems ($40) and games ($3 to $10) in stock. Fortunately, he has a warehouse supply of no-longer-manufactured consoles and cartridges acquired from trade-ins, garage sales, Web sites and other sources.
The flashback started with nostalgic thirtysomethings, says Eisenberg, 39. But "younger kids are really getting into them now, and not just with their parents."
He says the appeal is simple.
"The newer games are really really violent and expensive. A lot of people want to go back to their childhood. They want younger, simpler games."
The nostalgia factor was one reason behind game giant Nintendo's June relaunch of eight '80s classics, including "Super Mario Bros." and "Donkey Kong," all for Game Boy Advance.
"Many of us grew up playing Nintendo and have a fondness for some of the great games from our original console, the Nintendo Entertainment System," says Beth Llewelyn, public relations director for Nintendo of America.
"With the 15th anniversary of Game Boy this year ... we thought it would be fun to go back to our '80s roots and release some of the classic NES games."
Sales have been very strong, she says, already hitting the 500,000 mark. The company is also selling a Classic NES Limited Edition Game Boy Advance SP ($100) that re-creates the look of the original NES.
Nintendo's not the only company thinking retro. Toy maker Jakks Pacific recently launched a series of plug-and-play hand-held systems called TV Games, featuring classics such as "Ms. Pac-Man," "Galaga," "Pong," "Centipede" and "Asteroids" from Atari, Namco, Capcom and Activision. The $20 battery-powered system looks like a joystick and plugs into your television.
Radica Games Ltd. will release its own classic system this fall. The $30 console, dubbed Arcade Games, also plugs into your TV and features reissued Sega-Genesis games such as "Sonic the Hedgehog."
And the revival isn't limited to the home-tech world. "Pac-Man" bleeps and blurps are sampled in new songs by hip-hoppers Lil' Flip and Beanie Sigel, and game sounds and images have been used in ads for Hummer and Saturn autos. T-shirts with "Space Invaders," "Pac-Man," Atari joysticks and classic logos are a trendy urban retro-kitsch look.
Namco has even launched a "Class of '81" series of arcade machines.
Many fans aren't content with reissues, however. Vintage Intellivision, Sega-Genesis, Nintendo and Atari games and consoles are hot commodities at the eBay online auction site. A recent search on Intellivision turned up 492 games and systems. A "classic Atari" search yielded 219.
There's even an annual get-together for retro game fans. The seventh Classic Gaming Expo is set for Aug. 21 and 22 at the San Jose Convention Center in California. Last year's expo in Las Vegas attracted 1,500 people and caused organizers to move to a bigger venue, where they expect even more attendees this year, says expo spokesman Jayson Hill.
"There's a huge nostalgia factor to classic-game appeal," Hill explains. But he says the interest has grown beyond sentimental Generation X-ers. He was "shocked" by the number of kids and teens at last year's event.
But are these kids shocked by the primitive graphics and sounds of 8-bit classics, compared with today's 256-bit games?
Hill doesn't think so.
"Sometimes people don't want everything served to them," he says. "If you give a person everything, they get nothing from their imagination. It's not as much fun as if you have to fill in the blanks."
But actually, I was intending to ask for a strategy game recommendation if you had one!
I liked the way it looked, but don't mind them going more realistic. The only thing I didn't like about Wind Waker was that it was unfinished. They were supposed to have many more dungeons then they ended up with, but they rushed it out the door, adding instead that stupid "fish for Triforce pieces" bit.
Thanks much. Appreciate the name clue-in.
Check out Far Cry. The reviews are pretty awsome. I don't do much PC gaming but I went ahead and bought this one. :-)
SATA drives are great. What I use as well. I have four 250Gig SATA drives in my home machine.
3.4C will Work for ANY game. :-) Great processor.
Yes indeed. 350 ROMs and counting here :)
Ping.
The ones with the 5.x access times? (Can't remember exact number, but they run HOT.) Those must have set you back. Are they on the same RAID controller?
Night fever, Night Fe-ver,......
I'll have to join you on that one.
With computers I do! LOL
I just had to put a terra-byte on my machine.
Ever since watching Star Trek in the 1960's I have loved computers. :-)
I've got the Cooler Master aluminum case that has a wave shape in the front. I like it much. And I added a see through side panel just so I could watch the disco lights inside.
Two are raided and two are not. :-) I am using the ICH5R south bridge. They are two Western Digital WD2500 250G SATA drives and two Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 250G SATA drives. I use an IDE 133 200G Maxtor drive as well for my boot and C-drive.
Ooooo! Nice case! :-)
Cool! Need any tips? LOL! I played that game to death. Beat it completely including all side quests.
Please tell me you aren't reciting this from memory! LOL! I can't even remember the manufacturer of my motherboard, but I love the disco lights on the north bridge fan.
I am in my lab LOL! Yup, reciting from memory. hehehe
Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! I would love to get a few of those. WOWSER! :-)
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