Luna City Arcade News - Shawn Haines

This is a very hard letter for me to write.

Those who remember last year's Luna City Arcade Game Day will recall that it was fundraiser / benefit to raise money for the medical expenses of Shawn Haines who was suffering from Hodgkin's Disease. The event raised several thousand dollars and was a huge help to Shawn's family who were fighting the insurance companies and trying to keep up with the bills for the constant tests, procedures, etc.

Shawn passed away last Thursday after a 2 year battle with the disease. He was 22 years old, and stayed strong and upbeat until the very end.

I have been best friends with Shawn's parent's for 25-30 years and Shawn was like a son to me. Right now I am at a loss for words. My only comfort is that all the needles, chemo, drugs, and pain have ended now and that Shawn is now at peace.

I am working on setting up a small memorial display for Shawn for the upcoming Game Day on the 25th (next weekend) and I hope you will take the time to stop by and appreciate it.

I want to thank everyone who helped out last year and offered their support for Shawn. He was loved by many, and we will all miss him.

I encourage everyone to visit Shawn's CaringBridge site and sign his guestbook here:
http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/shawnhaines

Some pictures from of Shawn from last year's Game Day:








Please keep Shawn's parents and younger brother and sister in your thoughts and prayers.

-Peter

REMINDER: Luna City Benefit Game Day - Sat, April 25 - EVENT DETAILS ENCLOSED

Just a reminder of the upcoming Game Day Sat, April 25 from 11:00am to 8pm. This particular Game Day is open to ALL. Family, friends, coworkers - you're all welcome to come.

As with the last Game Day, this Game Day is a benefit event. This event will be a benefit for Col. Wesley Fox Young Marines (http://cwfym.home.comcast.net), a youth group to promote a drug free lifestyle. Donations to be accepted (and as always will be completely optional). Fred Stoki, who will be running the operations for this Game Day, is a close friend and neighbor of mine and he is in charge of the Young Marines in our area. Fred has been an integral part of helping me keep Luna City up and running so I don't completely lose my mind. Without him I could not do public Game Days. I hope you will help support him and his benefit.

Food will be available for a nominal fee. Made to order Hot dogs, Hamburgers, Pork BBQ sandwiches, chips & soda.

I believe we are working on getting a Moon Bounce again for this event, as well as a couple port-a-potties (sorry about last time)

** All proceeds from the event go directly to the Non-Profit Col. Wesley Fox Young Marines. **


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Just like always, ALL the games are FREE to play for as long as you like. Adults and children of all ages are welcome. All I ask is that children treat the machines gently as they are old, and all part of my personal collection. Please remember that Luna City Arcade is my residence. Also realize that by 8pm I am going to be completely exhausted, so please remember that the event ends at 8pm. You are totally welcome to come at 11am and stay until 8pm but at 8pm I shut off the all breakers and I go crash. :-)

I will also have console games (Atari 2600, maybe a Wii, etc) set up in the upstairs of the arcade for those who are looking for a slightly different diversion.

I hope everyone is looking forward to it! It's probably going to be another huge event like last time! Please plan on coming out and having a great time, as well as helping out the Young Marines!


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DIRECTIONS AND OTHER EVENT DETAILS ARE LISTED BELOW

DIRECTIONS AND OTHER EVENT DETAILS ARE LISTED BELOW

DIRECTIONS AND OTHER EVENT DETAILS ARE LISTED BELOW


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INTERVIEW WITH ME ABOUT MY GAME DAYS
http://peterhirschberg.blogspot.com/2008/02/digitallifestyletv-video-interview.html

BLOG POST ABOUT LAST GAME DAY
http://peterhirschberg.blogspot.com/2008/09/august-23rd-benefit-game-day-results.html

YOUTUBE VIDEOS OF SOME PREVIOUS GAME DAYS
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=033ACD93612500C7


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I NEED HELP! I NEED HELP! I NEED HELP! I NEED HELP! I NEED HELP!

* If someone has a portable (non-window-unit) Air Conditioner (the kind that has hoses to vent outside), I could REALLY REALLY use that to borrow for the event. Something like this unit is what I am looking for:
http://www.qualitymatters.com/Danby-12000-BTU-Portable-Air-Conditioner-p/qmdpac120068.htm

* Also, I need about 5 people to bring large fire extinguishers (not the tiny kind you keep next to your stove). With all the people at the event I want to be overly-cautious. If you have an extinguisher that you could bring for the event, please mark it with your name so you'll be able to find it when you are leaving.

* If you are an old-timer like me and want to assist some of the younger players with 'how to play' type coaching, that is always welcome as well. Let's teach these kids how video games used to be and preserve the classic gaming era into the next generation and generations to come. This is how it happens people - with us. Otherwise it will be lost forever.


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LUNA CITY ARCADE GAME DAY

DATE & TIME:
Sat, April 25
11:00am to 8pm

LOCATION AND DIRECTIONS:
Email Me

The website is: http://lunacityarcade.com/
You can contact me at peter@peterhirschberg.com or by replying directly to this email.


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If you are planning on staying in the area, here are some hotels nearby.

If you are being REALLY bold and flying into the area, the closest major airport is Dulles International.

http://www.metwashairports.com/Dulles/

It's about a 55 mile drive west from the airport to our place.



Kindest regards,
-Peter Hirschberg
http://lunacityarcade.com
peter@peterhirschberg.com


-

August 23rd Benefit Game Day results!

Last weekend's Game Day was a MASSIVE success. I hope everyone had fun. I estimate that over 150 people were in attendance. It was definitely the biggest Game Day yet.

Thank you to all who donated. Thanks to you, over $3000 was raised to help with Shawn's medical expenses!

Here is the video!



I only got to shoot video when things were just getting started. The video doesn't show the full extent of how busy it really was!

The local TV station came out to do an interview. Unfortunately they didn't even mention the benefit. Ummm...huh??!



The "Luna" Bounce.



Here are some photos that were taken by others and sent to me:



And some others:

http://s95.photobucket.com/albums/l156/mikemc3/Game%20Day%208-23/

http://www.documentone.ca/?p=324

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/lunacityarcade/

A huge thank you to the following people who provided crucial help during the event!

Fred and Darrian Stoki
Carl Haines and the extended Haines family
Jacob Rose
The Young Marines
The VFW (for loaning the tables and chairs)
Michael Verrechia
Sam Blackburn
Jim Talbot

Benefit Game Day - This Saturday, August 23rd

Game Day is just around the corner folks!

DATE & TIME:
August 23rd - 12:00pm - 8pm

EMAIL ME FOR THE ADDRESS AND DIRECTIONS

You can download the flyers for the event here! Please refer to the flyers for more details.

http://lunacityarcade.com/dl/Game_Day_Flyer_Aug23_2008_Page_1.pdf
and
http://lunacityarcade.com/dl/Game_Day_Flyer_Aug23_2008_Page_2.pdf

Visit from David "Auric" Hernly of Tron Sector

David "Auric" Hernly of tronsector.com paid a visit to Luna City Arcade yesterday.



It was a pleasure having you David! I know we could have chatted for days. :-)

Think Geek Game Day

Several weeks ago I hosted a private Game Day for the company staff of Think Geek. Everyone had a great time! A really nice group of people.



They even brought a cool custom-made poster for me that they all signed. [photo coming]

They recently started up a blog and here is their posting about their visit.

ThinkGeek Travels to Luna City Arcade

Upcoming Benefit Game Day - August 23rd

Greetings all. This Game Day is shaping up to be a big one! I've had many offers
from people to help out during the event (THANK YOU!). I will definitely be taking
you up on your offers. I'll need people to tend to the Moon Bounce, help out crediting
machines, coordinating the Chasing Ghosts movie showings, quarter collectors to
empty the machines out, etc. If you want to help, I can definitely find something
for you to do!

I've also been overwhelmed with emails, so I apologize if you asked me a specific
question and I haven't gotten back to you. It's just been more than I can handle.

Here's the current rough plan --

Saturday August 23rd
12:00 noon until 10pm

Over 60 vintage arcade games playable for free
Moon Bounce
All-day free screenings of Chasing Ghosts: Beyond the Arcade
BBQ, Burgers, and Hot Dogs will be for sale, with food sales benefiting Young Marines Organization
Donations will be invited to benefit the medical expense fund of Shawn Haines (more info below)
~No donations will be accepted on-site for insurance reasons~

My friend has set up a website for Shawn.
Shawn's Battle Against Hodgkin's Disease
http://mysite.verizon.net/cshaines/shawn.htm
~Donating is invited but completely optional~

If you would like to attend and need the address, please send me a private email!

More details will be posted here as they become available

More upcoming Game Day info

My friend put up a page about Shawn, who I'm doing the Benefit Game Day for in August. Here's his page:

Shawn's Page

Upcoming Benefit Game Day - August 23rd

I have settled on Saturday, August 23rd as the final date. I apologize to those who can't make this date!

The response has been, literally, overwhelming. Thank you to all who have replied. So far it looks like 200 people may be in attendance, with almost all of those wanting to see Chasing Ghosts. This is presenting some logistical problems, as I can't fit that many people where I was planning on showing the movie (the upstairs of the arcade). I'm working on several solutions, including giving out tickets to specific showings and thereby limiting the number of people at each screening, and also perhaps renting the theater in town to show the movie.

More details will follow shortly, but I wanted to get the final date out there.

UPCOMING GAME DAY

GAME DAY!

It's been a while since the last Game Day. I'm currently planning on having the next sometime in August. The dates I am looking at are August 16th, 23rd, or 30th. I will be sending out an annoucement when I settle on the exact day, but I wanted to give people a heads up.

This Game Day is going to hopefully be something extra special. First, I am planning on having this Game Day be a "benefit" Game Day. I am going to *suggest* that people donate something. Donating will of course not be mandatory. Those who know me or have been to previous Game Days know that I have never asked for *anything* in return. Here is a chance for me to do something good with the arcade. All donation proceeds will go to a Trust Fund for Shawn Haines, the son of some close friends of mine. He is currently undergoing treatment for Hodgkin's Disease Lymphoma. I am trying to set it up so that donations can be made directly into the Trust Fund. More info to follow.

As a special treat, I am also planning on showing the popular indie film Chasing Ghosts: Beyond the Arcade. This film made the festival circuit last year, including Sundance, the LA Film Festival, and also screened at the 2007 California Extreme event. Some of you may know that I worked on this movie, providing some graphics and computer animated sequences. I tentatively have plans to have the Producer of the film, Michael Verrechia, to attend and do a Q&A afterwards and I'm going to try and get some of the film's stars to attend. For those who have not yet seen this still-unreleased movie, here is another chance!

Snacks will be provided for free, and food will be for sale. We are doing a BBQ cookout at the event with all proceeds for the food sales going towards the local Young Marines organization.

Finally, we are investigating getting a Moon Bounce for the event.

And of course there will be arcade games! There have been some new additions to the collection since the last Game Day. I will also have a Vectrex console and an Atari 2600 console in operation in the party area for a change of pace.

The full list of games in the arcade is here:
http://lunacityarcade.com/games.htm

In order for me to start planning, please email the following questionnaire to mail@lunacityarcade.com within the next week or so.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
LUNA CITY ARCADE - AUGUST 2008 BENEFIT GAME DAY


NAME _____________________________

I WILL BE BRINGING _____ ADULTS AND _____ KIDS (just roughly estimate)

[_] THE BENEFIT IDEA IS NICE, I WILL TRY AND DONATE
[_] BENEFIT? DONATIONS? BAD IDEA.

[_] THE MOON BOUNCE IS A COOL IDEA
[_] NO MOON BOUNCE FOR ME, THANKS

[_] I WANT TO WATCH CHASING GHOSTS
[_] I AM NOT INTERESTED IN THE MOVIE
[_] I'll BE THERE FOR THE MOVIE ONLY

YOUR COMMENTS:



-------------------------------------------------------------------

Please return the questionnaire to me as soon as possible! I will be finalizing the exact date in August as soon as I can and will send that info along when I have it.

Radio Interview

I've been told the radio interview recorded Sunday before last will be aired this Wednesday. They have a posting about it already:

http://www.cbc.ca/spark/blog/2008/04/welcome_to_the_luna_city_arcad.html

Additional stations will most likely follow, but more details to follow...

Game Day

WOW! I can't believe how many people came for the impromptu Game Day last Sunday! I'm still recovering from it. Something like 60 people were in attendance. The last of the guests left at around 10:30pm. Visitors were for the most part people I hadn't met before. It was pretty cool seeing so many people showing up in tshirts with Atari, Pacman, Space Invaders on them. It almost felt like a convention.

I think the radio interview went well, although I'm a little concerned about my daughter being somewhat coached to say "my dad is crazy" on tape. Thanks.

Jason Scott made it out again. He actually flew out just to be interviewed, and ended up arriving after the journalist had left. Sorry Jason! I wish the timing had worked out better. He did have this to say about the visit, and posted some nice photos of the event as well!

I'm interested in any photos others may have taken. Especially photos of all the cars in the driveway!

Finally, here's some video!

Impromptu Game Day - Next Sunday, March 30th @ 2pm!!

I will be having an impromptu Game Day - Next Sunday, March 30th @ 2pm!! All are welcome!

I'm sorry about the short notice, but I just found out the final date yesterday. Sharon Pettigrew, a journalist for NPR, will be there on the 30th to interview me for a documentary that will air on The Canadian Broadcasting Corp as well as affiliated NPR stations. They have requested that I get as many people there that I can so they could also be interviewed for the documentary. Here's your chance to be on the air and explain why you love the classic arcade machines!

Hope you can make it and show your support! :-)

Please email me for directions if you are interested in attending!

Cub Scout party - Part 2

As promised, here's the video I took when we had all the Cub Scouts out for a Game Day party last week. Refer to my previous post.



Make sure you watch for the cute little "victory dance" a couple of the kids do near the end of the video.

I also received a really sweet Thank You letter in the mail from one of the kids, and another from one of the parents.

Game Day article

Vicente Martinez attended my Game Day last week, and he has posted this cool article about his experience. It's actually kind of weird for me to read about Game Day from someone else's perspective. :-)

Here's the article:
http://www.1up.com/do/blogEntry?bId=8598287&publicUserId=5798509

Sam Blackburn at my Arcade

Sam Blackburn, former Battlezone champion and one of the stars of the movie Chasing Ghosts, paid a visit to the arcade for my last Game Day. It was really cool seeing you again Sam!



Here's some video of Sam playing one of my Battlezone machines.

Game Day Video

Monday's Game Day was a HUGE success! Thank you to everybody that came!

We had about 40-50 people there. Insane! It was really wild seeing and hearing all the machines going at once, and seeing all those people milling around. I haven't seen anything like that since the early '80s. It was pretty trippy with everyone walking around video taping and taking photos.

Here's some video from the event!



We'll be doing it again in the next few months.

GAME DAY - Monday January 21st

I was thinking about having Monday January 21st (MLK Memorial Day) be a Game Day. This will be the first Game Day in the new building, and the first Game Day in a really long time.

I'm still trying to gauge interest. Email me if you think you can make it that day. I have a "Game Day" mailing list that I'm going to send out invites on soon.