The world of poker has been in full riot the past week. The game of poker isn’t a stranger to controversy, and any game as old as poker is going to have some growing pains along the way.
The final table of the World Series of Poker this year was… divisive, to say the least. What happened on the felt wasn’t necessarily the big issue though. If you haven’t been paying attention to this controversy, let’s take a few minutes to dive into it together.
This is a very important moment in the greater world of gaming. How we use digital tools in games will be a topic that comes up over and over throughout the entire industry.
Spoilers: We’ll be discussing the final table of this year’s World Series of Poker Main Event. If you don’t want to be spoiled on the final table until you get around to watching it, don’t read further!
Solvers on the Rail
On Wednesday, July 17th, Jonathan Tamayo won the 55th annual World Series of Poker Main Event. He outlasted 10,111 other players and won the grand prize – a championship bracelet and a cool $10 million. He defeated amateur Jordan Griff in heads-up play to take home the championship.
Jonathan Tamayo is the 2024 World Champion!
Tamayo takes home the $10,000,000 top prize in the largest WSOP Main Event in history!
— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) July 18, 2024
Tamayo is a great player. That’s not where this controversy lies. In his decade plus career, he’s proven time and again that he can sit with and beat the best.
Also, the main event of the World Series of Poker isn’t exactly the exclusive club it used to be with a few dozen tables featuring a few hundred of the greats. Nowadays five figures of players are getting in on the action. The main event has become a mental endurance test… a test that Tamayo passed with flying colors.
The real controversy was behind the table though, at the rail. Sitting on the sidelines, Tamayo’s friends rooted him on. Also fellow pro poker players, Tamayo would be crazy to not occasionally ask for their advice on a tough call within the game. This is pretty normal practice. Coaching is allowed.
The real trouble started when everyone watching at home could see what was going on at his friends’ spectator table. A laptop sat there facing away from the playing area. Clearly visible on the laptop screen was a popular poker simulation platform. As Tamayo told his friends about the hand pre-flop, they’d punch in the cards and determine his exact odds on certain calls.
I have to be honest here…if this really is the future of tournament poker I'm not interested at all. @PatMoorePoker 📸 This railbird team coaching stuff has to be curtailed it isn't going to grow the game we love it will only stunt the growth. Regardless of the stakes. pic.twitter.com/mkvqa5NxZ5
Tamayo claimed that he had no idea what his friends were doing at the rail… but in this picture captured by a spectator, you can clearly see both the stream and the solver pulled up and ready to go just as easily as Tamayo can…
For a seasoned pro, this isn’t a huge advantage. Most people who make their living playing poker can tell you exactly what the odds are for any hand pre-flop against random hands to two decimals… this is elementary stuff for competitive poker. Using AI and algorithmic analysis to verify and simulate this information against different hand sizes and differing chip stack sizes does give someone an advantage over just using their more fallible head math.
These poker problem solvers have been used more frequently both online and in person, with numerous pros having been caught sneaking analysis on their phones in recent years. Still, poker governance authorities are really yet to define the hard line on what constitutes cheating.
After this main event, they may have their hand forced.
How Far Is Unfair?
It’s important to note that Tamayo says he had no idea that his friends were going to bring a laptop. He claims he was asking for normal coaching and had little clue what was happening outside the rail.
“I mean, that stuff wasn’t under my control. My job was to play. Joe and Dom were giving me advice. I didn’t tell them to bring anything. You know, whatever was on there was on there. My job was to play. You have to be pretty narrow-minded when you’re playing. All the other external stuff is just wasted energy.”
This looks bad though. We have a professional player playing against an amateur in the biggest poker tournament in the world. The professional is not only getting help from two other professionals (one of whom is a previous main event bracelet winner), but also a dedicated computer program designed to solve poker problems.
The World Series of Poker has been clear about not allowing poker solvers in play. How does that apply to coaches on the rail though? How did it feel for Jordan Griff playing against not only a seasoned professional, but two sideline opinions with more experience than him backed up by AI?
All in all, Griff is handling what could be considered a $4m cheat with surprising grace.
Griff spoke to Doug Polk Poker’s podcast about the issue. He was totally unaware of what was going on at Tamayo’s sideline. He had totally assumed that if anything going on was nefarious that the WSOP floor team would step in.
“I’m sure in their mind if they knew they were doing something wrong they’re like ‘oh, well they’ll just tell us to put the laptop away’. I don’t think there was any serious repercussions people thought would come out of that.”
-Jordan Griff on Doug Polk Poker
Griff still walked away with $6 million, so not a week of work to whine about. As he discussed on Doug Polk’s podcast above, the most disappointing thing is that everybody is talking about someone trying to scrimp any unfair advantage they can get instead of the uplifting success stories that are always around in such a massive tournament.
We don’t know exactly how they were using the solver, but there are ways that it could’ve clearly tipped the balance. Were they referencing the stream to see what cards Griff was holding each hand, then punching that into their sim? If so, they could’ve gotten incredibly insight into his tendencies over hundreds of hands that Tamayo never would’ve been able to glean on his own.
We’ll probably never know how much the solver helped Tamayo. In theory, however, Dominic Nitsche and Joseph McKeehen definitely thought that it would help their buddy. Otherwise, why would they even bother?
“You think you’re getting heads-up, and you’re playing against – you know – robots now,” Griff summed up. “Optically … it’s not what you want to see at final table.”
A Gaming-Wide Problem
What constitutes fair? Especially when we’re using technology to actually engage with a game, what level of human intellect is required to be considered “fair play”?
Far more poker happens online than in person. If they aren’t even hiding that they’re doing it at the biggest in-person table in the world, surely these programs are being used all the time online in big money games. What’s most interesting in this regard is that Jordan Griff is considered one of the biggest online players in the world. Jonathan Tamayo, on the other hand, is traditionally a live tournament player.
There’s a lot of big questions here and not just for poker. Due to poker’s highly mathematical mechanics, it’s typically more straightforward to build a program to simulate it than for more convoluted games… but that doesn’t mean robust tools won’t rise for other competitive games.
Let’s start with the obvious… would a casino put up with this behind a player at a blackjack table? Of course not! Would this be acceptable in competitive chess? Definitely not.
Let’s take it further. Think about strategy games you may have played, where addons and external tools are often ubiquitous. In this day of AI, where is that line between unfair help and fair help? Most ToS on video games specific one player to one account… if you’re using the abilities of tons of programmers in a tool, is that really one human player to one account?
These are big questions… and ones I definitely don’t have the answer to. The entire world of gaming will have eyes on The World Series of Poker and the Nevada Gaming Commission, however, to see what their next steps are. How they react to this controversy will have echoes across the gaming industry for years to come.
The Future of Gaming Aids
It’s important to discuss these things, because culture will decide in these moments what’s acceptable in the future. How we incorporate technology into play and competition will change the trajectory of the human race… for better or for worse.
Where do you think that line is? Do you have a hot take or a path forward from this issue?
Bring your opinions over to #gala-gold or #general-chat-gala so that we can all see multiple perspectives on this really complicated issue. There’s no easy answer, and discussion is the best way to form educated viewpoints and find real solutions.
This is also a great topic for some great table talk!
Hop into Sweep It Poker today to take down some juicy pots while you discuss it with your poker buddies at the tables!
You sit down at the breakfast table with your coffee. As the yawns squeeze out of you and you wipe the sleep from your eyes, you pull out your phone to catch up on your emails.
Just routine stuff… spam, spam, free offer, Amazon invoice – wait, what’s this? Your cuteandreallycuddlyfluffypuppies.com account has been compromised and needs your immediate attention! 😱 You click the link to reset your password, glad you caught this email before it was too late.
You follow the prompts on the next screen and fill out your new password… little do you know, your cuteandreallycuddlyfluffypuppies.com account has been compromised. By you. Right now. That was a fake link from a fake address, and they got exactly what they wanted out of you!
Sound familiar? This is one of the most common tales of how scammers find their way into someone’s defenses. As digital security continues to improve, there is still one glaring vulnerability to even the best system – the human behind it!
Welcome back to The Guardian Papers, where digital heroes can get the base training they need to thwart villains’ underhanded attacks against them across the web3 world.
Email is often where scammers have a chance at getting directly to you. One miscalculation or momentary lapse of attention to detail could cause you a lot of hassle, so you’ve got to know how to keep yourself safe.
Miss a previous edition of The Guardian Papers? Catch up below!
First off, we definitely don’t want to imply that email is inherently insecure – many email providers have excellent security protocols put in place, and there are tons of tools out there for anyone who wants to beef up the actual protections in their email. The problem with email security is the person behind the keyboard… and it’s a vulnerability that isn’t going away.
Your email is a direct line to you. No matter your security infrastructure, if you’re getting a scammer’s email in front of you, you’re probably going to read the words they wrote. This direct access is the dream of all those fake Discord admins and help desks. They want that direct line so they can exploit your trust… because your security systems work for you. If they convince you, your security isn’t an issue.
For most people, email is the height of routine. When you are checking emails, you’re performing the same ritual you’ve done thousands of times. You may have many email accounts, only adding to the volume and frequency of your email checking ritual. When you do something day in and day out, over and over, you eventually become less attentive to the process overall.
As something becomes part of your routine, you eventually sort of automate it in your mind. How many things do you automatically do throughout the day without any real conscious thought? It’s the same for email. While the part of your brain that reads and parses the information in the emails may be present, other parts of your mind have moved on to other tasks.
This leads to some easy wins for scammers that would never work on your while at full attention.
How Did They Find Me!?
Honestly, how wouldn’t they find you? It’s important to remember that our data is everywhere, and we don’t typically consider email addresses private data. If it’s ever been out there, it’s still out there probably.
Let’s say Billy has a private, personal email address that he typically only shares with family and close friends, then he has another that he uses for work. Billy’s dad is fond of forwarding emails on occasion, and so drops a long chain email forward into Billy’s inbox once in a while. Billy’s friend Sally CCs him into a monthly newsletter that she sends out for their Karaoke Club. One day, Billy starts seeing large amounts of spam coming into his personal email account! 😨
What happened? Well you see, Tyrone from Karaoke Club was trying to get his friend Trevor to come to last month’s championship, so he forwarded him the newsletter. Trevor’s email account was compromised and the inbox contained Tyrone’s address, along with the CCd address of every other member of Karaoke club. Welcome to a list, Billy.
Let’s be honest though, it’s probably not the first time Billy has gotten scam emails at that address. He used to have it visible in his Facebook about section for years, and it’s still listed on an ancient and forgotten DeviantArt portfolio along with his real name. Also, he’s had this account for a long time and emailed lots of people. Each of those is a chain that connects to his email address. If any one link is discovered by the bad guys, the whole chain is in the open.
After that they can do a surprising amount to learn your behaviors. With a full-feature email service, they can theoretically tell exactly when you open the email, your operating system, your geolocation… all sorts of stuff that isn’t exactly secret, but gives you the shivers that they could know. Once they have this, it’s not hard to generalize demographics and predict who would be receptive to what scams.
Wolves Dressed as Sheep
Many of the ways people will attack you through your email fall right in line with our previous discussion about The Impersonator. In your email they know they have you in a format that you’re likely to overlook small details. If they know they can get past your spam filter, then they know there’s a good chance that you’ll at least click on their email.
They’ll try to mimic emails that you are likely to be receiving. There are lots of ways they could get an idea about what email lists you may be on, and not all of them are data breaches. A tracker in your browser could be feeding info about your behavior without necessarily doing anything nefarious to be flagged as malware by your safeguards.
Remember, legitimate businesses and individuals assign cookies and trackers all the time without any ill intent. We all click “Accept All Cookies” once in a while. Even if there’s just a .01% chance that any of those you click on has something harmful coming across, it’s just a matter of time.
Also consider that people are quite predictable with a large enough sample size. For every well-timed scam email you’ve ever received that seemed like they must be actually watching you, you’ve probably received two dozen weird ones that seemed to come out of left field. It’s just a numbers game. They’ll get it right sometimes.
If they’ve identified your email and the most likely services and addresses that can trick you, it’s only a matter of seeing what they can slide by.
In the case of this above example, the fake may seem obvious. After all, we’re here stretching our brains and thinking about scammers, but when someone comes across this email they may be distracted or in a hurry. Then, they could feel panicked that their MetaMask wallet has been compromised.
Notice that they color the email to draw the eyes directly to what they want you to see. The large notice at the top, and the button to “update now”. While we didn’t click that link, a quick mouseover revealed the target to be a proxy site, with a slug pointing to a long string of characters for a dAPP command. This link almost surely goes to a fake service site where you will be immediately asked to connect your wallet.
Oh, and also –“MҽtaMask”? That’s not an E. That’s an Abkhazian Che, a Cyrillic character that is entirely different from the latin “e”. If you’re not paying close attention though… it may be enough to not get them flagged for impersonation, while your eyes simply autocorrect that to “MetaMask”.
Also, check out that XM over there. That’s called a BIMI or Brand Indicator for Message Identification. These are verified trademark spaces, so a brand can submit a BIMI that won’t be copied anywhere else. This is a relatively new system that only works with some email providers, so you may notice a difference between impersonators and the emails they’re impersonating based on their mark. This isn’t always the case though, as some brands have not yet adopted BIMI… our emails here at Gala, for instance, do not ever use a BIMI.
That verification check mark doesn’t mean anything, it’s just part of the display name – like we saw with fake help admins in our imposter profile.
The dead giveaway is the return email though. Even half redacted, it should be pretty easy to tell that’s not from MetaMask. Why would MetaMask not send emails from their domain that users know and trust?
Straight to the Source
The important part here is that your email usually has your attention. If they can slide into your inbox, half their work is done. If they send out 10000 emails, what do you suppose the chances are that no one is careless enough to click without thinking?
That’s the end goal for these scammers. They know that most people in the digital world are protected in some way from bad actors, but they also know that you hold the keys to your security mechanisms. The best defenses in the world don’t mean much if you willingly click to their site and give them your information.
This is why The Guardian Papers are here. These scammers know that there is always someone to prey on because people aren’t informed. If we all know what to look for, the fruit they’re looking for gets waaaaay higher in the tree. Maybe they’ll just go find another tree to climb.
Digital Guardians
No one is going to ensure your security on the web. You have to take matters into your own hands and change behaviors if you want to be safe. While it may seem overwhelming to think of all the ways the bad guys can get to you, it’s really not that hard. If you learn the ways that they come at you, before long it’ll be easy to spot the attackers long before they breach your walls.
We learn. We teach. If everyone is equipped to deal with them, digital villains don’t stand a chance.
That’ll do it for this week’s Guardian Papers! We’ll be back though as we dive into common ways people use Discord and other messaging apps to prey on the unaware!
Hip-hop has been buzzing about The God MC’s first solo studio album in 15 years. It’s finally here, with G.O.D.S. NETWORK REB7RTH landing on Friday, July 26th. To celebrate the release, Rakim has kicked off a partnership with Gala Music.
First, he dropped the “PENDULUM SWING” NFT on Gala Music a full three weeks before you could hear the song anywhere else. Digital reward enabled copies from the limited NFT run are still available while supplies last. Pick one up to access daily $MUSIC rewards.
Today the Hot Gala Summer continues with a special and indefinitely exclusive instrumental EP with choice tracks from the record. These 7 instrumental tracks won’t be found anywhere but Gala Music, and they’ve all just dropped as limited-supply NFTs.
This instrumental EP is sure to be a hit for hip-hop connoisseurs all over the world.
The 1st beat created for “GODS NETWORK REB7RTH” that went on to become the song “BE ILL” features Masta Killa of the Wu-Tang Clan nd Kurupt Young Gotti of Tha Dogg Pound. Official video for “BE ILL” is available worldwide online now.
This track takes the listener through a range of emotion highlighting everything GREAT about Hip-Hop culture and how a simple instrumental can guide our moods in a positive way. This instrumental ultimately became ”Now is the Time” where Rakim keeps his sword sharp amongst the likes of B.G, Hus Kingpin and Compton Menance. Welcome Home B.G.
One of the most beautiful pieces of music ever created, “Effect Mode” is truly a blessing to the culture. As it appears on “GODS NETWORK”, Rakim carefully crafted a masterpiece alongside a full orchestral choir and violin quartet to truly bring his production ideals to light. The late great Nipsey Hussle alongside Rakim, Planet Asia, Louis King, Snoop Dogg and more handle vocal duties herein thus providing for an unforgettable musical experience. “Love is the Message”
A fun, club-like anthem showcasing the versatile production chops of Rakim. In true unorthodox fashion, Rakim turned an otherwise club inspired anthem into a beautiful composition honoring our fallen comrades and the trials and tribulations that accompany all aspects of life from the perspective of the emcee. Rest in Peace DMX and Fred the Godson. “Gods Playground”
This 90’s inspired boom bap classic rendition was utilized to provide Rakim with his 1st ever full posse cut over the course of his 30+ year career. With an infectious loop reminiscent of the golden era 90’s sound, any Hip-Hop hear across the globe is sure to nod their heads to this absolute monster banger. Album wise, Rakim who handled rhymes, production and cuts is joined by Kxng Crooked, LA the Darkman, Canibus and Chino XL for “Pendulum Swing”.
This melodic banger utilizes keys, harps, drums, bass and more to take the listener on an electrifying ride through the psyche of Rakim’s illustrious Golden Era revival. Longtime “Who’s the Best Emcee?”, Kool G Rap joins Rakim in the duo’s 1st appearance together on the mic in over 20 years for the hit record “International”.
The infectious beat embodies everything great about Hip-Hop Culture. Driven by pulsating Drums and Bass, the listener is instantly taken back to the classic feel of early Jay-Z, Wu-Tang, Mobb Deep, Nas and more. Known as “Sign of Se7en”, the eerie rhymes of the late great Prodigy kick off the track backed by Method Man, Big Twins and X-Raided for a perfect ending to an otherwise flawless album dedicated to everything we have grown to love once again via Hip-Hop culture.
Unlock Rewards
When you collect Gala Music track NFTs, you’re also opening the door to daily rewards in the form of $MUSIC tokens. To start the flow, just host your tracks by pairing them with an active Jukebox Node at no additional cost.
You can unhost and trade NFT tracks any time you want– they’re yours. If you’re interested in leveling up your involvement in the future of music for even more daily $MUSIC rewards, consider running a Jukebox Node of your own. Each Node starts with room for 10 hosted NFT tracks, and running a node is easy in the background of your computer.
$GALA is the official token of the Gala web3 ecosystem. Consistently placed in the top 100 crypto tokens (by volume) on CoinMarketCap, this token acts as the fuel for a thriving and always growing web3 world, powered by GalaChain.
$GALA on Ethereum
When the development of our layer 1 blockchain had just begun, $GALA was first created as an Ethereum-based token. Even today, as GalaChain is fully operational and rapidly expanding, we strive for interoperability with the Ethereum Virtual Machine, recognizing it as the most widely used blockchain system today.
Bridging $GALA to and from Ethereum is easy, although it is no longer originally minted there. By bridging $GALA to Ethereum, users can take advantage of numerous dApps and exchanges, both centralized and decentralized.
On Ethereum’s massively popular secondary marketplace, OpenSea, you’ll find all the official Gala collections, making it easy to trade Gala ecosystem NFTs.
When your $GALA is on Ethereum, you can:
Create or fill buy and sell orders on dozens of Ethereum-based exchanges
Use it to make GalaChain purchases via your connected web3 wallet
When new $GALA enters into circulation, it is created on GalaChain as a mint allowance, letting the owner decide when the official minting event should take place. Once it is minted from allowance to its tokenized form, it can be:
Spent in the GalaChain ecosystem
Used in Gala Games
Swapped on GalaSwap
Transferred to other accounts
Bridged to Ethereum
Getting $GALA
There are many ways to get $GALA beyond simply purchasing it from a crypto exchange where it is listed.
Rewards for Founder’s Node Operation
The main way that new $GALA enters the ecosystem is as a reward for the operation of Founder’s Nodes, which power the main Gala ecosystem DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Network).
Based on the current total supply of $GALA in circulation, a set amount is allocated for distribution each day to all active Founder’s Node operators. This total distribution amount is distributed to active operators based on a daily point system that rewards each node based on the total amount of time they were active for the previous day. The greatest number of distribution points that can be attained by an operator in a day is 4– 1 for each 6 hour period in which their node was active.
Gala Founder’s Node licenses can be acquired here. They are easy to set up and run in the background of a user’s home computer through the Gala Node software, and they will generate $GALA rewards for every active day.
Rewards for Gameplay
Many of our games offer ways to receive $GALA for gameplay. Here’s a quick rundown of your options:
Champions Arena
When you compete in the PvP Arena against other players and play with NFT Champions, you are eligible for Victory Points, which convert once daily into $GALA rewards that are delivered directly to your account. Even players who do not own NFT Champions can take advantage of the Nexus feature to borrow and play with NFTs owned by others for a share of the rewards!
By participating in Legacy’s Design competition events of various leagues, players can win Legacy Tickets, which are converted daily to $GALA prizes based on a reward allocation determined by the amount spent in the game.
In the 4X space adventure game Echoes of Empire, players build and defend their home bases while scouring celestial bodies in search of Stardust, an extremely rare and rewarding resource. Every day, 50% of the Stardust held by each player is systematically burned and $GALA is given as a prize from a reward allocation.
Gala’s strategic sim game of town and city builders is centered around a meta-shifting weekly competition in which players from all over the world try to make the most Stars, crafting and selling the flavor of the week! Don’t let the relaxing and adorable feel of the game fool you. It’s an intensely strategic battle for the leaderboards, but winners are well rewarded with $GALA prizes.
Our casual browser-based poker game hosts tables of Texas and Omaha Hold’em. Every day, players win as many chips as they can in the free-to-play game, collecting Sweepstakes entry tickets as they go. Each week hosts a handsome $GALA prize pool in which multiple winners are drawn and each Entry Ticket is a new chance to win!
Every token available on GalaSwap may be swapped for $GALA. This includes project tokens that have been created by community members via the Project Token Creation Tool, as well as in-game currencies from games (like $TOLK, $MTRM and $ETIME) and wrapped versions of cryptos from other blockchains and GalaChain-based stablecoins (GUSDC and GUSDT). It only costs 1 $GALA to create or accept a swap. To start using GalaSwap, just log in with your Gala account credentials.
Trading on External Exchanges
Ethereum-based $GALA is available on dozens of exchanges in lots of different exchange pairs, making it accessible in almost every locality of the world. For a list of $GALA exchange pairings on both centralized (privately owned) and decentralized (open source, anonymous) exchanges, visit the Markets page of CoinMarketCap.
Sending or receiving $GALA is very simple, whether on Ethereum or GalaChain.
On GalaChain
To send $GALA to another GalaChain account, follow these steps:
Acquire the recipient’s GalaChain address – It will look like this:
client|5f64659d468267207aaf7982
In you account’s Balances area, select $GALA (GalaChain) and choose Send $GALA (GalaChain).
Enter the amount you’d like to send, along with the recipient’s address.
Finalize the transaction with your Transfer Code and you’re all set. They should see their $GALA within a couple minutes.
To receive $GALA from another GalaChain account, follow these steps:
Select Get GALA (GalaChain) in your account’s Balances page.
Share either the provided QR code or your GalaChain address with the sender.
On Ethereum
Sending and receiving $GALA on Ethereum works the same way as any other token on that blockchain. This should be self-explanatory within your preferred Ethereum wallet, such as Metamask. For added convenience, you can also conduct Ethereum transfers within your Gala account when your Metamask wallet is connected to your account.
Bridging $GALA
Moving $GALA from Ethereum to GalaChain (or vice versa) is easy through your Gala account with a connected Ethereum wallet such as Metamask. If your Ethereum wallet is not connected, you can connect it easily through your account’s Settings under Linked Accounts.
Bridging Fees:
Keep in mind that when bridging from one network to another, you are required to pay transactional fees for the network from which your tokens are departing.
Bridging from GalaChain to Ethereum costs a variable fee in $GALA.
Bridging from Ethereum to GalaChain costs a variable fee in $ETH.
Cryptocurrencies and blockchain tech aren’t going anywhere soon, and people who take the time to learn the basics now will be glad they did when the rest of the world catches on.
With all the excitement surrounding the Telegram blockchain-based app (tApp) craze, mass adoption is closer than ever. Speaking of rewarding and exciting Telegram tokenization, have you played our awesome new tap-for-rewards game, Treasure Tapper? You can play absolutely free through your Telegram account, and the rewards you win will soon be minted as real crypto on both TON and GalaChain, onboarding a million (or many more) users to the empowerment of blockchain tech!
Start tapping for treasure today if you haven’t yet!
Flashing lights and loud noises dominate your senses. Last quarter. This time you’ll get it for sure.
You pop it in and the screen comes to life. Dirk the Daring fearlessly gets to his heroic work. You use what you’ve learned all afternoon to navigate the treacherous path. It’s a perfect run so far. Just as you’re starting to get cocky, the Lizard King creeps out of nowhere. Game over.
Just one of many horrible fates that befell Dirk the Daring.
Totally defeated and having lost your last quarter, you start to slink away from the machine. Almost automatically you sweep the coin return with two fingers – A quarter! Maybe one last game of Ninja Gaiden instead of trying your luck at this one again.
The Golden Age of the Arcade
If you were born before the 90s, chances are this sounded pretty familiar to you. All those of us who grew up in the time when the arcade was king distinctly remember those last quarter feels, or the sensation of poking at the coin return in the hopes that some other kid forgot their last coin in it.
Yes, arcades are still a thing. My daughter is quite fond of them. It’s hard to take her to a half abandoned and dilapidated arcade though and not have my mind drift to those days where games meant more than just tickets. When the arcade was the spot to be all summer long.
Back then, the video games we could play at home were limited. Sure, depending on what decade we’re talking about there were Ataris, Commodores, NES and eventually even those late 90s persistent 300+ game shareware discs. The quality and quantity of games you could play from your couch, however, paled in comparison to wall to wall arcade cabinets and the sure chance of finding at least some of your friends at the arcade.
These were the days of no internet. The days of very limited multiplayer outside multi-joystick arcade games. The days when gaming culture was born… and that culture lived full-time at the arcade.
Dragon’s Lair, which I was referencing above, came out in 1983. Dragon’s Lair BLEW OUR MINDS! This was a time when most games were lines and dots on a screen, or at best they were made up of moving static images. Some of the highest tech out there had sprites for characters that had 2-3 poses at most.
Dragon’s Lair showed up with a Disney-quality, rotoscoped movie as its gameplay. They used the entirely new LaserDisc data format to encode a movie with multiple branching paths… one of the first examples of interactive media at this quality! It was impressive… so impressive, in fact, that sometimes you’d keep draining quarters into it even after you realized how punishing and impossible it was.
Not So Distant Beginnings
We’ve come a long way in a very short time with video game tech. The glory days of the arcade weren’t that long ago. Looking back, however, it’s really no wonder why we moved so fast. At the arcade, you could play 40+ new games in one day, talk about them with your friends, and watch hundreds of other kids playing (who were probably better than you) over their shoulder. We learned quick, which is why gaming learned quick.
Simple shapes and basic mechanics of games like Breakout gave way to slightly less simple shapes of games like Arkanoid. One by one, the kids pumping quarters in the games started to recognize genres and core mechanics. At first it was “Oh! It’s like Double Dragon”, but as our knowledge grew it quickly became “Oh! It’s a beat ’em up, co-op platformer”.
Arcades were education. In those early days of the 70s and 80s, there were great game designers and programmers working on games. That was nothing compared to the kids they were training up though. No one had ever absorbed so much of the previously non-existent media of video games.
Spoiler, some of us who put our time in at the local arcade ‘studying’ would go on to push gaming forward with this education. Soon the kids recognizing patterns in the games they pumped their quarters into grew into the young professionals propelling gaming into the next generation.
The Legacy of Arcades
Arcades may still exist, but they’re not always the bastion of culture they once were. That having been said, that culture is still very much alive. When my daughter used to lure three friends into her Minecraft world so they could run her newly created obstacle course, that felt very arcade. When I watch a Twitch stream and think my commentary actually adds to the group conversation, that feels a lot like crowding around the arcade champ’s shoulder while they’re taking challengers on in Killer Instinct.
I think you’d be hard pressed to find many who work in game dev today that don’t have fond memories of the arcade. This was the shared experience that helped raise us and led to the rapid progression of games through the past few decades. Whether you were setting your coins on deck for Space Invaders in the late 70s or trying to solo run The Simpsons Arcade Game in the early 90s, you helped create this industry.
There are cultures throughout the world where arcades still hold some of their former glory. Japan, notably, has sprawlingly huge arcades with an often ridiculous assortment of all kinds of games. Even those, however, are on the decline compared to their heights in previous decades.
Pictured: The Kabukicho pedestrian crossing in Tokyo, at the corner of Shinjuku Moa 2 Avenue and the Godzilla Road. Though arcades are statistically on the decline in Japan, there are still whole districts with entire buildings devoted to nothing but arcade games.
Luckily, one thing out there is preserving the classic arcade feel… And I’m not talking about a room full of machines that dispense tickets so you can buy worthless prizes. That great force working to save some piece of this culture is probably the same thing that made you read this far – nostalgia. Adults love games too, and over the past decades we’re seeing far more arcades formatted for grownups.
It’s really no surprise that these ‘barcades’ have risen so quickly. Adults do love to play just as much as everyone else. Billions of people out there all have this shared experience of the arcade… is it any wonder we’d want to relive a little of that? Also, compared to the price of some leisure activities out there… my wallet and wife would much prefer I play some Ms. PacMan with a cheap beer in my hand for an hour or two rather than some of the alternatives.
Fun is fun, and arcades are fun that everyone can enjoy together.
Arcade Culture Comes to GalaChain
This long, nostalgic ramble has finally brought me to the point. Those of you who have been around the Gala Community for a while may be aware of the Happy Valley Arcade Bar in Beacon, NY. The owners of this establishment have long been incredibly supportive and involved community icons across all things Gala… and they’re working on something absolutely amazing for all arcade fans.
They are currently building some of the world’s first web3 gaming cabinets. These arcade machines will connect to GalaChain and reward high scorers with $VALLEY. Eventually, these games may be playable on the PC, but the arcade cabinets is where the bulk of these tokens will come from.
Early footage from one of Happy Valley’s arcade games!
We here at a Gala are a bit on the outside looking in on this one, but I personally am VERY excited. Not only is it amazing to see people doing new and innovative things with GalaChain, but I really like the idea of a worldwide arcade high score battle.
Information will be coming out soon from the Happy Valley team. I hear they are planning to sell arcade cabinets with $VALLEY potential among other things.
You don’t have to take my word for it though… head on over to https://discord.gg/5zJ8WqNV to join their Discord server today!
