Post #1 · Posted at 2017-03-31 05:21:02pm 7 years ago
 rapidemboar | |
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I'm sure I've mentioned this on the site multiple times, but I live in Oregon. If you check the arcades page on this site, you'll notice that Oregon has very few arcades. All the good ones are a 5-hour drive away in Portland, and the only arcades in town with DDR machines either closed or removed their machines. Luckly for me, my family travels a lot. Since we have family all across the country (And my dad loves playing the milage game), this gives me the chance to visit DDR machines across the country.
If you're like me, you've probably had to travel a pretty long distance just to find a good DDR machine. Here, you can post about various travel stories about searching for BEMANI games, or just about anything. While I'll probably focus on my own BEMANI experiences, ordinary travel stories work fine too. (I've got no shortage of those too, like the time my plane caught on fire. That's a story for another time...)
I'll start- For winter break, we visited our grandmother in Honolulu, Hawaii. (We have to keep tabs on her from time-to-time. She can be a bit spacy...) My brother did some searching on the arcades page, and found that there was a Dave & Busters in a relatively easy-to-hit location downtown with a DDR A machine. This would be my first time playing DDR A. It was my favorite part of the trip- I got to see players way better than I was (I happen to be the best DDR player in Coos Bay, which isn't saying much), I impressed a bunch of people myself (End of the second day, I started gathering a crowd after playing Xepher
, then I reached the Extra Stage and managed to full-combo Far East Nightbird on my first sight-read), but my best memory was when I went up on the dance pad with some guy I didn't know. I could tell he played Extreme back in the day, and although he was a bit rusty, he was pretty good compared to many of the other people I've seen.
Meanwhile, we looked elsewhere and found a Fun Factory with a Beatmania IIDX Lincle and a Pop'n Music 20. I thought these were myths before then. They're still the only Beatmania and Pop'n machines I've ever seen to this day, except for that one other Lincle machine at Jungle Fun at Ala Moana Center that was broken. (I asked when it would be fixed, apparently it was on hold while the technicians were working on a Stepmania cabinet...) Also, "Shoot the Elves Ball".
Anyone else got any other fun stories?
If you're like me, you've probably had to travel a pretty long distance just to find a good DDR machine. Here, you can post about various travel stories about searching for BEMANI games, or just about anything. While I'll probably focus on my own BEMANI experiences, ordinary travel stories work fine too. (I've got no shortage of those too, like the time my plane caught on fire. That's a story for another time...)
I'll start- For winter break, we visited our grandmother in Honolulu, Hawaii. (We have to keep tabs on her from time-to-time. She can be a bit spacy...) My brother did some searching on the arcades page, and found that there was a Dave & Busters in a relatively easy-to-hit location downtown with a DDR A machine. This would be my first time playing DDR A. It was my favorite part of the trip- I got to see players way better than I was (I happen to be the best DDR player in Coos Bay, which isn't saying much), I impressed a bunch of people myself (End of the second day, I started gathering a crowd after playing Xepher
, then I reached the Extra Stage and managed to full-combo Far East Nightbird on my first sight-read), but my best memory was when I went up on the dance pad with some guy I didn't know. I could tell he played Extreme back in the day, and although he was a bit rusty, he was pretty good compared to many of the other people I've seen.Meanwhile, we looked elsewhere and found a Fun Factory with a Beatmania IIDX Lincle and a Pop'n Music 20. I thought these were myths before then. They're still the only Beatmania and Pop'n machines I've ever seen to this day, except for that one other Lincle machine at Jungle Fun at Ala Moana Center that was broken. (I asked when it would be fixed, apparently it was on hold while the technicians were working on a Stepmania cabinet...) Also, "Shoot the Elves Ball".
Anyone else got any other fun stories?
Post #2 · Posted at 2017-03-31 05:54:29pm 7 years ago
| MrDanceCrazer | |
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I too have a ton of great stories to talk about and one good way to start was my summer of 2014 where I started to travel across the country hitting Minor and Major League Baseball teams. For our first ever "tour" we started in California where the same named league and two Pacific Coast League teams resided. And the cool thing was the fact that I also got to see 2 Nevada teams during that same trip. I for once was thrilled that I was going to be spending time in Las Vegas (although I was only a couple of years away from playing in the casino but hey I had alternatives!) because I'd always wanted to see the nightlife there. And yes, I did some mascot selfies and broke my own barrier on meeting them. Personally, one of my favorite California League mascots was KaBoom of the Lancaster Jethawks cause he slightly reminded me of TRINITY ARROW from Pop'n.
Cool thing about the trip was that almost every city we went to had at least a DDR machine in it. Some highlights including playing X2 in Ontario (pretty crappy pad service there.), and in Bakersfield (MUCH BETTER! Had even scored a few PFC's there) passing my first Oni course on Modesto's MAX2 machine. Getting the top score on Pop 4 and Sunny Days, and black flagging Young Forever
. Also in Sacramento, I got the opportunity to play IIDX SPADA and pop'n Sunny Park for the first time and I was impressed! And this was during the PW tenure so I do not blame myself for discovering Round 1 the next year and neither arcade in my hometown had any of the cool stuff.
Overall the trip was a blast and since it was successful we would go to different places the next year. And speaking of the next year, next time when I talk about the 2015 tour things would start to go on a much grand spectacle! You could say we were having a magical all star extravaganza!
Cool thing about the trip was that almost every city we went to had at least a DDR machine in it. Some highlights including playing X2 in Ontario (pretty crappy pad service there.), and in Bakersfield (MUCH BETTER! Had even scored a few PFC's there) passing my first Oni course on Modesto's MAX2 machine. Getting the top score on Pop 4 and Sunny Days, and black flagging Young Forever
. Also in Sacramento, I got the opportunity to play IIDX SPADA and pop'n Sunny Park for the first time and I was impressed! And this was during the PW tenure so I do not blame myself for discovering Round 1 the next year and neither arcade in my hometown had any of the cool stuff.Overall the trip was a blast and since it was successful we would go to different places the next year. And speaking of the next year, next time when I talk about the 2015 tour things would start to go on a much grand spectacle! You could say we were having a magical all star extravaganza!
Post #3 · Posted at 2017-03-31 07:37:36pm 7 years ago
| PureBlue | |
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The best memory I have of traveling + music gaming is probably the first time I went to Tokyo Game Action in Winchendon, Massachusetts. It was an arcade in a kind of small bowling alley in a pretty fucking random town, but the arcade had pretty much every current Bemani game up to that point and their snack bar had lots of unique Japanese style food since the owner's wife was Japanese. I was 13 at the time and I seriously felt like I died and went to heaven. I ended up going back there numerous times before they unfortunately ended up closing down due to extreme flood damage as a result of a severe ice storm. But even then, I still made it to the auction where they were selling whatever they had left and scored some good stuff.
Some other good ones....
- Playing on a good Supernova machine (or at least good at the time) at Mohegan Sun in Connecticut, and then going to see Fall Out Boy and Panic At The Disco literally right after.
- Playing on a StepMania machine at Hawaiian Brian's in Honolulu, Hawaii with pretty much every song imaginable.
- Going to the Supernova 2 location test at the AMC Theater at Jersey Gardens in Elizabeth, New Jersey.
- Going to the Nanuet Arcade numerous times before they closed down.
- Going to the Palisades Mall and playing on the machines at Catskill Laser Tag and Krazy City.
- Playing on my first ITG dedicab at Islands of Adventure in Florida.
- Getting big ass crowds playing on the machines at Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios when I was 10 in 2004 and again in 2007.
- Playing on an Extreme that had event mode and free play enabled at the Motown Cafe that was at Universal Studios Florida.
- Playing DDR Max 2 at Six Flags in San Antonio, Texas and getting some pretty large crowds.
Some other good ones....
- Playing on a good Supernova machine (or at least good at the time) at Mohegan Sun in Connecticut, and then going to see Fall Out Boy and Panic At The Disco literally right after.
- Playing on a StepMania machine at Hawaiian Brian's in Honolulu, Hawaii with pretty much every song imaginable.
- Going to the Supernova 2 location test at the AMC Theater at Jersey Gardens in Elizabeth, New Jersey.
- Going to the Nanuet Arcade numerous times before they closed down.
- Going to the Palisades Mall and playing on the machines at Catskill Laser Tag and Krazy City.
- Playing on my first ITG dedicab at Islands of Adventure in Florida.
- Getting big ass crowds playing on the machines at Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios when I was 10 in 2004 and again in 2007.
- Playing on an Extreme that had event mode and free play enabled at the Motown Cafe that was at Universal Studios Florida.
- Playing DDR Max 2 at Six Flags in San Antonio, Texas and getting some pretty large crowds.
Post #4 · Posted at 2017-03-31 07:52:55pm 7 years ago
| The Legendary DJXYZ | |
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There is a slim chance I will end up at The Break tomorrow night. But this chance is very slim.
Post #5 · Posted at 2017-06-25 03:48:31am 6.8 years ago
| rapidemboar | |
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Arright, I just got back from another visit to my grandmother's in Honolulu. May as well bump this thread and give a bit of a summary:
Day 1: Made a visit to Jungle Fun to see if the broken IIDX machine was fixed. Unfortunately, it was gone. Also unfortunately, it seems the plans for the Stepmania cabinet I heard rumors about were scrapped too. I'm not complaining too much, however, because I managed to discover Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune 5 in the process. Finally, an arcade street racing game I enjoy! I'll have to find some other games I can use my BanaPass with...
Day 2: Visited Dave & Busters. Once again, I was one of the weakest players, but at least I was relatively comparable to the others. I saw a kid do doubles and a girl who was really good at playing no-bar. She cleared MAX 300!
Day 3: No arcades. But hey, we made a trip to Kailua.
Day 4: Hoo boy. It was half-off day at D&B, so we made another trip. This was my longest time at a D&B- And keep in mind, I'm the kind of guy who will hover around one arcade cabinet for hours. This was my chance to test out some new shoes I got on day 2: They were smaller, flatter and lighter than my previous Nikes, and fitting snugly and well along with being laceless was a bonus. There were quite a few novice/casual players when I first arrived (Most of them still better than pretty much everyone at home, unfortunately...), but I finally got to get the feeling of being the big fish in a big pond. Then 4:30 rolled around, and a huge line of skilled players started. I had to leave soon after that. After dinner, we got to play a little more Wangan Midnight.
Day 5: Since we had not much else to do, we went to D&B again. I decided to work on unlocking Triple Counter. I cleared all the prerequisite songs on EX Exclusive, but didn't get a change to actually challenge TC. Looks like it'll have to wait for another half a year... After dinner, I got to play one more round of Wangan Midnight because no one thinks about looking behind them to see if there's anyone in line and just loads in another credit.
Yeah, basically I'm the kind of person who goes to the hottest tourist locales to just play arcade games. At least I get the excuse that there are few-to-no arcades in Oregon. It's not like my parents do much else, either. Ultimately, another fun trip!
A few accomplishments...
-I'm starting to get AA ranks pretty often now
-Cleared Start A New Day, my fourth level 15, with an A on the first try
-My brother and I tried Cozy Catastrophy- I failed because I was stupid and set the speed mod to 2x, and my brother lost all four lives on the last 5-10 steps. Tried it again the next Extra stage, and we both full-combed it.
-Almost about to unlock Triple Counter
! I doubt I'll be able to get the chart, though...
I've still got a busy summer ahead of me, though: I'm going to be visiting London in July! If anyone has any arcade recommendations to make, please let me know!
Day 1: Made a visit to Jungle Fun to see if the broken IIDX machine was fixed. Unfortunately, it was gone. Also unfortunately, it seems the plans for the Stepmania cabinet I heard rumors about were scrapped too. I'm not complaining too much, however, because I managed to discover Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune 5 in the process. Finally, an arcade street racing game I enjoy! I'll have to find some other games I can use my BanaPass with...
Day 2: Visited Dave & Busters. Once again, I was one of the weakest players, but at least I was relatively comparable to the others. I saw a kid do doubles and a girl who was really good at playing no-bar. She cleared MAX 300
!Day 3: No arcades. But hey, we made a trip to Kailua.
Day 4: Hoo boy. It was half-off day at D&B, so we made another trip. This was my longest time at a D&B- And keep in mind, I'm the kind of guy who will hover around one arcade cabinet for hours. This was my chance to test out some new shoes I got on day 2: They were smaller, flatter and lighter than my previous Nikes, and fitting snugly and well along with being laceless was a bonus. There were quite a few novice/casual players when I first arrived (Most of them still better than pretty much everyone at home, unfortunately...), but I finally got to get the feeling of being the big fish in a big pond. Then 4:30 rolled around, and a huge line of skilled players started. I had to leave soon after that. After dinner, we got to play a little more Wangan Midnight.
Day 5: Since we had not much else to do, we went to D&B again. I decided to work on unlocking Triple Counter. I cleared all the prerequisite songs on EX Exclusive, but didn't get a change to actually challenge TC. Looks like it'll have to wait for another half a year... After dinner, I got to play one more round of Wangan Midnight because no one thinks about looking behind them to see if there's anyone in line and just loads in another credit.
Yeah, basically I'm the kind of person who goes to the hottest tourist locales to just play arcade games. At least I get the excuse that there are few-to-no arcades in Oregon. It's not like my parents do much else, either. Ultimately, another fun trip!
A few accomplishments...
-I'm starting to get AA ranks pretty often now
-Cleared Start A New Day
, my fourth level 15, with an A on the first try-My brother and I tried Cozy Catastrophy
- I failed because I was stupid and set the speed mod to 2x, and my brother lost all four lives on the last 5-10 steps. Tried it again the next Extra stage, and we both full-combed it.-Almost about to unlock Triple Counter
! I doubt I'll be able to get the chart, though...I've still got a busy summer ahead of me, though: I'm going to be visiting London in July! If anyone has any arcade recommendations to make, please let me know!
Post #6 · Posted at 2017-06-25 06:33:31am 6.8 years ago
| midnightclubx | |
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Sadly, I don't have too much to talk about here, since I hardly travel anywhere, but that doesn't mean I haven't found music games whenever I go on vacation.
I remember back in 2004 there was an arcade in Pismo Beach, that was right by the beach itself, and it was on the 2nd floor. They had a 5-Key Beatmania game (I believe it was Complete Mix 2?), a Guitar Freaks cabinet, and a DDR Extreme machine. Sadly, I didn't get to play either of the BM or GF machines because the coin mechanism's metal was bent to where you couldn't put anything in them.
And then there was the time I went to Orlando in 2009; Disney Quest had a DDR SuperNova 2 machine that I sadly only got to play once or twice (a bunch of teens were hogging the machine and they mostly played only Xepher), but I still enjoyed it, since none of the arcades in my area had any machine that was running anything newer than Extreme. And when I went to the Old Town area, there was an arcade that had a Pump It Up Fiesta or Fiesta EX. Keep in mind, this was back when the nearest PIU from where I live was all the way in Ontario, 38 miles away (which I only played a few times).
Other than those, I haven't really been to any arcades that have had anything exciting in terms of games (the only music game they have is Guitar Hero Arcade. :/ ), so Round1's is automatically the best arcade near me.
I remember back in 2004 there was an arcade in Pismo Beach, that was right by the beach itself, and it was on the 2nd floor. They had a 5-Key Beatmania game (I believe it was Complete Mix 2?), a Guitar Freaks cabinet, and a DDR Extreme machine. Sadly, I didn't get to play either of the BM or GF machines because the coin mechanism's metal was bent to where you couldn't put anything in them.
And then there was the time I went to Orlando in 2009; Disney Quest had a DDR SuperNova 2 machine that I sadly only got to play once or twice (a bunch of teens were hogging the machine and they mostly played only Xepher), but I still enjoyed it, since none of the arcades in my area had any machine that was running anything newer than Extreme. And when I went to the Old Town area, there was an arcade that had a Pump It Up Fiesta or Fiesta EX. Keep in mind, this was back when the nearest PIU from where I live was all the way in Ontario, 38 miles away (which I only played a few times).
Other than those, I haven't really been to any arcades that have had anything exciting in terms of games (the only music game they have is Guitar Hero Arcade. :/ ), so Round1's is automatically the best arcade near me.
Post #7 · Posted at 2017-06-25 12:39:43pm 6.8 years ago
| 01angel | |
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In July or August, I will hopefully be traveling out to New Jersey to check out 8 on the Break. I'd love to play Jubeat and éclale there! They've got so many rhythm/BEMANI games that I don't have here on Long Island so I'm super hyped 
Post #8 · Posted at 2017-06-25 08:26:03pm 6.8 years ago
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Quote: 01angel
In July or August, I will hopefully be traveling out to New Jersey to check out 8 on the Break. I'd love to play Jubeat and éclale there! They've got so many rhythm/BEMANI games that I don't have here on Long Island so I'm super hyped
I was planning on going to 8 on the Break again, but I'm probably going to save up my leave days and go to ColossalCon East instead. Lots more people, WAY more BEMANI arcade rhythm games, and it is hosted at the current Nation's Largest Indoor Water Park (Pocono Mountains, PN). It's from September 8th - 10th.
Post #9 · Posted at 2017-06-26 02:50:25am 6.8 years ago
| Aegis | |
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Used to travel a lot. Met a lot of players along the way.
Played on cabs I thought I would never see.
Playing iidx on a cab! Not on beatmania US cs, but on a cab!
Seeing the graphics not through a youtube video shot on a flip-phone...it was beautiful. (This was a long time ago)
It was a great moment to even play on a iidx empress cab that was hacked with custom stuff. It wasn't beatmania US.
Thought it would never get old.
(Nowadays...)
No one really plays. I'm usually the only one playing a rhythm game when I do have a chance to visit an arcade.
The times I do run into people, they don't tend to make the moment good since most of them act like jerks. A pity.
Played on cabs I thought I would never see.
Playing iidx on a cab! Not on beatmania US cs, but on a cab!
Seeing the graphics not through a youtube video shot on a flip-phone...it was beautiful. (This was a long time ago)
It was a great moment to even play on a iidx empress cab that was hacked with custom stuff. It wasn't beatmania US.
Thought it would never get old.
(Nowadays...)
No one really plays. I'm usually the only one playing a rhythm game when I do have a chance to visit an arcade.
The times I do run into people, they don't tend to make the moment good since most of them act like jerks. A pity.
Post #10 · Posted at 2017-07-09 04:17:34am 6.7 years ago
| PaperSak | |
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I think the first time I traveled to a DDR tournament was one in Kansas. It sounded like it had been going on for years, so I thought it was gonna be a big crowd. I mean, it was big enough to knock me out of the tournament rather easily, but it was kinda small. The people there were cool and a chuck of us went out to dinner after the tournament. I managed to get one of the shirts from the event and I a token from the arcade just for keepsake. I didn't expect it to be the last one. D: Even if there were all sorts of flags that the area was sort of erm... disappearing, business-wise.
The second time, I went to DDR storm 16. Went with a couple of friends and we had a super blast. First time being at the beach, got to meet the guy two posts ago, and got completely wrecked in bracket. But they had some cool other games to play.
Then there are all those other trips where, if there's a DDR machine within an hour, I'm gonna go play it. Oklahoma, Colorado multiple times, Georgia for a double tasty dose of DDR A, some nearby city that had DDR X2 years ago. Even has the opportunity to play DDR and DanEvo in Japan last year. I think the thing I'll miss the most about DanEvo is that their players were the most approachable. Even when I could only say like two sentences, they let me play alongside them like awesome clams. ;~;
I might get to go to New York later this year. I'm always more enticed to travel if I can play some DDR A now. >.> Especially with all the nearby public machines unplayable now.
The second time, I went to DDR storm 16. Went with a couple of friends and we had a super blast. First time being at the beach, got to meet the guy two posts ago, and got completely wrecked in bracket. But they had some cool other games to play.
Then there are all those other trips where, if there's a DDR machine within an hour, I'm gonna go play it. Oklahoma, Colorado multiple times, Georgia for a double tasty dose of DDR A, some nearby city that had DDR X2 years ago. Even has the opportunity to play DDR and DanEvo in Japan last year. I think the thing I'll miss the most about DanEvo is that their players were the most approachable. Even when I could only say like two sentences, they let me play alongside them like awesome clams. ;~;
I might get to go to New York later this year. I'm always more enticed to travel if I can play some DDR A now. >.> Especially with all the nearby public machines unplayable now.