Funspot
5th Annual Classic Pinball
& Video Game Championship
May 29-June 1, 2003

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For the fifth year, Funspot, the worlds largest classic video arcade, is bringing us the World Championships in coin-op videogames & pinball.  This event is certainly not for the casual or hobbyist gamer.  Over 100 of the hardest of the hardcore gamers from all over the world are here in the mountain resort town of Weirs Beach, New Hampshire to compete for world records in the biggest & best classic arcade in existence.  Four days may sound like a long time for a tournament.  However, most of these players can play a single game for hours on a single token.  I've seen Galaga players at this event play all day one token.   

The Funspot classic contest was co-created by Gary Vincent and Ken Sweet -- both of Funspot.  Because Funspot is famous for owning the world's largest collection of publicly operated classic video games, Ken and Gary realized that this would be the obvious site for the classic gaming hobby's premiere contest.

Update -- May 31st, 2003   11:30am

World record #5 has been achieved....

Greg Bond has beaten the world record on Mappy.  Greg has been a bit of a "Mappy Machine" lately as he has beaten his own record a number of times in the last year.  Greg's new world record is  827,980. 

Congratulations to Greg for achieving this new record.

Update -- May 31st, 2003   1:00am

It took over 15 hours, but Greg Erway has just reached a major milestone.

Greg started playing Tapper at 9am on May 30th, and continued to play for roughly 15 hours.  In the end, he had established a new world record score of 9,100,175 points.

Funspot stayed open several hours late to allow Greg to achieve this awesome score.  Despite the late hour, many gamers stayed to witness this awesome feat.

Congratulations Greg!!!

Update -- May 30th, 2003   10:35pm

World record #3 has just fallen....

Shawn Cram has just beaten the record for Zookeeper.  The previous record had stood for 18 years.  Jack Gale had the former record of 20,063,920.  He achieved this score on June 28th, 1985.

Shawn managed a score of 21,849,650.  Congratulations on a job well done.

Update -- May 30th, 2003   6:25pm

We have the second new world record for the tournament. 

John Lawton, one of the co-owners of Funspot, has broken the world record for DepthCharge.  His score was 4,420.

The old record (which was held by Dave Nelson) was 4,140 set on June 3rd, 2001

Also, Bryan Wagner completed his game of Burgertime.  The final score (and new world record) is 7,960,050 points.

Congratulations to both John & Bryan on their new world records!!!

Update -- May 30th, 2003   5:40pm

We have the first new world record for the tournament. 

Bryan Wagner has broken the world record for Burgertime.  His score is currently just shy of 8 million points, and the game is still in progress.

The old record (which was also held by Bryan) was 7,946,800 points set on May 31st of 2002.

Update -- May 30th, 2003   4:00pm

We have the first major "scoop" of the tournament.  Funspot has informed me that they will be making an announcement today at 5:00pm.  At that time, they will let the gamers know that there will be a Commemorative Program available after the end of the tournament with photos, scores, and all of the other action from the tournament.  This program is expected to be around $5-$10, and should be available in July, 2003.  Ordering information will be posted here later.

Update -- May 30th, 2003   2:15pm

Here are some of the first photos of the action.

Click on the photos to enlarge

Dave Nelson (left) and Donald Hayes compete on some pinball machines	Depthcharge, Berzerk, Domino Man, and Ghost N' Goblins	Randy Lawton of Funspot tests out the gun on Vs. Duck Hunt
Players compete on Battlezone, Lunar Lander, Depthcharge & Berzerk	Randy Lawton opens up Lunar Lander to fix a broken button	Rob Barrett (right) discusses his skills in Tutankham
Several people watch Rob Barrett play Tutankham	Greg Erway videotapes his game of Tapper	Shawn Cram goes for the world record in Donkey Kong 3
Darren Harris impresses the other players with his awesome Star Trek skills	Anna Cram plays Astro Fighter	Abner Ashman installed a Jr. Pac-Man board in this Pac-Man Plus unit
Jason Cram plays Domino Man	Mark Schulz plays Spectar	Richard Marsh plays Tempest

The secret tournament game of the day today is Astro Fighter.

Update -- May 29th, 2003   5:35pm

One of the first announcements of the tournament is that there will be a player named as the Funspot "Player of the Year."  This player will be the overall winner from all of the individual contests during the tournament.  This player will be enshrined on the wall of fame here at Funspot, along with Billy Mitchell.

The secret tournament game of the day is Moon War.

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