Tempest Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 I know there are already several PC5 threads out there, but I thought I'd start another one... Thursday ----------- For those who don't know, I'm in Michigan so I ended up driving 9.5 hours to Philly. The drive wasn't bad, but PA's turnpike sucks the big hairy one. After missing the Valley Forge exit and having to go 12 miles out of my way (and pay $11 in extra tolls), I finally made it into Philly 5:00 Thursday night and was immediately put to work in Albert's sweat shop making Saboteur carts. Around 12:30am I decided to call it a night and went to sleep. Friday ------- Waking up bright and early (well around 9:30am anyway), Dale Crum, Joe Grand, and I decided to go out to breakfast before setting up the booths. The set wasn't too bad, but Albert decided to bring everything except the bathroom sink. My booth was pretty easy to set up since all I had was a 5200, TV, and several protos. I also spent the day playing a few arcade games as they were being set up. I can gurantee that I'll never see another Quantum in my lifetime. After the set up a group of us went out to Lonestar Stakehouse for some real food. Saturday ----------- The first real day of the convention. I got down to the floor around 8:30 and there were already a horde of people lining up at the door. I ended up spending most of the day either watching my booth or Curt Vendel's Atari display (convienently located next to mine). When I could get away I spent my time poking around Curt's Atari mainframe (it was alot smaller than I thought it would be) or playing my new arcade machine over at Cassidy's booth. My new baby is a DECO cassette system with Burgertime and Bump n Jump. The machine is in mint condition and works perfectly. The only problem we encountered was a blown joystick switch after the World Champion Burgertime player decided to christen my machine. After a quick fix, she was ready to go. I also spent alot of time in the arcade which contained mint condition specimins of some of the rarest arcade machines. Imagine Quantum, Blaster, Hard Drivin' Panorama, Major Havoc, and Indiana Jones Temple of Doom all in one place (and set on freeplay). It was a dream come true... After picking up some goodies it was time to close down the show for the night. A group of us went out for drinks at some restaurant, where I proceeded to get the top score on the trivia machine even though I was blitzed out of my mind. Guess I'm smarter than I look... Sunday --------- The last day of the convention was the shortest, but seemed to go on forever. After spending some time chatting with HSW and picking up some last minute goodies (including yet ANOTHER Adam system), I spent the rest of the day demoing Blaster to some eager fans. The show went by quickly enough, but the teardown took forever. My booth was down in about an hour, but I spent the next four hours taking down the AA booth and Atarimuseum booth. That little mainframe may have been small, but it was HEAVY! After everyone was packed up, there was one last task to be completed, getting that DECO machine into my minivan. It took three people (Curt, S.S., and myself) to haul the machine out to my car and wedge it into van. Since the cabinet was so tall (much taller than a normal cab) it stuck out the back of my van by a good 3 inches. After tilting it upwards and shoving as hard as we could, we were able to wedge it and shut the door. I didn't think that thing was ever coming out... There was a small incident during the teardown. While Curt was taking down his booth, his display collapsed on him. Luckily Curt wasn't hurt, but about 20 people came racing over to see what happened. The only thing that kept a large pillar from crashing into me was my arcade machine. It took the blow and stopped the pillar. I knew it was good for something... After the teardown a small group of us went out to the Cheesecake Factory and talked about the success of the show. The attendance was over 2500 people this year (the wristbands made it easy to count this year. No need to guess and inflate the numbers like some other shows do). That makes PC5 the most attended classic video game show so far (AGE, the previous record holder, only had around 2300). I can't wait to see how well PC6 does. I know I'm leaving out several events, but my sleep deprived mind can't quite recall everything. I'd like to thank Curt Vendel, Albert Yarusso, Dale Crum, Joe Grand, Cassidy and Nicole, S.S., Osmeroid, Mark DiLuciano, Dan Boris, Tony Morse, Dave Newman, the MegaManFan's, Cafeman, Fat Dave, and just about everyone else in my AtariAge family. Thanks for everything, I owe you guys. Tempest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tempest Posted March 23, 2004 Author Share Posted March 23, 2004 Oh and the Blaster roms will be made available when Albert gets home and can post them. Tempest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Oh and the Blaster roms will be made available when Albert gets home and can post them. Woot! can gurantee that I'll never see another Quantum in my lifetime Yep.. that was one of the main things (Aside from the Blaster of course) I noticed in the various pics .. the Quantum machine! It's the Quadrun of the arcade collecting scene.. Or did I just say that because their names are similar Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maibock Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Oh and the Blaster roms will be made available when Albert gets home and can post them. Woot! can gurantee that I'll never see another Quantum in my lifetime Yep.. that was one of the main things (Aside from the Blaster of course) I noticed in the various pics .. the Quantum machine! It's the Quadrun of the arcade collecting scene.. Or did I just say that because their names are similar Hmm I never heard of the game until I played it. Was pretty fun too! Had I known how rare it was I would've played it some more Other games were calling me however Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MegaManFan Posted March 24, 2004 Share Posted March 24, 2004 Oh and the Blaster roms will be made available when Albert gets home and can post them. Tempest It can be released after all? TOOOOOOOOOO SWEEEEEEEEET! Matt, you already know this, but you ROCK! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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