Midway Big Game Console

Value City has the Big Games Midway console for $300. It's an almost full size arcade cabinet with 12 original Midway arcade games from the 70's and 80's. I was seriously interested in this until I read this review and went to the manufacturers website and found this on their support page.

Warranty Policy:
BigGames Home Video Arcades have a 90 day manufacturers warranty IF the machine is purchased at an Authorized BigGames Reseller. Out of Warranty machines can be serviced or repaired at the owner’s expense. For service, call (800) 749-4345.

The all uppercase IF is directly from their site. I'm not even sure that they can legally do that. All in all, this is the worst 'F**ck you' warranty I've even seen on an item that costs hundreds of dollars.

Before I started researching it tonight, I was %25 sure I was going to buy one. Now I've dropped down to zero with no regrets other than I wish some more reputable company had come out with this.

Of the 12 games on the machine, about half were ones I used to play when I was in my teens.

Ah well, if these guys screw up the franchise, maybe someone better will come along. After all, Indian motorcycles went through a few bad owners before they came back.

If the machine itself and the warranty didn't suck, and I had the space, I would SO want one of those.

I kick ass at Joust, and have a fond nostalgia for the near-seizures from Robotron.

I have the Midway Games Pack for every game platform I own, I think.

You can always build yourself a cabinet and put a PC running MAME in it.

We had a thread on that, but that would require I have even more space than I don't have, and skill at doing something other than injuring myself with power tools.

MAME for teh win as Steve mentioned.

I had a copy of M.A.M.E. back before it was cool and well known. I had it on the computers at work, along with a whole bunch of the games, especially Donkey Kong, Junior.

Then we got new computers at work and stern warnings about installing our own non-work-related software and getting fired if we did. Therefore I lost the ability to while away the hours I get paid for by playing Joust and Duke Nukem. Of course, now we have high speed internet at the nuthouse, so I spend a lot of time at shockwave.com.

This is a much nicer unit. It should be, for the price.

I used to work with some folks who installed MAME on their devkit Xboxes (modified for game development, and specifically designed not to be able to play retail discs). Microsoft found out somehow, and the people in question got in a LOT of trouble.

My brother has an old Galaga game in his basement. His teenage kids play it. I loved the Galaga. It's a bit worse for the wear, but it works.

Now if I could just get an old Atari with Riddle of the Sphinx and Yar's Revenge. I could not be beaten in Yar's Revenge, and Riddle was pretty much my first experience with an adventure/find the stuff/avoid traps type game, to which I am addicted.

Great idea, disappointing execution. You'd be better off building your own MAME cabinet.

I have Galaga on my Palm T|X