The last Ridge Racer Full Scale arcade cabinet in the UK

[aeroflott]

A recent blog post about a cautionary tale relating to arcade preservation. The cabinet in question was a Ridge Racer Full Scale - Namco's audacious and over the top arcade racing sim from the early nineties, which utilises an actual Mazda MX5 car shell and a huge triple display screen.

 

This particular example, still operated until recently in the UK, is believed to be the last working example in the world, (ok I might be a bit premature with that assumption, but it made a good headline). It was almost lost forever, following the actions of a careless 'collector' with questionable judgement, if it were not for some pioneering detective work by UK arcade enthusiasts looking to preserve this cabinet and save the code contained within it.

 

It's quite the yarn, so do check it out:

 

Article here

 

[DeciderVT]

Fairly certain my dad worked on one of these, possibly the one that was in the Trocadero. He would've been disappointed to see most of them ending up on the scrapheap. Can't imagine why anyone would go to the trouble of picking up the whole setup just to leave sections of it outside.

[Lyrical Donut]

3 minutes ago, DeciderVT said:

Fairly certain my dad worked on one of these, possibly the one that was in the Trocadero. He would've been disappointed to see most of them ending up on the scrapheap. Can't imagine why anyone would go to the trouble of picking up the whole setup just to leave sections of it outside.

 

Odd - I don't remember seeing this at the Trocadero. I must have missed it somehow. I do remember seeing it at Namco Wonderpark, just behind the Troc on Shaftesbury Avenue. You couldn't miss it as it was on the left as you entered the building.

[klargon]

I remember they had one of these in Meadowhall. It was pretty amazing to see, but I’m not sure I ever saw anyone playing it.

[Lyrical Donut]

Yeah - I think it was at least £2 a credit at Namco Wonderpark, possibly more.

[DeciderVT]

16 minutes ago, Lyrical Donut said:

 

Odd - I don't remember seeing this at the Trocadero. I must have missed it somehow. I do remember seeing it at Namco Wonderpark, just behind the Troc on Shaftesbury Avenue. You couldn't miss it as it was on the left as you entered the building.

 

I never saw it at Troc myself, around that time I only really visited there for Alien War as the arcades were too expensive. My dad used to work on a lot of machines that ended up there. He definitely worked on one of these as he got to use it for free for a few hours and wouldn't stop talking about it afterwards!

[Paulando]

Had a go on this in Blackpool a few years back. It did look past its best, but was incredible to see. I had no idea it existed until we came across it!

 

 

 

[Pistol]

I’m pretty sure there was one of these at the Hollywood Bowl in Teesside, of all places. I recall sitting in the car, at any rate. Wonder what happened to that one…

[chris on the moon]

12 minutes ago, Pistol said:

I’m pretty sure there was one of these at the Hollywood Bowl in Teesside, of all places. I recall sitting in the car, at any rate. Wonder what happened to that one…

Yep, there was! I didn't get to play it, it was swarming with bigger boys.

[dumpster]

I played this when it was new in Blackpool and my memory of it was the steering wheel was way too big to play the game.  It felt like playing Sega's 18 Wheeler with the steering wheel rotating like a real car, rather than the 135 degree each way of the original arcade version. It was amazing to look at but i only played it once and was disappointed.

[ScouserInExile]

Back when I worked for Sony, one of the events they held was in Namco Wonderpark. I think it might have been an ECTS party. Everything was on free play (including the beer) so I had a few goes on this. From what I remember, it only let you play one track and once you finished the one race, that was it. I remember being glad I hadn't paid to play it.

[Count Buffalos]

That was the same for all arcade racing games wasn’t it? 

[Gorf]

I remember the one in Codonas in Aberdeen around 1995/1996 it was definitely the most expensive thing in the place maybe £2 a go? I never did get a go

 

12 year old me wasn’t into cars and I didn’t realise it was an MX5 until seeing these pictures, my vague memory was always of something much more exotic

[sofasurfer]

Played this on Clarence Pier in Southsea, all I remember is being far too drunk to actually drive and it costing an arm and a leg to play.

[dumpster]

4 hours ago, ScouserInExile said:

Back when I worked for Sony, one of the events they held was in Namco Wonderpark. I think it might have been an ECTS party. Everything was on free play (including the beer) so I had a few goes on this. From what I remember, it only let you play one track and once you finished the one race, that was it. I remember being glad I hadn't paid to play it.

I wonder about the way the arcade industry works.  Like, I was at Arcade Club the other day and I was fucking LOVING Daytona, the recent remake with the cameras pointing at you and the Widescreens and when I came home I googled it and found one for sale, you know, to go in the garage.  And it was £35,000.  I remember when Outrun 2 came out it was £68,000 for a 2 player and you have to wonder don't you... 

 

So if that Ridge Racer FullScale was £250,000 how the hell do they expect to make their money back? I guess the machines become a draw - come for the Ridge Racer and stay for everything else.  But there are so many business ventures you could go into that offer a much better return.  Imagine being the arcade owner waiting for 68,000 people to have played Outrun 2 so you can finally start turning a profit. It's almost a loss leader.

[ScouserInExile]

5 hours ago, Count Buffalos said:

That was the same for all arcade racing games wasn’t it? 

I assumed it had the same structure as the PS1 version - if you finish 1st, you go in to the next race, otherwise it's game over.

[Count Buffalos]

Fair enough. That’s not the structure of the PS1 version either though

[dataDave]

3 hours ago, dumpster said:

I wonder about the way the arcade industry works.  Like, I was at Arcade Club the other day and I was fucking LOVING Daytona, the recent remake with the cameras pointing at you and the Widescreens and when I came home I googled it and found one for sale, you know, to go in the garage.  And it was £35,000.  I remember when Outrun 2 came out it was £68,000 for a 2 player and you have to wonder don't you...

 

I hogged the new Daytona when I was there. Two hours at least. My mate had never played any Daytona before so I had to get him into the manual shift cornering before he too was hooked like a total addict.

[dumpster]

1 minute ago, dataDave said:

 

I hogged the new Daytona when I was there. Two hours at least. My mate had never played any Daytona before so I had to get him into the manual shift cornering before he too was hooked like a total addict.

Oh my god the manual gears makes it.  You're always half a second away from losing control. It's such a great game.  Every time I played it I turned around to check, no queue, right back to it. 

[dataDave]

As for this Ridge Racer effort even back in the day I had to question if it was a proper Namco endorsement or something that'd been ham-fisted together by some external chancers. Why a Mazda? Why no livery? 

[dataDave]

1 minute ago, dumpster said:

Oh my god the manual gears makes it.  You're always half a second away from losing control. It's such a great game.  Every time I played it I turned around to check, no queue, right back to it. 

 

That's the hurt. Even when it's set to Freeplay in one of the best arcades in the entire world no fucker gives a fuck.

[Lyrical Donut]

12 minutes ago, dataDave said:

As for this Ridge Racer effort even back in the day I had to question if it was a proper Namco endorsement or something that'd been ham-fisted together by some external chancers. Why a Mazda? Why no livery? 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ridge_Racer_(1993_video_game)#Development_and_release

 

I guess Namco/Mazda had some deal going at some point and cobbled it all together for the Ridge Racer release.

[Lyrical Donut]

3 hours ago, dumpster said:

I wonder about the way the arcade industry works.  Like, I was at Arcade Club the other day and I was fucking LOVING Daytona, the recent remake with the cameras pointing at you and the Widescreens and when I came home I googled it and found one for sale, you know, to go in the garage.  And it was £35,000.  I remember when Outrun 2 came out it was £68,000 for a 2 player and you have to wonder don't you... 

 

So if that Ridge Racer FullScale was £250,000 how the hell do they expect to make their money back? I guess the machines become a draw - come for the Ridge Racer and stay for everything else.  But there are so many business ventures you could go into that offer a much better return.  Imagine being the arcade owner waiting for 68,000 people to have played Outrun 2 so you can finally start turning a profit. It's almost a loss leader.

 

I would imagine the outlay for the big cabs would've been subsidised partly by the cheaper and more lucrative SNK MVS, CPS 1 & 2, Namco System 11, Naomi games and fruit machines during that period. In theory, at least...

[Vimster]

Well remember seeing one of these in an arcade in Weston Super Mare about 1995. At £2 a go I wasn't touching it (50p for Virtua Fighter was bad enough) but it was popular. There was a guy making sure kids weren't dropping icecream all over it.

[dumpster]

Yeah, back then there was the R360 which had its own attendant. It was a quid for 5 minutes so that equates to £20 an hour. Surely requiring an attendant to safely strap you in removes half that profit immediately.

[ScouserInExile]

11 hours ago, Count Buffalos said:

Fair enough. That’s not the structure of the PS1 version either though

It's been a while since I played it, but I had it in my head the basic structure was you had to win all races to progress, then if you won all of them you'd have a single race against the white / angel car, then if you beat that, you'd have another single race against the black / devil car.

 

I'm probably wrong, though, it's 27 years since I played it last, I reckon. The PAL version was the first game I tested for Sony and I don't think I've played it since.

[SuperFamiTom]

I was messing about with it last night while testing a controller for my MiSTer. 
 

On the Japanese version at least it’s Game Over whether you come first or not after each track. 

[Count Buffalos]

1 hour ago, ScouserInExile said:

It's been a while since I played it, but I had it in my head the basic structure was you had to win all races to progress, then if you won all of them you'd have a single race against the white / angel car, then if you beat that, you'd have another single race against the black / devil car.

 

I'm probably wrong, though, it's 27 years since I played it last, I reckon. The PAL version was the first game I tested for Sony and I don't think I've played it since.

You’re right regarding the overall structure but it’s effectively a series of unlockable races rather than a single session / credit progression, if that makes sense.

[dumpster]

1 hour ago, ScouserInExile said:

It's been a while since I played it, but I had it in my head the basic structure was you had to win all races to progress, then if you won all of them you'd have a single race against the white / angel car, then if you beat that, you'd have another single race against the black / devil car.

 

I'm probably wrong, though, it's 27 years since I played it last, I reckon. The PAL version was the first game I tested for Sony and I don't think I've played it since.

That's all correct but only applies to the Playstation version.  The arcade was always just one single game for a quid and no devil car (no choice of car at all in fact). The Playstation version had 4 cars, more if you cleared the galaxians loading game.  Still no level structure though, you just had to come top on every difficulty to unlock the devil time trial.

[Corranga]

What a crazy story!  Like others, I also used saw and played this in Blackpool, it was a fair bit worn, and as the site says, manual gears didn't work, but what an amazing thing!  I never thought I'd ever get the chance to play one of these (I didn't know Codonas in Aberdeen had one, but was rarely up there at that time).

On the flip side, the story has something weird about it, who goes through the trouble, and presumably cost of getting that and then leaves it outside, and dumps parts of it.  Was it all about the kudos of owning it?    All seems a bit suspect to me.