Arcade-Junkies.com

GameTap Gets Overhauled, You Get To Try It For Free!

Big change is coming to GameTap. In just over 2 weeks a completely re-designed GameTap website full of new features, an improved digital download store, and a new way to access and launch your games will be launched. The bottom line is, it’s a whole new GameTap.

One of the exciting changes is the addition of a new Classic Pack. For $4.95 a month or $49.95 for a whole year you get access to over 500 great arcade and console titles that you can play right in your web browser!

But the best news is for those who have still never even tried GameTap. To celebrate the introduction of the Classic Pack, they are offering everyone (no really, EVERYONE) a sneak peek for free starting on Thursday, March 12. That’s right. Play over 500 games as much as you want for free. What’s the catch? This extravaganza ends when they flip the switch to the new system, or March 18th, whichever comes first.

So don’t wait or you’ll miss it, head on over to GameTap and take advantage of them before they change their mind!

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HyperPin Frontend for Future Pinball

BadBoyBill (creator of the HyperSpin frontend) has started development on an amazing Future Pinball frontend for pinball emulation. If you didn’t already know, pinball emulators are basically 3D remakes of real arcade machines with advanced ball physics for realism.

HyperPinFeatures:

• Supports only Future Pinball and doesn’t currently support visual Pinball
• Supports f4v video format for preview videos and png format for preview images.
• Dual Monitor support, you can preview videos or images on the playfield area and images on the secondary monitor or backglass.
• All images and videos are named after a common description so they never have to be updated, so when you upgrade tables you just have to update you database with your new version.
• Many other features.

HyperPin should be ready for a beta release soon, they have a few loose ends to tie up with keyboard controls and resolution currently. In the meantime check out this awesome video of what it’s capable of, just try to imaginewhat you see here in a pinball-like cabinet. Whoah!

Watch In High Def YouTube

HyperPin Official Forum

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Quake Live Goes Live

Id Software’s Quake Live has been in development in closed beta for nearly 7 months, but has finally entered Open Beta stage for everyone to play now! QUAKE LIVE is a new and innovative multiplayer game experience from id Software - the creators of DOOM and QUAKE - that offers game players of all skill levels a totally free and easily accessible multiplayer game and community through a single website. Every element of the QUAKE LIVE experience, from finding and playing games to post match stats review and social networking are delivered through a single state-of-the-art website. “This is a very exciting time for the project and we hope that all of you, who have contributed your time and feedback, share in that excitement.”

Play Quake Live Free Now

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KEEP - A MAME-Killer in Development at Portsmouth University

UK-based Portsmouth University in co-operation with the European-based KEEP (Keeping Emulation Environments Portable) have an ambitious plan that aims to save old video games from the ‘digital black hole’ by developing the world’s first general purpose emulator and archival system. And yes, even though it sounds like the famous arcade emulator MAME (Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator) with newsgroups, it’s not. It’s much bigger than that.

The project aims to safeguard old game files in the same way that aging literary works are now being digitally archived online, including Google’s large database of books. And once all those gaming files are securely stored away, the project aims to go one step further by developing emulation software that can play all those files.  The project’s ultimate aim is to design an emulator that will play all of ‘em,  from 1970s Space Invaders games to three-inch floppy discs.

An interesting quote from Doc Anderson says “Early hardware like games consoles and computers are already found in museums but if you can’t show visitors what they did, by playing the software on them, it would be much the same as putting musical instruments on display but throwing away all the music. For future generations it would be a cultural catastrophe.” Maybe someone should tell him the famous phrase ‘what goes on the internet, stays on the internet’.

But there’s still more to it than that. They go on to say in the press release that “Currently, there are lots of emulators out there, but they are all self-enclosed and can become obsolete just like the media they are emulating.” So what happens if the MAME devs all die off and MAME no longer works on the next big O/S? “The difference with [KEEP] emulation is that you are freed from these problems. Every time hardware, software, operating systems or anything else upgrade, the KEEP machine just emulates on this new platform. It means it is as future-proof as these things get.”

So somehow this can magically work on future un-made operating systems? Color us skeptical.

Read the Full Press Release Details

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Holiday Wish List - Top 5 gifts for the gamer

It’s that time of year again when some of the best things come to us. What’s on your wish list? Well, the people from Examiner.com have put together a shopping guide to make it easier to find gifts for the gamer in you and me. The number 1 thing most wanted? The X-Arcade Machine. Of course, we need our Yamaha RH101MS Headphones, and our King of Kong DVDs, but it all wont be complete without that X-Arcade Machine, a gift that will truly bring tears of happiness to your eyes.

Check out the full list [Examiner.com]

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Trogdor Will Burninate in Final Strong Bad Game

From Wired.com’s blog:

“And the Trogdor comes in the niiiiiiiiight!

“By “Trogdor,” we mean Trogdor the Burninator, the peasant-stomping dragon from web cartoon Homestar Runner. And by “night” we mean the fifth and final chapter of Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People, the episodic series of adventure games for PC and Wii.

“Developer Telltale Games gave Wired.com these exclusive screenshots, which show Trogdor starring in the final Strong Bad game. Gaze upon them and witness Trogdor’s stick-legged might, now in three glorious dimensions. Imagine all the peasants he will “burninate” with his 3-D flames.”

You can read the whole article here [Wired.com]

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Homemade MAME cabinet with X-Arcade

We found a nice MAME cabinet made by one of our X-Arcade fans. KeWLMoNK from kewlmonk.com built his cabinet from pre-cut parts, an X-Arcade Tankstick and a television. The entire building process took a total of 4 days and rewards consisted of a round of some good ol’ Street Fighter 2. of Check out some of pictures:

Continue reading...

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