Wystful Days

Board Games

2011-06-14T15:13:00.000-07:00

Before the internet, LAN parties, and modems, the only way we used to be able to play a cooperative game was to either play sports (boooo!) or play a board game (yay!). It has been about 3 years since I've last played a decent board game (Puerto Rico), but when we were kids, we used to play board games all the time.

The gang of players would include my sister, my brother, my two older cousins, and me. Sometimes, we'd include school friends into the posse as well. The popular games of choice would include Monopoly, Cluedo, Poleconomy, Ratrace, Game of Life, Ulcers, Mad Magazine, Taxi, Postcards (also known as Seaside Frolics, one of the most beautiful games I've ever played) and Saidina (a Monopoly rip-off based on Malaysian towns and streets).

Succeeding in the Game of Life - it's all down to luck.

The earliest board games I remember playing probably started with Fun Fair, Sorry, Ludo and Snakes & Ladders. Most of these games didn't really have much in the way of strategy, just luck with the dice which explains why we progressed on to more 'mature' games as we got older.

Sorry, the game that taught kids about sarcasm.

We used to play board games either at home, at Lake Club's kids' room or the kids' library. Looking back at it now, we were a big bunch of competitive board game nerds, carting them around with us wherever we went. If anything, playing the games probably taught us how to be competitive in a good way, though some of us may still need to learn how to lose gracefully.

Thelega iligin-falagay-malagus fileguyve.
Pictured above, the faces of treachery behind masks of innocence

Monopoly was by far the most popular game we played, which we played with our own interpretation of the rules. Some variations included no purchasing properties on the first round. I think it was supposed to even out the game so that everyone was moving by the time the first property was bought.

Another change to the rule was getting automatic exclusive rights to a colour strip with the first colour property bought. This sped up the process of achieving a monopoly so that we could develop houses and hotels faster. The alternative to that was that we could develop houses and hotels without the need of a monopoly. Then there was the Free Parking Fund where all taxes were placed under the Free Parking square, and the first person to land there would get the accumulated loot.

I think the most exciting version we came up with was the double board figure eight configuration where we collected double the income each time we went past GO. This provided the players with more money, and more properties to buy. As you can tell, with such drastic changes to the game dynamics, the games would last through the night.

I think we even had a version where you could purchase multiple hotels per title and rack up debts.

The last time I played Monopoly with my immediate family, which was before 1999, we had a big blow out about people ganging up on other people, and there were a lot of tantrums thrown around the place, so we've since put that on the Banned At Family Gatherings pile. I think the first time I've ever played Monopoly by the rules was about 4 years ago with friends from Canada and France and I have to say, it's a lot faster by the rules.

The good thing is, we have most of our games stacked up at Mum's place. I think most of the pieces are still there, but we could always get replacements online, or rebuild them from scratch. You can even print your own Monopoly cash if you're short of $1s, $5s, $10s, $20s, $50s, $100s or $500s. The only thing is, I need more players, but hopefully in a few years, the boys will be ready to take me on, otherwise I'll have to get together with my family the next time we meet up. In the meantime, I hear that my nephews are already being trained by my sister for the 2015 Monopoly Royal Rumble. Good luck to them, as I'm teaching my boys strategies on how to play Monopoly well and how to palm loaded dice.

You're never too young to learn to scam.

Bata Slippers

2011-05-19T15:42:00.000-07:00

For most of my childhood in Malaysia, my main casual footwear were Bata slippers. I wore them everywhere, from riding my bike, to the pools, and even as evening wear. I wore them for years too, until I was probably in my mid-teens. They were comfortable, easy to slip on and provide great airflow, which is a great feature in a hot and humid country.

At least my feet were comfortable.

There are a couple of stories about my slippers that I remember. One was an urban myth from my cousin Kris who stated that my extended use of slippers would cause your 2nd toe to extend way beyond your big toe. I can tell you now that if that were true, my feet would look like ET's hands.

Nothing wrong with my toes at all.

The other story revolves around a time when I was supposed to go out to dinner with my extended family. Of course the only thing to wear for such an occasion were my blue & whites. Apparently this wasn't up to the dress code for the restaurant (I can't remember which restaurant it was) at Lake Club, so my grandfather dragged my ass off to the shoe shop at the club, all the while giving me a lecture about my slippers. All I can remember about those shoes were that they weren't terribly comfortable, but they did get me into the restaurant.

To me, the slippers were a symbol of my laid back attitude in life, that life shouldn't be taken so seriously. Fashion should always be comfortable and reflects who you are, and never conformist. Looking back at it now, I still never understood why a kid couldn't just wear slippers into a restaurant. Was it an industrial zone with big blocks of lead falling on people's toes? No. Are my feet so mangled that the mere sight of them caused one to puke? No. Which probably explains why I don't wear a suit to work too. I work better when I'm comfortable and I'm happier when I'm comfortable.

The sad thing is, I can't get them anymore. I've had friends and family scour the various Bata shops in Malaysia to no avail. Apparently they used to be pretty big in India too, sold as Bata Hawaii Chappals, but they've since stop making them there too. I was hoping to pick up a pair for myself, and a set for my kids, so that they too get to train their toes to be able to pick up dropped keys, write letters and peel bananas. There is some hope though. I've been searching the internet for awhile now, and it looks like Bata Kenya still sells them under their Patapata brand. It might take me awhile before I head out that way, so in the mean time, I'll have to make do with whatever I can find.

The Bata Patapata slipper. The only thing missing is the blue Bata logo.

Zeitgeist

2011-05-10T20:53:00.000-07:00

My kids will never get to enjoy Star Wars (later renamed Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope) the way I enjoyed the movie as a kid. The same could be said with regards to Star Trek: The Next Generation, Tron, Ultima 4, Bard's Tale, Dragonlance, Groo The Wanderer and everything else that I enjoyed as a kid. While it is entirely possible to watch every movie I've watched, read every book I've read, and play every game I played, the moment when it meant something during that time is way past.

Where I learnt the meaning of virtue, mantras and avatar.
Would've been easier to pick up a dictionary, but less fun.
Image Source: Wikipedia

I remember talking to friends during our lunch breaks about the Empire Strikes back, and the surprising news that (SPOILER ALERT) Darth Vader was Luke's father. We had endless discussions about the new toys released, we re-enacted lightsaber battles and generally lived the Star Wars experience. My brother, sister and I would collect a Wookie's Bandolier of Star Wars figurines, vehicles, and plush toys. I'd go over to a friend's place and admire his diecast Millennium Falcon, or spend a weekend with my brother destroying our lightsabers.

Man, those lightsabers would've been worth a mint if we hadn't destroyed them.

However, 30 years, 6 movies, endless cartoons, hundreds of books and (SPOILER ALERT) the death of Chewbacca later, Star Wars seems to have lost its appeal to me, and probably kids in general. Sure, I still sit back and watch it once in awhile, but I don't spend hours discussing it like I did when I was a kid (except to try to convince my brother that Lucas didn't have a clue about the whole Star Wars Mythology back in 1977 - *cough* Darth Vader built C3P0 *cough*), and neither will my kids. Sure, they may watch Empire one day, but when Vader tells Luke about being his father, they'll know because that came about in Revenge of the Sith. Actually, they won't know it as I'll never let my kids watch Episodes I-III.

Trade Federation, blockade, taxation, trade routes, blah blah blah...

The same thing goes for watching Tron and The Last Starfighter. Imagine watching Tron before there was CG, that was how mind blowing it was for me. Lightcycles, arcade games, frisbee battles, how awesome was that? The Last Starfighter had some of the best CG space battles ever, like the Death Blossom scene. You look back at those movies now, and it looks like they were rendered with MS Paint. The thing was, they were great movies for me at the time.

Looks like you're watching someone play a computer game on the big screen.

Once upon a time, I played Zork: The Great Underground Empire on my Apple II. I stood outside a White House, I went down dungeons with my lantern (I'm afraid of Grues), and got lost in a game that consisted of a black screen with some words and a prompt. Zork spawned multiple sequels, The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy, and many others by Infocom. The games were marketed as Interactive Fiction, claiming that no graphics processor could beat the human imagination, and comparing them to the graphical games in the 80s, that wasn't a huge claim. By today's standards, I'd think that you'd be hard pressed to convince kids to play them.

Unfortunately for them, it's hard to sell games using your imagination...

compared to a game that leaves nothing to the imagination

The thing is, games get better all the time, have huge development teams, better graphics, online forums, create 2nd lives for people, and have legions of followers. Unfortunately for me, I don't have the time nor the patience to really get stuck into a game for more than a couple of weeks, which is a sad thing.

You're probably saying to yourself now that I must be a sad bastard to lament not having enough time to play games, but you'd be wrong. I'm not lamenting the fact that I don't get to play enough games, I'm lamenting the fact that I won't get to spend as much time playing games with my kids as I would like to. This means that I won't "get" what my kids are going on about, what movies that they're all talking about at school, what's the next big thing that's coming out for Christmas. In short, I'm lamenting about the generation gap that will occur between me and my kids. They will get to experience their own zeitgeist, have their own interests, be moved by other movies, move out and have their own kids. In short, I lament not being able to grow up with them, and that isn't all of it.

The thing is, the older we get, the more we drift apart. Brothers, sisters, parents, cousins and friends, we all slowly drift further apart as our interests and social circles change through the years. Once upon a time, we'd all be watching the same cartoons, hanging out at the same pool, playing with the same toys, going to the same beaches, but now, my family is spread across 5 countries, we all work in completely different fields, we are immersed in a sea of media streams, and it isn't surprising that half the time we haven't a clue what each other's interests are, and end up moaning about work clients, as that's something we can all relate to. Of course, the odd blog helps, but at the end of the day, that lack of real social interaction like talking about any old rubbish, chatting about the inane, and just hanging out on a daily basis means that we'll inevitably drift apart. While that means my kids will never get to grow up with me, while I still can, I'll try my hardest to grow up with them, even if it means having to watch Cricket with them (and I'll be sure that they'll also watch Star Wars with me).

Hopefully by then, they'll have invented Lightsaber Cricket.

The cinematic experience

2011-04-11T02:43:00.000-07:00

Back in the day, going out to watch a movie at a cinema was quite an experience. The screens were big, the popcorn was cheap, and you could run out for a pee halfway through a movie without missing anything.

One of the biggest things that I miss about the movies are the red velvet curtains that would hang from ceiling to floor across the whole length of the screen. I would be sitting in the dark waiting for the show to start when the projector would start to hum, and the waves of fabric would slowly gather up, revealing a new world behind the curtain. The deep red brought a feeling of rich opulence that added to the special experience of going out to watch a movie.


Let's not forget the chilly touch of a ghost in the balcony. (Picture of the Coronet, Notting Hill)

That wasn't the only thing about the theatre experience that I miss. You used to be able to choose if you wanted to watch a movie from the stalls, or up in the balcony seats. I preferred the balcony, especially at the front of the row, as it offered the unobstructed view of the screen. Being a kid, there's nothing worse than trying to peer between people's shoulders to watch a movie. Sitting in the stalls gave others the opportunity to throw things at you. There's nothing worse than getting a chunk of hair cut out because of a stray piece of chewing gum.

Patrick Stewart before the problem with the gum.

I also miss those pre-show cartoons that used to show before the main feature kicked in. They may have only been a few minutes long, but it sure could buy you extra time if you were running late for the movie, and provided a lot more entertainment than all the ads you get bombarded with nowadays. I think the last pre-movie short I saw was Valley of the Stereos by Peter Jackson.

This leads on to movie intermissions. Imagine if you will, watching Avatar (running time 162 minutes) and drinking a large coke. Now imagine what it is like around the 2 hour mark and you're starting to get cold sweats from keeping that litre of coke in your bladder. Don't they know that people have died from bursting bladders? Intermissions used to give the projectionist a chance to swap film reels (yes, physical media) and for the cinemas to sell you more wholesome snacks.

Expensive salty-buttery packing foam

It wasn't all great back in the old days though. The seats were stiff backed forcing you to sit up straight for the whole length of the movie, which in turn annoyed the little boy behind you struggling to see over your head. The seats were also narrowly spaced between the rows so that more people could get squeezed in (just like modern airlines). You either got your toes trod upon, or you were in danger of flipping over the front seats. On top of that, most of the early cinemas I remember going to were not air conditioned! They probably found it too expensive to run a bank of air conditioners to cool down a large auditorium back in the old days (or had a lot of environmental forethought). Then again, it was cheaper to watch a movie back then too as it is over NZ$15 to watch a movie today (well over a 300% increase in price). That probably means that it'll cost $45 when my kids get to my age.

"Could I have four tickets for Star Wars Episode 9: The Ewoks Take Coruscant (3D)"

So the screens are generally smaller today compared to their predecessors (apart from the IMAX screens), but it also gives us more choice of what to watch. It isn't uncommon to get 12 movies running concurrently, whereas back in the day, you could choose from either Superman or Drunken Master for the whole week. That's not such a bad thing though, as I'll explore next week about the whole zeitgeist of the 70s and 80s.

I learnt to ride a bike and lived to tell the tale

2011-03-31T02:40:00.000-07:00

Sometime around 1983, I learnt to ride a bike at my piano teacher's house. My sister, brother and I used to go to Mrs Soh's house for piano lessons, and at the end of our sessions, we would hang out at the front of her house with her kids who happened to have bikes. I learnt to balance on the bike by coasting down her driveway, and after a few weeks, I got the hang of riding it.

In case you were wondering, I'm sitting on a red seat, and yes, that is my real hair.

For me, part of the stimulus to ride a bike probably came from watching E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, The Goonies, The Karate Kid and Whiz Kids. The personal freedom of escaping FBI agents, running down gangsters and jumping the moon just looked awesome, which coincidently I did none of. There were a bunch of other BMX movies that came out too like RAD (my wife recommends it) and BMX Bandits (starring Nicole Kidman!) that I vaguely recall but can't remember which probably helped with the boom of BMX bikes being sold everywhere. At the time most of my friends had a BMX (you know who you are, Mr Raleigh Chopper) and we proceeded to do stupid stunts with our new wheels.

Richie Adler and friends (from the Whiz Kids theme) tearing
after the stupid spaniel who peed on RALF.

Goonies, the coolest geeks on bikes.

With a bag like that, you know he's about to get his ass kicked.
Picture from Crackle.com

Now, you have to realise that this was way before anyone bothered to wear safety helmets. Some of the accidents that have been recounted back to me include cycling fast down a hill and slamming on the front brakes causing a handlebar flip, falling off the bike while trying to stand on top of the bike, and losing a front wheel while cycling. My brother tells me that I once collided with another cyclist, but I must've been concussed as I can't recall that incident at all.

"I'll never survive the landing!"

My other misadventure seems lame by comparison. I was cycling down a steep road and I started to veer round a corner. Unluckily for me, the road had a surface layer of loose asphalt which caused my bike to slip out from under me and sent me and my bike into a corner storm drain (longkang). It's kind of hard to explain what the storm drain is like in the suburbs of Petaling Jaya, but suffice to say, it was about a 2 meter drop into a concrete pit, head first. I'm still not quite sure what happened, but the bike was basically on top of me, with a dented rim and handlebar. Surprisingly, I walked away with a swollen jaw, and some scratches on my palms and legs. I'm not sure how I did it, but I managed to get the bike out of the drain and pushed it all the way home without anyone knowing about it. Despite that, I still learnt to ride my bike hands free without a helmet, because I'm stupid like that.

It was like falling into the Death Star trench.
Photo Source

Aside from the dangers of riding a bike, we used to have fun riding all over the place. My friends and I used to shoot down alleys, dodging broken glass bottles, dog crap, dead rats and rubbish. We'd go to the various local parks, where we had to cycle across a plank of wood just to get into the park (I'm not sure what the urban planner's reason for limiting public access by only providing a plank. Cost cutting?). We'd try to shoot out each other's tyres with a plastic bow & arrow set. We'd even cycle through snake infested grass patches and tried to avoid the packs of rabid dogs that would chase us if we ever dared to slow down. We'd once come across several boxes of packing foam discarded in front of a derelict factory. So we made a 'snow' pile and drove through it. Through it all, I had my 5 year old brother following behind us with his trainer wheels. It would take my sister another 26 years before she learnt to ride a bike.

BTW Bro, jandals don't help when you mangle your feet
in the bike chain. I know that from experience.

Nowadays, I'm less inclined to cycle. Unlike the suburbs of Petaling Jaya, Auckland tends to be a lot on the hilly side. Maybe in a couple of years when the kids are old enough to balance, we'll roll out the bikes, strap on our helmets, and burn baby burn.

Sun Tanning

2011-03-19T18:40:00.000-07:00

Kids, when I was a wee little snapper, my skin used to be a deep bronze brown colour, unlike the palid vampire white I am today. Back in those days, staying out for hours in the sun used to be good for us, or so conventional wisdom taught us.

Yup, a bronze god in Speedos.

Whenever we went swimming at the pools, or were at the beach, we would lie on our towels and try to get tanned by using Coppertone Suntan lotion. "Sun TAN lotion?" you ask. Yes, there used to be a product which probably had a -10 SPF rating and accelerated the tanning process, rather than protecting you from UV radiation. It was like basting a leg of pork in the roasting dish so that you get nice crackling, which essentially happened to our backs after a weekend of sunbathing.

Beautiful tan today, a crispy, wrinkly old hag tomorrow.

The telltale signs appear as long strips of skin peel off, and you're left with a raw pinkish red patch all across your back. Sometimes, some asshole at school would walk past and give you a good slap on the back, causing a flinch of pain. In hindsight, that's a sign that you've done some serious damage to your skin, vastly increasing the risk of skin cancer.

Yummy instant bacon.
Source: Wikipedia

Nowadays, especially in New Zealand with that great big hole in the Ozone above us, I'm less inclined to go out into the hot summer sun between 10am-4pm even with sunscreen on. That pretty much explains why I walk around with a bucket hat, lavish my meals with tomato sauce (for the lycopene) and don't play cricket.

Purple Stains

2011-03-02T00:17:00.000-08:00

Kids, you may not know this, but I was always accident prone. Grazes on knees & shins, splits on lips, chin and skull, burns on legs and hands, and one bad incident with a brass zipper. Usually I'd just get up, brush myself off and be on my merry way. Sometimes though, there's a gash with blood flying everywhere. That's when the hard stuff comes out. I'm talking about Iodine.

It was usually dispensed by the school nurse after a kid does a knee slide over the loose asphalt parking lot behind the school (yes, it happened to me). The nurse would then tell the me off, wipe the wound, and dab a generous purple stain on the knee. Then for the next week, I'd would walk around with the badge of awesomeness splattered all down the side of my leg.

Nowadays, we'd just wash the wound, quick acid bath with Dettol, a scream, a plaster, and we're away laughing.

I want the Wolverine one please. I need the mutant healing factor.

Debonair hair

2011-02-21T01:01:00.000-08:00

As a kid, I remember seeing a red jar of Brylcreem on my grandfather's table in his room. This was probably not such a big deal, but at that time, my grandfather was rather follicly challenged. Despite that, he would apply a gentle spread of it around the back & sides, and a gentle sweep across the combover. It never came across as a particularly noxious, but it did have a very distinct smell. I'm sure I would place that smell if I ever come into contact with it now, even after the 20 odd years since I've last come across Brylcreem.

Created by the British Army to create instant helmets.

I believe that my dad and most of my uncles would use the slick stuff at some point in their lives, judging by the glistening coifs sported in their early years. At some point as a kid, I even gave it a go, not that I had much sense in how to style my hair. What kid wouldn't enjoy applying warm grease to their head?

Can't touch this. No seriously, don't touch the hair, it won't wash off.

I guess at some point, it fell out of fashion with my family, as most things do. Part of the problem was the curse of male pattern baldness that seems to strike at most of the male members of my family. Some of us may deny it, believing instead in the wow factor of combovers, while others are inspired by the smooth shine of knights like Patrick Stewart.

Real Captains don't wear rugs

I also have to wonder how many of their wives made them give it up, as I can remember my grandfather's Brylcreem stained pillowcases, and it still brings a smile to my face. Maybe it's time to bring back the shine to my head while I still have some hair left.

Monkeybar Madness

2011-02-15T22:20:00.000-08:00

Mum, trying to pry me
from the bars

I often wonder if I'm an overprotective parent. As my son tries to walk, I hover near him to catch him before he kisses the floor. As I push him on the swing, I stand under the bar to catch him as he loops the frame. As I take him out for a drive, I strap him into his body-forming, neck-cradling, five-point-harness, side-impact-resistant space capsule. Is this all a bit excessive? No, I don't think so, and yet, as a child, I used to engage in the most ridiculous forms of play almost everyday at school without adult supervision.

I am, of course, talking about the most terrifying of all school yard implements of doom - the Monkeybars, AKA the Jungle Gym, the Climbing Frame, the Borg Cube of Death, etc. Here was a structure, made of steel pipes maybe 5m³, setup for children to play on. On top of that, kids weren't just using this piece of architecture to simply 'climb'. No, we used to race from point to point in 3 dimensions, playing tag (catching), or just to hone our balance skills for the day the ninja academy decided to recruit some fresh meat. Usually this all happened at the same time as various groups of kids tried to play their games in spite of each other.

Looks innocent enough until you realise that the bars at the bottom have been dented by the broken bodies of falling children.
Image Source: Wikipedia

Looking back at it now, why in the world would anyone have approved such a thing? Kids would try leaping between rungs, sometimes directly across, sometimes across and down a level or two. Others would run along the top of the structure just to show how badass they were. There must have been a gap of a meter across! That's just crazy, in hindsight. We're talking about kids between the ages of 6 to 12 play acting like Jackie Chan. I've seen someone dislocate their shoulders from a fall performing those stunts. There were rumours of kids failing to get a good grip and plunging down, smacking their heads and teeth on the rungs as they fell. Back in those days, we didn't have soft foam mats or thick layers of bark to break our falls, just a hard and unforgiving earthen patch. Despite this setup for The Darwin Awards, we still went back up there to play, addicted to the adrenaline, and if we got injured, we would get to skip a couple of days of school, or a caning.

I remember watching a scene from Superman II when a kid was playing at Niagara Falls alternating his grip on some handle bars. He lost his grip, fell, and was saved by Superman. That last part never happened to me on the jungle gym.

Picture this without the waterfalls in the background or Superman to save your ass.

The other thing I remember about the Monkeybars was that the steel bars got extremely hot during the day. Imagine trying to pole-dance while gripping a searing hot rod between your thighs for no other reason than it's a stupid idea. Now imagine kids trying to climb up a blisteringly hot scaffold while gingerly gripping onto the rungs. Yeah, not such a good idea for school any more, is it?

The Empty Arcade

2011-02-13T21:28:00.000-08:00

Pac-Tron image by Pixel Fantasy

Ken was crouched in a defensive position, waiting for Zangief to leap towards him before letting rip with a dragon punch. A hand went across the screen and placed a coin on the glass plate, in anticipation of getting a chance to play Street Fighter 2. A quick flick of my wrist and Ken jumped instead. What followed was a flying pile driver and the end of my turn with the game. That was how I used to spend my breaks between lectures at University. I wasn't particularly good at the game, but it was fun to watch and play against others.

After University, I didn't really play with arcade games for well over a decade, as I was busy working and didn't get many opportunities to play on an arcade machine. As time went by, many of the old arcade parlours and fun-lands, like Spaceworld and Thunderdome on Queen Street, have since disappeared. The local dairies too, once a place for local kids to play a couple of games while running chores picking up groceries, lost the arcade machines from the front of their stores. Maintenance was probably too high for the old boxes and new ones weren't exactly cheap either. I come across a few games once in awhile, usually at the movie theatres or at the mall, but at $2 a game, I'm less inclined now to sit down and play, and that's a shame.

My earliest memories of an arcade parlour was in the playground area at the top floor of Jaya Supermarket sometime around the late '70s and early '80s. There were probably only a hand full of arcade games at that time, and most of the space was taken up by a shuffle puck table, a foosball table, a bubble hockey table, various pinball machines and a fairly large carousel. I don't think I've even seen a live bubble hockey machine in decades.

When was the last time you saw one of these?

I think the first arcade machine I ever played was Breakout, a simple spinner control game that moved a paddle along a horizontal axis to deflect a tiny ball up to destroy an array of bricks. The display used a transparent overlay to simulate coloured rows for the bricks. I'm sure I wasn't much good at it at the time, probably being only 5 or 6 years old, but it a simple enough game to grasp despite the fact that I required a stool to stand on.

There were other games around that time that I remember playing including a first person Formula 1 driving simulator that had a scrolling background, Space Invaders, Asteroids and many more. It wasn't until we went on one of our many holiday trips up to the Genting Highlands Resort that I would have experienced a true arcade with scores of machines blasting out tunes and the great dings that rang out from the multitude of pinball machines. That was what an arcade was all about, the noise, the smoke (yes, people were allowed to smoke indoors in those days) and the hordes of people crowding around the machines.

This used to happen to me everytime I played. Talk about performance anxiety.

There were the classic upright cabinets, the driving booths and my favourite, cocktail tables, on which I played both Frogger and Galaxian. They must have had well over 30 pinball tables too, screaming for attention with their pings and bright lights.

The great thing about arcade games was that you could sit down and get into the game mechanics instantly. Here comes a flaming barrel, press the jump button. A bunch of aliens are descending, mash the fire button. Spin that ball, a spider is about to gobble you up. Swerve right to avoid that oil slick! Whatever you do, wiggle that joystick like mad. Fun, intense, and thoroughly enjoyable. The aim of it all? To get your 3 letter initials up on the High Score screen, to prove that you were a god amongst men.

The Best of the Best, 1982. Boys wanted to be them, girls wanted to worship them.

It wasn't until the mid 80s when the arcade craze slowly faded. There were still some great games coming out like Gauntlet and Operation Wolf, but it wasn't until Street Fighter 2 came out in 1991 that the arcade parlours really got into a crazy fever pitch again. I remember going back to Malaysia in the early '90s and seeing hordes of people trying to master dragon punches, sonic booms and invisible throws. Even so, the many fighter clones that have since come out didn't really bring back the arcade experience for long.

So what happened? I guess the demise of the arcade parlour came about with the release of home entertainment systems like the Atari 2600, personal computers like the Apple II, portable gaming devices like the Game & Watch series and later, the Game Boy from Nintendo. Pay for it once, and play it forever. You didn't have to get your parents to drop you off at the arcade, it was probably cheaper for them in the long run, and you didn't get leg cramps from standing the whole day playing a game. To get decent in a single arcade game would probably require well over a hundred games, millions if you wanted to finish Dragon's Lair (that game was impossible). Instead, you could pop in a cartridge, flick a switch and be blasting spacies all weekend long.

About 5 year ago, I decided I wanted to resurrect some of my childhood by building my own Arcade Machine with all the classics running on it. It took me about 2 months to build the table part-time, and it sat in the living room as a piece of geek pride. After awhile, the glory faded, the endless battles ended, and the machine sat idle down in the basement, waiting. Then, a few months ago, I fired up the box, propped my son on the couch next to it, and watched his eyes light up as I proceeded to blow those crazy aliens from the sky once again.