Computer Video Games Championships

[Russ J]

I finally caught up with a very good friend of mine from BITD called
Michael.Last time I saw him was some 23 years ago.He was one of our
'Arcade Gang' of mates and was very good on numerous arcade games
ie....Starwars,Robocop,Super Sprint just to name a few...

Anyway
we got talking and the memories came flooding back from 'our time' in
the arcades in the 80's and I found out that he has a higher score than
me on Starwars (69.000.000+) he told me

I didn't think his high score was that high tbh...

Anyway
we got to talking about the time he went to the Computer And Video
Games Arcade Championships that he entered (I had mentioned this in my
'Starwars Score' thread on J+ but wasn't too sure on what year he entered) it
was the 1984 championships and the first prize was a Hunchback cocktail
cab.He didn't win but he got some type of handheld pinball game (to
which he broke several months later apparently

...

Anyway
he did remember that he got a certificate to certify that he got to the
finals of the competition and he was sure he still had the certificate
somewhere...so off he went looking for the certificate (it was only days
earlier that he'd seen it and put it to one side for me to look
at)...He found it after a few minutes so I took a photo of it,

Not
sure if anyone on here entered the same year ? (I no Jon mentioned
something my my Starwars Score thread on J+ that he entered his PACMAN score
but was too late for 83' but not sure if he entered for 84' ?

Michael
entered with his 69 Million score on Starwars and he did say that they
only had 10 mins or so to get as many points on their 'entered' game as
possible....

 

[Nintendo Arcade]

That's a great story and amazing he still has the certificate.
The hunchback cocktail is a great prize I bet he wished he won that

 

[Pacman83]

Great post Russ.

They did select my score for Pac Man at the Xenon club, but due to the age of Pac Man at that time (it was 4 years old) and the fact that there were so many new games that came out in '83 & '84, it wasn't selected for the tournament. I believe Dragons Lair ousted Pac Man. Anyway, my Dad would have made it hell for his 15 year old lad to go to London

They really were great gamers BITD. Would have been an honor to compete with them

Pacman832014-07-20 21:46:12

 

[Russ J]

He's not sure who won the Hunchback Alex ?

Julian Rignall was there (he won the 83' championship as far as I no) and he got taken by the C&VG magazine as an 'arcade game' reviewer so my mate said....

@Jon....My mate was 19 at the time so he had no probs going to London (The tournament payed for all travel expenses apparently)...

The guy who entered with the Dragons Lair score was from our arcade as well (Starlight Rooms in Leeds)...when I say 'our arcade' I mean he played in the Starlight but he wasn't part of our 'little gang' so to speak...His name was Michael Chilton if I remember rightly,he was the first to complete Dragons Lair in the Starlight and also Space Ace when the Starlight got that in as well....

He was a little older than the rest of us (at a guess he would have been in his mid-late 20's)
Russ J2014-07-21 21:12:40

 

[IDCHAPPY]

Fantastic stuff

 

[noXwing]

I was in that Star Wars heat as well, after Micheal's beat my score I remember he apologised in person. Finished 3/4 in the heat, my certificate is up in the loft somewhere, also got an Electric Dreams LP at end of tournament.

Initially the time allocation was 3 minutes, though this was bumped to 4 minutes because of complaints by some of the players of the very short time, this helped for Star Wars as it was roughly 2 minutes a wave.

The other 3 games for the heats were:

Gyruss - this was the previous year final playoff machine.

Dragon's Lair - as mentioned in previous post.

Track & Field - glad I wasn't on this machine, it was one of these Track & Field machines you had to hit the buttons with a hammer to get some movement.

The Final playoff machine was Flicky.

Remember the host Jools Holland comment about the meal - no bad words though it was very colourful.