It's Official! e-AMUSEMENT NETWORK is in the Philippines!

Rockwell Power Plant, Makati City

Great news for BEMANI fans all over the Philippines, as the e-AMUSEMENT service of KONAMI is officially online! As we all know that last month a location test was held at Quantum SM North for MUSECA and SOUND VOLTEX and ended last April 18. A few days after, Quantum released their latest BEMANI games; jubeat Qubell and Dance Evolution ARCADE. These two BEMANI games are available at Quantum SM North EDSA, PowerStation at Shangri-la in Mandaluyong and in Rockwell Makati.

Dance Evolution ARCADE acrylic marquee

My friends went to Rockwell early evening, knowing the fact that it's only a ride away from our house. A per credit pricing is 30.00Php on both games where Dance Evolution has two stages and jubeat has three stages. On both machines has about to receive an online update, meaning new content will be added the next reboot of the game. As of the moment, e-AMUSEMENT PASS cards are not yet available at counter, luckily, we all have our own cards. Some of us bought our cards overseas years ago.

An e-AMUSEMENT application for iOS

On the other hand, I was able to link my current e-AMUSEMENT PASS to my KONAMI ID, an app is available for free at the Japanese Apple App Store. I was able link it right after I played the location test 2 weeks ago.

jubeat Qubell

This was an exciting turnover as many of us are expecting new games will be available soon not just to BEMANI games but also to other KONAMI games. Being nostalgic, it took as around seven years of waiting for KONAMI to add us in their network. I am looking forward that we will be part of the next KONAMI Arcade Championship!

I guess the BEMANI hype is back again!

Refreshments during our gameplay!

Comparison: pop'n music mini controller 1 and 2

pop'n music is a long time arcade game since 1998 with more than 23 version since its release. During its early years, KONAMI released a home version of the game from PlayStation, PlayStation 2, and short lived for Dreamcast and PC. Of course! in order to mimic the game experience is to have a controller similar to the arcade, however, they are small in size.

pop'n music mini controllers

They released a mini controller for pop'n music. The mini controller has two versions, the mini 1 and mini 2. The first controller was released in 1999 for PlayStation and Dreamcast and the mini controller 2 was released around 2002 for PlayStation 2.

Both controllers almost have the same dimensions but different on buttons and color variations. The buttons of the first mini con are flat, where the mini con 2 are dome like shape similar to the arcades. The first one have transparent variation, while the mini con 2 has white for stand-alone controller only and limited edition yellow bundled with pop'n music 10 CS.

Tried both controllers and mini con 2 has my vote unlike the first mini con because I won't have to look on the controller while playing. If you want to play pop'n music with real arcade experience, an Arcade Style Controller (ASC) is also available blog entry kindly click here.

My Gaming collection

Since I was in college, I have been collecting video games. My first item was the PlayStation counterpart of DanceDanceRevolution 3rdMIX, since then, my passion for video game collecting grew. I started to buy games in various such as Japan surpluses in the Metro Manila, online stores such as Tipidpc and ebay, and trade games to other game collectors.

When I was collecting games, I dedicated myself to collect only games from KONAMI such as; Winning Eleven, Jikkyou Pawafuru Proyaku, Genso Suikoden and Gundam video games from BANDAI. There was a time that my games collected was over a hundred and space became a problem. My mother warned me to refrain from collecting because it collects dust and consumes household space. Suddenly, I realized that I have been collecting games that I don't really like. So I decided to relinquish those games that I don't like.

Now, I am still collecting video games from KONAMI, but limited to BEMANI, Metal Gear Solid, KONAMI's Arcade classics ported to consoles such as Gradius and Silent Scope. I think it's better to concentrate on te games we really love because we can enjoy the passion of collecting, unless, a huge space is available inside your house.

Elecom's PlayStation 1/2 Game Pad Converter

This Sunday afternoon, my friend and I paid a visit to Japan Surplus. While we are browsing stuff, I saw a Game Pad converter for PlayStation controller. The game converter is an Elecom brand. Searched thru the Elecom's Website and found out that retail price of this peripheral is 1,512.00JPY or approximately 700.00 pesos.

Elecom's PlayStation 1/2 converter

Fortunately, I bought it for only 150.00 pesos and it's brand new though.  PlayStation's Dual Shock 1 and 2 are compatible with converter and it can be used for PlayStation 3 console as wired controller. Over the years, my friends are wanting to have this kind of converter, as converters that are locally available are unreliable and sometime, not in good quality.

The converter's purpose is able to use wired DualShock controllers to PC's but it is also compatible with PlayStation 3 console, tried and it works just like a DualShock 3! Though there is no substitute for home button. I am planning to use this converter for my beatmaniaIIDX ASC, so that I can play IIDX to my PC or for my future use.