Archive of category "data east"
RoboCop the arcade game by Data East is in my opinion, one of the greatest arcade games ever. Not only did Data East have exclusivity on the RoboCop franchise for the arcade, but it also seem to have exclusivity (at least for a while) for the home versions as well. The three Nintendo versions are not that great of a game in themselves and compared to the arcade game there is no comparision.
Anways last night in an exhausted haze I had noticed that Netflix had RoboCop 2 available for streaming so I started to watch it. The original movie was damn near perfect for a variety of reasons, and this sequel is mostly crap. But there is one scene I do love and can watch over and over again.
To get you up to speed RoboCop tracks a thug kid to an arcade who is assisting a major drug operation. While RoboCop stakes out the arcade he observes the kid talking to a dirty cop who is telling the kid and one of the thugs information about the police. RoboCop decides to take action.
When RoboCop enters the arcade he makes some remark to the kids about it being a school night and the kids boo him and start to pelt him with popcorn. Then all hell breaks loose and the kids start to run off. The dirty cop realizes he’s been caught and RoboCop uses excessive force on him to make him talk and confess the location of the drug operation.
So you’d swear by the movie that only Data East makes arcade games. The arcade is full of them. And in some cases other games are branded as Data East titles, or have controls that don’t even exist for the title that the machine supposedly “is.” Each time I watch this scene I notice something new. But here are some of the cooler highlights:
1. As the kids start to scatter from the arcade you can see the Data East logo on four machines. I don’t know what that machine is on the left, but below the control panel is the Data East logo. Next to that is Bad Dudes with the logo clearly visible on the side of the machine. Next to the machine is that kid in a green shirt and jeans and to the right of him is another game with the Data East logo located near the top. I’m not sure what game this is but is clear that the logo was placed over the original cabinet art its angled weird but it definately has bowling pins on it. Next to that machine in profile is a white cabinet with a red and blue stripe. This is easily recognized as the cabinet to Pole Position (made by Namco published by Atari in the U.S).
2. In this next screen grab the dirty cop tries to sneak out of the arcade with out RoboCop seeing him. On the left is Midnight Resistance – an actual Data East game. Centered in the background has another game with the Data East logo below the control panel. I couldn’t make out what it was that game is Super VolleyBall. To the left of the dirty cop is Slap Shot. Not an arcade game but rather a redemption game released by Data East. And on the far right in the background is Vigilante. Vigilante is made by Irem but was published in the arcade by Data East.
3. RoboCop tosses the dirty cop into the Midnight Resistance machine. In the background you can see Bad Dudes. There is also a Data East logo on an unknown game (Ghostbusters – sorta you’ll know why in a moment) and Kung Fu Master another Irem game published by Data East.
4. Things start to get rough for the dirty cop. In the background we see Heavy Barrel.
5. Face plant into the Bad Dudes machine. In the background we have Hippodrome and Super VolleyBall.
5. Close up of Bad Dudes. Wish there wasn’t a dirty cop’s face in the way. The broke the glass! Those bastards.
6. And finally something really weird. See that Ghost Busters? Why does it have a steering wheel controller?
Too bad Data East really didn’t operate arcades as that would have been really cool – much like Namco currently does and SEGA has done in the past. There are two other arcade scenes from movie I hope to share in the near future. The first is the scene from Terminator 2 with the motion activated After Burner. The other is the scene from Death Wish 4 when your favorite classic games are machine gunned down. Hope you enjoyed this post!
