Phoenix gets Retro with Zap! Vintage Video Games

Posted by Jonathan McNamara at 3:39 AM Jun 17, 2008

By PJ Standlee, Phoenix New Times

Gamers seeking digital camaraderie and elbow-rubbing competition have a place to call their own. Located at the historical McCullough-Price House opposite the southwest corner of Chandler Fashion Mall in Phoenix, AZ, the "ZAP! Vintage Video Games" exhibition welcomes gamers of all ages to come in and pick up the joysticks of challenge and test their skills on some of the oldest and most beguiling games ever created.

Atari 2600: The archaic Atari 2600 entombed in glass as a reminder of gaming’s humble beginnings.

Guests can try out games from the archaic Atari 2600 game console on a vintage 1980s TV or practice their rapid-fire fingers on arcade classics such as Centipede. If classic games aren’t your thing, current generation home consoles such as the X-Box 360 are also available to play — all for free from June 14 to September 6.

Best of all, players with more ambition may also compete head-to-head at the ZAP! Vintage Game Tournament, which will be held on June 19 from 2 to 5 p.m. for youths; then on June 20 from 1 to 4 p.m. for teens; and finally on June 21 from 3 to 6 p.m. for adults.

Admission to the tournament is also free but with a limited number of spots, so first come, first served. Players will have a five-minute warm-up round and then head off to compete using the Atari Flashback 2 system, which will use an undisclosed range of Atari games. After banging on the controllers for two and a half hours, the top three players will advance to a championship round. Prizes and honors are up for grabs to the vintage gaming king.

Ms. Pac-Man Whores it Up

Posted by Chris Ward at 12:12 PM Apr 09, 2008

A friend of mine passed this along to me some years back and, just like the Monkey's Paw, I can't get rid of it. Over countless moves across the country, it keeps popping up somewhere in my house. More smut after the jump....

Joysticks: The Greatest Video Game Movie You Never Saw

Posted by Chris Ward at 8:44 AM Apr 03, 2008

So I watched "Joysticks" again over the weekend, and I think this movie deserves a hell of a lot more cult status among gamers then it actually has. The fact that it's on DVD is nothing short of a black magic dealing with Pan, the Goat God. The fact that it's supposedly "Digitally Re-Mastered" is something that makes sense only to the fully conscious beings like the Star Child from 2001: A Space Odyssey.
If you are a serious gamer, there is NO REASON not to own this movie, to hear its theme songs ("Totally Awesome Video Games" and "Totally Awesome Video Games (feat. T-Pain and Fu Schnickens)" and to see Joe Don Baker phone it in even more than his appearance in "Mitchell."There are 35 for 7 bucks on Amazon, for Christ's sake. Here are just a couple reasons this is a must watch, as if an 80s sex comedy cashing in on video games, with an hour and a half of thinly veiled dick jokes weren't enough.