Grails....

EQDruid

New member
Joined
Nov 25, 2009
Messages
40
Reaction score
0
Location
Las Vegas, Nevada
I'm fairly new to Collecting, and I have never been a operator, I have spent more time in Arcades, then in High School. ( as my spelling and grammar will surely point that out... lol )

I know what I like, and I know what i would love to see in my game room, but what makes a game a grail?

Personally I want to get Star Wars, Tron, Joust.

I started out with my Boss getting a divorce with his wife, wife getting the house, and him giving away the arcades because he lacked the room. Started with Silent Scope, and House of the Dead 2. Had to sell those because wife said it didn't look right having it in the dinning room area.

Now that I own a much larger house, I don't want to just grab whats out there, but something that will bring a smile not only to me, but my friends that come over.

Do you own any games that just don't make the grail list, but you just love anyways?

EQDruid
 
#1 It should be a game you really enjoyed playing in your youth.(Donkey Kong?) Second, how cool does it look. (Tron's game play is ok but the cabinet is what makes this game awesome). Third, how unique and cool are the controls. (star Wars)
 
A grail should be the game you buy that will have the most sentimental value to you. I remember shoving fistfulls of tokens into a Super Mario Bros. Pinball whenever my dad took me to Chuck E Cheese when I was a wee lad. When I brought that pinball home a few months ago, a cherished memory of my childhood was relived. It will never leave my gameroom.
 
I'm fairly new to Collecting, and I have never been a operator, I have spent more time in Arcades, then in High School. ( as my spelling and grammar will surely point that out... lol )

I know what I like, and I know what i would love to see in my game room, but what makes a game a grail?

Personally I want to get Star Wars, Tron, Joust.

I started out with my Boss getting a divorce with his wife, wife getting the house, and him giving away the arcades because he lacked the room. Started with Silent Scope, and House of the Dead 2. Had to sell those because wife said it didn't look right having it in the dinning room area.

Now that I own a much larger house, I don't want to just grab whats out there, but something that will bring a smile not only to me, but my friends that come over.

Do you own any games that just don't make the grail list, but you just love anyways?

EQDruid

You made a short list.. Pick one. If you seach for it, then its your grail. Does not mattter what it is. Could be as common as pacman or as rare a qubes quest.

the real question is once you find your "grail", is the next item on your list a new grail?
 
A grail should be the game you buy that will have the most sentimental value to you. I remember shoving fistfulls of tokens into a Super Mario Bros. Pinball whenever my dad took me to Chuck E Cheese when I was a wee lad. When I brought that pinball home a few months ago, a cherished memory of my childhood was relived. It will never leave my gameroom.

Yep, thats what I meant by #1. When I was a kid I went to a friends birthday party at Showbiz pizza(later a Chuck E Cheeses). I played a brand new game called Front Line and loved it. I used every token I was given to play it and nothing else. I went home and thought of nothing but Front Line for the whole week. During school I would draw different scenes of Front Line gameplay on my scratch paper instead of using it to practice my cursive writing assignments. The teacher scolded me for this. Everyday I would ask both my mom and dad to please take me to Showbiz pizza on the following saturday so I could play Front Line again. I would describe why the game was so cool in detail to them.(the push down spinner knob that could shoot independent of character movement, different types of tanks, and grenades, etc.) We were rather poor at this time and my parents saw arcade games as nothing but a waste of good money. The idea of spending what little money they had on taking me to this place for no special occasion must have been absurd. Birthdays were not even given this kind of consideration. But saturday came and they surprised me by taking me and my brothers and sisters out to showbiz pizza. In the past, the most I could ever get to play games from the parents was 50 cents or maybe a dollar if I did a bunch of chores. But that night my dad, for the first time actually watched me play an arcade game and fed me tokens on demand all night to keep playing. Looking back, I imagine my mom and dad realized how much it meant to me and just wanted to bring me happiness despite their complete distaste for arcade games and over priced crappy pizza. Five or six years ago, when I bought Front Line, I informed my dad that one of my fondest childhood memories spending time with him was because of this game. I told him the story. He didn't remember the event. But Front Line is one of my biggest grails and I relive my showbiz pizza night everytime I play it.
 
Believe it or not, but my grail was the first game I bought too... SINISTAR. Hard game to master and there was a lot of sentimental value to it. Not the most popular game but I still play it the most.

Your grail is just that... YOUR grail. Don't buy a game just because everyone else likes it. Buy the one you will play the most and get the most satisfaction out of.

Then after you've gotten your grail, let the hunt (and addiction) begin. The first game is best but building your arcade piece by piece is where the real thrill comes in.

Welcome to the Madness... You're in great company here.
Aaron
 
Interesting topic: Thinking about it, when I started out collecting the first game that I thought of as a grail was Street Fighter II Champion Edition. That might sound odd to some, but this game came out while I was a freshman in high school and with my older brother and a 4 other friends we would hit the arcade and just play this game until we got kicked out. We played the crap out of it, and would travel to other arcades and take on the local talent. When SFII came out on SNES we played the crap out of it as practice for the arcade. We spent a lot of time and money at the arcades playing this. I'm not sure if it was the challenge of the game or the challenge of playing each other, but with a good mix of 5 guys you really could get a good rotation/smack talk session going.

I have a lot of found memories of other games, like Punch Out, and tron, I am still on the hunt for tron. But I think it is important to get games that you enjoy playing and enjoy owning. Which is not to say that I haven't found some classics which I really enjoying playing, jsquared has a tutankham which was a grail for him. Until a game day at his house I had never played the game, however after that day I was hooked! I found one and was able to pick it up. Ironically, I invited a guy from work over one day and he is completely hooked! Could not stop playing it and stayed way later at the house playing it (as his wife kept called yelling at him). So, what is a grail? I'm not sure I could really define it for you, but you will know it when you see it.
 
First game I ever bought was my grail too... Star Wars... It was in bad shape but not working (with Amplifone monitor), but I got it all working. Its what got me really interested in fixing/collecting games...
 
My grails were Donkey Kong and High Speed, and I actually acquired both within a year of collecting. There are a lot of other games that I either have or want, but those two were the ones I remembered the most from the 80s. Games like Tron are something I enjoy and would like to own someday, but for now, they are not worth the premium price that they demand.

It is weird how the grail hunts go here at KLOV. Vectors were definitely the hot items last year. I bought a Tempest which was a game a enjoyed as a kid. I only bought it though because I found one way cheaper than normal, even though it is one of my favorites. I also bought a Star Castle due to all the vector hype. I never had played it before, and didn't like it. I think Asteroids and Star Wars are the only vectors aside from Tempest that I enjoyed playing as a kid.

I don't think I am going to hunt for anything specific this year. I want to see what comes up, and hopefully make good purchase decisions. I just bought a MIllipede, a game that I had never played before, and it has turned into a garage favorite.
 
I have to agree that vectors were a hot item for us this past year... and I'm hoping that continues for 2010 also. :)

But back when I first got into the collecting aspect of the hobby 14 or 15 years ago, my grail was Wizard of Wor. We still have that game and I still smile when I look at it. One neat thing is I had the world record for a short time and got a certificate from Walter Day at one of the PhillyClassics. It's now framed above the game. :D
 
Shew... I was getting worried - it had been a couple of days without a "grail" thread - thought something was wrong.
 
Back
Top Bottom