[game_preservation] Fwd: [Media] Article
Devin Monnens
dmonnens at gmail.com
Mon Feb 4 17:33:28 EST 2013
Here's my notes on common arguments made for the crash of the arcades:
-Too many arcades = too much competition
Giant arcades needed lots of clientele to stay in business
First ones to shut down when business slacked
-Too many street vendors – one or two machines in locations where they
shouldn’t have been
Chinese restaurants, groceries, etc.
Machines sold on credit; the buyers couldn’t pay back
(you can make some connections with the housing
crash – selling houses to people who couldn’t afford them and then not
being able to recoup costs)
When machines reclaimed, they couldn’t be resold, so put in
dumps
-Competition from home consoles (probably not true)
Usually cited as an answer (but how much sense does it make
logically?)
Argument goes that players would buy the home console version
and thus not go to the arcades; however, the arcade version would usually
come out first and was cheaper than buying a $50 cartridge
-Games got too hard (Eugene Jarvis’s explanation)
Games became too difficult because hardcore players would
easily master them
As a result, games were too challenging for casual players who
spent the most money
There were some quality games produced in 1983 and 1984:
Dragon’s Lair (although laserdisc were too expensive to maintain)
Star Wars
Gyruss
I, Robot
Mario Bros.
Spy Hunter
Paper Boy
1942
Punch-Out!
It’s funny to note that Tristan Donovan says Donkey Kong 3 didn’t sell very
well, when by all accounts I’ve read, it seems like it just wasn’t that
great a game to begin with – hence why it didn’t sell! (It also wasn't
designed by Miyamoto, which is probably why.)
Incidentally, if you look at the timeline on arcade-history, there were
over 300 arcade machines made in 1982, 1983, and 1984. (362 in 1982, which
was the height). Note some of these are duplicate machines.
http://www.arcade-history.com/index.php?page=timeline
On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 4:11 PM, Martin Goldberg <wgungfu at gmail.com> wrote:
> Keep in mind though, the coin-op industry is separate from the consumer
> industry. Different market, different clientele, different model, different
> resources, etc. The famous "videogame crash" was a consumer industry crash,
> there was no single "video game industry" back then. Coin was just
> bottoming on it's own industry crash when consumer's started and was on
> it's way back up when consumer was approaching it's worst.
>
>
> On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 12:30 PM, Devin Monnens <dmonnens at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I've got some knowledge of it since we teach the videogame crash.
>> However, I think it's mostly information that everyone here would probably
>> know (at least if they've looked in detail at Steve Kent's and Tristan
>> Donovan's books).
>>
>> Pretty sure there's some guys from the arcade museum on here - they would
>> be perfect for the interview.
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 1:31 AM, Frank Cifaldi <fcifaldi at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> I'll take it if no one else wants to.
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sun, Feb 3, 2013 at 8:30 PM, Henry E Lowood <lowood at stanford.edu>wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> Guys, I am laid out with a nasty bug, so would somebody else in the
>>>> group like to respond to this information request. It was sent to IGDA
>>>> central.
>>>> Henry
>>>>
>>>> ----- Forwarded Message -----
>>>> From: "Kate Edwards (IGDA)" <kate at igda.org>
>>>> To: lowood at stanford.edu
>>>> Cc: "James Baldwin" <ops at igda.org>
>>>> Sent: Sunday, February 3, 2013 2:03:22 PM
>>>> Subject: Fwd: [Media] Article
>>>>
>>>> Hi Henry,
>>>>
>>>> We received this query from the IGDA website; would you or a colleague
>>>> in the preservation SIG like to respond to this request?
>>>>
>>>> Thank you,
>>>>
>>>> Kate
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>>>> From: < colinctpaulette at gmail.com >
>>>> Date: Sun, Feb 3, 2013 at 12:13 PM
>>>> Subject: [Media] Article
>>>> To: kate at igda.org , ops at igda.org
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Colin Côté-Paulette sent a message using the contact form at
>>>> http://www.igda.org/contact . Hi, I am a student in journalism and i'm
>>>> doing a story on the decline of arcades. It is for the Montreal Campus
>>>> http://montrealcampus.ca/ . It is a francophone journal so i will
>>>> translate the interview. I think that a member of your organisation can be
>>>> a useful and relevant speaker in my article. Thanks a lot!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Kate Edwards
>>>>
>>>> Executive Director
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> International Game Developers Association
>>>> Email: kate at igda.org | Skype: IGDA_ED | Website: igda.org
>>>> Office: +1 856 423 2990 | Mobile: +1 206 849 0103
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> game_preservation mailing list
>>>> game_preservation at igda.org
>>>> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/game_preservation
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Devin Monnens
>> www.deserthat.com
>>
>> The sleep of Reason produces monsters.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> game_preservation mailing list
>> game_preservation at igda.org
>> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/game_preservation
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Marty
>
> _______________________________________________
> game_preservation mailing list
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>
>
--
Devin Monnens
www.deserthat.com
The sleep of Reason produces monsters.
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