Infinite Lives

Hi, mom. Hi! It’s me! Yeah, hi!

What? No, I haven’t taken the GRE yet. Hang on, hey, I was calling to tell you—hmm? My driver’s license? Um, nuh-uh, I didn’t renew it. But I—huh? Well, I mean, probably. No, I mean, I’ll get the oil changed, I think I can do that for twenty bucks at the Car-X. What? Yes, we are. No. Yes. Yes. Probably a movie or something. No, I think I’ve actually stopped losing weight. What? Well, ramen and granola, mostly. OK. OK. OK. I don’t think so? OK.

Hey, I was actually phoning to tell you about my article in the magazine. What? No, my article. Well, the magazine is called Kill Screen—uh, no, it’s a video game magazine, I guess “kill screen” is like a video game, uh, term.

But it’s Kill Screen, issue number one, the “No Fun Issue,” and my column is about gender and sex and sexism and uh genderism, and the magazine is twenty dollars. What? No, I get one copy. No, I just get the one copy of it. No. No, I’m keeping my copy. You have to buy your own copy. No. No. Yes. Hmm? Well, even though you can kind of already read my piece online for free, you know, the magazine is published like quarterly, and it’s ad-free and glossy and ninety-six pages long, so since this is a really nice magazine or whatever, like, I couldn’t just publish the old version of the column. So I added a lot to the original piece and we all workshopped it, and so it’s like a really different article now, in some ways, but I think in good ways.

Anyway, I guess that’s all. OK. OK. I will. Mhm. Yes. OK. I will. I will. OK! Talk to you later. OK. OK. Talk to you later. Bye! OK. OK, bye! Yes. I will. Bye!

• Kill Screen Magazine – Issue One: The No Fun Issue

Beacon, New York’s Retro Arcade Museum opened its doors late last month. There, and for just $10 an hour, visitors can play curator Fred Bobrow’s collection of vintage pinball and arcade cabinets from the 50s, 60s, and 70s.

I suspect the handheld collection isn’t playable—as it’s behind glass—but, uh, it never hurts to ask?

• Flickr – RETRO ARCADE MUSEUM via Retro Thing

They told him, “Don’t you ever come around here,
“Unless you’re really good at Soul Calibeer”
There’s Frogger in their eyes
And Crystal Castles in their leers
So beat it, just beat it

This April, Michael Jackson will auction his arcade collection, including Frogger, Soul Calibeeer, and an old Zoltar machine. Zoltar, you guys.

Check out the Julien’s catalogue—either MJ doesn’t own a Moonwalker, or he ain’t sellin’ it.

• Siliconera – What Arcade Games Did Michael Jackson Own?

That sound you hear? It’s the whooshing of Chris Kohler’s envy.

This image I purloined from Game|Life, which conveniently doubles as an illustration of how my intestines feel today, is a screenshot from Alien Crush Returns. The Virtual Console revival of Alien Crush—that is, the original TurboGrafx pinball game from 1988—apparently generated enough interest (and revenue!) that Hudson released this spectacular graphical update of Alien Crush todayish on WiiWare. Well, in Japan.

But Chris Kohler isn’t one for geographic circumscription, so you can bet your bottom dollar he’s already played Alien Crush Returns. His early impressions? ”[It’s] pretty nifty,” he writes.

The game is played with the trigger buttons on the Wii’s nunchuck and remote, and Chris notes that the lack of Classic Controller support “is kind of disappointing—it’s a bit tiring to have to use your index fingers the entire time instead of your thumbs.”

Chris promises a full review later, so keep watch.

• Game|Life – Impressions: Alien Crush Returns, Hooray

This weekend, we made it out to San Jose—barely—for this year’s California Extreme, the classic arcade expo. Parkside Hall was crammed with video arcade and pinball machines spanning decades, including some contemporary machines (The Act, anybody?).

Set to the music of the New Pornographers, this shaky-hand footage is from Saturday, July 19.