Play Meter

FROM THE EDITOR Passing through time I Valerie Cognevich Editor PLAY METER t was a thrill meeting Bob Gale at the recent AMOA show. Even ifthe name is not familiar, his work certainly is. He wrote and produced the "Back to the Future " movies. He was at the show promoting Tattoo Assassins, a game he worked on for Data East. I enjoyed meeting him so much because "Back to the Future" was one of my favorite movies. Haven't we all dreamed of going back to a time when our parents were young and vulnerable (even though they tell us a different story!). We conjure up a list of changes we 'd love to make, figuring that the future would be different. Marty McFly was stunned to see how whimpy his dad was and how aggressive his mom was. He made the changes that affected their future for the better. In our minds there would be so many things we'd change to make our future different. It's been a similar experience doing this 20th anniversary issue. We've had a chance to travel back in time and read all the stories that dominated Play Meter's pages. Who could forget when pinball went to solid-state from electromechanical? But what we do manage to forget is that many thought it was never going to work. We learned then that no one likes change. After the change from electromechanical games to solid-state, pinballs went through even more of a metamorphosis: combination video and flipper, double playfields , more and more balls in play at one time, etc. There was always someone looking ahead and creating for the future. I chuckle now when I think of how skeptical people were about video games! They were not taken seriously at all while Nolan Bushnell was making Pong in his garage. They weren't even called video games; it was TV games or 8 arcade games. Space Invaders made believers out of even the most skeptical. After that, I began wondering how many space games it was actually possible to introduce! Space was the t heme and there was every conceivable (maybe some not even conceivable) scenario out in video form. I call it the beginning of the hit syndrome which was talked about quite a bit back then. We know it well now--a game is popular, players flock to play, and suddenly that theme is top priority. In looking back, I can't help but ask how Pac-Man could have b een the catalyst for such dramatic changes in our industry. Amid space themes dominating the industry comes a cutesy game that is so different from anything out at the time that no one imagines what effect it will have . The industry peaked with Pac-Man and began d escending into what we call the video bust soon after. Could we have done anything differently? Maybe we wouldn't change things, but possibly we 'd change the way we react to industry changes. All the high points of the coin-op industry have been followed by a slump of sorts. Not to dwell on the past, but I well remember pay telephones, basketball games, and now virtual reality. Whenever anything new catches the fancy of the playing public, there are people coming out of the woodwork to offer a version of that product. There's a groundswell of product, and eventually it dwindles down to those who were doing it right in the first place. There 's a lesson here if we can sift through the past and realize that as much as things have changed, one basic remains : there's always someone doing something different, and there's always someone doing something right. They aren't always the same someone . We have to cautiously approach new ideas, but be poised to act when that something new turns out to be right. If nothing else, we should at least learn from our mistakes and our successes so we can spot either one when it comes along . .&. DECEMBER 1994