Hello Hello! Just wanted to put out an interest check for an idea I had. This would be a “Retro Game of the month club” for anybody who is interested. The idea started when I challenged a friend of mine to Battle Garegga to see who could get the furthest in a week. He and I have similar interests in shmups and classic arcade games. So I thought it would be fun if we could find a group of other people who would be interested in competing, comparing notes, just chatting about the games in general.
The types of games we will be playing:
Arcade Shmups (via MAME)
Examples include: Dodonpachi, Battle Garegga, R-Type Leo
Arcade Platformers (via MAME)
Exaples: Wardner, Chelnov, Contra
Console games (Anything that can be emulated fullspeed is fair game, from Atari 2600 thru Playstation 1)
PC Games (Preferably multiplatform, or at least ones that function in Wine)
If console/PC games are played, preferably they will have “arcade sensibilities”… i.e. Challenging, action based… No RPGs or anything that takes too long to play. Something you can sit down and enjoy in 1 sitting. And then play again to see if you can get further than the last time 
Why will we do it?
For fun! For a more in depth history, check out this article about “arcade culture”… While I don’t agree with everything he says (especially dislike his condescending tone), it is still a great read and kind of “gets you in the spirit” of arcade games.
Also of note: Players in this club will most likely be “average human beings”, and not “Japanese Robots”. (Japanese Robots is my endearing term for players who can beat really difficult shmups with 1 credit blindfolded with their arms tied behind their back)… So typically instead of limiting our games to 1 credit, we would limit to 3 credits which is a much more attainable goal.
While Japanese Robots will certainly not be excluded from the club, if one does happen to join, it would be assumed that they would get 1st place on all the games, and the “real” first place would actually be 2nd place. See?
Prerequesites:
- Go play Dodonpachi if you have never played it before. No, really, go play it. You will like it. Trust me.
- MAME. Make sure your ROM versions match your MAME version, otherwise the games will probably give a “missing files” error.
- Console emulators
So how will this work? For about 1 week every month, we will play a game and compete against each other in a predetermined goal. Goals could be:
- Getting the furthest in the game
- High Score
- Fastest time
- Etc
How will games be selected?
Everybody can suggest 1 game that they would like to play for the upcoming round, and we will vote on the games. The game with the highest votes will be the next month’s game.
So… Chime in if you’re interested and we’ll get this thing kicked off in a week or two. The game for this first official round has already been selected and is called “Wardner” for Arcade (MAME). More details to come once we get started!
Well, that is why I check these things first. Guess it will just be me and my friend for now. But if anybody else is interested, don’t hesitate to post here or send me a PM. Even one or two more players would be great 