-  from the Friday, May 30, 2008 edition of 

     -  from the Sunday, June 1, 2008
    edition of 

     -  from the Saturday, June 7, 2008 edition of 

    This article appeared in the Sunday, May 25, 2008 edition of 

They've traveled from as far as Finland, Israel and Australia to kick videogame butt. For a peek at the intensity, check out the documentary "King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters." To get in on the action, bring your A-game to New Hampshire at the end of the month.

The Funspot arcade on Weirs Beach will host the 10th Annual International Classic Videogame & Pinball Tournament starting May 29. It's the first tourney since the "King of Kong" debut last year. Part of the film - a battle of wills between a strutting, '80s-haired Donkey Kong high-score champ and a humble, can't-catch-a-break science teacher nipping at his record, was shot here.

"We now have players who actually plan their vacations around the event," said Gary Vincent of Funspot and the on-site American Classic Arcade Museum.

Pre "Kong" exposure, it has drawn 75 registered players each year, he said. Another 25 to 50 come to watch or settle in on one machine with the aim of breaking that game's record.

"Every year usually at the tournament, on average, 15 world records fall," Vincent said. "People have said to me, 'If I want to break a world record, I'll do it there. This is a big gathering of the top players. If you break a record here, everybody sees it."

Making it official: Walter Day, from Twin Galaxies, the official scorekeeper of gamers everywhere, and Doug Parsons from the Guinness Book of World Records, will be there all four days.

The tournament runs from noon Thursday to Sunday, with Saturday the busiest day. It has three parts, as Vincent explains it: a videogame tournament, pinball tournament and manufacturer's challenge (a contest specific to one maker; last year's was Atari). There's a winner in each category. Volunteers have worked out a program, he said, that evens out differences in scoring. (For instance, in one game 20,000 may be a high score, in another, 2 million.)

Showing it's got a level of recognized geek street cred, Funspot has been the site of two other movies: the documentary "Chasing Ghosts: Beyond the Arcade," which debuted at Sundance last year, and "The Altar of the Unnamed," a sci-fi thriller.

Vincent said "Altar"'s director had been scouting locations for the film when he saw "King of Kong."

When shooting began in March, Funspot had to shut down a section of the arcade for six days, he said. "They hired a game designer to design a game just for this movie."

The tournament is played on machines that are all 1987 models or older, and he doesn't rule out the potential for guest appearances from people in "King of Kong."

Go and do

10th Annual International Classic Videogame & Pinball Tournament


Where: Funspot Family Entertainment Center, Weirs Beach, N.H.

When: May 29-June 1

Fee: $30, register at the door; includes 200 game tokens

Bring: Mad skillz, game face

FMI: (603)366-4377 or www.classicarcademuseum.org

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    This article appeared in the Friday, May 30, 2008 edition of  .

GAMERS HAVE GATHERED at Funspot this week for the 10th annual International Classic Video & Pinball Tournament.

It is a yearly tradition for enthusiasts of classic video games, and it was exposed to the world on the big screen. Now, nearly a year after Funspot's International Classic Video and Pinball Tournament was featured in a movie on a gaming rivalry, gamers have flocked to arcade for this year's competition in even greater numbers.

The 10th annual International Classic Video and Pinball Tournament began on Thursday afternoon and is scheduled to run through early Sunday evening.

The tournament brings players from around the country and around the world to compete on games in Funspot's Classic Arcade Museum.

The tournament was prominently featured in the widely released documentary, "King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters," as the site of a cross-country showdown between Steve Wiebe and gaming legend Billy Mitchell for breaking the "Donkey Kong" record.

Tournament organizers and players said the film has had a positive impact on the event. By 2:30 p.m. on Thursday, around 68 people had signed up.

Gary Vincent, president of the American Classic game Arcade Museum, said this time of the day on Thursday usually sees around 40 competitors.

"We're only two and a half hours into this," Vincent said. "It's just an amazing number of new people. [The movie] gave us exposure to people that may have forgotten about classic gaming or didn't realize we were here. We've had a lot of inquiries about it, even people that didn't live that far away, didn't realize what we had. I think it is going to be very busy just because we've never had this many people sign up so early."

"A lot of people got to see what Funspot was all about," said manager Tina Gebhard.

"Donkey Kong" has a new life this year, as a version of "Donkey Kong II" is now on the floor.

The playing board was bought by gaming legend Greg Erway who donated it to Funspot. Erway also arranged for art for the game from the original artist and the cabinet was provided by another gamer.

"When I played, it was so much fun and so much like Donkey Kong," Erway said.

Erway said the movie "was good attention for the museum." Working for Twin Galaxies at the time of the rivalry, Erway said much more was going on behind the scenes than was shown, though the film was accurate. He said Billy Mitchell's personality in real life is similar to what was shown in the film, though, "if you get to know this guy better, it's a little different."

"I love [that] Steve [Wiebe] came up here and played it," Erway said.

Erway is working on reaching a world record for "Donkey Kong II" with competition from Scott Kessler of North Carolina.

Kessler, who holds the speed record on Super Mario Brothers, said he has been playing video games since the age of five and remembers "Donkey Kong" being one of his first games. 

"Once the movie came out, I started to play hard," Kessler said.

His highest official score on "Donkey Kong" during the tournament was 895,400, though "I'm going for a million." 

"King of Kong" star Billy Mitchell was unable to make it to this year's tournament, though he donated gallon jugs of his hot sauce to Funspot. They are on display at the classic arcade museum.

"Donkey Kong" is one of the many classic arcade games in the tournament. This is Erway's eighth year at the tournament and, while he gained the nickname of "Tapper Greg" for his record in "Tapper," he is focusing more on "Donkey Kong II" and "Wild Western."

"It's become a big social event to me," he said. "It's always nice to see more people here with us. I love seeing it grow every year. Gary does a fantastic job. You get done here, it's such a big letdown when you know you've got to wait a year to come back."

"It actually helps promote the mission of the museum," Vincent said. "This is the only place you can go to find a collection like this that is open to the public."

Last year, 20 newer games were added to the collection and 22 will be out on the floor by the end of this year.

Several games are also being repaired to go out on the floor. "A lot of this technology has become obsolete and it is incredibly difficult to find the parts," Vincent said, explaining that many of the parts would not be found "if it wasn't for the Internet."

"A lot of this is because of doing bingo that we're able to keep a lot of these things running," Gebhard said.

Players have arrived from all parts of the country, with others arriving from Ireland, the Netherlands, and England.

Within the first two and a half hours of the tournament, Isaiah TriForce Johnson of New York broke the arcade record for "Super Mario Brothers" with a score of 579,250. Johnson also broke the record for "Tiger Road" with a score of 112,960 at Funspot. 

"This is the first time a record has been broken that fast," Vincent said.

Johnson has been playing video games for the past 26 years, ever since finding a "Star Wars" game at the age of four while on a family grocery shopping trip. He currently runs a development company to promote video games through fashion, art, music, and other mediums.

"Super Mario Brothers" was one of his first games and he has practiced it on both a gaming console and arcade versions. The Funspot version is different from another arcade version of Mario Brothers.

"I use my general skills that I had in the console game," Johnson said.

 
Note: edited to fix gamer name error (Kesslar changed to Kessler) and game name error (Donkey Kong II changed to Donkey Kong re: 895,400 score)

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    This article appeared in the Sunday, June 1, 2008 edition of  .

Aart van Vliet flew all the way from Holland to beat the world record on Ms. Pac-Man.

The dimly lit arcade along Route 3 in Weirs Beach has that sort of cachet.

Van Vliet honed his skills at a Saudi Arabia youth center for the kids whose parents worked in oil and said he hadn't been inside a real arcade for years. At a friend's house a week before, unofficially, he'd already beaten the record once.

"It really makes your heart go wild. I'm not very good in public, to be honest, so that's going to add to the pressure," said the 38-year-old financial administrator.

But there's no way he traveled from Holland to New Hampshire for nothing.

So, with a video camera aimed at the screen and most of that section of the arcade to himself, he popped in a token. Ahead of van Vliet: trying to rack up nearly a million points in four-plus hours of non-stop Ms. Pac-Man play.

A few minutes into the attempt, three people gathered nearby, pointing and saying in reverent tones things like, "That's the guy..."

Funspot, and its 10th annual International Classic Videogame & Pinball Tournament, is the place and time to get noticed.

The tournament started Thursday at noon and wraps up Sunday at 5 p.m. Gamers have known about it for years. The rest of the world was introduced in 2007's documentary "King of Kong," one man's quest to unseat the cocky, longtime Donkey Kong record-holder. The film was an unexpected smash hit.

Mark Alpiger, from Louisville, Ky., was quick to offer that he can be seen in the movie wearing a glove so he doesn't get blisters playing with a trackball.

"If I didn't use this, my hand would be hamburger," said Alpiger, 45, nearly breathless after a frantic bout with Marble Madness.

He makes another appearance in "King of Kong" playing a video game trackball with his foot - no small feat.

Alpiger said he made the trip to Funspot, which claims the title of largest arcade in the world with hundreds of machines, because he's into the classics: "You can get the modern garbage anywhere."

The film's influence on the event was evident early. Last year on opening day, one employee reported seeing 10 people. By 12:30 p.m., Jenn Moore had registered 50.

"It's an awesome time. I took 11 days off from my paying job to be here," said Moore. And she's not even playing, she's helping out.

Moore pulled together goodie bags and gave advice on the best food to eat before marathon sessions (cheese and crackers, bananas, room temperature drinks). Told in advance two different people were going for records on Kicker, the game was moved closer to the bathroom.

Some games, like Pac Man, have a "safe spot" where you can hide your man for a break, safe from attack, Moore said. Unfortunately, with Kicker, "You've probably killed off six, seven men while you've run to the bathroom."

The price to pay.

Kelly Flewin, from Winnipeg, Manitoba, stopped at the local Shaw's and cleaned them out of Cherry Coke, his trademark drink, before the tournament. The 29-year-old said he had his eye on breaking a record on the pinball machine Mata Hari.

He's been coming since 2005.

"If need be, I'll start looking for anything to pawn off on eBay to come down here," Flewin said. People are like family, and it's fun. He spends most of the four days at the arcade, renting a cottage, he joked, "just to keep up appearances of a normal person."

How would he describe the event to someone who's never been?

"Epic, that's the first word that comes to mind."

OK, if he had to use more than one word? "Awe-inspiring."

Mike Haycock from Windham, last year's pinball champion, planned to hit the tournament Friday with friends to defend his title. To get ready: No pinball for a week so his arm was good and rested.

"I think it's going to be tough to repeat, that's for sure," said Haycock, 43, a machine operator.

Pal Jeff Blair of Turner, going to the tournament for the first time, was trying to psyche him out with trash talk. "He'll have to really shine to take me out, we'll see what happens," Haycock said.

Organizers expected 115 or more players throughout the weekend vying for video game, pinball and manufacturer's choice titles. Twin Galaxies, official scorekeepers, and a rep from Guinness World Records, were both scheduled to be on hand.

Van Vliet's Zen approach before tackling Ms. Pac-Man: "You've just got to be a little lucky. If you try not to die before the end, you'll always have a chance."

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    This article appeared in the Saturday, June 7, 2008 edition of  .

Jeff Blair backed up his trash talk. The Turner man unseated pal Mike Haycock of Windham as pinball champ at last weekend's International Classic Videogame & Pinball Tournament in Weirs Beach.

Blair put in about 30 hours of play and at noon on Sunday, held the high score on five of the six pinball machines in the tournament at Funspot arcade. He finished with the high score on three.

"I was on top all weekend, I led the whole way," Blair said Monday. "Believe me, it was a war. I'm sore now."

Blair, 43, owns a small construction company and held several records at the old Dream Machine in the Auburn Mall. He owns five machines and plays about an hour each night. He's pinballed since he was a kid.

"My family in the summer traveled around New England and into Canada (camping,)" Blair said. "My parents loved the outdoor thing. As an 8-year-old, I liked the rec halls."

The other highlight of his weekend, besides winning: Meeting idol Tony Temple, the top player in the world on Missile Command. Blair said he played the game and surprised himself by setting a record second to Temple's.

"It inspires me to play more and beat him," Blair said. "It was fantastic to be in that environment."

Organizer Gary Vincent with the American Classic Arcade Museum said 173 people registered over the long weekend of play, 100 more than last year. There were so many world records broken that he was still waiting for an official tally. No word yet on whether Aart van Vliet who flew all the way from Holland to beat Ms. Pac-Man was successful.

"It was like the old days all over again," Vincent said. "Just seeing the crowds of people playing all the games. It reminded me of when I started working here in 1981."

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