Retro Video Gamer

[align=center:mdprqkxi](http://i1303.photobucket.com/albums/ag160/TrekMD/RVG%20Images/FreePlayFlorida_zps0641b80d.png)

[size=180]For those in the United States, particularly those close to Florida, a new retro event will be taking place November 20 to 24 at the Double Tree by Hilton, 10100 International Drive, Orlando, Florida 32821. 

There will be pinball, arcade, and consoles available to play.  Check out the Facebook and event pages for additional details.  [/size]

[size=140]http://freeplayflorida.com/

https://www.facebook.com/freeplayflorida (//https)[/size][/align:mdprqkxi]

This is excellent news for you fella. I take it you will be attending in full RVG costume lol.

I'm so jealous of these great events, wouldlove to go to something like that..you guys that have acces to these show appreciate that priveage , I sure would...please trek if you do attend, to make sure and get plenty of photos and if possible your RVG costume too

I think this is the first event in Florida that I've seen.  I have it on my calendar to attend at least for the weekend.  Don't we have an RVG logo posted somewhere that is nice enough to put on a T-shirt? 

Here is an update that was just posted about the event:

[font=georgia:mbj5gbom]We have our finished artwork from DC Comics artist Bobby  Timony and boy did he do it up right for us.  We gave a direction of having a number of classic good guys have something in common to battle a huge foe.  After Bobby stewed on the idea this poster was the result giving us Chun le and Samus Aran going into battle with Ms Pac Man to take on armies of space invaders and rampaging monsters using their BFG's from Doom.
 
What started out as 'what if two heros from video games of different times were fighting with others, what would that look like?  It would look a lot like this:[/font:mbj5gbom]

[align=center:mbj5gbom](http://i1303.photobucket.com/albums/ag160/TrekMD/RVG%20Images/FreePlayFloridaPoster_zps8817433c.jpg)[/align:mbj5gbom]

This is the next retro event that I plan to attend.  This looks like it'll be different from CGE as its main focus is with consoles.  It does appear there will be vendors for retro games, though. 

Do you have enough cards? lol..

Quote from: "zapiy"Do you have enough cards? lol..

LOL Well, I may just go a day for this rather than the entire event. 

So you have some?

Depends on the type of card you're talking about.  LOL

I hope some of you can make it to our show!   Free Play Florida has been a labor of love for all of us and it's nearly here!   The only thing that we really wanted but just felt it was too much for year one is consoles.  We have a huge console tournament in partnership with CEO gaming and a few console vendors but no actual displays planned.

That will change in future shows as i'm a huuuuge console collector as well as arcade collector.   I have at last count over 300 nib atari carts, over a thousand loose carts, tons of homebrews and on and on. 

Any and all support we can get will be greatly appreciated and we'll make it bigger and better next year!

Well, you can count on me being there.  I'll only be attending on Saturday but I'm looking forward to it.  I've been checking the schedule for updates.  I'm hoping to see something soon. 

Schedule should be posted shortly.  Saturday in a nutshell will have 2 arcade legends panels with Walter Day, Billy Mitchell, Robbie Lakeman (new DK champ), George Idontknow (Qbert champ), David Cruz (tron champ), Keith Swanson (gorf champ), Richie Knucklez and on and on.   Also likely to have either Gary Stern or Jersey Jack speak as well a cool presentation from the creator of the Rock a Fire explosion (including Animatronics) and even some musical stuff from Jerry Buckner of Buckner and Garcia (pac man fever song fame)..

All the while we will have about 10 world record attempts underway, a huge Star Wars display as well as TRON, a PAPA sanctioned pinball tourney and tons of gaming celebrity signing opportunities.

Sounds good. 

Lucky sods. Get lots of pics Trek.

That does sound good, well except for Billy Mitchell :21:

For anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about, you need to see the movie The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters.

Time flies.  This is already next week!  Looking forward to it.  The agenda is posted now on the site.

Plenty of photos fella and hand out those business cards lol.

Quote from: "zapiy"Plenty of photos fella and hand out those business cards lol.

 

It's almost showtime for us, stressing out! 

Bring me your cards, we'll put them in all the VIP bags.  For tron fans check out the pic I attached, custom screen printed TRON arcade marquees to commemorate our TRON:Battle for the Grid world record event.

Quote from: "prok"Bring me your cards, we'll put them in all the VIP bags. 

Will do!  Thanks!  Where can I find you? 

@prok thanks so much for that offer.

Can either mail them to me, or i'll be at the show pretty much start to finish.. just ask where brian/prok is at the main entrance.   If you want to mail them please PM me and i'll send my mailing address.

Free Play is all about the game and the people that make the community so anything we can do to help promote others we're all in to help.

Quote from: "prok"Can either mail them to me, or i'll be at the show pretty much start to finish.. just ask where brian/prok is at the main entrance.   If you want to mail them please PM me and i'll send my mailing address.

Free Play is all about the game and the people that make the community so anything we can do to help promote others we're all in to help.

I'm attending, so I'll ask for you when I get in on Friday. 

Quote from: "Shadowrunner"That does sound good, well except for Billy Mitchell :21:

For anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about, you need to see the movie The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters.

That movie is heavily skewed to show Billy as a villain for dramatic purposes. He really isn't like that.

The whole Billy Mitchell, Videogame Champ thing is just a persona, akin to wrestling. He feigns superiority. In reality he acknowledges he has a certain skill but is more than willing to do the same for others. He's quite amusing too, has quite a sense of humour.

He's been interviewed on Retrogaming Radio several times, and I feel those interviews are more representative of the man behind the name than anything else I've seen or heard which tends to be superficial. Track down those old shows if you can. They have some other incredible interviews too. Shane really broke ground with those shows, a podcast pioneer from before podcasting existed.

On a related note, gutted I'll miss this event.

In 2010, I missed Star Wars Celebration in Orlando by 2 weeks, having booked a holiday before itwas announced. Star Tours was there for 20 odd years and I missed my chance to ride it by a fortnight,not to mention missing the convention.

I was in Orlando again last month for a wedding. Finally got to ride the new Star Tours, but now I find I'm missing another great con. It wouldn't be so bad, but I missed Replay home in the UK because we had to book the holiday to fit the wedding.

Oh well, good luck with the event, I look forward to coverage from it. I hope you get some interviews recorded with some of it's stars.

Prok, up until what will the registration desk be open on Friday?  I won't be able to make it into Orlando until the evening on Friday.

I tried to get down there this year for Arcade USA, just to busy with work traveling around the country.  hope to get down there sometime

Alright, I'm back from FreePlay Florida. I had the chance to meet Bob DeCrescenzo, Walter Day, Billy Mitchell (and other record high score gamers), and Jerry Buckner (of Pac-Man Fever fame).  There were tons of arcade and pinball machines to play and that was just awesome.  I got to play some games I had not played in the arcades and some that I had not played in many years (like Tron!).  Below is a video of the event by Greg George of The Atari Times followed by a link to my picture album.  You'll find me with Bob and Michael (from Good Deal Games) and there's a picture of Bob playing Ms. Pac-Man. 

[align=center:15eqeq6q]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x72dNwHAI-c#t=48 (//http)

[size=180]My Picture Album[/size] (//https)[/align:15eqeq6q]

Great pictures! I'll watch the video later but it looks like it was fun

Thank you and, yes, it was quite fun.  Imagine having a huge room full of tons of arcades and pinball machines that you can play to your heart's content.  That's what it was! 

Looks fantastic and much like the events we have over here.

[align=center:1fr4etd5][size=120]Thought I'd give this thread a bump as the 2015 FreePlay Florida event is getting closer.  I'll be attending and meeting up with a few folks and programmers.  There will be some games released at the event as well for the Atari consoles.  [/size]

(http://i1303.photobucket.com/albums/ag160/TrekMD/RVG%20Images/FreePlayFlorida2015_zpsg73fnmbf.png)

[size=180]FreePlay Florida 2015 Site[/size] (//http)[/align:1fr4etd5]

Looking forward to your thoughts and what news comes from the event.

Absolutely!  And I'll be creating an online photo book as well. 

This event is this weekend.  Looking forward to it. 

Cool! Looking forward to the photos

Well, I got back from FreePlay Florida!  The event was really cool and I spent most of yesterday playing all sorts of pinball tables and video games.  Here is a list some of the games I enjoyed:

Pinball - Avatar,  STTNG, Game oo Thrones, Flash Gordon, Transformers, Star Wars, Full Throttle, Big Juicy Melons, Independence Day,  Demolition Man,  Judge Dredd, 300, & Fire.

Arcade - Tutakham, Pac-Man, Circus Charlie, Wizard of Wor, Berzerk, Mr. Do, Gyruss, Blasteroids, Major Havoc, Pac-Mania, and Gauntlet II.

Console - Mr. Do! & Donkey Kong (for ColecoVision)

I've made an online album with pictures.  I got to meet Gary Stern, from Stern Pinball and got a picture with him (last one in the album.  You can check my pictures of the event here:  FreePlay Florida 2015 (//https)

That is a lot of pinball tables, great pictures! Looks like you had fun

I sure did!  I was quite impressed with the digital tables they had there as well.  Those are awesome as you can play many tables and they do have ways to give you physical feedback.  I'll be posting more about that later.

OMG, that looks amazing :13: Did you play it or was it a display? (didn't see it in the arcade list of your post)
Anyway, great score meeting Mr. Stern. Would like to have an autograph from him someday
Looked like a blast.

It sounded like a loud room in there!  It was hard to make out the sounds of most of the machines when the room was really crowded and everyone was playing.  Early in the day and late in the evening it was better as there were fewer people playing and you could hear the sounds the machines made.  There were exceptions, though, like R2-D2's shrieks from the pinball machine.  There was no missing that! 

The Joust machine was an emulator and it kept on crashing, so I never played it.  People tried but the game would crash in the middle of it.  So, I just posed for pictures. LOL

Awesome stuff fella. I love events like these. Did you pick anything up? You should try and get contact details for interviews.

I got a couple of 2600 games as one of the programmers from Atari Age was there selling games.