The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Jonathon Naylor Editor Scampering away from ghosts and shooting up aliens aren't a normal part of the school curriculum. Unless, of course, you happen to be in Colin Davis' Grade 11 woodworking class. Rather than the usual picnic benches and book shelves, his students have spent the semester assembling tabletop arcade machines. 'I always had a love for these machines when they first came out in the late '70s, early 1980s,' says Davis, whose class is based at the shop at Ecole McIsaac School. The machines, played while seated, contain 60 classic video games ranging from Donkey Kong and Pac-Man to Galaga and Frogger. Both ends of the desk-high units feature an old-style joystick and round plastic buttons _ pure nostalgia for the pre-Xbox generation. In keeping with their vintage look, the arcade machines are fed with quarters, though there is a setting that permits free play. With few exceptions, the students are fashioning each component of the units themselves. They cut the wood for the cabinets. They bent metal for the control panels. And they are wiring the guts and attaching the glass surfaces. 'It's an integrated program,' says Davis, who wanted a class project that would hone a string of different skills. Bryton Hovland, the first student to complete his machine, thoroughly enjoyed the months-long process. 'Pretty sweet' 'It's pretty sweet,' says the teen. 'I think it's the best project we've done in wood shop.' Though the games on his machine were released long before he was born, Hovland has grown to love the addictive simplicity of the classics. With a smiling Davis looking over his shoulder, Hovland tries his hand at his favourite of the 60 options, Mappy, in which a cartoon mouse retrieves stolen goods. 'It's funny, some of the boys have told me that their dads are excited about the project,' says Davis. With 11 machines, including a prototype assembled by Davis, the project represented a significant undertaking. So time-consuming is their construction that the units are this semester's lone undertaking for Davis' woodworking class. Davis ordered the required electronic parts, such as circuit boards and buttons, from a supplier in Toronto. Several local businesses also lent a hand. Hefty fee Though each student paid a hefty fee of $400 to help cover supplies, Davis says they got a bargain. 'These machines sell on the Internet for anywhere between $2,500 to $3,500,' he says. 'Each machine has roughly $1,000 worth of parts in them.' As the end of the semester nears, some students are further along than others, but all are welcome to stop by after school in order to meet their Jan. 31 deadline. 'They know that their homework is to give up some of their free time after school to come in and get some extra time in on the machines,' says Davis. Davis says the first-for-Flin Flon project would not have been possible without the backing of the school division. 'No other place where I've worked has offered me a budget as generous as what is offered by the Flin Flon School Division, which is the sole reason why I can take on a project as big as this,' he says. As he prepares for another round of Mappy, Hovland sounds just as grateful. 'I enjoy working with this kind of stuff, so it's kind of fun,' he says.
