Virtual Ping Pong

Greg Lucas asked:


Some people like to unwind by listening to music, some like to watch TV, some like to indulge in a little baking, and some like to play in the Arcades.

Those people who belong to the first three categories are lucky because the radio, the television, and the oven could be found in the comfort of their own homes.

The same couldn’t be said for the guy who likes to play in the Arcade though as the nearest Arcade is probably blocks away. And due to the dwindling popularity of the Arcades, their numbers have dropped as well.

But, as is the case with almost everything else in our modern world, technology has made it easier for the Arcade Buff. Your favorite arcade games like Pac-Man, Pinball, and Space Invaders can now be played in the comfort of your own home all for free.

You don’t have to buy those bulky Arcade Machines. The solution is actually more practical. You only have to go to your desk, open the computer, connect to the Internet, and go to one of those on-line Arcades. Nobody has to see you struggling over that unbeatable stage in Super Mario.

Nobody has to see you fumble with the controls as you try to outrun the enemies in Pac-man. Nobody has to hear that booming voice shout “Game Over”. You can do it all in the comfort and privacy of your own home. No more humiliating defeats, no more annoying bystanders whispering that they can do better, no more waiting in line to buy tokens. Indeed, the on-line arcade has made things extremely better for the modern gamer.

Online arcades also offer a bigger variety of games than your local arcade. There are over a million arcade games in the Internet, a number made possible by the emergence of different versions of different games.

These on-line games, ranging from puzzle games to shooting games to word games, have even become more complex, more interesting, and more addictive. Pac-man, a traditionally two dimensional game has evolved into a full three dimensional game, where our hero, Pac-man has changed from a mere circle to a 3-d sphere with legs and arms, and an interesting personality to boot.

Modern Technology has made things easier for the modern man. If you’re too busy to go to the actual Arcades, you can still indulge yourself in the Internet without having to leave your home and and play free arcade games.

Daniel Millions asked:


Modern arcade games have been around since the 1970s, although the more popular ones that most people are familiar with were created in the 1980s and early 90s. Currently, arcades are not as thrilling as they once were, especially since home consoles and computer games nearly rule the video game market. Many of the popular arcade games have been transferred to a console setting, so if you still want to play a classic arcade game, you can do so from the comfort of your own home.

Of the many arcade games that have been invented, there are a few that warrant in depth analysis due to their monumental impact. Mortal Kombat, created by Ed Boon and John Tobias, was released in arcades in 1992. It was a response to the hit game Street Fighter II, which at the time was one of the highest acclaimed fighting games. What made Mortal Kombat special, and controversial, was the incredible amount of violence. By pushing a unique combination of buttons, players could perform fatalities, which were intensely graphic ways of killing one’s opponent.

The games developers did this on purpose, as a way to generate controversy and thus publicity for the game, and their plan worked quite well; in fact, almost too well. Due to Mortal Kombat and a few other games like it, the Entertainment Software Rating Board, commonly known as the ESRB, was created to give ratings to games (such as E, T, and M). Mortal Kombat has been released on several different consoles, and two film adaptations have been made.

Street Fighter was conceptualized more than five years before Mortal Kombat, and was developed by the well known Japanese company Capcom. The game features several characters, the most popular being Ryu, who was only one of two characters (the other being Ken) available for play in the first street fighter. The ten other characters shown in the game could not be controlled by the player. The first Street Fighter did not develop much of a following, although it set the stage for sequels, all of which would gain a better following than the original.

Specifically, Street Fighter II initiated a strong fan base and essentially launched the fighting game genre in to widespread popularity. This was because eight characters could be played, and each had their own unique fighting style. The variety of characters enabled enhanced and prolonged game play, and some people even credit the game with extending the arcade era by a few years.

Rampage allowed up to three players to play at once, controlling various monsters with the purpose of destroying cities. The three monsters included a giant gorilla (George), a gigantic lizard (Lizzie), and a large werewolf (Ralph). Players could destroy buildings by punching, kicking, or jumping on them. You could also climb buildings and eat people and food along the way. Resistance was provided in a variety of forms, such as police, helicopters, tanks, and the army.

In addition, if you tried to eat the wrong thing, like an electrical appliance, you would take damage and fall off the building. When one’s life ran out, the monster would revert in to a naked human and walk embarrassingly off the screen. If multiple players were participating, another monster could even eat their human comrade. Several sequels have been created, including some of the Playstation 2, Gamecube, and Wii. No new installments are set to come out in the near future.

Pascal Smeets asked:


With the growing popularity of social networking sites like My Space, people are looking all over the place for ideas to make their individual site stand out among all the thousands of others. One of the ways people are accomplishing this is by finding cool sites that will help you post fun things like MySpace games and other stuff that is fun and interesting on your page. Most of these are free games where you basically just copy a bit of code and paste it on your My Space page and voilla, you have a game ready to go.

Some of these are cooler than others, and the ones I like best are the ones that offer arcade games . I have always been a big fan of arcades and this is a cool way to get to play some of your favorite games without actually getting in your car and driving to the arcade. On top of that, you can share the games with your friends so they can play too, so they can play a free online game, and on many of these arcades you can actually save high scores, etc., so that you can see who is the resident champion at a given game and how you yourself stand up to the competition.

The concept of putting a free online game on a website to get people to spend time there is not a new one. It has been around on many a forum site for literally years, but what is new is that you can now actually put them on your individual page at almost any of the major popular social networking websites and share them that way. Also, some of these new arcades offer really cool ones, like this maffia game I’ve been playing. This is a different concept because it is more personal and enables a larger number of people to actually host their own web based arcade without being a skilled web developer.

For more information log on to http//www.redython.com or contact us at P.w.m.smeets@home.nl