[SOLVED] Please help name this electro mechanical arcade light gun game


Ian J

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Aug 27, 2010
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Many years ago myself and my partner Jane played a game in a local arcade.

It was a 2 player vs shooting game where the object was to propel a tin can into your opponents goal.

The play-field was similar to the following basketball games, a perspex dome covering a dimpled pitch.

Basketball_1.jpg

Basketball_2.jpg

The tin can fell into the hollows and you had to shoot a light sensor at your side of the can at which point the can was flicked towards your opponents goal with a ram.

I'm hoping someone else can remember this game as we'd love to try and find it again to play it.
 
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We had a stand right next to the Pandora's one at GamesCom which had the same exact machines.

The guys knew how to fix it.

Ask ED about their name.
 
I'd rather not pester ED with PM's so I hope he sees this thread and can respond.

Maybe there are some photo's from the event that show the game.
 
Haven't had any luck with the search so far, Ian.  Normally I'm pretty good at these sort of retro-gaming searches - that one must be rare indeed.  Maybe you could narrow down your search some by recalling WHERE you saw and played this particular game.  Maybe the store/arcade may no longer be there, but maybe something might turn up, maybe you might even be able to track down the past store owner/offspring.  Worth a shot if you're really bent on seeing/playing this game again.

Let me know what you come up with anyway - I'm a bit curious as well.  Looks like I've had a refresher course on historical arcade games today - it's always good to see things that I've missed.  Sometimes I forget that arcade games aren't just an "80's" phenomenon.  That's my own myopia at work...again.   :D
 
...also, as a side note - the old electro-mechanical games were notorious for breaking down.  They usually had a LOT of physically moving parts and you could count on the more complicated ones breaking down - sometimes with a few days of being repaired.  Which is no doubt complicating your search here...
 
There's a list of Williams and Bally Midway EM Gun games here:

http://www.pinrepair.com/arcade/wmsgun.htm

http://www.pinrepair.com/arcade/midgun.htm

If it's from their stable the name might ring a bell?

I used to live within cycling distance of a seaside town with an arcade stuffed to the gills with electro-mechanical games, they didn't even have space invaders! Some of the games were so odd it was hard to tell if you were actually in control or whether they just ate your coin and put on a brief show.

The cabs that ran a super-8 loop of film while you 'drove' were a favourite.
 
Thanks, comradekingu and Asmo, I've already seen those sites and those games.  I think the "dimpled pitch" and a few things are similar to that basketball game, but Ian mentioned that a tin can was pushed out of those "hollows" and by a response of a "light gun" somehow...and it was to be aimed at a "goal" and not a basketball net...I also saw a soccer variation of that game, but nothing with a tin-can or a light gun.  I'm really curious now.  I wonder if it was a one-of-a-kind variation by a tinkerer?  These games were electro-mechanical, you could have put any ball or can or whatever on the "pitch"....if it was of similar weight and size.  The light gun however is puzzling.
 
Many thanks for everyone's input, I too have gone through that list previously of EM games.

That guy has a massive list of stuff I played in the late 70's early 80's but the game we played was new in the 90's.

As Franko says it was definitely not a basketball game but used a similar playfield with a rectangular open goal at each end.

If memory serves it had a title like crackshot or marksman but we could be completely wrong.

Ah well back to searching through google images.
 
OH MY GOD!!!

It wasn't a dream it was called "Cool Gunman" awesome game, highly recommended if you're into mechanical arcade machines.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/YhZ-qR5Ye3M?feature=oembed

77220737_d65047f936_b.jpg

My description was slightly off caged not a dome and the playfield is slightly different, so apologies if that was hindering peoples searches.
 
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^  Yeehaw!  Glad you found it - that was driving me nutZ...and yeah, that whole perspex dome thing was throwing me off a bit.  It'd be hard to have one AND a manual light-gun at the same time (I would think).
 
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