Arcade USA Presents: Arcade1Up’s Star Wars Arcade Review

There was a disturbance in the Force a few days ago – as it turned out that Willie of Arcade USA released a brand new video, a rundown on the recently released Arcade1Up cabinet for Atari’s Star Wars. A truly legendary vector graphics title, say like Asteroids, that I can tell you that at the arcade still draws new Players to it on a daily basis. As Willie points out though in his new video, the Arcade1Up’s cabinet also includes 1984’s Return of the Jedi as well as 1985’s The Empire Strikes Back. That latter game was actually released back in the day as a conversion kit for arcade owners who might have found the coin collections for the original 1983 cabinet beginning to dwindle. In the arcade game enthusiast community there has been some rather aggressive push back against the products of Arcade1Up – some of that as Willie points out in his video are fair… others not so much. I do feel however that it is quite true that when it was announced by Arcade1Up that they were releasing a dedicated Star Wars arcade cabinet – many eyebrows were raised in appreciation as well as surprise. Some of the first comments I read involved the concern over the control for all three games – as the arcade cabinets all used an X/Y directional yoke. Well, it certainly appears as if the folks at Arcade1Up did their homework because just a quick glance at Arcade USA’s video shows that it is present and appears to work as intended – meaning like it did on the actual arcade cabinets themselves.

I should point out right up front that Willie’s latest Arcade USA video is INCREDIBLY fair on the quality and performance for Arcade 1Up’s Star Wars arcade cabinet. This video nearly clocks in at 30 minutes minutes long and Willie truly does an exceptional job of approaching the cabinet – detailing it step by step. From the actual construction process to the the apparent ease of it courtesy of an incredible instruction manual. In addition he shows off how the menu and calibration settings are handled – I suppose what I am trying to get at it is with his review, after watching you should be able to decide for yourself if you need it for yourself.

For what it is worth, Star Wars the 1983 arcade game is in my top ten list – not just because of it’s beautiful vector graphics but the addition of dialogue from the likes of Mark Hamill, James Earl Jones, Harrison Ford, and Sir Alec Guinness takes it over the top. Atari’s Star Wars was a game I first played at that fabled Showbiz Pizza of my youth and I can remember how giddy I became the first time I plopped in my token and heard Luke Skywalker say: “Red Five standing by!”

Without further ado, enjoy Willie and his new Arcade USA video as he discusses Arcade 1Up’s Star Wars arcade cabinet!

I want to thank Willie once again for allowing me to begin to share some of the Arcade USA videos with you – make sure to check out his Facebook page as well as The Toy Tomb and the Atari 5200 Super Community! podcast.