Videogame History Museum To Exhibit At E3 2013

The Videogame History Museum team will be on hand to share their exhibit “The History of Videogames” once again at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) on June 11-13, 2013. This exhibit, well over twice the size of last year’s, will include many of the familiar aspects including a timeline represented in games, systems, accessories and memorabilia; a “hands-on” section where attendees can get re-acquainted with the systems from their youth; arcade game cabinets set to free-play; live entertainment featuring 8-Bit Weapon; and classic “living rooms” to experience the joys of 70′s, 80′s and 90′s home console play. There will be new surprises this year as well!

New Classics For Your iPhone/iPod/iPad

Montezuma’s Revenge  - A faithful and fun rendition of one of the all-time great Atari 8-bit computer games. Designed by Jim Pavloff in conjunction with original Montezuma’s creator, Robert Jaeger, this new version features both modern and classic graphic styles to choose from as well as 4 different joystick schemes. There’s even a pause/resume feature so you never lose your progress. Available for $1.99 in the Itunes App Store.

WalZ ArenA - Designed by L4 Games and Mario Perdue, the creator of the award-winning Atari Jaguar game, Breakout 2000. If you love brick-breaking games, you’ll love Walz Arena! This addictive game features 3D targets, power-ups, progressive levels, multi-hit targets, a pulse cannon and much more. Addictive portable fun at its best! Available for $1.99 in the Itunes App Store.

Gearbox Software Presents: A Charitable Celebrity Poker Tournament

To kick off Gearbox Community Day 2012 and the Borderlands 2 Launch party, our generous friends at Gearbox Software are holding a charity poker tournament on Friday, September 14, 2012 at The Palladium in Dallas, TX.

All proceeds from this tournament as well as the various auctions and raffles are earmarked to support the Videogame History Museum. The tournament will be a night to remember loaded with good times, good people, and video game talk. Even if you’re not into poker, stop by for the silent auction and raffles.

For registration and more information regarding the tournament, please visit the Gearbox Software Poker Tournament page.

For more information on Gearbox Community Day 2012 and how to register, please visit the Gearbox Community Day page.

Latest Acquisition: Atari 2600 Store Kiosk

Ever since Museum co-founder Joe Santulli opened his Digital Press Videogames store in 2005, he’s been watching a daily eBay search for store displays. Several years ago, this gorgeous, never-before-assembled Atari Video Games kiosk appeared but was way out of his price range. It was generally considered to be way overpriced by the gaming community (even though Joe wondered how you could figure a price on something so “one of a kind”). It eventually disappeared from eBay and he figured someone with deeper pockets than him had snatched it up.

SEE THE ATARI 2600 KIOSK PHOTO GALLERY

Then, in July 2012, it turned up in Joe’s ebay search again. Definitely the same unit, same location, and now at HALF the price it was originally. Joe was already planning on making some room in his shop as two arcade machines were about to be shipped to Classic Gaming Expo. Was this the time? The seller had a “make offer” option on the item so Joe submitted his best offer which was still well below the asking price. An hour later, the seller called Joe’s shop to make sure he understood that this was brand new, unassembled, local and very heavy. The offer was accepted.

According to Joe: “We had to wait until after Classic Gaming Expo 2012 to get it put together, and it was a lot of fun. I invited some of my local buddies to the store and we made an event out of it: essentially unboxing and assembling something that no one had done in 30 years. It took roughly 2 hours to put together, and we spent an additional 2 hours playing with it.”

The kiosk has a flourescent lighted display for its marquee, and hardwired joysticks and paddles. The sticks are not standard 2600 sticks but rather arcade leaf-switch style controllers. The paddles are amazingly accurate. The display allows for 32 games to be shown along the bottom section and 4 more up top. No television or game console was supplied with the unit, but it wasn’t hard to find a nice matching “old” TV and a heavy-sixer right there in the store. The kiosk also allows for the installation of a pre-programmed board containing 42 games, this also allows you to use the touch-sensitive select and start buttons on the kiosk rather than the system.

As you can see, it was worth the trouble. It is now a centerpiece at the Digital Press Videogames store, where it will remain until the Videogame History Museum finds a permanent location, at which time this kiosk shall follow.

Computer Space Restoration

Many years ago when Classic Gaming Expo was just starting out, our good friend Larry Anderson donated a Computer Space machine to our museum effort. This was a machine that Larry had found in a barn or one of those similar horror stories that you periodically hear about. The machine was in rough shape with the cabinet sun-faded and cracked, and the monitor and other parts occupying several small boxes. We put the machine into our storage unit with the plan of one day restoring it. Well, that day has come! Scott Schreiber from Retrogaming Roundup saw it recently and offered to restore the machine for us. We were skeptical at first, but figured, “What do we have to lose?” We shipped the machine to Scott and when we received it back shortly before this year’s Classic Gaming Expo, we thought Scott had shipped us a different machine because there was no way our old machine could look this good.

 SEE THE RESTORATION PROCESS IN THIS PHOTO GALLERY 

The Retrogaming Roundup guys are huge supporters of CGE and the Museum so when you get a chance, drop by and tell Scott “Nice job!”

Legendary Game Designer David Crane Launches Kickstarter Project for Jungle Adventure

Legendary game designer David Crane has turned to Kickstarter to launch his new studio and his next jungle adventure game. 30 years after the release of Pitfall for the Atari 2600, David is ready to tackle his next big adventure but this time, you the player, get to come along for the ride! David’s innovative funding method will allow his supporters to help shape the game into the next-gen hit that they want to play. In addition, Game Trailers will be filming and documenting the development process for all to see.

Reward tiers offer cool prizes such as posters, collectible patches, copies of the finished game, digital soundtrack and art assets, naming rights on in-game treasures and even a lunch with David himself! We’re thrilled that David Crane is offering the community a way to be involved in his next big hit and we’ve already contributed ourselves!

For more information and to contribute, please visit the Jungle Adventure Kickstarter page.

The Year (2012) In Review

Thanks to all of you, it’s been a busy year! For those of you who have missed our appearances since the Kickstarter campaign ended, here’s what we’ve been up to:

1) Our last update mentioned a collection of items in southern California. During that trip, we invested in some storage solutions. Thanks to you, we became more mobile and more organized. In the past, you saw Classic Gaming Expo’s museum unfold in a series of cardboard boxes and random plastic tubs. Now, we can “roll out” with heavy duty bins – many on wheels – which help us get places faster and more efficiently and most importantly protect our valuables.

2) In February 2012, we attended the DICE Summit (www.dicesummit.org) where we exhibited to a much different audience than we are accustomed to, consisting primarily of executive-level industry people. The exhibit included some rare items and a few arcade machines that highlighted the work of Ed Logg, who was given a lifetime achievement award during the event. Our exhibit provided the backdrop for G4TV’s broadcast where we met Gearbox Software’s Randy Pitchford. More on the significance of this in a moment.

3) In April 2012, we exhibited at PAX East (east.paxsite.com) where Videogame History Museum was the sponsor of the “Classic Consoles Freeplay” area. The museum exhibit was a small sampling of what we offer but we also provided 40+ classic game consoles and hundreds of games for attendees to play all weekend.

4) In June 2012, we made our annual appearance at E3 (www.e3expo.com). Graciously sponsored by Gearbox Software, our 2500 square foot exhibit was just a stone’s throw from Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony in the West Hall. With the additional space and new storage options we were able to exhibit in 4 massive glass display cases and still had plenty of room for our signature “classic 80′s living room”, console timeline, and freeplay area. Tens of thousands of attendees visited with us and among other accolades, the exhibit was named “best of show” by The Seattle Times.

5) In August 2012, we hosted Classic Gaming Expo (www.cgexpo.com) in Vegas. This is our 13th year doing the show, and it is here where we currently put on the largest museum exhibit. Over 7000 square feet were dedicated to the museum alone, and this does not include arcade machines or console freeplay. Many new items were exhibited this year thanks to a cross-country effort to move some of the east coast collectibles into permanent storage out west.

6) In September 2012, Gearbox Software will host a Community Day surrounding the release of Borderlands 2. During the weekend, a celebrity Poker Tournament for charity will be conducted, with all proceeds going to The Videogame History Museum (http://www.gearboxsoftware.com/poker). We are very excited to be partnering with Gearbox, they have been a tremendous supporter.

There’s quite a lot more going on that we hope to reveal by the end of this year. It’s exciting stuff!

We’re still a pretty small team and trying to keep expenses down. We’ve used the Kickstarter funds sparingly and we believe productively so as well. Our next task is to update our website so we can provide timely updates and photo galleries on our own home site going forward. Stay tuned because you will see this site re-launch in the next few weeks, providing all kinds of updates and photos as we march towards our goal of a permanent home for the museum. In the meantime, you can see photos of this past years’ events on our Facebook page.

Thanks to all of you once again and please follow us on Facebook, Twitter, or the soon-to-be-relaunched website www.vghmuseum.org, as this will be our FINAL transmission here on Kickstarter.

John, Sean & Joe
Videogame History Museum

Classic Gaming Founders Launch Videogame History Museum

July 25, 2011 – John Hardie, Sean Kelly, and Joe Santulli, organizers of the annual Classic Gaming Expo, have launched the Videogame History Museum – a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity dedicated to preserving and archiving the history of the video game industry. Currently the group is seeking initial working capital using the unique crowd funding business plan offered through their project on the Kickstarter web site.The initial goal is to raise $30,000 to help finance additional fundraising activities and also to better mobilize the museum’s collections for exhibit at various industry trade shows.

The enormous success of their display at the recent E3 trade show was evident as they garnered several “Best of Show” nominations from the gaming press along with positive testimonials from show-goers. “The videogame industry is double the size of the music industry and while there are several music “halls of fame” and museums, there isn’t a single dedicated, all-inclusive videogame museum”, said Joe Santulli. “We’re taking the necessary steps toward creating a physical museum, research facility, and reference library to honor and archive the history, hardware, software, events and people of this industry.”

Get the full PDF press release HERE

Find us on Facebook to keep up to date on events and view photos from past exhibits.