Retro Games Club

Greetings fellow travellers!

If you’re reading this blog, you probably like old video games. I know I do! Especially those of the arcade variety. They’ve been an important part of my life for nigh on half-a-century (Yeah, I’m that old!). I’ve enjoyed them at the shows, at the seaside, in town-centres, in take-aways, at motorway service stations, up mountains, on boats, and more recently, at home. If you saw my previous post you’ll know all about my (very) modest home arcade. If you’ve yet to meet ‘The Twins’, why not grab yourself a butchers via this link.

Let’s face it, ‘though, a mere two JAMMA cabs was never going to cover all my gaming bases. They were never going to scratch that pixellated itch.

You know the score.

To reconnect with the ‘Golden Age’ of arcade or home gaming, you really need the ‘equitment’.

Inevitably, my stash of vintage gaming equipment has grown to include a selection of old computers, consoles, and TVs. Not so many that I’m in danger of getting showcased – in Retro Gamer magazine – or one of those ‘hoarding’ documentaries! But I do seem to have acquired a modest collection of stuff.

As a naturally tidy person, I kept most of it stored away in the loft, rotating things out every now and again as time permitted. Starting about 2016, however, I was also bitten by the console-revival-bug that started with the NES, C64, and SNES minis. Being living-room-friendly, it was a lot easier to leave them out, under the TV, and left on for the kids to play at parties and gatherings. Perhaps not surprisingly, they proved to be rather popular.

Fast-forward to the Christmas holidays in 2018, and a dinner with friends – and the topic of video-games events came up.

Why?

Our local library had been dumped by the coonsil, only to be saved at the last minute by a community group. Events were needed to encourage folks, especially kids, to keep coming into the building on a regular basis – hopefully to borrow and read some books! But keeping the venue open wasn’t cheap, so fundraising was important too.

Various suggestions were on the table, mostly on the kind of book-related themes you might expect. But as the bleeps and bloops in the background began to escalate, it seemed that we had another potential solution staring us right in the ears. What about a Retro Games Club? The idea appeared to have wings. A few weeks of discussion, photoshopping and printing later and I had a plan.

In today’s post, I want to share my experience of running a Retro Games Club. I’ll cover what we did, how we did it, and how long it all took. That way, if you ever take the notion of running a club of your own, you can side-step the logistical problems, and start with the dial wanged all the way round to 11!

Gathering the troops

If you’ve got enough stuff, enough time and enough energy, it’s perfectly possible to set up and run a retro games club on your own. If you can remember back to the glory days of the JAMMA+ forum, you’ll probably know about the legendary efforts of Mr RGP (Retro Games Party), which have since blossomed into a bona fide business model.

For my humble project, however, the idea was to get the local community involved – to spread the joy, but also the load. Being of a certain age (old) was pretty useful here. With a few of my friends also harbouring retro-gaming urges, there would be a range of hands on deck. As we were all dads, we also had a ready made constituency of mini-gamers to help get the party started.

So far, so good.

Between us, we had a pile of retro kit – but that didn’t mean we could just plug it all in and get started. The venue was now run as a charity, and the terms of its insurance meant that electronics equipment had to be P.A.T. tested. With some of this stuff being 40 years old, and some of it accumulating 1000s of Volts, it was important that we didn’t expose the public, or the building, to any unnecessary risks. Even more so when kids would be involved. For an extra layer of saftey – and convenience – we also decided to run most of the stuff via fused extension cables. That meant absolutely tonnes of stuff had to get tested. If we’d had it done privately, it would have cost a bomb. Fortunately, a member of the Committee was a registered electrician, who gave up an evening to do it for free. If you need to get this done yourself, it’s worth checking if any local sparkies will do a special rate for charities. I’ve heard of some that will do it for a pound a test – although even at that rate you could be looking at £50 or more for a half-decent selection of gear!

Planning the event

With the equitment gathered, tested, and ready to go, the next big step was to advertise the first event. Before we could do that, however, we had to figure out what the format would be.

The main thing – obviously – was being able to offer a wide range of systems and games. But we also wanted to avoid the ‘tyranny of choice’, where the limitless selections of multi-carts can isolate gamers from each other, and quickly lead to boredom. The more sessions we ran, the more obvious it became that optimum levels of fun were generated by paring back the selection of games as much as possible – essentially running every system as a dedicated arcade cabinet.

Rather than simply turning on the machines and leaving the visitors to it, we decided to have a couple of systems fitted with multi-carts, but for most to be running a single competition game – with high scores getting listed on a white board, and prizes awarded to the winners.

In terms of competition games, we had to think pretty carefully about the selection on offer.

Lots of folks have very fond memories of obscure old games – and while we were keen to accommodate those nostalgia trips where possible, we were also conscious that they wouldn’t always make the best games for quick plays or competitions.

The winning formula turned out to be pretty straightforward. Games should be simple, easy to learn, have a clear scoring mechanism, and not last very long – allowing the maximum number of people to have a go, and to encourage a bit of competition. Games like Frogger, Galaxian, and Chuckie Egg fit the bill rather nicely.

Nowadays, there are also a bunch of amazing home-brew games for the C64, including the awesome Canabalt, and the 4K phenomena Winky Blinky and Dog that make for really great competitions. If you haven’t seen them, be sure to check ’em out!

I already had a whiteboard and pens we could use for high scores. A few shifts on GIMP later, and we had some information boards for the machines, some labels highlighting the prize games, and some certificates for the winners. Kids love that kind of thing!

Given that the club was going to involve a long stretch on Saturday afternoons, we reckoned that there should also be snacks. First thoughts were the kind of comfort snacks we remembered from our own youth – donuts, crisps, and coca cola. All the good stuff! But as responsible, community-minded adults, we also had to be sensible. Healthy snacks (apples!) would also be available, as would gluten and sugar-free alternatives. There would also be some water, coffee and – of course – biscuits for the grown-ups. All of this would come at a cost, which would have to be covered by the ticket price. While the ultimate goal was to raise some money for the library on top of this, we didn’t want to price anyone out.

Compromises had to be reached.

Luckily, the best donuts on the market (street), could be had for 11p each in packs of 5. Crisps weren’t much more. And at the time, cans of coke (full-fat and sugar free) were south of 30p a tin (if bought in mahoosive boxes). Figure in some packets of gummi-type sweets for prizes, the fruit, and the gluten and sugar-free snack alternatives, and we found that we could cater for about 80p a head. That was assuming that this wouldn’t be a one-off event, and that the remainder of any bulk-buys could be held over to the next event. Setting the ticket price at £2 including snacks seemed like good value, and would still generate some cash for the library. I imagine you’d have to raise that to £3 or more nowadays to achieve the same kind of results.

Letting the world know

The plan was to let people pay on the door. But to encourage folks to buy into the event in advance, I also rustled up some souvenir tickets. If you’re going to do this kind of thing yourself, you’re going to need a paper guillotine. Cutting them out with scissors is a pain in the proverbials.

The final hurdle was letting the world know. To do that, we needed some posters.

The design of the posters was deliberately cluttered (honest!) – partly for ironic reasons, but mostly to give the intended audience something to explore, and hopefully to find something specific to identify with. Something to hook them in. We posted them on relevant and specifically-targetted web-platforms and ‘socials’. For extra-added old-skool charm, they were also printed out, laminated, and pinned up on notice boards around the village!

After the first few, I decided to beef up the retro-chic-quotient by adding some 80s icons.

Eventually, the temptation to riff off (rip off?!) the kids’ favourite TV show was just too hard to resist.

And once you go down that road, the challenge of matching branding, fonts and styling sets you sliding down the slippery road towards addiction.

In the end, things started getting a bit out of hand!

Let battle commence!

As you can see from the posters, the Club had its premier on the 20th of April 2019. That’s five whole years ago! Happy Birthday ‘Retro Games Club’!

Getting everything ready that first Saturday morning took ages.

Moving my own stuff from its various hidee-holes at home into the boot of the car took about an hour. This was on top of the hour it had already taken to go to the shops to buy the scran, and make up some flasks of coffee for the grown ups.

From parking the car outside the venue to being fully green-lit and ready to go took another 45 minutes – and that was with several other people helping to get the boxes in, unpack the stuff, and set it all up. Getting everything dimantled, back into the boot, and finally stowed away at the end of the day took another 90 minutes. So, basically, with a 1 pm start in mind, the shenanigans had to get underway by about 10 am. The 5 pm finish meant that tea could not be eaten, nor hostelries visited before about 6.30 pm. That’s quite a shift for the old day off!

After a few sessions, it was clear that a later start time would be needed to let us get things ready at a less frantic pace. It also meant we had time for some lunch before the guests arrived. Noice.

Retro-games clubbing!

Running the Club was definitely not a one-man job.

In fact, you’ll want a sensible number of adults for the size of the intended audience. A ratio of about 1 to 10 is usually a good idea. But you’ll need to make sure that at any given time, the whole area can be looked over by adults who’ve gone through the appropriate background checks. In Scotland, that means a DBS (Disclosure Scotland) check. The easiest thing to do here is to get someone involved who already works with kids (eg. as a school teacher, teaching assistant, nursery teacher etc.), or who is involved with a childrens’ group, like the Scouts or the Boys’ Brigade. Teachers will already have one, paid for by their employer – as will most folks who are regular contributors to kids’ groups. Depending on the size of the venue, one might be enough. The best thing to do is check the rules and requirements with the venue itself. They may well have a list of certified volunteers who can come along for the day and help out. Fortunately, we had all those bases covered between us.

We needed someone at the front desk to meet, greet, explain what was happening, and make sure that high scores were recorded accurately. We also needed bods in circulation to keep an eye on the kids, and the machines (!), and to check that everything stayed on and working. It’s amazing how easily kids can crash RPi set-ups – even when they’ve been certified bomb-proof by adults.

With the snacks, rather than leaving everything out on a table and having folks help themselves, we decided to have a dedicated snack-time about half-way through. Two adults minimum were needed to hand out the goods, and make sure that the inevitable debris was quickly and suitably recycled. Those kids went at the donuts and crisps like a shoal of piranhas! Cloths, kitchen roll, disinfectant spray, and binbags were on hand in case of catastrophe. We also decided to give guests a time-warning at 4.30, and to use the last 10 minutes for anouncing the competition-winners and awarding the prizes.

How did it all work out?

In short, it was BRILLIANT!

That first day – which we ran as a test – had about 20 paying guests. More would have been better. But in retrospect the limited nmbers were a good thing. It gave us the space we needed to iron out the creases and nail down the routine. After that, word spread, with the number of paying guests doubling to around 40 for the next event, and passing 50 by the end of November.

The growing numbers inspired an adults-only event between Christmas and New Year, with beer and cake, as well as coke and donuts. I have to say, it looked pretty good fun, even if I was lumped with responsible person status!

Game Over?

By late February 2020, we’d got into a bit of a rhythm. The Retro-Games Club was taking off as a local event. The vibe was good, the kids had fun, and we’d raised several hundred pounds for the library.

Plans for a follow-up event at the end of March were well underway when…

Well, we all know what happened in March 2020.

It was late 2022 before we were in a position to think about a revival.

By that point, the pooled retro-collections, Rpi-creations, and TV stock-pile had grown. I’d managed to bag a few extra CRTs through a local advertising campaign (!), and was keen to get them fired up and running clasic video games.

Unfortunately, in the years that had passed since our last event, the library’s buildings insurance had been changed to one that seemed to require full PAT-testing for every single piece of electrical equipment being used. While that seems sensible for high-voltage kit, like CRT TVs, I’m not so sure it’s necessary for very low-power gear like RPis. I also ‘hae ma doots’ that blasting aging PC Engines or Vectrexes (Vectrices?) with a test jolt is the best thing for their electronic health. To my mind, the regulations would allow for (partial) exceptions for this kind of equipment, especially if other layers of saftey precaution were put in place. But that doesn’t mean the insurance company needs to agree!

Epilogue

If I can find a way to spare my geriatric electronics the indignity of shock-testing, I’d be up for reviving the Retro Games Club. An alternative might be to restrict the event to less valuable and less-cherished relics, like RPi-based systems and LCD screens. Would that cut the mustard? Maybe some of the dads would still come along. But in the life of the kids who used to visit the Club, 5 years is a very long time. The ones who still play video games have moved on to more modern things. Some of them have left home and moved away. Would an even younger crowd be interested in our Stone Age appliances? Watch this space. We’ll have to wait and see…

Have you organised a Retro Games Club? Do you have any tips to share? Do you plan to, and have questions to ask? If so, please join the conversation in the comments section below.