Holidays are funny things aren't they? You go and spend a while pretending to live somewhere else, and sleep on mattresses and pillows where strangers have made sweet love, and done blow-offs, and disgorged other bodily nonsense, and we all pretend that isn't disgusting.
But please... what is best type: holiday? It is this: free holiday!
You see, my parents had paid for a caravan weekend in Kessingland via The Sun newspaper, because they are ordinary working class people - so don't have a go okay? - for them and my nephew's family, but then my nephew couldn't go, so they asked me instead, and - well - that's all a lot of unnecessary detail to explain that this is how I ended up in Suffolk, or somewhere, at the weekend, in a caravan, next to a bunch of terrible people who spoke to their small children thusly: "If you wander off, I will f@ck your life up".
Remember this when you watch the finale of Mr Biffo's Found Footage; that sort of grim child abuse was my backdrop while editing the episode's sound in the bedroom of the caravan.
But anyway. That's not what I want to talk about, much as I'd like to. What I want to talk about is this: the weirdest seaside arcade in the world.
But please... what is best type: holiday? It is this: free holiday!
You see, my parents had paid for a caravan weekend in Kessingland via The Sun newspaper, because they are ordinary working class people - so don't have a go okay? - for them and my nephew's family, but then my nephew couldn't go, so they asked me instead, and - well - that's all a lot of unnecessary detail to explain that this is how I ended up in Suffolk, or somewhere, at the weekend, in a caravan, next to a bunch of terrible people who spoke to their small children thusly: "If you wander off, I will f@ck your life up".
Remember this when you watch the finale of Mr Biffo's Found Footage; that sort of grim child abuse was my backdrop while editing the episode's sound in the bedroom of the caravan.
But anyway. That's not what I want to talk about, much as I'd like to. What I want to talk about is this: the weirdest seaside arcade in the world.
WHILE BACK
A while back, Twitter user @evilution_6_6_6 recommended that I visit somewhere called The Under The Pier Show, in a place called Southwold.
I had never heard of Southwold, and couldn't conceive of any reason I would ever visit there, and I promptly forgot all about it all. But - unexpectedly - it turned out that Southwold was just a few miles from where we were staying at the weekend, and on Sunday morning we went for a stroll along Southwold Pier. There I saw this: a sign for The Under The Pier Show.
Created by Southwold resident Tim Hunkin, unlike the usual seaside arcades - typically full of penny falls, crane machines disgorging Minions, and old Sega games - every machine in The Under The Pier Show is handmade and unique.
Hunkin explains, via his website: "As a kid in the 1950s I made silly contraptions, struggling to get them to work at all. In the 60s as a teenager I had a Saturday job with Ruffler and Walker, a company building coin-op machines.
"My own first coin-op machine, built a few years after leaving college in 1974, was too successful - the coins completely overfilled the box and shorted the electrics. "
In 1999 Tim made The Instant Eclipse - a solar eclipse simulator, that was essentially a dark box - which was placed for a short time on Southwold High Street.
"When I put it out again in 2000, the people living next door complained. This was the reason I first approached Chris Iredale, the owner of the pier, and he let me put the Eclipse outside the pier cafe. It was not a great success. The salt air kept tripping the RCD, stopping it working"
A while back, Twitter user @evilution_6_6_6 recommended that I visit somewhere called The Under The Pier Show, in a place called Southwold.
I had never heard of Southwold, and couldn't conceive of any reason I would ever visit there, and I promptly forgot all about it all. But - unexpectedly - it turned out that Southwold was just a few miles from where we were staying at the weekend, and on Sunday morning we went for a stroll along Southwold Pier. There I saw this: a sign for The Under The Pier Show.
Created by Southwold resident Tim Hunkin, unlike the usual seaside arcades - typically full of penny falls, crane machines disgorging Minions, and old Sega games - every machine in The Under The Pier Show is handmade and unique.
Hunkin explains, via his website: "As a kid in the 1950s I made silly contraptions, struggling to get them to work at all. In the 60s as a teenager I had a Saturday job with Ruffler and Walker, a company building coin-op machines.
"My own first coin-op machine, built a few years after leaving college in 1974, was too successful - the coins completely overfilled the box and shorted the electrics. "
In 1999 Tim made The Instant Eclipse - a solar eclipse simulator, that was essentially a dark box - which was placed for a short time on Southwold High Street.
"When I put it out again in 2000, the people living next door complained. This was the reason I first approached Chris Iredale, the owner of the pier, and he let me put the Eclipse outside the pier cafe. It was not a great success. The salt air kept tripping the RCD, stopping it working"
SPACE HARRIER
When Chris Iredale began rebuilding Southwold Pier later the same year, he agreed to give Hunkin a small space to house his arcade machines, and asked the inventor - following a visit to his home - whether he could also buy the elaborate water clock Hunkin had built in his back garden. It is now a pier attraction in itself.
The Under the Pier Show first opened in June 2001, initially just with five machines, while the pier was only half built.
"During the first summer Chris gave me a few old machines from the main arcade that had become too unreliable. I found the Sega Space Harrier particularly inspiring, and decided to convert it into a machine of my own."
Space Harrier became Micro Break - still in the arcade today - a holiday simulator, in which players sit in an armchair and are taken on a whirlwind virtual holiday that aims to do away with all the boring bits of going away, or having to put your sleeping face upon a pillow that a stranger has dribbled and shed his skin upon.
Another game, Art Apocalypse, is a shooting gallery built around an old Namco light gun game: "It’s a good game with a really clever Pepper's Ghost illusion to make a ceramic cup explode.
"Southwold is quite an arty place so jokes about art seem to be popular. I got a bit carried away with the graphics applying the language and hype about global warming to the increasing amount of art produced in the developed world."
A change of pier ownership led to Tim's work more or less taking over the pier in 2006 - he designed mechanical signs, and The Quantum Tunnelling Telescope, a unique take on the usual 50p-a-view telescope you typically get at the seaside.
When Chris Iredale began rebuilding Southwold Pier later the same year, he agreed to give Hunkin a small space to house his arcade machines, and asked the inventor - following a visit to his home - whether he could also buy the elaborate water clock Hunkin had built in his back garden. It is now a pier attraction in itself.
The Under the Pier Show first opened in June 2001, initially just with five machines, while the pier was only half built.
"During the first summer Chris gave me a few old machines from the main arcade that had become too unreliable. I found the Sega Space Harrier particularly inspiring, and decided to convert it into a machine of my own."
Space Harrier became Micro Break - still in the arcade today - a holiday simulator, in which players sit in an armchair and are taken on a whirlwind virtual holiday that aims to do away with all the boring bits of going away, or having to put your sleeping face upon a pillow that a stranger has dribbled and shed his skin upon.
Another game, Art Apocalypse, is a shooting gallery built around an old Namco light gun game: "It’s a good game with a really clever Pepper's Ghost illusion to make a ceramic cup explode.
"Southwold is quite an arty place so jokes about art seem to be popular. I got a bit carried away with the graphics applying the language and hype about global warming to the increasing amount of art produced in the developed world."
A change of pier ownership led to Tim's work more or less taking over the pier in 2006 - he designed mechanical signs, and The Quantum Tunnelling Telescope, a unique take on the usual 50p-a-view telescope you typically get at the seaside.
ROBERT MAXWELL
The games in the arcade are a mix of the out-and-out bizarre - such as The Bathyscape (a bathysphere
simulator, which takes you to the bottom of the ocean, where you encounter - among other things - the late Robert Maxwell) - and the lightly satirical - such as Whack-A-Banker (a take on Whack-A-Mole, which gives you the opportunity to wallop bankers over the head).
The newest machine is The Property Ladder, a mix of step machine and wry take on buying your own home. It was inspired by the recent opening of Hunkin's London arcade, Novelty Automation, and the staffs' difficulty in affording somewhere to live in the capital.
Hunkin explains: "I was struggling with Celeb, the arcade machine I'd just installed. A confident older man, wearing rust-coloured corduroy trousers, told me he didn’t like the machines like Celeb with joystick control; he preferred the more physical ones.
"I was so fed up with it at the time, it was such a pig to get it to work reliably, I rather agreed with him. Leaving the pier I saw the exercise machines in the park opposite in a new light. All their simple mechanisms could be the basis of arcade machines. A housing ladder suited the step exercise machine perfectly."
Some of the machines - such as The Doctor (a robotic doctor who writes you a prescription in terrible handwriting) and The Disgusting Spectacle (a mechanical nose-picker) - date back almost 40 years, and it's remarkable that they're still in working condition.
My favourite was Test Your Nerve, which requires you to place your hand into a cage and keep a button pressed as long as possible, while an angry robotic dog growls and drips warm drool onto your wrist.
Many of the machines disgorge souvenirs - fake money, or, in one case, a fortune cookie (though the one we got was mouldy, so beware).
The games in the arcade are a mix of the out-and-out bizarre - such as The Bathyscape (a bathysphere
simulator, which takes you to the bottom of the ocean, where you encounter - among other things - the late Robert Maxwell) - and the lightly satirical - such as Whack-A-Banker (a take on Whack-A-Mole, which gives you the opportunity to wallop bankers over the head).
The newest machine is The Property Ladder, a mix of step machine and wry take on buying your own home. It was inspired by the recent opening of Hunkin's London arcade, Novelty Automation, and the staffs' difficulty in affording somewhere to live in the capital.
Hunkin explains: "I was struggling with Celeb, the arcade machine I'd just installed. A confident older man, wearing rust-coloured corduroy trousers, told me he didn’t like the machines like Celeb with joystick control; he preferred the more physical ones.
"I was so fed up with it at the time, it was such a pig to get it to work reliably, I rather agreed with him. Leaving the pier I saw the exercise machines in the park opposite in a new light. All their simple mechanisms could be the basis of arcade machines. A housing ladder suited the step exercise machine perfectly."
Some of the machines - such as The Doctor (a robotic doctor who writes you a prescription in terrible handwriting) and The Disgusting Spectacle (a mechanical nose-picker) - date back almost 40 years, and it's remarkable that they're still in working condition.
My favourite was Test Your Nerve, which requires you to place your hand into a cage and keep a button pressed as long as possible, while an angry robotic dog growls and drips warm drool onto your wrist.
Many of the machines disgorge souvenirs - fake money, or, in one case, a fortune cookie (though the one we got was mouldy, so beware).
VISIT AT THIS TIME: NOW
The Under The Pier Show is well worth a visit if you're in the area. Aside from much of Southwold looking like a throwback to the 1950s, with its brightly coloured beach huts and quaint tea rooms, Under The Pier is a testament to creativity.
Though you won't likely play any of the games more than once, you'll want to play them all. They're silly, they're funny, some of them are a bit pseudo-Banksy (though Banksy himself comes in for a little stick in Art Apocalypse), but their uniqueness makes them special. What's more, for a quid or two, most of them display more imagination and invention than the majority of mass-produced games in the traditional arcade at the entrance to the pier.
If you're not in the Southwold area, you could always visit Novelty Automaton instead - just five minutes walk from London's Holborn station. I shall be doing this: that.
The Under The Pier Show is well worth a visit if you're in the area. Aside from much of Southwold looking like a throwback to the 1950s, with its brightly coloured beach huts and quaint tea rooms, Under The Pier is a testament to creativity.
Though you won't likely play any of the games more than once, you'll want to play them all. They're silly, they're funny, some of them are a bit pseudo-Banksy (though Banksy himself comes in for a little stick in Art Apocalypse), but their uniqueness makes them special. What's more, for a quid or two, most of them display more imagination and invention than the majority of mass-produced games in the traditional arcade at the entrance to the pier.
If you're not in the Southwold area, you could always visit Novelty Automaton instead - just five minutes walk from London's Holborn station. I shall be doing this: that.
RSS Feed
