only about another month until the 2015 NW Pinball and Arcade show on the weekend of June 5-7! Apparently this bad boy will be making its debut there….very, very cool!

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Thanks to Ed Fries, I got to play a real Computer Space tonight! Ed bought a Time2000 backbox from me (backbox for a vintage Atari pinball that I had around, it had been intended for a wall decoration for a gameroom that is likely to never get built out in that way, so decided to sell the BB. Ed bought my Atari Space Riders pinball some time ago). So I took the BB out to his house tonight, and in the arcade he recently built near his house in a separate building – lo and behold, a 1971 Computer Space resides.

Here’s the story of his Computer Space. And here’s some history links on the game itself:

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=7381 – KLOV
http://www.pinrepair.com/arcade/cspace.htm – Pinrepair.com
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Space – Wikipedia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nhdu2Jh9cuc – The Dot Eaters (video)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esp24NI9ixs – Computer Space making a cameo in the early 70s dystopian Soylent Green

I got to play one of these a few years ago at California Extreme, along with another extremely early Atari game – Space Race – but i honestly don’t remember the gameplay. It was very cool to *attempt* to play this – the controls look at first glance similar to the much later Asteroids (button to thrust, button to fire, two buttons to rotate the ship left and right) but the layout is effectively a mirror image of Asteroids, so hard to figure it out without practice.

One of the things I really like about this game – besides its age and heritage from the dawn of videogames – is simply that it represents a dream. When you look at that wild fiberglass cabinet, you know someone was thinking of science fiction when they designed it. They were thinking of inspiration and imagination, dreams of spaceships and exploration that wasn’t far removed from the Apollo 11 landing only a few years before – dreams that we still have in other forms, but to me, not quite the same, perhaps even a bit more cynical these days.

But when Computer Space came out, it was still at the dawn of solid state hitting both US industry far more broadly as well as the nascent consumer market not long after. For two kids at the local Sunshine Pizza Exchange in Oregon (and the far bigger, always extremely fun arcade down at Seaside, OR) the question was always “Can I have a quarter?” and “can I have another?”….

Thanks, Ed.

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It would have been really interesting (and more than a bit eye-opening if you know much Atari lore) to watch this guy in action over the first half of the 70s….

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I had a buddy in high school that was really into them but I never got there. May have to check this out though….?

The Residents thrive on odd mix of fame and obscurity

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Came across this video from Jim Henson’s memorial tonight on YT – very hard to believe he’s been gone for 24+ years(?) and yet his star has anything but diminished. Would that the rest of us had such a positive and uplifting effect on the world while doing it with humor and grace, while not being afraid to be zany and weird when the mood suited. This video really captures the essence of Jim Henson – enjoy and be inspired.

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So Amazon is trying to get on the ‘online studio/streaming’ bandwagon with a number of new pilots – most of which I haven’t paid attention to, but The Man in the High Castle is of particular interest, given that it’s based on a PKD book, one for which he won the Hugo back in the 60’s.

This the story of an alternate history where the Axis won WWI and divided up the world (specifically the USA for the plot of the book) between them. The story flips between the East Coast (dominated by Nazis), West Coast (run by the Japanese) and a central ‘neutral zone’ (I think it was called the Colorado Free State in the booK).

After some stupid tech issues, I finally got the video to run – the first episode is free, although it does make you log in with your Amazon account. Not sure if they are doing a miniseries (like the initial return of BSG was before it became a full-on series) or trying to extend the original story beyond that of the novel, but it’s an interesting start, and well-made so far. I liked the several Seattle ‘architectural cameos’ in it – nice touch, Bezos – and I liked that the actors aren’t big names – for a series like this, I think that in many ways detracts from the story, especially with an ensemble cast.

Definitely interested to see more – although now I may need to take a spin back through the original book too, as it’s been so long since I read it. Hoping they do this justice like A Scanner Darkly, Minority Report or Blade Runner – and NOT like the recent adaptations of The Hobbit (for which JRR T must be doing backflips in his grave about now) but time will tell….here’s a clip:

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Calculating the cost of Calvin and Hobbes’ shenanigans

Actual ‘study’ link here.

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8,000 Glowing Balloons Recreate the Berlin Wall

As Germany celebrates this, an amazing art installation is in Berlin. Wish I could get there to see it – i’ve been there twice, once in 1987 (before it fell) and once in 1992 (right after). Very strange on the second visit how it had immediately changed and the desolation at the center of the city between the two sectors – i’m sure much, much more has changed since …. Such a cool city – can’t wait to go back again….!

Enjoy and congrats, Germany.

LICHTGRENZE from Fall of the Wall 25 on Vimeo.

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A very funny woman has passed away. Rest In Peace.

and one of the best all-time SNL sketches, with Jan right in the middle as ‘Sine-Aid O’Connor’ 🙂

The Sinatra Group

RIP.

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