ARCADE WATCH
Keeping an eye on the coin-op gaming scene
We don’t tend to cover the subgenre of arcade gaming that goes by ‘videmption’, and that’s not only because of the messiness of the term (though that’s certainly part of it). Rather, it’s because the dominant coin-op business model has had a similar sort of effect on coin-op game design as the success of free-to-play has had on mobile-game mechanics. Here, sessions are short, gameplay is basic and the reward is not in the playing, but in the strip of tickets the machine spews out at the end.
We’ll make an exception for Hot Wheels: King Of The Road,
however, for all that it bears the hallmarks of the videmption model: sessions are short, at just 60 seconds per race, and the midtrailer flash about winning up to 300 tickets hardly sets the pulse, erm, racing. But there’s a decent story behind it. Originally known as King Of The Road, it was first conceived by Coin Crew Games, known to their mums as Wyatt Bushnell – son of Nolan, founder of Atari – and Mike Salyh. It was installed at Two Bit Circus, a wonderfully named barcade in downtown Los Angeles.
An eightplayer cabinet in which every participant has a wheel and pedals, it was an imposing presence. Evidently it came to the attention tention of Adrenaline Amusements, musements, which has signed ed it up, secured a Hot Wheels
licence, cut the e player count to five and nd made the whole thing ng about winning g tickets. Oh well. ll. Nice to hear the Bushnell lineage lives on n though, isn’t it? t?