Ever been to Berwick-Upon-Tweed’s Spittal Beach Arcade on a Saturday? Nope, neither have we. But if anyone’s wondering why it’s worth a visit, here are some exquisite pictures that were sent into us by Paul Blackwood (we think he’s the one pictured, playing the Sega Rally cab). He took a stroll into The Pavilion Family Fun Centre over the weekend and took a few snaps of some impressively pristine looking arcade machines. Cheers for the relatively easy blog update Paul.

Here’s a picture of the Pavilion Family Fun Centre. Apparently it boasts a snack bar, an arcade and a pool.

A Konami Simpsons cab in pretty good nick, we got Steve (our designer) to zoom in on that credit sticker and, yes, it’s 20p a go.

Our mistake, the Sega Rally pro in the picture is actually Paul’s son Luke. Would it have killed you to put your hand in your pocket though Paul?

A broken Prop Cycle machine ironically propped up in the corner. Apparently, Paul also spotted a Donkey Kong cab getting a donkey ride and the Ice Climbers clubbing a seal to death.

Yep, not retro in the slightest, but we couldn’t resist.

  Needs no explanation really.

Seeing as no one managed to topple Darran’s score on Strider last week, I get to select this week’s game; the gorilla-charging flame-hopping classic, Donkey Kong. Here’s my effort, an easily beatable score of 84400 points.    

For those of you who are unaware, Retro Gamer has a brand new designer in the form of Stephen Williams. Hailing from a place that isn’t Bournemouth; a quick glimpse into his mind proves that he’s a perfect addition to the Retro Gamer team. Take a look at what he was seeing while playing Asteroids. 

Last night’s episode of The Apprentice finally saw the show’s producers stop asking the teams to wash and press 1,000 pillow cases or become pub landlords and set them the commonsensical task of creating a product (which, in this instance, was two ridiculous sounding flavours of ice cream), market test that product, and sell the product. One team was lead by the timid Lucinda Ledgerwood, who, thanks to not immediately jumping down everyone’s throats or pointing fingers at the first sign of pressure, seemed to hold her team together well – demonstrating easily the most ‘with it’ approach to a task we’ve seen on the show so far. The other team, led by mouthy Claire Young, were the complete opposite, nonchalantly stumbling at every hurdle and yet annoyingly, thanks to bagging a large deal at the 11th hour, still managing to walk away with the task. Eventually it was Lindi Mngaza who was ousted by Sugar, after it came out in the board room that Lindi had been left in charge of the sales team and they’d essentially lost the task by not selling hard enough.    

We’re huge fans of Halo, so when we heard that it would be appearing on the Spectrum 48K we became ecstatic. There’s no news as to when the game will be released, but here’s an early screenshot to get you excited.   

Sorry for the late post everyone, but ever since we watched The King of Kong yesterday we’ve been trying to set our own world records on the hit arcade game. You can expect to see our own interpretation of the classic documentary in the next few days. In the meantime here’s a picture of the lovely Link statue we received to mark the release of The Twilight Princess. Unlike the versions that were available on Nintendo’s online store, this one is actually from a limited run. A gift from the lovely Robert Saunders. Cheers mate. 

Not content with just making a home conversion of Pac-Man that looked like this…

Very, very occasionally, we will sometimes be able to get out of the office and do a little travelling. While we rarely get to go abroad (most companies don’t promote retro games you see) we do occasionally get to visit our heroes.

One such example was when I was lucky enough to get invited to Rare’s headquarters and interview Wil Overton, Nick Burton and several other team members about JetPac Refuelled (you can read the full interview in Retro Gamer 39.) Anyway, after being shown around, having the interview and reminding myself that few other magazines had received the same privilege, it was time to take the five-hour trip home.

I didn’t leave empty-handed however as I received my very own Piñata and a framed piece of JetPac Refuelled artwork signed by all the developers. Needless to say it was a brilliant end to a rather special day.

A lovely framed piece of art. Don’t worry guys, it hasn’t been flogged on eBay.

Look everyone, it’s Horstachio! Play’s art editor, Justyn Chan slyly hides in the background, Thundercats  toys just out of  sight.