Moppet- Berenstain Bears- getting CLOSE!!!!

DirkDDS

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Berenstain Bears in Big Paw's Cave!!

With the help of Phil Bennet and Todd Young, we are very close to getting this game fixed. It will be the only working cabinet in existence. (yes, it will be added to MAME too) See attached pics. The colors are still off because there is a bad prom.

More to come...
 

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Excellent. Glad you could find someone to help you with that and that the game is preserved.
 
Love it! It looks like it's in great condition too.

What's the background story on the discovery?
 
Noice (Steve Hulett), the King of the Moppets, had been searching for this title for many years. It was the only Moppet title he had never seen. He had placed a want ad for it on one of the newsgroups back in 2001 (?). He said he would always get XXX rated junk emails regarding his search for "Berenstain Bears -Moppet" and then one day he received a real email from someone selling the cabinet.

The cabinet was located in Maine, I believe. He purchased it and had it shipped to his place in Texas. The side art is unique to this Moppet title (ie. all other Moppet games have the same side art). The cabinet itself is in really nice shape. Both side art complete and intact, perfect marquee and very nice CP. It has fewer than 4000 credits on the coin counter so it was obviously played very little. After owning it and unable to get it working, Noice sold it to me along with a dedicated Tugboat.

There is story on the net of someone who remembers seeing one in the Pediatric unit of a hospital in Seattle.

I have been collecting Moppets for a few years now. I purchased one from Joe Magiera (a HUO/ mint Leprechaun) and the other three from Noice (Tugboat, Pirate Treasure and Berenstain Bears). I have the first right of refusal on a beautiful Noahs Ark when the owner decides to sell. I have not located a Desert Race. Todd Tucky has a Desert Race and apparently there is one other known cabinet in existence. I would rate the rarity of these titles as follows:

1. Berenstain Bears - 1 cabinet known
2. Desert Race - 2 cabinets known
3. Tugboat- fewer than 5 cabinets
4. Noahs Ark
5. Pirate Tresure
6. Leprechaun

Leprechaun seems to be the most common cabinet but I wouldnt say any of them are very common. Chuck E Cheese destroyed these cabinets after they were done using them so that they could claim it as a tax write off. This makes finding them today very difficult.

I loved these games as a youngster because I could last forever on one quarter when I was down to my final quarter at an arcade.

This site has some interesting information about the games as well as a short synopsis about Berenstain Bears:

http://everything2.com/title/Moppet+Video
 
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That info you posted is very interesting indeed. I guess it really is a shame that Chuck E. Cheese destroyed almost all of them. I wish you the best of luck in getting your Berenstein Bears to work!
 
Berenstain Bears in Big Paw's Cave!!

With the help of Phil Bennet and Todd Young, we are very close to getting this game fixed. It will be the only working cabinet in existence. (yes, it will be added to MAME too) See attached pics. The colors are still off because there is a bad prom.

More to come...

Got any pics of the boards? just curious what it looks like. I've got a tugboat set somewhere...
 
I wish I had known these were rare. Somebody was selling three of these about two years ago on CL, IIRC. The ad said that they were scavanged from the dumpster behind a Chuck E Cheese somewhere in Houston. One worked and the other two had monitor troubles.

This was before I had started collecting seriously, so I didn't pursue them.

ken
 
I think someone local has one in storage..need to check on that ...good to see that cab has been saved and made to work...I remember when noise was excited to find it.:D
 
Yellow Dog-
What were the three titles that you remember being for sale?

Roadrunner-
What title is in storage?

Attached are 5 of the 6 dedicated Moppet CPs. (In order, left to right- Noahs Ark, Berenstain Bears, Tugboat, Pirate Treasure, Leprechaun) No one knows what the dedicated Desert Race CP looks like. Todd Tucky has a working DR machine but his CP is generic. The Tugboat and Berenstain Bears cabinet below are the only known dedicated CPs in existence.
 

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Leprechaun's funny because somewhere around 350k or something (I think around that point) it goes from a game built for a 7 year old into a near kill screen of impossible-ness. Never played the other ones but I guess that was the built in adult silencer within the game.
 
Tugboat has a possible kill screen too. They had it as one of the monthly MAME competitoins over at TG in 2008 and nobody could get past level 8 (top score ended up being 837).
 
Yellow Dog-
What were the three titles that you remember being for sale?

It was either 2 Berenstain Bears and 1 Leprechaun or the other way around. I just remember looking at them and saying to myself that I remember my son playing them at CC when he was small and he said they sucked. He prefered skee ball and driving games.

I didn't know they were collectible at the time and my son was 20 so there was no reason for me to pursue them.

ken
 
I swear I've seen three or four of these cabs at a Pizza Hut in down town Chicago. I haven't been there in ages, but I distinctly remember thinking the games looked too short for real vids. Then I learned about them from the RGVAC days and it made sense.
 
moppets are definitely not common but a number of CEC were privately owned and did not necessarily participate in the destroy every game policy that CEC supposedly had. I'm sure there are more out there. I've seen a few pop up on CL in the past two years in CA alone and I've never searched CL in any other areas or looked on ebay for that matter.
 
Awesome. just an idea, but did you ever try to reach out to Stan and Jan's family to see if they happen to have a moppet? It may be worthwhile as they could possibly have one and would like to know the trouble that someone is going through to preserve the Berenstein's legacy.
 
I've never tried contacting Stan or Jan Berenstain. I would imagine they wouldnt give it much bother because the Moppet games are a diminutive amount of the Berenstain's legacy.

Perhaps I will try and contact them although I'm sure they are pseudo-celebrities.

If anyone comes upon any Moppet cabinets, please be sure to contact me. I can pay very well. I would love to upgrade my Tugboat and Pirate Treasure cabinets as well as find a really nice Noahs Ark and ANY Desert Race parts.
 
I remember walking past two or three of these at CeC back in the day. Never gave it a second thought. :p That's cool that you're able to save these especially since they're so rare now. Damn CeC for killing all those games. :(
 
Actually, I saw one of these (Berenstain Bears) at a yard sale in Rancho Cucamonga a year or two ago. EXTREMELY reasonable price, but I just wasn't interested enough. I did not know they were considered rare to the point of only one believed to be in existence! Hopefully someone who appreciates it got it.

You might put up an ad on CL, they might be wanting to sell it by now....
 
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