FunSpot Classic Arcade and Pinball Tournament May 29th-June1st

[Moon Jump]

Hey guys. I spoke to a couple of you about FunSpot when I was at the NAVA meet up yesterday.

If you've seen King of Kong, then you might know what FunSpot already is. Up in New Hampshire they have a whole floor dedicated to arcade and pinball games from the 70's-80's. (Sorry to all you younger guys and gals, not many selections from the 90's and fighting games too)

The tournament is going to be taking place May 29th to June 1st. The whole area is chock full of stuff to do, other then FunSpot. They have a drive-in theater, great places to eat, mini-golf and other stuff.

Check out the site at www.funspotnh.com to see the list of all the games they have up there. I also have a ton of pictures and videos of the place on my website if you'd like to check it out.

[Overbite]

I attended the first tournament back in 99 (I still got the mug!) and was thinking about attending this one as well.

Hell, I'll probably do it. I don't expect to get a high score but I'll try!

[RetroYoungen]

I wish I was close enough to the place to compete (compete = show up and make a fool out of myself and my inferior gaming skills). Maybe another time, there are a few places I need to visit in my living, gaming years. And FS is one of them.

[Overbite]

I was thinking, I haven't been to this thing in 10 years. What's it like? I read that there will be mystery tournaments and various events during the weekend and that Guinness will be there (the book, not the beer. Though the beer can come too) and record high scores.

When i was in it it was basically everyone playing random games to get a high score and thats it. No events or mini-tournaments. Though I did see Billy Mitchell sit infront of pac-man all day, but I wasn't there when he got the perfect game :(

[2600]

How it was set up last year was:

A selection of games were picked for the tournament and set up in one section of the arcade behind "ropes." This was to keep the games open to people participating in the tournament. The tournament cost I think around 20 something bucks and you got a ton of tokens, a name badge, and an atari classic game comp for the PC. During the tournament you can play any game (or pinball) in the tournament that is open. When you finish and feel you did your best and got a good score, you raise your hand, a score taker comes over and writes down your name and score. You have basically 4 days to play the games chosen for the tournament. Every time you get a better score then your best, or you feel you've done your best you raise your hand and have your score taken down. The games are chosen at random and "mystery" games are picked throughout the four days and announced (Chiller was announced last year).

Guiness will also be there, and a huge turnout is expected due to the whole "King of Kong" thing. It is definitely well worth checking out (Hell, I think entering the tournament got you more tokens then buying them with cash from the machine).

[Overbite]

Ah, that's a lot different then how it used to be but it makes more sense.

But say I was playing 1943 and it wasn't one of the games chosen for the tournament and I happened to get the highest score, would that count or not?

Also with the games being kept secret until the start it's not possible to prepare for it which makes it more fair I guess.

Are enough games chosen so you don't have to wait for an open game? People usually park at one machine for hours trying to get a score.

[WizDawg]

I seriously thinking about going to this!

Can anybody give me the name of the nearest airport/motel or hotel to Funspot?

Thanks!

[Overbite]

The nearest airport is Manchester/Boston airport in Manchester NH. I dunno why they added Boston to the name. That's about an hour and a half away from Funspot.

There are a ton of hotels/motels near it but I can't think of the names. I know there's a motel 8 in Tilton which is pretty close.

[Moon Jump]

The Tilton Super 8 is Press Start's home base when we go up to Funspot.

When we went two weeks ago we used the coupons that you find at the rest stops. Only problem is they aren't good for Friday. So since it was dead, we got our first night online for a good price then the other two days for 35 a piece. It was about 150 for two for the three days we were up there. Just make sure you bring multiple coupons, you can't use one and get two nights with it. Also, if it is crowded, they won't take the coupons, but since we went in the dead of winter, they gladly took them.

2600 and I are going to write up a whole nerds guide to Funspot and put it on our site with all the tricks and tips for getting up there without spending an arm and a leg.

One of the best things is the coupons you can use. Here's one that you can print out, cut and take there with you.

http://www.funspotnh.com/mws-coupon.htm

You just clip it after you print it and boom, 50 free tokens when you spend 20 bucks. It comes out to 11 CENTS a token. I don't know anyplace that'll let you play arcade games for that cheap!

If your going for a world record, or getting close to one, you might be able to yell for a TG ref to watch you play out your game. They are very hardcore about SEEING what you do so you don't cheat. Last year not many records were broken. I was speaking to Mark Alpiger and he said "Yeah, it's a really quite year, last year was nuts, a lot of people going for records"

But as we said, this year is going to be crazy. Since King of Kong, people are coming out of the woodwork to break the high scores. The Galaga high score got destroyed recently and the guy who broke it wore a "Team Weibe" shirt.

I was thinking of having an "End of Summer Get Together" up at FunSpot in August. Not a tournament or anything. Just a weekend to end the summer with a bang. Just have a bunch of people hanging out and playing some classic games then going out, checking the drive in flicks, hitting the beach and all the other cool stuff Weirs Beach has to offer.

Let me know what you think.

[2600]

I know you can set up a camera and tape your gameplay for high scores. I believe you may also be able to ask one of the twin galaxies ref.s to come over and check your score out, though I am not 100% sure how you go about doing this. Also they pick a decent chunk of games and pinball for the tournament. There were only a few times I had to wait to play a game, and those times I simply went to a different machine in the tournament. Everyone was cool and if they noticed you waiting behind them, they would hop off the machine when they were done. Also the random picking does make it fair for everyone, and also keeps it varied. If the tournament was simply, centipede, pac-man, donkey kong, mappy, moon patrol, Q-bert, etc., odds are the machines would be taken up for hours on end by a single player

[Overbite]

Those funspot coupons can usually be found at convience stores in the area. Have stacks on the counter, so if you fill up be sure to look.

Year ago they used to be Buy $20 in tokens get $20 in tokens free which was a great deal but they stopped that. This was back in the late 90s when the place was hoppin and they still got new games in. Now they only get new old games in.

[Moo Cow]

You just clip it after you print it and boom, 50 free tokens when you spend 20 bucks. It comes out to 11 CENTS a token. I don't know anyplace that'll let you play arcade games for that cheap!


I know it's completely off-topic, but there was one place in California that had almost every game set to a nickle or two, with the exception of Virtual On being a quarter. I could never understand how they made money, seeing as how arcades aren't very popular and rent in California is expensive.

[Moon Jump]

Yup, I know what your talking about. Nickel City. I've never heard one good thing about any of those arcades. Everybody would say the machines were beat to hell and they would never fix them. How could you for a nickel?

[Moon Jump]

Just going to bump this up, instead of making a new topic.

2600 and I are planning on going back up to FunSpot in August before the end of summer. I always love checking out more of what Weirs Beach has to offer.

I was thinking of having just a friendly weekend get together for all the folks that wanted to come. Of course, I'm not going to plan it on a Saturday of a NAVA meeting, so it'd either be August 15th-17th or the 22-24th that way it doesn't go against the monthly NAVA meeting.

Let me know what you guys think. If this gets a more positive response, I'll make another thread and we'll try to plan something out.

[Moon Jump]

Bumping this one up to see if anybody else is going next month.

[Overbite]

I'm going to this, who else is?

[Coldguy]

If I get money and time, I will definately join you all.

[rolenta]

Bumping this one up to see if anybody else is going next month.

I'm planning on being there on Saturday (5/31) with my kids. Last year I was invited there along with Ralph Baer. The folks at Funspot went out of their way to make sure we had a good time. They gave each of my two sons a 16 ounce plastic cup full of tokens. So now I'll bring the kids back to use the tokens.

[Carey85]

I would love to be able to go, but travelling a third of the country is a little much. Maybe in the future...

[Moon Jump]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v98/Yuckmud/mariobump.gif

It's this weekend baby! Can't wait for it. My friend's gotta job interview up in New Hampshire on Thursday, so we're heading up there Wednesday night and we should be at FunSpot Thursday afternoon.

Looking forward to checking out the "new" games they got in as well as checking out the summer expansion they just finished. Plus the Drive-In is doing a double feature of Indy and Iron Man!

Hope to see you folks down there! Be sure to say hello if you see me!

[Overbite]

I will but i dont know what you look like!

I can't wait to see what new games they got as well. I wonder if they have them now, I can run down and look.

I'll be there all 4 days, though I don't know if I feel like staying there from open to close. I'd get sick of it fast. But I will be there every day for hours!

[Moon Jump]

http://www.youtube.com/user/PressStartComic

That's me, if you see me. My name's Nick.

[Overbite]

I was there for around 4 hours today. I woke up with a cold so I wan't doing my best and I felt like crap so I left early. I didn't see you there, but I was wearing a shirt that said BORING on it if you saw me. Hope I feel better tomorrow so I can do better at Xenon.

Also I was dissapointed in the games chosen for the tournament. Not only are they not fun, but I suck at them!

[Overbite]

I stayed home today (friday) because my cold isn't better. I have a lot of tokens left and I intend on using them!! I will show up sat and sun

[Overbite]

TRIP REPORT woot


holy crap there were a lot of people. I saw the vids you took of last years tournament and it looked slow but this year was packed.

I went and got a cold so I was sick the entire time so I only went for 2-3 hours on sat and sun. I wasn't playing my best :(

I got to see people playing really well at these games. I enjoyed the sound of all those old games mixed with 80's music and people shouting out DAMMIT and SHIT when they died. Which happened a lot. I spent most of my time playing the Xenon pinball machine. It had a score of over 5 million on it but I could only get to 300k. And the ball kept getting stuck at the beginning of the tunnel so I had to tilt the machine to get it out of there.

I did see you once but I was playing a game at the time and when I was done you were gone. I'm suprised I didn't run into you more but there were a ton of people there so it was hard to find someone in that crowd.

I had fun, and I still have tokens left!

edit: I hope you took pictures/video because I didn't.

[kgagne]

edit: I hope you took pictures/video because I didn't.

I did! They're not very significant though. Here they are:

Funspot's Champions of Classic Arcades (http://www.gamebits.net/2008/06/02/funspot-tournament-x/)

This was my first time attending the tournament. I've been to Funspot four times in the last two years. I practically grew up there then fell off the face of the Earth for a decade. I'm glad to be back!

[Moon Jump]

http://s155.photobucket.com/albums/s320/PressStartComic/FunSpot%20X/

Good times had by all, but my friend Gerard lost one of his Mini-DV tapes and his TG Record book so hopefully somebody returned them.

We do have some video so we'll try to make the most of it.

I think they said over 150 people entered the tournament, which is insane compared to last year. I was right about people coming out of the woodwork after King of Kong.

[kgagne]

That's an awesome photo gallery -- thanks! I've linked to it from my blog (see above), with a hat tip back to this thread.

[Overbite]

Triforce is a pimp with that powerglove, NES hat and NES jacket. I didn't know he was Triforce though, but I knew that he was there because I heard Mark Alpiger talking to him in another aisle. Wasn't he the first one in the US to get a Wii?

And he's the one who kept beating my Contra scores.