So, as you may have heard, Ralph (the owner of FFA) took over Japan Arcade. A bunch of us employees from FFA have been going there bringing in new games and fixing the place up. It still requires a lot of work, but we’ve made a ton of progress.
Currently, Japan Arcade has (but will change very soon):
Racing:
Rush 2049 x2
Hydro Thunder x2
Max Tune 3 DX x2
Initial D 5 x2
Initial D 3 x2
Music:
DDR Extreme
ParaPara Paradise 2nd Mix
Drummania V3
Guitar Freaks V3
Mambo a Go Go
Taiko Drum Master 5
Fighting:
Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike (JP cabinet)
Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike (AM cabinet)
Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike (AM Head2Head cabinet)
Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 (AM cabinet)
Garou: Mark of the Wolves (AM cabinet)
Super Street Fighter II: Turbo (AM cabinet)
Tekken 5 (JP dedicated cabinet)
Hokuto no Ken (JP cabinet)
Guilty Gear XX (JP cabinet)
King of Fighters 2002 (JP NeoGeo cabinet)
King of Fighters 2000 (JP NeoGeo cabinet)
Street Fighter IV (JP sticks)
King of Fighters Maximum Impact: Regulation A (AM sticks)
Capcom vs. SNK 2 (AM sticks)
100 Neo Geo games in 1 (JP Sticks)
Puzzle:
Puzzle Bobble
Puzzle Bobble Again
Tetris Plus
Super Puzzle Fighter II: Turbo
Shoot-em Up:
Raiden Fighters II
Strikers 1999
Others:
Virtua On: Cyber Troopers
Metal Slug 4
Punchmania 2
Ninja Assault
Golgo-13 (Japanese sniper game)
Tsurugi (that Japanese sword fighting game)
Air Hockey
Pool Table
60 in 1 Cocktail cabinet
A lot of stuff will be changing in the future.
Most importantly, we will be checking all the games and fixing them (a lot of the sticks kind of suck right now). We will also be converting most of the fighters to H2Hs.
SF4 will get a toggle to choose between AM or JP sticks, similar to FFA’s cabinet. BlazBlue will go into a JP cabinet. We’ll probably add CvS2, and HnK. GG will be upgraded to AC. Tekken 5 will be upgraded to Tekken 5: DR. Probably MotW, and KoF2k2 will be consolidated into one cabinet with two other neo geo fighters (my vote is for KoF2k3 and FF:S).
We will be adding a hacked In the Groove machine. We will be adding Bishi Bashi. We will be adding consoles with online play. If FFA upgrades a machine, Japan Arcade will at least get the older version (i.e. if FFA gets BBCS2, JA will get BBCS1).
So come check the place out, it’s located in Little Tokyo in LA. Arcades - Japan Arcade @ Little Tokyo - ArcadeFly
Photobucket album: http://s449.photobucket.com/albums/qq219/Id_asz/Japan%20Arcade/
FAQ:
Q: Will Japan Arcade be getting new fighters like SSF4:AE, KoFXIII, BBCS2, T6:BR, or MBAACC?
A: No. We simply do not have the budget for very expensive games at Japan Arcade yet. Once Japan Arcade is able to hold its own and start making money, we’ll try and get more new fighters in. Until then, you’ll have to support the arcade by playing the older fighters.
Q: Will all the games be Japanese Sticks?
A: No. We are trying to have a diversity of games and cabinets at Japan Arcade. Certain games will be on American sticks, and certain ones will be on JP sticks, though there will be more JP games than American. Games you can expect to see on AM sticks: MvC2, 3S, CvS2. Games you can expect to see on JP sticks: 3S, GG, BB. Basically, games that are obviously Japanese, like the airdashers, will be on JP machines, while games that are more geared towards Americans wll be on AM machines. Some games there will be both, like 3S. SF4 will have its cabinet modified so that the player can choose to switch between JP or AM sticks at will (like FFAs SF4 machine).
Q: Will all the fighters be Head 2 Head (two separate cabinets for each player)?
A: We’re working on it. We’d like to have all of the cabinets be H2H, but I’m not sure if we have the resources to make every one of them like that. We’ll definitely have as many of them H2H as possible. We will also have 1 or 2 purposefully non-H2H games with a big screen and controls far apart from each other (i.e. MvC2).
Q: What are Japan Arcade’s hours?
A: Atm they are roughly 11am-11pm, but we would like to change that. On weekends (Friday & Saturday) we’ve been staying open as long as there are people. I think our goal will to be to close at 2am regularly for the weekends.
Q: Will you guys be having tournaments?
A: Yes. Though no dates are planned, we want to host some tournaments in the future (specifically SSF4 and BBCS). We will be sure to post tournament dates online, on SRK, dustloop, and FFA United.
Q: How does parking work?
A: In the mall there is a parking garage. If you go to any of the shops, including Japan Arcade, you can get your ticket stamped, and get 2 hours of free parking. You then have to pay if you would like to stay longer. If you stay in the garage until 3am, you don’t have to pay at all. There is a lot for the market in the mall area that requires a fee on weekdays, but on weekends (as far as I know) it is free to park.
Q: Will FFA hurt because of Japan Arcade?
A: Not really. We’re moving some old stuff and hand-me-downs from FFA in order to make Japan Arcade better. Most of these games had little play at FFA. We also moved quite a lot of stuff that was in our warehouse. We are getting a bit of new equipment as well. We are still planning on getting SSF4:AE at FFA (we have preordered it), but we have no plans for getting that game for Japan Arcade yet.
Q: X game is kind of a rip-off. It costs too much, the difficulty is too high and the buttons don’t even work!
A: That’s not a question… but we’re working on it. We do plan on making all of the prices in the arcade fair, whether that entails making the price go up or down. Certain options will be changed and fixed (i.e. the music games will all be on the default settings), but for fighting games the difficulty might be pretty high (except ST, which will be at the lowest possible). As for buttons and sticks, we will be inspecting everything and replacing what needs to be replaced. We want the arcade to bring in customers again, and I think that one of the big problems was that it was dysfunctional. Nobody wants to pay money for a game that doesn’t work properly.
