Special Report: Twin Galaxies' Video Game Festival

The Old-School Spirit Lives On!

The Twin Galaxies Second Annual Video Game Festival at the Mall of America was a three-day extravaganza for the hardest of core, featuring a 5,000 square-foot arcade. While on the surface it may have seemed like a simple contest, featuring some of the great points-based games of today, below the surface was an education in old-school video gaming subculture that I’ll not soon forget. In fact, in my mind, the “contest” portion of the show was secondary to the other attractions it had to offer.

Relive the Arcade Experience At Home!
It looks like an arcade machine, it feels like an arcade machine, and most importantly, it plays like an arcade machine. For those of you unfamiliar with the Arcade PC, it’s basically a PC housed in a custom arcade cabinet, allowing the player to enjoy 50 of the greatest classic Capcom arcade games. Even better is that the unit is fully capable of playing up to 2,000 games! Here’s the short list: Bionic Commando, Final Fight, Ghosts ‘n Goblins, Strider, Street Fighter II, Tiger Road, and many, many more.

After getting a demonstration from Daniel Zirbes, VP of Technical Services at Global Computer Services, and spending an extensive amount of time with the units, I can personally say that this machine is all I’ve ever wanted in my basement gaming room. The unit comes in a full-size, mid-size, and table model and are priced at $3999, $2999, and $2999 respectively. For exact game listings and great shots and specifications of these dream machines, head on over to Hanaho Games, Inc., the official home for the ArcadePC.

If you can’t really handle spending $3-4k to relive the arcade experience, perhaps $149 is a little more up your alley. For this small fee you can get your hands on the X-Arcade Ultimate Arcade Controller. Good news folks, this is one arcade controller that doesn’t suck. For an additional $20/adaptor, you can use this baby with any next generation console system you desire. The folks that demonstrated this bad-boy sold me on the unit. After a 20-minute whoop-athon with Virtua Fighter 4 (disregard the sign that says “5 Minute Time Limit". I did.), I grabbed this sucker and never looked back. Here’s a picture of me kicking the crap out of some unsuspecting kid. Take that, 11 year-old!

Be sure to head on over to X-Arcade for more killer X-Arcade products, suited for the arcade fanatic.

The Contest
The main attraction of this three-day show was the Console Championships, featuring Sky Gunner, MLB Slugfest 20-03, Red Card Soccer 20-03, and Crazy Taxi 3. The winners of each contest were awarded a $1,000 cash prize, and the top two contestants in the MLB Slugfest 20-03 competition were each awarded a bat or a jersey signed by none other than Alex Rodriguez. Not too shabby.

The contestants lined up in droves for the chance to show their skills and come away with the grand prize, while onlookers watched the action on the giant screens at the front of the festival. The competition was judged by gaming referees who also happen to be some of the biggest names in old-school gaming competitions. Ever want to meet the all time Gorf champion? Well, Todd Rogers was on hand in his black and white-striped referee’s uniform to greet onlookers and crown the next generation of gaming champions.

Video Game Champions
This, to me, was the highlight of the entire weekend. When we at GWX talk about “hardcore” or “die hard” gamers, the folks who put together and ran the Twin Galaxies Video Game Festival are the embodiment of these terms. As I was standing and watching the action, I noticed a few posters hanging up on a wall surrounding the festivities. One of the posters described an event I was familiar with: the Pac Man world record set by Billy Mitchell in 1999. I had heard of this story on the news a couple years back where a man spent six hours and one quarter playing Pac Man until he finally reached the absolute, highest score possible: 3,333,360 points. Mr. Mitchell was then honored at the 1999 Tokyo Game Show as the “Player of the Century” for his accomplishments in gaming. As I finished the article and looked to my left, there he was, the Player of the Century, standing right next to me!

Being the goof that I am, I grabbed my digital camera, ran up to him and asked, “Hey, aren’t you Billy Marshall?”

He responded, “Um…Mitchell.”

Ok, so I didn’t get off to the best start with Mr. Pac Man, but he was a sport and shrugged it off with a smile and shook my hand anyway. Feeling like a moron, I handed him a Gaming World X flyer and introduced myself as the Managing Editor for his new favorite website. He laughed and told me that Walter would probably want to speak to me. Walter? Walter Day, of course, the organizer of the festival, head of Twin Galaxies, and editor of the “Official Video Game & Pinball Book of World Records”. A few minutes passed, and as promised, I was introduced to Walter Day, who in turn introduced me to people that, alarmingly, I had never heard of. People like the aforementioned Todd Rogers and Dwayne Richard; people that Mr. Day assured me were big names and I should be acquainted with. Sure enough, I found that these folks held records for perhaps more old-school arcade games than I had ever even played.



In this group photo, from left to right is GWX Graphics Contributor, Aaron Hilden, Dwayne Richard, Billy Mitchell, Todd Rogers, myself, and Walter Day. Spending just fifteen minutes with these guys redefined the word “Hardcore” in my book. After listening to Todd Rogers explain rabidly for ten minutes how he beat the machine in Dragster, Aaron and I walked away astounded. These are guys that have been pouring their lives into video games for the past 20+ years, and have traveled the world to beat records and display their skills. Heck, Billy Mitchell traveled to Canada on Canada Day just to beat the Pac Man record held by a Canadian! Now that’s hardcore.

Just paging through Walter Day’s book proves that these guys mean business. Back in the day, they formed teams, traveled the globe, appeared on TIME Magazine, LIFE Magazine, “That’s Incredible”, ABC-TV, were visited by Governors, and had parades held in their honor. These guys didn’t just play a few games here and there and then post their inane opinions on some websites’ forums. No sir. They ate, slept, and breathed in the arcades and proved themselves to be experts on the topic.

Most importantly, the book is a trip back to the “Golden Age” of arcades, and a read that will make you long for the glory and atmosphere of the arcades of the early 80’s. I came away from my meeting with Mr. Day and company amazed, amused, and excited. Amazed by their obvious passion and dedication to the industry, amused by the stereotypes they embody in the eyes of the general public, and excited for next month’s Classic Gaming Expo, where I’m sure to see these folks again along with even more who share the same ravenous passion for video gaming.

Make sure you stop by Twin Galaxies for a lesson in gaming history. The company hosts competitions like this one all over the country year round, so there’s a good chance that they’ll be coming to an area near you. Also, Mr. Day’s book, Twin Galaxies’ Official Video Game & Pinball Book of World Records is available for sale on the site. Think you’ve got what it takes to play with the big boys? The book also details the rules and tips on how you can become an official video game world record holder.



In the end, The Twin Galaxies Video Game Festival was highly entertaining and whetted my appetite for next month’s expo. For those of you in the neighborhood of an upcoming Twin Galaxies-sponsored event, make sure you head on out; it’s well worth the effort.

Feature by John Luedtke