Podouken

Ever wanted to end a dinner conversation suddenly? Is the boy band's choreography not meeting the door fee charged? Did someone heat up tuna in the work microwave again?! All are valid scenarios where there's just one option - flip the table and leave. We talk about the arcade game that lets you live out this fantasy (without all the post-flip cleanup), Taito's Cho Chabudai Gaeshi! Reminisce with...

If Hayao Miyazaki agreed to make an arcade game we doubt it would fit better in his world than this one. We continue the Peripherals Y'alls miniseries with Namco's exertainment calorie burner, Prop Cycle. Was Prop Cycle the first arcade game that tricked kids into healthy gaming? Is the Namco System Super 22 the heaviest arcade system ever made? Why is the story so good for a bicycle game? Did you...

Did you know that if you finish Typing this entire block of lines That you will be completely Dateless for the rest of your life? The Peripherals Y'alls miniseries starts with the best undead Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing simulator in the entire arcade - Sega's Typing of the Dead! Is the bullet mightier than the keyboard? How did Sega take The House of the Dead 2 and make it even campier? Is pineapp...

Time to bring the Vector Victor miniseries in for a landing so please fasten your seatbelts and place your tray tables in the upright position as we descend into an Arcade Obscura. Rob brings us the first game to ever come out in the arcade after previously coming out on the home console. Jarrod brings us a tale of caution and woe with a game whose failure rate was legendary. Adam delivers on the...

Remember, the Force will be with you, always. The vector series continues with one of the best arcades to ever do it - Atari's Star Wars. What very Star Trek name did Star Wars originally go by before Atari gained the license from Lucasfilm? How did a focus group give us one of the top arcade grails ever? Did we discover a hidden and somewhat obscene new arcade cabinet format? How many parcels mak...

Welcome to.....NOT Podouken, but Rankdouken. The internet's dumbest named ranking thing. In this episode, we take a listener request to rank......Fruits!    Rankdouken is normally a YouTube exclusive show, be sure to check out our channel for more video contant such as Listener questions, and occasional game play sessions. Due to travel and life, Podouken missed an episode release, but will be bac...

Hell is empty, and all the devils are here. Any good miniseries must include the best game of that genre, so let's discuss Dave Theurer's gorgeous vector Atari game, Tempest. If Tempest was a steak what cut would it be? Why does this episode leave Rob breathless? Was the Cranberries Doors and Windows the best video game of 1995? Did Tempest birth the most popular arcade-based urban legend? We answ...

Have fun storming the castle! We circle back with Cinematronics to see what they cooked up to compete with Atari's Asteroids - the beautiful vector classic Star Castle. Did this game's life begin as a game about the beginning of life? How did Atari's failure to port this Star Castle lead to one of their biggest hits? If arcade games rose up to kill humans based on what the game was about, what wou...

Atari treads new ground with their first terrestrial vector arcade offering, Battlezone! Was this the first game with true military applications? How did constant complaining lead to getting credited in one of the best arcade games made? What genius idea did Pastblaster's wife have to witness the Gumball 3000 rally for free? Was Battlezone the original Virtual Boy (but better in every way)? This e...

Roger, Roger. What's our vector, Victor? In 1977 arcades lit up with a new vibrant and high-resolution display that brought a dead video game publisher back to life. This was the vector monitor and it did more than just connect the dots, it dropped jaws and led to some of the most memorable arcade games ever created. We kick off our new miniseries with the first vector coin-op game, Space Wars by...

The Three's Company apartment lease is up and it's time to move out and move on in the only way we know how - with an Arcade Obscura on underrated or obscure three-player arcade games! The first pick is so undefineable that Jarrod had to create a new word for the genre. The next pick gives us gore and bad line deliveries to go with our beat 'em up. The last pick takes a famous character, gives the...

Pastblaster finally gets his flowers as we cover one of his favorite games - Capcom's excellent three-player beat 'em up, Alien Vs. Predator. Where does Alien Vs. Predator rank on the list of all-time arcade beat 'em ups? Are you familiar with the Vela Incident of 1979? How did comics lead directly to this game (and a movie that we'd rather not mention)? Did Christmas come early for Jarrod with a...

We return to our normally scheduled broadcast to tear into one of the best 3-player and 80s games ever made - Rampage by Bally Midway. Did Rampage lay out the landscape for future sandbox video games? Can you tell the difference between Ralph Wolf and Wile E. Coyote? What led to the long-standing partnership between game designers Brian Colin and Jeff Nauman? Did we really just go around the moon...

While the episode title could be interpreted as a comment about the three knuckleheaded hosts, we're taking a very foolish look at the little known Mylstar arcade game The Three Stooges in Brides is Brides. Why is this game so intent on players wiggling men's joysticks? How does a game based on a property made 50 years before the game's release play 45 years after it came out? Did this game stay t...

In the world of three-player arcade beat 'em ups Capcom is king. But which of their games reign supreme? In this episode we're talking about the build-a-mech brawler Armored Warriors! Is Armored Warriors the closest we'll ever get to an Exo Squad arcade game? What is the quarter mile time of a Night Fury Nissan GTR and how much horsepower does it have? Did Rob turn traitor while watching Olympic h...

In 1991 Video System released what is undeniably the best three-player vertical arcade shooter that retrofits Lamborghinis into flying vehicles that fight a giant Lexus in space - and 35 years later we're talking about it. Now get your butt in the Diablo(on) as we launch Turbo Force! With its blood selling for $60k per gallon is Turbo Force's giant horseshoe crab the most valuable boss in an arcad...

Step right up and spin the wheels (all three of them) on the best stand-up racing game to feature a vague Marvel reference - Ivan "Ironman" Stewart's Super Off Road by the Leland Corporation. What is the true name of this game? Why does Rob sound like he gargled with razor blades? How many copies of Super Mario Advance can one person legally own? Was the Activator the worst gaming peripheral ever?...

It's the start of the Three's Company series but instead of Jack, Janet, and Chrissy (it's an old joke, look it up) we're talking about Pimple, Rash, and Zitz who star in one of the best, but woefully undersupported, beat 'em ups to hit the arcades - the Rare and Electronics Arts collab, Battletoads. What insane decisions did Rare make to keep this game fresh? Which collects more dust: a navel or...

This episode is about a game you've definitely heard of but likely never knew was an arcade game. Lemony Vengeance joins the show to talk about his efforts to keep this Valve and Taito arcade collaboration alive. We're talking Gordon Freeman, airboats, gravity guns and headcrabs as we discuss the super rare Half-Life 2: Survivor. How did Lemony bring this Survivor back from its Street Fighter tomb...

Let's go! Ah, the early 90s when the perfect date night meant hopping into a sit-down arcade game based on buddy cop movies, grabbing the steering wheel with one hand, gun with the other, and having you and your passenger blast away the bad guys in gory pixelated glory. Was there anything better than Namco's unique driver/shooter Lucky & Wild? Do you believe the story that Lucky & Wild drew no ins...

The late '80s were packed with pop-culture obsessions: arcades, action movies, neon aesthetics, and of course, a nationwide fascination with ninjas. Sleek, masked warriors showed up everywhere from toys to TV, shaping the era's love of fast, flashy combat. But no arcade game captured the ninja craze as perfectly as Sega's  iconic side-scrolling adventure, Shinobi. How did Shinobi perform a bait an...

The music is fading and the lights are coming up on our Rhythm miniseries. Time for the final encore as each host picks one more game for this rhythm Arcade Obscura. The first pick is a helluva ride that features a very familiar arcade character. The next pick takes us to heaven with a development contract made in hell. Our final pick may be one of the most obscure games we've ever featured and re...

It's our penultimate episode of the Rhythm miniseries (and hey, we also hit episode 150)! We return to BEMANI to explore their sub-sub-culture game that allows you to ruin good music just like real DJs, Sound Voltex (or SDVX as the cooler kids say). What is it about the Bop It nature of this game that causes some people to love it or hate it? Want to hear our spoiler-free thoughts on Tron: Ares? H...

Sega is no stranger to the arcade rhythm games but they really hit their stride with their Performai series of games. So scan your Aime card, select your song, and let's play the game that literally translates to "pre-teen kids who think they're cooler than they are playing a rhythm game" - Chunithm. What is it about Chunithm that makes it so addictive? Do you really need gloves to play? Was Adam...

This "Behind the Music" is an 8-part retrospective of the biggest rhythm game franchise to ever hit the States (and the reason so many of us still have plastic guitars stashed in our hall closets). Featuring opening acts Harmonix and Red Octane, and headliner trio that gave us Guitar Hero Arcade - Activision, Konami, and Raw Thrills What is the musical instrument-based peripheral you never got but...