This story goes back 20 years. In 1983, I was skinny, 6' 2", and weighed like 180 lbs. I was fresh out of Community College and my friends from High School were all involved in a racing league at Malibu Speedway in Mount Laurel, NJ. I liked racing, but it was pretty expensive at like $1.65 a lap. I would hang out in the arcade and play the games while they raced. Reactor was one of my favorites. Come to think about it, I was really only fascinated by a handful of video games back in the day: Battlezone, Popeye, Scramble, Jungle King, SubRoc 3D, and Reactor. I played Pac Man, Centipede, Defender, and other popular games, but my money went into the ones that I couldn't play as well at home. My Atari Home Computer had great graphics for the day, but some games were just the best on a real arcade machine.
One Day, the reactor was gone. I remember it. I felt like I was missing an old friend. I would not see a working machine for over 15 years. My friend Steve Zeuner found an awesome condition Reactor. It looked and played great. I really wanted it. Steve gave me the option, but it was too pricey for me at the time. Arcade collecting requires patience. You never know when you're going to find something and where. I think it's best to keep a mental note of what you really want and try and be prepared for it, in case you trip over it. That's what happened here with this game.
Jump to November of 2003. I'm now living in Georgia and I'm about to drive back up north 700 miles to the Big Baltimore game auction. I won't mention the name of the auction company here because they refuse to allow us to take pictures. So we'll offer no links or mention until they are willing to compromise. This is usually a HUGE auction every year and this was no exception.
Eric Selak, who I hadn't met until Friday, November 14th, 2003 brought the reactor to the auction. On it he had attached this note:
Claims like these can be made by anyone, but I saw Eric locking up the machine and I asked him, "Is this your machine? So, what do you want to get for it?". He said "I'm going to stop Bidding at $700 - I don't pull any punches". I said, "Thanks, I may be interested". I was. Very. The previous weekend, I had purchased my Twilight Zone pinball machine so the games budget was already overdrawn. I called my Wife, Roxann on the cell phone. Let me make a public statement, she is a wonderful woman! She told me if I really had to have it, to buy it. I was still uneasy, but I kept thinking, when would I find a nicely working Reactor in that nice of shape again. Probably never. I went to my hotel room that night and didn't sleep well.
The following morning, I asked Jon eXidy what a Reactor is worth. He said, "$900, if it's nice maybe a bit more". Someone told me that some other people had offered the owner $1000 to pull it out of the auction, I don't know if that's true. My friend, Rob Rhodes came up to me and said "Did you see that it's serial number 2?". "No, really?". I believed Eric's note a lot more now. Someone else commented that it had broken, I was thinking that I might actually save some money on it, but when I walked by, it was working great. One thing I have learned was to keep your distance on games you're interested in. You don't want a whole bunch of other people remembering how cool of a game it was all of a sudden!
My friend Mark Davidson likes to record all of the prices of things at the auction. I usually try to help with this. I positioned myself so that I would be getting the prices for the row with the Reactor in it. It was near the end of the row, I was more nervous, the closer I got. My friend Brian Jones commented that this was going to be "Cool". I was worried. Actually, I'll let Brian describe this as he did in a chat session we had on-line recently...
[Al] I get nervous at auctions.I obviously got it. The price was a little more than I wanted to pay, but sometimes opportunities knock but once. Eric never had to bid. When the auctioneer said SOLD and I was the new owner, everyone applauded. It was cool. After the row was complete, Eric came over and introduced himself and handed me the keys. Everyone was congratulating me and I noticed Jason (AKA JWC) was listening intensely when I asked Eric to let me know where he got it and any history of it. He told me, but I was still pretty pumped with adrenalin and missed most of it. I asked him to refresh me in an e-mail and he said:
"I don't really have much more information on the Reactor. Sometime in the summer of 1981, pinball sales were down, and this designer in Harrisburg, was told to quit making pinball machines and start character editing on video games. Gottlieb sent his Critical Mass prototype pinball machine back to him, then they sent him the Reactor video game to use for their next game Q*bert. The designer tried for months to understand what he was working on, but eventually gave up. Video games weren't in his blood, pinball machines were. So he stopped working for Gottlieb and never looked back. Gottlieb obviously forgot about all of the parts and Reactor they sent him, because they never asked for anything back. Hope this helps a little." (Ed: Very much so, Thanks Eric).
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Here is the game at the auction, Thanks for Brian Jones for the awesome picture! My camera was safely in my truck to avoid the auction police. |
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My friend Paul Frie snapped this picture of me loading the truck. That's Steve Zeuner to my right, and those are Brian's arms helping me guide it in. Oh, and I "borrowed" Mark Davidson's awesome cart to move the game. I have one as well, I just hate to get it wet so I left it home. Oh, and I am sporting my Al's Arcade T-Shirt. These are available for purchase at my cost. |
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Wrapped up with a Robotron I was transporting for Jon eXidy. This is how it looked when I pulled in, the game was below a bunch of wrap and tarps. Miss Roxann is acting like I'm NOT taking her picture in the background. |
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The Art is amazing - it IS a 20 year old game. |
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It's pretty short but looks kinda like a mini game. |
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Cleaner than most inside! |
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Again - Very clean. It had the manual inside as well. |
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Looks Amazing! Original monitor. |
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Is the the oldest surviving Reactor? I'd love to know if #1 or a prototype are still out there. |
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Marquee is nice. |
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Control panel is nice but has some cracking on the bend. This is VERY common. They do that. |
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He was a little off on the coin count - This is better! |
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The lovely Miss Courtney knew how excited her Daddy was and posed with the new game. I have this picture hung up at work. |
It was a major find and I Thank everyone who helped, supported, and congratulated me on it. This is great hobby with some great people in it. Thanks for reading.