What exactly IS a bad conversion from hell?! ANY conversion of a
classic
arcade game from the original to another game. That's right, ALL
conversions
are BAD conversions, including the Pac-Man to Twin Eagle to Super
Spacefortress
Macross I have in my garage. I would like you to vote for the pictures
below, tell me what YOU think is the worst conversion! When you're done
with this section, be sure to browse through the Auction
Pictures and Results section of the site and try to find other
games
we've missed placing below. there's more than likely some in there that
I wouldn't catch unless I happened to own one. Afterwards, send
me
an e-mail, arcade@madocowain.com
and let me know what you have found, and where!
Contestant
#1: Super Dodge Ball/Reactor. This is a very rare classic vector game.
You can see it here, a shadow of it's former self, disguised as a
non-working
Super Dodge-Ball. As usual, click on the picture to see a larger image.
Contestant #2: From a previous auction comes another contender: Golden Axe in a Super-Pac cabinet. As Sara from New York commented:
i mean that's a really nasty paint job on the
golden axe, and the super pac cab ... looks so much nicer.. (i
like the colors of the super pac cab, and painting them like that is
just plain ugly!)
Contestants #3 and #4: Arkanoid/Mouse Trap, and Ameri Darts/???. Kyle S. brings this contestant to my attention:
This is an Exidy Mousetrap cabinet, easily
identifiable
by the four doors on the front of
the cab. It's particularly strange
when a game that began its life with a
horizontally oriented monitor gets
outfitted
with a vertical monitor kit,
and they have to remount the monitor.
All the time, you'll see vertical
monitored cabinets turned horizontal,
but rarely the other way around.
A close second is the Ameri Darts in the same
picture. It's in a Pacman
or Galaxian style cab, but the sides
of the cab have been cut into the
normal shape. See the picture directly
above, and look to the extreme right
(by the cabaret Pac) to see what I mean.
I've seen a handful of these cabinet
re-shapings before, and I have no idea
why operators did this. Unless,
perhaps there really WAS a Midway machine
that shaped that way,
but it tanked horribly, and this a
conversion
of that flop game...
Contestant #5: Mr. Do/Targ. Also submitted by Kyle S., who points out the problems with the Mr. Do cocktail below:
Contestant #6: Road Riot/Astron Belt
Contestant #7: Birdie King/???? Kyle S. asks:
What the HELL is that Birdie King 2 in the
mystery
cabinet in the 5th
picture down? I've even seen this one
(or one exactly like it) on Ebay
before. The recessed marquee and the
shape of the top of the cabinet
is exactly like Atari's Liberator, and
the "wedge" shape cut into the sides,
coupled with the control panel and how
the monitor is mounted looks
similar to a Xevious. I dunno what the
hell it was. Perhaps this was some test
market proto machine that got converted.
Contestant #8: Wrestlefest/Space Duel(?). Kyle pointed this one out to me, and I believe it to be a Space Duel. Definitely an Atari cab though. Any guesses?
Contestant #9: Arkanoid/Satan's Hollow
Contestant #10: American Horseshoes/Q-Bert *sniff*
Contestant #11: Pac-Land/Pot of Gold/Kaos. This one definitely got around! We were totally stumped by this one, until Kyle did a bit of research:
The cabinet shape is clearly Game Plan Inc.
The
design on the kick
panel are two cartoon dragons from
the game "Kaos". But dedicated Kaos
machines had a much darker color scheme
than what is shown here. The color scheme
matches that of an earlier Game Plan
game... Enigma II. (But that dragon kick
panel art doesn't match)... The screen
glass is from "Pot Of Gold". My guess
is that:
Game Plan originally had a darker color
scheme
for Kaos, and then
changed it part way through the run
(maybe
the original color of paint became
unavailable?). Some operator bought a
Kaos in 1981 with that lighter
color scheme, and then converted it in
1983 to Pot Of Gold (hence the
screen glass). Then when THAT game tanked
also, it was finally converted
into PacLand. Crazy.
I'll buy THAT for a dollar!
Contestant #12: Cobra Command/Mach 3.
Contestant #13: Simply Solitaire/TRON. Oh, the humanity!! Chuck S. got this one at the April 28, 2001 Indy auction:
For $5 I got that Simply Solitaire that was a
Tron in it's former life. That cab got
stripped and cut up out in the lot. The
bottom was still wet and crumbling away
from being in a barn. That game had a
486 computer board and a VGA
monitor with a Happ serial trackball.
The monitor works great, so that was worth
the effort.
At least its out of it's misery now!
Contestant #14: Fighters History/Defender. Yes, Williams to JAMMA. Ugh.
Remember, your vote
counts,
so place it in my mailbox, arcade@madocowain.com!
Copyright
2001 Madoc Owain