Arcade Legend releases in 2022 for Oculus Quest and PC VR, presenting a pretty compelling concept that sees you build your own arcade from scratch, using licensed arcade games, which you can then play by yourself or with friends.
As you can see in the trailer above, the game looks to mix gameplay elements from several games into something new for VR. It has elements of a tycoon/sim management game, a touch of The Sims and then a big sprinkle of the emerging and increasingly popular social magic of VR.
Providing players with a framework and campaign to build a unique arcade space with licensed games is interesting enough in itself, but being able to actually use the space like a real arcade, playing games and hanging out with friends, is a really unique angle.
Here’s a more detailed description from the developers LAI Games:
Inside Arcade Legend, an arcade builder and gameplay simulator, you’ve inherited a mysterious old arcade which was once a legendary entertainment destination … Restore and customize your arcade using a wide range of materials, then fill it with officially licensed arcade games to earn revenue and build Reputation, which unlocks new attractions that you can play solo or with friends.
Casual, competitive, and always social, you can chill out with friends, go head-to-head on global leaderboards against the best players in the world, or open your doors to the public to show off what you’ve built.
It sounds like a properly unique and different experiences, that merges gameplay structure with the social opportunities of apps like BigScreen, VRChat and Facebook Horizon.
There’s no word on the exact full roster of licensed arcade games yet, but you can catch a few classics shown in the trailer.
Arcade Legend will release in 2022 for Oculus Quest and PC VR via Steam.
Steam Next Fest is set to bring a week-long deluge of game demos, developer talks, and update news starting on June 16th. Steam will be hosting around 20 playable VR game demos over the course of the event, and there’s some real gems in there we’ve just been itching to play.
We’ve rounded up our 10 most anticipated demos coming to Steam Next Fest, including trailers, descriptions and links so you can make sure to try out the demo when all of them officially go live between June 16 – 22, 2021.
I Expect You to Die 2
Genre: Puzzle, Adventure
Studio description: Be the elite super spy we’ve been waiting for! The popular escape-the-room virtual reality franchise is back with new missions, more villains, and ingenious puzzles.
Studio description: Seeker: My Shadow is a VR adventure that utilizes the versatility and possibilities of VR, sending players of all ages to an immersive adventure! You control a Giant Spirit while assisting Kippo, a small and adorable Seeker, through various puzzle levels. Go solo or solve the levels in co-op mode!
Studio description: AGAINST is a combat rhythm VR game that will immerse you in a noir crime nightmare. Follow the beat to shoot and slice your way through Mafioso forces. Empowering modern music is your only way out from the bleak streets of 1930’s New York.
Studio description: Arcade Legend is an arcade simulator and management RPG. Clean up your run-down venue, add new games and customize the layout and look. Build your reputation to continue unlocking content and play officially licensed, modern arcade titles as you unravel the secrets the venue holds.
Studio description: What does it mean to become an agent of authority? Master the art of beheading, become an agent of authority, and enact a divine drama of justice, death, and redemption.
Studio description: Snap together inconvenient road pieces to build ridiculously convoluted highways, and guide the dysfunctional Flowers family on a psychedelic road trip across post-infrastructure America.
Studio description: Have you ever dreamt about being inside an old Arcade Machine? ARK-ADE is a fast-paced VR First Person Shooter. Plunge into the retro vibes and shoot your way out through an evocative low-poly 80’s Sci-Fi setting to protect ARK and defeat ADE.
Studio description: Cave Digger 2: Dig Harder is a VR adventure game for 1-4 players, taking place in an alternative, weird west dieselpunk world. The player excavates the mountains of their claim, and encounters many mysteries along the way. The North is cold and the Frontier guards its secrets well!
Studio description: The spiraling psychedelic puzzle – Grab revolving orbs and guide them through twisting liquid crystal mazes to create the Universe! A refreshing, relaxing and satisfying “one more go” experience, only in VR.
Studio description: Into The Darkness is a VR action-adventure game built on physics mechanics. Near future. Humanity is trying to achieve immortality by transferring consciousness to machines. Navigate through environments, solve the puzzle, engage enemy… to find out the dark secret behind the experiments.
Steam Next Fest goes from June 16th to June 22nd. You can sign up for an official reminder here, which can send you either an email or push notification from the Steam mobile app.
Arcade Legend is an upcoming arcade simulator for PC VR headsets that not only lets you manage your own arcade, but also collect and play officially licensed arcade games too.
It’s been a rough year for arcades, yours included. Now it’s time to clean up the place, build your reputation among the quarter-dispensing public, and unlock all of the arcade games along the way.
With officially licensed games created by physical arcade cabinet maker LAI Games, you may recognize more than a few. From the lighting fast reaction game Speed of Light to the ever difficult Stacker, the cabinets have been lovingly reconstructed in VR with a bit of virtual flair added for effect. There isn’t an official list of cabinets available yet, but it looks like there’s slated to be plenty of ways to earn tickets, which you can use to buy items from the prize counter to customize your avatar.
The arcade simulator is set to offer both single and multiplayer modes, so you’ll get to focus on building out the arcade, going for high scores, and hanging out with friends too.
Arcade Legend is aiming to release on Steam Early Access for PC VR headsets sometime this year, although LAI Games says a free demo is coming in June. LAI says the demo will feature three of its arcade games, including Speed of Light, Let’s Bounce, and HYPERshoot. You can now wishlist it on Steam.
Rather than going to the arcade, industry specialist Kevin Williams, in his latest Virtual Arena column charts the rise in popularity of VR amusement games on consumer platforms, and how an actual amusement manufacturing company looks to launch their own virtual recreation of the amusement experience, which you can manage yourself.
The arcade experience is a popular zeitgeist, especially for an audience that has restricted mobility to local venues. Home arcade game ownership has been supported by a profusion of miniature arcade cabs. For those that do not have the space or deep pockets to build their own arcade, there is the ability to achieve this experience in VR.
We saw a mainstream attempt at feeding the continuing hunger for amusement gaming back in 2015 on the then Samsung GearVR, powered by Oculus. The platform would see the launch of ‘Oculus Arcade’, which would be ported onto other Oculus hardware like the Go – players able to assemble a collection of 22 recreations of classic video-arcade games. Virtual cabs they could play on such as Pac-Man and Defender, supported by licensed products from manufacturers SEGA, Namco and Midway. Though in the end the game would be abandoned due to unclear contractual reasons.
The Oculus Arcade experience
We have also seen perfusion of VR creations of amusement games like shooting the hoops, and arcade builders and management games, such as the releases New Retro Arcade: Neon, and VR Toolbox DLC ‘80’s Arcade’. At the same time, we see other attempts at arcade management games. Social VR offerings like Rec Room have included their own interpretations of the arcade hall-style experience, able to shoot some hoops with friends in VR. But many, if not all, of these interpretations of amusement fun, have been shallow experiences.
It was time for real amusement developers to apply their skills in this medium.
For the first time, an amusement manufacturer has ventured into the world of virtual amusement entertainment. LAI Games is a well-known video amusement, prize, and redemption machine manufacturer. Prior to becoming a subsidiary under Helix Leisure Pty Ltd, LAI Games was part of the Timezone Group and sister company to the popular ‘Timezone’ amusement facility chain. So, the company knows a thing or two about amusement and its operation.
LAI has grown an extensive R&D resource that has been responsible for much of the innovation being applied to the new generation of amusement pieces that break the mould and aim to offer a new level of engagement for the modern amusement audience. Highly themed, with strong illumination and an even stronger gaming ethos. Titles like the company’s new release HYPERshoot – a re-imaging of the basketball hoops game, with immersive lighting, and audio cues, along with much more competitive gameplay. The need for modern amusement to be both compelling and enthralling is evident in these releases. The unique style of eye-catching presentation and compelling gameplay has fathered a sequel title in the same vein with HYPERpitch, a baseball-style pitching game.
LAI Games’ real multi award-winner HYPERshoot. Image Credit: LAI Games
The company is no stranger to the explosion in VR, having developed in partnership with Ubisoft, and D-BOX on Virtual Rabbid’s: The Big Ride – one of the leading sellers in the VR amusement machine genre, with well over 700 units sold across the world. But in the time of the Global Health Crisis, and LAI had an extensive R&D resource in Singapore looking to broaden their coverage under lockdown. It was in these conditions that the R&D operation decided that if the player cannot come to the arcade, then they will ship the arcade to the player. And so was born the new consumer VR game app called Arcade Legend.
The unique element of Arcade Legend is it is much more than loving recreations of real amusement gaming pieces but is also a management game – with the story gifting the ownership of a dilapidated and rundown amusement hall that they get to renovate and populate with machines, laying out the space, and attempting to attract players. The success of this represented by the number of NPC’s playing the machines. The game also allows multi-player allowing players to invite their friends to their creation.
Add and customize multiple units of HYPERshoot for multiplayer action. Image credit: LAI Games
VR offers the recreation of LAI’s games into this space. The company creating enhanced versions of their titles Let’s Bounce, Stacker, Speed of Light and the eye-catching HYPERshoot. The immersive representation adding a new level to the gameplay, allowing an audience to get to grips with these highly addictive amusements. The player able to manipulate the colour configurations and the price to play for all their machines.
Virtual version of LAI Games’ multi award-winner Let’s Bounce. Image credit: LAI Games
But the game itself is much more than virtual simulations of the popular amusement hardware, the player must manage their arcade, building up a varied selection of games, attractions, and facilities to draw an audience, and price accordingly. LAI’s team is first looking at a list of their own videogames for the player to select from.
But it’s also in the early stages of discussions to have the inclusion of other real-world amusement hardware from other manufacturers offering depth to the game experience. Details teased suggest it has already secured a deal with another manufacturer, to include “…one of the most popular games in the history of our industry”, with Arcade Legend. Along with additional titles to follow.
The company has started the process of an early roll-out of the videogame. First releasing a teaser experience outlining the features of the experience and collecting player feedback towards a full release later in the year. Players can try the experience for themselves at the upcoming Steam Next Fest from June 16-22.
