What arcade game "Did it" (AKA: Started/Motivated you down the MAME/Refurb path)

[postalp123]

Mine, it was Black Tiger.

Even during those "Drought Years" when I was too focused on building my career, I still thought about that one game until I finally got enough free time to pursue it again via MAME Building.

I swear, every time I load that game up on my Cab, I feel like I'm right back in that bowling alley...

Please, let us know your Fav.

[rlemmon]

teenage mutant ninja turtles, and robocop 

http://klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=&game_id=10052

http://klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=&game_id=9343

[Matth9]

Discs of Tron & CyberBall would be at the top of the heap, but being able to play the many other games I've played and forgotten and the thousands that I've never even heard of... that's just awesome.

[NIVO]

when i saw mr.do, moon patrol and then found you could use a trackball/mouse. Crystal Castles was the icing on the cake.

[monkeybomb]

Mostly the Street fighter series.  But, Moon patrol and jungle king were up there too.

[Hockeyboy]

Two years ago I had no idea anyone could make an arcade-style cabinet that would house literally thousands of arcade games... my best recollections of games were Moon Patrol, Donkey Kong, and Cliff Hanger and Space Ace (never did finish Dragon's Lair and I probably put about $500 in quarters in that damn game!). Oh yeah, trying to memorize patterns for Ms. Pac-Man too...hehe...

Now, today, after buying my first home that is also brand-new, the wife has given her blessings to start such a project. The only rule is it can't look slapped together and I can't go crazy with the money. Fair enough. I told her I'd love to make a devoted Mechwarrior cabinet that you sit in and have blinking lights and controls, but we'll get through a MAME one first and then see.

[ppilot]

This is probably the most generic answer ever, but for me it's Pac-Man.  I remember spending quarter after quarter on that game trying to figure out patterns (now all it takes is a google, but back in 1980?  It took lots of time and money.)  I remember they had a machine at my county fair in the arcade tent, and spending hours playing that thing, people behind me watching in awe (Ohmigod!  He got to the key!  Ohmigod!  The monsters don't even turn blue anymore!)

And you know the best thing?  Those patterns are still in my brain and they still work on my mame cab, after 25 odd years!  That opening music after you press the start button just brings me right back to the fair.

[ArcadeMaze]

X

[releasedtruth]

This will blow you away....  Okay, it won't really. I just wanted to hype it up too much, but for me it was Simpsons/Final Fight/Raiden.   I never really got to play much when I was a kid, just watched other kids play.  "Who's the tough guy now Vinny! sluuurrrp!" -Zoidberg

[johnm160]

I remember when it all started.......

I was in a printshop that a friend owned when a guy came in and asked him to print some side art for his MAME Machine. Ok I feel stupid....what is a MAME Machine?

You mean I could have Donkey Kong, Tempest and Pacman all in my house???

I was a gonner in 15 minutes........that was four years and many $$$ ago.

[koz319]

Definitely Tempest, with Robotron a close second.

Early 80's arcades left a real impression, most of the games I play seem to be from that period.

Koz

[(+_+)]

Robotron (on level 10, 30,000 per free man of course). A game that separates the men from the children. 

[CIA_Guy]

Defender.  Every night after dinner in college, my room mate and I played a couple of games.

Years later, when I got the chance to buy a real Defender, I had to have it.  Only the real thing has that classic "graphics processor overload" when you really get the screen loaded with bad guys!

[postalp123]

Deleted out of stupidity.LOL

[leapinlew]

While Galaga is one of my favorite all time games... the one game I wanted a cabinet for was Gauntlet. I never could have enough money to play that quarter sucking hog at the arcade. The gameplay isn't very strong now, but when it debuted - it had a powerful effect on me.

Now, my machine see's more action playing classics, fighters and party games like World Class Bowling.

[gamecreature]

It was a search for Burgertime that led to my discovery of Mame. It was the need for two joysticks for Robotron and Crazy Climber that led to my building my own controls.

[_) (V) (-)]

Hey guys,

Most of my quarters got spent on Space Invaders and Battle Zone & Asteroids, until the color stuff started coming out. Us kids all talked about how "once we got some money we were going to buy one of these machines for our rooms so we could play them all the time!" Rember: this was BEFORE the Atari 2600 even!

Was also hooked on Vanguard, Donkey Kong and Pac-Man for a while, till they started jackin the patterns and speeding up the ghosts to get more $$$ out of us kids. Also liked Gorf, Defender, Tempest, and Robatron was real cool.  Mostly for that 'on the edge of a siezure' feeling I'd get when the games really got 'interesting'.

I found mame by accident a couple years ago and am still figuring things out in it but know one thing for sure, it just ain't happinin on computer keyboard!

I would say it's them later ones that inspired me to do a cabnet. Just wanted to show em to my kids y'kno?

[desertsand2ktj]

Street Fighter II Championship Edidition.

I bought a working JAMMA cabinet with combatribes in it (sucks) bought a SFII CE edition board on Ebay which didn't end up working.  Now I still want to play the game.

[ddrmanxbxfr]

For the NeoGeo's classic (Metal slug.. Neo Drift Out.. Puzze Bubble..) And old classic like galaga and pacmac.. or mario bros is alway's fun to play 

[NoOne=NBA=]

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[postalp123]

I bought a working JAMMA cabinet with combatribes in it

You did a service to the world that day that you "Retired" Combatribes.

That game was a ripoff.

[ften]

Three part Answer from 3 different portions of my life.

The first time I watched Silver Spoons as a kid I was like why does that bastard Ricky get an arcade, I want one.

Then my goal as a teenager was to one day own a Street Fighters cabinet.

And finally when I saw CmdrTaco, Jubei arcade cabinet a few years ago that was the final straw and I built one.

-FTen

[shardian]

No games...I just have a fascination with buttons. 

Seriously I do, but to tell the truth, it was just the whole arcade experience I wanted to capture into my home. I have always wanted my own arcade game, I didn't care which one or how crappy it was. Having all of them was just icing on the cake.

[Chris]

I'm one of those who "always" wanted one; I remember thinking about building a cabinet around my 2600 when I was a kid, and some company sold videogame shelves that were vaguely cabinet-shaped.

But oddly enough, it was pinball that got me to build a MAME cabinet.

One of my long-term harebrained schemes (again going back to childhood) was to build my own pinball machine, partially just to do it and partially because it would (so I thought) be cheaper than buying a real one.  By now I was already playing MAME on my PC.  I spent months designing circuits for pinball (with my primitive electronics knowledge) as I vaguely became aware of cabinet building.  Finally on the Visual Pinball forums I saw Black's cabinet and the lightbulb went off: I could put all this work into pinball and end up with a machine that could play one game that was sort of like a real pinball, or I could build one MAME cabinet and have a machine that would play hundreds of games almost exactly like the arcade.  A quick peek on eBay revealed a gutted cabinet complete with glasss, coin door and a fully-populated fighter control panel for 40 bucks in Atlanta, only 2 hours away.  It bid up to $61 by the time I got it.

[danny_galaga]

no specific for me, but the last time i played galaxians before mame, was on a cocktail like this pic. so now that i have a cocktail like that, i have a special moment when i put galaxians on. i even make sure i ALWAYS insert a coin in the slot (",)

[johnm160]

Finally on the Visual Pinball forums I saw Black's cabinet and the lightbulb went off:

Pics ? LinK?

[desertsand2ktj]

I bought a working JAMMA cabinet with combatribes in it

You did a service to the world that day that you "Retired" Combatribes.

That game was a ripoff.

And a poor one at that.  I bought the machine for the cabinet more than the game inside.  Combatribes has a few moments..but it's a pretty bad "double dragon" esque ripoff with a very poor story.  Of course the original game in the cabinet was BIO-SHIP Palidin - which was also another very poor ripoof and well not too fun

[leapinlew]

I bought a working JAMMA cabinet with combatribes in it

You did a service to the world that day that you "Retired" Combatribes.

That game was a ripoff.

Ha! Look what I did to my Combatribes cabinet (They converted a Xenophobe! the horror!)

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=55021.0

[Chaos]

The game that started me off was Mike Tyson's Punch-Out. That started me into emulation. From there I found Mame, then onto here to build my own.

What a long strange trip its been.

[postalp123]

I bought a working JAMMA cabinet with combatribes in it

You did a service to the world that day that you "Retired" Combatribes.

That game was a ripoff.

And a poor one at that. Combatribes has a few moments..but it's a pretty bad "double dragon" esque ripoff with a very poor story.

Lets elaborate on how bad a DD ripoff it was, it was "Like DD" in every way except:

• The level was restricted to a non-scolling small area
• The graphics made everyone look "Squarish"
• Your health meter was that rip-off "Numerical" system that drained health even when you werent getting hit just to ensure you pumped more quarters in
• Fun? What's that?

[btoddkelley]

Crazy Climber. I just couldn't play it on a keyboard!

Todd

[Chris]

Crazy Climber. I just couldn't play it on a keyboard!

Heck, I can't play it with joysticks! (Love the game, just suck at it)

[WaRpEd]

Mortal Kombat.
built one from scratch about 4 years ago when I got the PCB cheap.
Still have it and play it.

[Drugstore_Cowboy]

after my Raven Games Supergun died (taking my bootleg SFII Champion Edition with it) back in 1993 I sold/gave away all the PCBs I'd collected.

wasn't until using MAME a few years back I had the chance to replay SFII CE and fell back in love with it,  put together a machine for a mate and seeing how much better it looked compared to using hardware stretch on my PC wanted to do the same for myself.

I have neither the time or money yet so settled for ArcadeVGA + TV

[Extreme8]

A long forgotten and little known game called Radar Scope.
I believe it was Nintendo's first release in the US and many were converted to DK's early on.
I have only seen 3 of 'em in the wild, but one was in the Roller Skating Rink my family owned. It stood along side a Gorf, a Space Invaders, and for a short time a Smokey Joe.

To be 15 again....

[Dervacumen]

Gunfight.  My best friend's dad had a Gunfight machine in their family room.  The day I saw it I vowed I was going to have my own arcade machine.  It's taken a little longer than expected.

[spacies]

Bombjack for me.
I have that game so wired I could play it with my eyes closed.
In the 80s in our own parlour I could play it all day on 1 credit.

[Havoc]

Simpsons & Aliens vs. Predator

[teef two]

Once I found out about Mame my first thought was "Excellent, I can play Twin Cobra"

[MaMeNnO]

Not a particular game made me decide to build a arcade cabinet. When I found out about MAME it took some years before actually started on one. I just wanted the feeling and experience of the old days when playing.

I tried, really tried to explain it to my girlfriend... forget it! 
Maybe someone could write a book: Why men build Arcade cabinets and women bye so much shoes