tankgunnerOIF1 Wrote: @ ACAM Got any extra flyers for my gameroom?

Let me look around. Will you be there tomorrow?

Rob Ross Wrote: Ah, yes. I did mention doing those things to improve the atmosphere of the ACAM tourneys. Wow! Amazing that other people/events do stuff to create excitement.

Rob:

ACAM is a Museum. It is located inside of a family entertainment center. I think is goes without saying that because of the environment, it is not appropriate to have running announcements or someone yelling into a microphone constantly making racket. There needs to be a sense of decorum, and when people violate that, we do something about it.

Our tournament competitors have made it clear: They don't like noise. They don't like disturbances. They don't like being videotaped while playing. They don't like camera flashes reflecting off of the monitors into their eyes. They don't like that people try to push strollers with crying babies through the tournament area. They don't like self-appointed advocates thinking they speak on behalf of the gamers. All of these things players do not like is because they are distractions that break their focus during competition. How do we know this? Because we talk with players and we listen to what they say. We take that feedback and act on it. EVERYTHING we do during competitions is a direct result of 14 YEARS of player feedback.

I know you like to think we don't listen, but trust me, you are in a very small minority in your opinion. You may not like to hear that, but it is a fact.

I don't get exactly who we need to "improve the atmosphere" for. If ninety-nine competitors want to minimize outbursts and distractions & you are the only one who thinks we should be making pointless noise, who do you think we are going to listen to?

In short, the overwhelming majority of our competitors have told us that they don't want what you want. If you insist on getting something that we will not do because our competitors don't want us to, then perhaps our facility and events aren't for you. I wish you well in finding what you want.

PacWhiz Wrote: I don't know about that Mike, whose concept was the Frog-Off that was held in Challenge Arcade, PA, in September 2008 (also with Pat & Don)?

Hey Aart. Great to hear from you. When are you coming to ACAM again? We miss you! :)

The thing at Challenge Arcade was something completely different, and it was not called the Frog-Off. That was never a head-to-head competition involving multiple players. It was an attempt by one player (Donald) to go for the "Costanza" score. Pat was not involved. He may have been there, but I know for a fact he did not play. He told me so himself.

Our Frog-Off was a direct result of Gary Vincent & I speaking with Pat and Donald about how fun it would be to have multiple people trying to break a record on the same game at the same time. They agreed, & the rest is history.

I really had to dig to find this, but here is the press release detailing the Challenge Arcade event.

http://arcadeheroes.com/2009/06/20/a-challenge-towards-the-george-castanza-frogger-high-score-happening-now/

Anyway Aart, please try to come back to the ACAM tournament next year. It is always nice having you visit.

Stulir:

This is gonna cause huge backlash, but meh, its my opinion, you brought it up and I have a right to a rebuttal so here we go:

When you say "they" don't like, "they" don't like, we all know you are talking about the upper elite players (all 10 of them) whom the ACAM tourney is really run by/catered to.
Hell, THEY even get to test the games before the tourney begins.

Funny how the top DK players (Billy, Hank, Wiebe, Howard, Falls, etc) can handle being taped, flashes going off, an emcee on the microphone and loud music, but the poor ACAM players can't deal with it. Oh, my heart goes out to them.

Us lower players (and I hope some come on here to back me up -- $50 to each one of you who does) would like the ACAM tourney to be less boring, cost less, to have a better physical setup with more room to move/play, have gameplay monitors and maybe one camera streaming across the interwebz. We all sit outside during the tourney talking about our ideas to improve the event.

And your argument about the place being family friendly is weak. For the most part you only see us uber nerds on the 3rd floor during the tourney. The families are downstairs.

Plus, don't try to minimize this by saying I'm the ONLY one complaining. Again, there is a group of us (at least a dozen people -- who could all use $50 I bet) who aren't all rainbows and kitty cats happy with the ACAM event for the money you ask us to fork over. Don't get me wrong....some people work hard on the event, the volunteers are awesome folks and overall the weekend is okay. Listen, I've graduated from a university program where I took courses in event management, tournament design, marketing, etc so I'm not just throwing out nonrelevant rants from my butt hole here.

If you think moving 20 machines, creating a database connected by wifi and setting up 6 tables for the scorer's area is what makes for a wicked tournament, then by all means, carry on.

It doesn't take a rocket surgeon to watch videos of ACAM 14 versus other arcade events like the recent Kong Off to discern which one has an electric atmosphere.

I know one guy not getting $50.....and his name is tankgunner.

Rob Ross Wrote: Stulir: This is gonna cause huge backlash, but meh, its my opinion, you brought it up and I have a right to a rebuttal so here we go: When you say "they" don't like, "they" don't like, we all know you are talking about the upper elite players (all 10 of them) whom the ACAM tourney is really run by/catered to. Hell, THEY even get to test the games before the tourney begins. Funny how the top DK players (Billy, Hank, Wiebe, Howard, Falls, etc) can handle being taped, flashes going off, an emcee on the microphone and loud music, but the poor ACAM players can't deal with it. Oh, my heart goes out to them. Us lower players (and I hope some come on here to back me up -- $50 to each one of you who does) would like the ACAM tourney to be less boring, cost less, to have a better physical setup with more room to move/play, have gameplay monitors and maybe one camera streaming across the interwebz. We all sit outside during the tourney talking about our ideas to improve the event. And your argument about the place being family friendly is weak. For the most part you only see us uber nerds on the 3rd floor during the tourney. The families are downstairs. Plus, don't try to minimize this by saying I'm the ONLY one complaining. Again, there is a group of us (at least a dozen people -- who could all use $50 I bet) who aren't all rainbows and kitty cats happy with the ACAM event for the money you ask us to fork over. Don't get me wrong....some people work hard on the event, the volunteers are awesome folks and overall the weekend is okay. Listen, I've graduated from a university program where I took courses in event management, tournament design, marketing, etc so I'm not just throwing out nonrelevant rants from my butt hole here. If you think moving 20 machines, creating a database connected by wifi and setting up 6 tables for the scorer's area is what makes for a wicked tournament, then by all means, carry on. It doesn't take a rocket surgeon to watch videos of ACAM 14 versus other arcade events like the recent Kong Off to discern which one has an electric atmosphere.

I'm not local and I generally don't go to compete but mainly to see my friends and enjoy watching the competition unfold. I treat it more as a vacation and 15 games and 4 days is a lot of work for me on vacation so I play more casually than others during the weekend. However, my thought on the tourney rules, settings, games, etc is that it is ACAM's tourney, I am choosing to participate under their rules. I used to compete in Mark Alpiger's tournaments and compete under his rules. I make suggestions where I think it might warrant consideration in any event but in the end I compete or don't compete under a set of rules put forth by the tournament governing body, if I fundamentally had a difference of opinion about the rules or setup I simply would not attend or compete whatever the case may be. I've often told people that I enjoy playing so much that I'd play on a control panel made of cardboard with "fire" written in sharpie in a circle on the right side. Most things don't bother me and I simply enjoy playing classic games in general and moreso enjoy hanging out with friends and going to the pub. Maybe it's me, but I can't see getting too worked up about anything related to a hobby, just take out of it the most enjoyable parts to you and happiness will follow. IMO.

mpstulir Wrote: Aart, I may have to eat my own words. I have just done some more research and found out that Pat and Donald did play Frogger during the 2008 World Record Weekend at Challenge Arcade......and that you were there. I can't find anything to say this was called "Frog-Off" and I don't recall Pat or Donald telling us that they had done this before. However, I cannot find any evidence that both players were playing simultaneously. Looks like they were alternating between the same machine. That may be why it was not mentioned to us. In any event, if it turns out that I am wrong, I am a big enough man to admit it. Will do some more digging....

hope you have an appetite this morning ;) There were 2 Frogger machines there side-by-side at Challenge Arcade, and I have a pic of Donald and Pat playing at the same time. There was also a TG Poster with a few of the events going on that weekend, that included the following text:

"Frog-Off
Head-to-head showdown between
Donald Hayes (NH) and Pat Laffaye
(CT) for the Frogger, World Record -
and a shot at the fictitious "Seinfeld"
Frogger score of 860,630."

I don't actually have a copy of the poster, but did take a photo of it. I don't know how many games they got in at the same time though, as I remember hearing at least one of the machines was having power supply issues, causing phantom deaths.

I was at the Kong Off II and it was electric atmosphere. I don't know about other events or competitions but I live in Denver and had to be at this event. As a spectator, I really enjoyed the access to the players, the positive vibe all around, and the excitement from announcements to everyone just overall having a good time. It might not be the perfect atmosphere for a serious competition like the aforementioned but I still think it has it's place as well. On Friday ( I was not there ), they had everyone there as a mingle and mixer with drinking and free games. Others I spoke to told me it was a great night before the event even if most were not happy about the early morning start..lol. I hate to see all the bickering and pettiness over something as special as this event. It was just a cool thing to be a part of and I can't wait for next year.

PacWhiz Wrote: Hey there Mike. Yeah sry for the short post, didn't mean to come off like that, just had a headache last couple of days and was remembering World Record Weekend and had to get that short note in there for historical accuracy, hope you understand ;)

Aart, I did not read anything into it. I may not know you as well as some of the other crew that hangs around ACAM, but I do know you are a good guy & I did not take anything negative from your statement.

Let's talk about historical accuracy for a moment. One of my responsibilities on the ACAM BoD is working directly with former game developers and the game publishers. There are a number of reasons for doing this including cooperation with these people on our trade show presence and obtaining sponsorships for the tournament and other work we do at ACAM. However, the main reason for all of this communication is for historical accuracy with the exhibits we have built and the ones that are in development.

Aart, it has been a while since your last trip to ACAM. When you come back, you are going to see that we have been adding large TV's on the walls of the Museum. We are using these TV's for presentations on the history of game development. Our most recent addition was two weeks ago when we mounted a 50" TV on the wall with the Pac-Man games and detailed the history of Pac-Man. There were a lot of people involved with documenting that history including the programmers & designers of Ms. Pac-Man and Jr. Pac-Man. Heck, we even managed to score some video you will see nowhere else of "Crazy Otto" and the never-before-seen "Pac-Woman."

The reason that we go to that degree is because as the Museum of coin-op videogame history, we insist on getting it right. On a personal note, I insist on getting it right as my name is the one attached to that material. This is even more important now since Universities around New England are using us as an educational resource for videogame development programs.

Unlike some other people in this community, I am man enough to admit if I made a mistake or if I am wrong. It would appear I was wrong in this case and I have no problem admitting that. I had no idea this happened in 2008 until your post. That arcade was located less than 45 minutes from my home in Pennsylvania and I had no idea it even existed until 2009. The 2009 press release about Donald was the first I had heard of it.

PacWhiz Wrote: I do miss Funspot its crew and all the gamers and i'm sad that i wasn't able to get over there the last couple of years. I certainly hope to remedy that situation next year, if not in the summer then surely in the winter (i kinda like winter better, oddly). Hope you guys are all doing well!

Tony Temple & Paul Drury were just here last week. It is always nice when people travel so far to see ACAM, and we certainly feel the same when you make the long trek to visit.

I do agree with Rob on some things to make the tournament more interesting, but on many of the things it is difficult as players do not want to be bothered by lights or noise and that's fine.

But one thing I'd throw out there to spice it up a bit, during our trip to Pinball Wizard when we took Rob down there after the Funspot tournament we played Pacman Battle Royale with Sarah and she showed us how the game also broadcasts on the tv while people play.

That would be a interesting way to get people to watch players rather then line up behind them and potentially distract them from their game, people could just watch on a couple of televisions on the wall.

It was also nice to see pinball make its way back into the tournament, so good on that!