EXA Arcadia Review - Is It Worth The Money?
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- Опубліковано 9 лют 2025
- EXA Arcadia Review - Is It Worth The Money? At last I have been able to get my hands on the extremely expensive Neo-Geo style arcade board the EXA Arcadia - which in total costs around $5,000 when paired with a game. (The games are very expensive as well). Thank you again to the patron who let borrow his board for this review. In today's video I go over my thoughts how the EXA hardware is designed, especially its choice to use Warranty Void if Seal Broken stickers as well as its general locked down nature. I also discuss the process of setting the EXA up and go over what parts the machine requires like the JVS I/O board and digital to analog converter if connecting to crt. I give my thoughts on the system's hardware power and game selection, I measure the input lag of two games, Dodonpachi SaiDaiOuJou (True Death Label), Akai Katana (Crimson Katana), and also wonder if having these games get a new arcade release is worth MAME receiving a cease and desist from EXA to drop them from emulation. I also share my thoughts and concerns on the system's lack of online updates/leaderboards, as well as the longevity of the hardware and cartridges.
If you want to hear my original interview with the EXA CEO, you can listen to the old podcast here: • Episode XI: Bring Arca...
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Good thing you have such cool patrons, I was worried the channel would just be "The Underground" now since you would have no money for electricity bills if you had actually purchased that thing.
Yeah there is no way I would buy a game system so expensive, just not happening ga. And yeah I would be the homeless underground if I dropped 5k on a game system
Arcade operator who owns two exAs here; Also been blogging about this since 2018. No, I am not paid by exa in any way but I do have frequent contact with the people there. It's an interesting perspective to see this from the collector's side although the answer to some of your critiques/questions are not the ones most collectors will want to hear. The reason being is that as you mention at the beginning of this video - this was made for operators first, players second, then collectors being a 3rd. The more the collectors accept that, the more it will make sense.
You mention the Neo Geo and that is an apt comparison, it's just important to remember that when the Neo Geo was released in 1990, there was not much of a collector scene and no emulation scene. It was made solely for arcade operators, the AES being made to please wealthy home players. Now there is both a collector/emulator scene but much about the arcade operations side hasn't changed, so exA is trying to fill in a need.
I see collectors constantly ruminating about the price but among operators, this really isn't an issue. In fact, I've never heard a complaint, and I've been asked about this a lot from colleagues. If I go to Sega, Namco or Raw Thrills right now, I'm lucky if the cheapest game they have is close to $6000(it would probably be something used sitting in a warehouse). Most of their games are above $10k and that's for a single game that you can't change. The exA really is one of the most affordable coin-op solutions on the market, just like the Neo Geo was in its day. No not affordable for collectors but again, they're not the target market.
I do agree that online updates would be great as having to ship in my carts or boards for updates is troublesome; But it might surprise you to learn that a vast majority of arcade games out there need something like a USB stick to update it, even those released in 2023. Many games just aren't online, even from manufacturers like Sega or Raw Thrills; Out of the 64 games I currently have at my arcade, only 5 of them connect to the internet!
The arcade market has been slow to adopt online stuff over security concerns but there's another angle here - Japan. Japan has fully embraced online but this comes at a price - almost every single game there since 2009 has been on a rev share model (i.e., the manufacturer gets a portion of your earnings every play or month, even though the op has to purchase the hardware and pay for maintenance). exA's biggest market has been Japan so they've kept it offline to prevent worry about them turning around and start charging for every play. Their Japanese marketing is constantly stressing how "you buy the game and you keep all of the revenue." That same worry about getting charged for plays exists in the US, to a lesser degree(it exists for Big Buck Hunter and Golden Tee games). Now I'm not sure if it's the best trade off - I'd rather have online updates than the worry about something that might happen, but I do understand why it is that they do it that way.
I can't speak much to the customer service stuff since they've taken care of me but again, they're used to dealing with operators and not consumers - that said, I know it's better to have good CS regardless. Finding great customer service in the coin-op industry is rare but again, I've not had issues with exAs CS, and yes I've had a few tech problems I needed assistance with. They've been attentive to my feedback and made fixes - I was the first op in the world to use it on a 4K setup, so I helped them correct a few little issues with that.
Re: security, this is something that most consumers don't know about but it's a very, very important issue to developers. Both Taito and Sega's platforms (Nesica & APM3) have been hacked, the games released for free online. A developer looking at a platform doesn't want their investment to instantly pop up online as soon as it's released if they can help it - selling in the arcade space is more difficult and the numbers are much lower (most games sell in the hundreds, rarely in the thousands of units), so they are more prone to look at the most secure platform out there. There are Chinese devs who aggressively work to crack stuff and that eats into a manufacturer's profits but it can end up hurting operators too. You won't read about anti-piracy efforts online but devs have to take it seriously and do what they can to keep it from happening.
Hopefully someone out there gets some insight from that :)
Thanks. I am glad to see multiple sides, and sadly, the reviewer lost when getting into a heated argument with the CEO. Hope that does not happen again.
For the creator: label the video clearly as “worth it for collectors / home buyers?”
Hey my dude thank you for the insightful comment! So this is why I specifically mentioned that the review for the exa is from the perspective of a consumer buying the machine for home use, because unlike the other arcade systems out right now that I'm aware of (the nesica and such) EXA is trying to serve both markets, it even says so on their website. And while I respect that some of their practices work or are accepted in a Japanese arcade setting, that doesn't give exa a green light to do whatever on the consumer market side without critique. If all consumer hardware was sold with the philosophy of very outdated arcade business practices, we'd all be in trouble ha. When I interviewed the CEO of EXA many years ago and he was going over the plan for the machine, he specifically mentioned wanting to have the EXA be international and be a machine that both arcade operators and personal collectors can buy. As an arcade operator yourself, I think you can recognize that the home market side of things has a lot more potential for sales and revenue in the year 2023 than arcade operators. There are not that many arcades left and there is going to be a point of diminishing return where the arcade owners are likely not going to keep buying every game EXA puts out. However judging by the tone of my talks I had with the CEO yesterday and also the tone of your comment here, there is definitely a "the customer is always wrong" ethos around this product. It doesn't work like that in my book. If the EXA is going to sale to private collectors and make that part of their business model, then they need to treat the customers they sell to fairly. They are no less deserving of support and customer service than arcade operators.
@@TheElectricUnderground My tone isn't trying to be critical - just explanatory but it's the internet so things can always go off in different ways 🙂Although I'm not sure how I came off in sounding like the customer is always wrong, so you can help me understand that (I personally believe its in the middle instead of the extreme absolutes, but that's another discussion).
Not saying you're wrong to criticize exA's stance or practices - but trying to explain why things are the way that they are.
To explain myself better, and to your point about which markets are being served, I used to sell arcade machines for a major distributor and I sold quite a bit of products to home users - I'd sell several Golden Tee and official Pac-Man machines (not Arcade 1ups but stuff by major manufacturers). Once in a blue moon I'd sell something more expensive to the home - but where did most of my sales and biggest commissions come from? Businesses. They would more often buy in bulk, whereas home users would buy one thing and you might not get a repeat for a decade or more.
The point is that nothing stops anyone from buying anything in the arcade biz for their house, but that fact doesn't change the target market or the pay-per-play biz model.
As for the arcades are dead insinuation, there really are a lot more arcades out there than people think there are, particularly gamers who comment on this a lot. The problem is that there is no concise list of all venues in operation to point to. People just talk about how they feel it is and if you don't have a bunch of arcades within walking distance, it "feels" like they're dead. Reality is that there are thousands and thousands of places out there that exA could sell to. I cover brand new places opening up almost on a monthly basis.
I do agree that all customers should be treated fairly and I have no idea what comment you're referring to with the CEO (guessing the warranty thing?), but if this is back on the "customer is always right/wrong" piece, I think that's situational and contextual. I've seen a lot of collectors demand that exA have a console business model. That makes no sense for them to do for a variety of reasons, so in that essence, they would be wrong in that demand. But if they buy something, it's not in perfect condition and the repair should be covered under warranty, then yes, absolutely it should be.
NIcely explained.
"I am not paid by exa" 🤣
something i noticed when you were showcasing the cartridges is that the pins are very similar to Mini PCI-E slots, which are commonly used in laptops and motherboards for peripherals such as wifi cards and SSD storage
something tells me it may be possible to disassemble one of them and plug it into a regular PC and look at the contents of it if they're not encrypted
Was wondering about this arcade for a long time thanks for the review
No problem! It was a hell of an undertaking getting one to look at on the channel, that's for sure
Thanks for the video Mark. Saw these EXA Arcadia machines in the back of arcade Mikado in a Japal IRL stream and was a bit curious about them. But the sheer cost of the unit and individual cartridges is insane. Props to the patron for providing you the hardware to test. I would have so much anxiety shipping thousands of dollars of equipment through the mail.
Also just received the Electric Underground shirts, came out great!
Yeah I m really happy the patron reached out and took the risk :-) also I m really happy with how the shirts turned out and the bonus ep will be up tomorrow:-)
Man if I spent 5k on anything and the company did me dirty like that, the last thing I would ever do is give that same company another 5k. Even if I was loaded, it's more about the principle of the matter than anything. I guess customers like that are how companies like this stay afloat though...
So I thought about this myself fightaman, but the consider this. The patron was basically stuck in a nasty trap since he spent 6k on just his games right. So by not buying another exa he would have been out 6k, versus the 3k he spent on the replacement ... Tough situation
Yeah, I couldn't do this. No offense to the patron who did, but this is part of the reason we are suffering with the cancer that is microtransactions and DLC in gaming. No matter how shitty companies get with it, the majority of us, keep throwing money at it.
@@robibennobi3775 You're not funny
@@jro1244 not sure how a commercial arcade machine has anything to do with kids buying fortnite skins.
@@wearethewearethewearethhe I was talking about people throwing money at things even when those things are a bad experience. I didn't mean this is literally causing microtransactions. It's the kind of impulse buying, fomo, must consume behaviour that is driving both. If a company is screwing you over, quit giving them money.
Thanks for the informative video! I'd love to hear your opinion not on just the hardware and games, but the future of the Arcadia and how it's business model affects players, it's access to a robust library, and if we as a community really need or want it. Personally I can only see the EXA as a hurdle to playing the games I want to not only because I can never afford one, but the closest arcade to me is a plane ride away. I love arcade games, but at the current time I see the 'arcade' culture to mean meet ups in person, and playing online.
That is super interesting, but I've had enough EXA drama in the past day for a lifetime ha. I've said my piece about the hardware and I'm gonna move on ha
@@TheElectricUnderground I can accept that, hahaha. I look forward to some easy going videos in the future
@@zhukov2116 Maybe he should upload a Stardew Valley or Minecraft review to calm down his nerves.😅
I'm holidaying in japan right now and I've been enjoying the arcadegoer experience with exa machines in Taito HEY and Mikado for what it's worth. Like it's just a really good experience as the player. They play very well, good games, keeps me coming back. I hope my 100 yen coins are helping chip away at the crazy initial costs. Makes me wonder how much Mikado would struggle more than (I think) they already are if they have to have one serviced. God no an exa is not worth it for your average nerd at home, but for an arcade operator yes.
Yes and that's why in the video I pointed out that I am reviewing the product from the perspective of if it fits well in a home use setting. EXA is trying to tap into both markets, but just because some business practices are accepted in a japanese arcade, that doesn't automatically equal a green light when carrying over the product to consumer sales. Also I feel like if the exa ceo was more serious about expanding and improving the home consumer side of the machine, he'd be more receptive to my critiques as useful insights. Instead it's just him saying on discord that there are not issues and consumer protection law doesn't apply to the EXA because the payments for the machine are processed in Singapore ha.
About the "cease and desist" mame situation... FBNeo never got the memo kiddos! Enjoy the games without selling your kidneys!
Yeah fbneo still swagging out ha
So, Mark drives a truck. Jean jacket and baseball cap were dead giveaway, but it's nice to have a confirmation. That was informative and interesting breakdown, even if I will never be able to have one of this, thanks.
Ha yes I'm def a truck guy, but a smaller truck. Big enough to hall most things around but not so big that it's taking up a bunch of gas money or space.
I was looking forward to your review of AKA TO BLUE. Especially because we mere mortals can only play the touchscreen version. For that much money I expect a much better customer service even a concierge that can assist me in real time. As an Arcade Operator you must be able to open your arcade and repair your equipment. Online updates is a must on this day and age. It has good titles and the input lag is amazing but they have to back it up with a premium customer service for that price. Just my two cents.
Agreed completely Joel! Funny enough it was aka to blue I was most looking forward to as well since I can already play katana and sdoj with low lag on shmuparch, sadly the cart was not working, but I promise it went dead before I got the exa ha. I treated that exa with more care than an active landmine
More than anything, I'm now very curious about the "shmup shed" 👀👀👀
Specs: i3 9100F with 8 GB DDR4 RAM and a GTX 1650. In other words, a $500 PC.
Very enlightening video. At first I only thought of it as something like owning a supercar where it's a product for people who have the means to buy it. But now that you discussed all the caveats and the expenses and the hassle makes me question the customer service practices of this company. Unless you are the high roller person that doesn't care about losing hundreds to thousands of dollars, it really does feel a lot like a major rip-off, or a major liability at the very least.
That cease-and-desist order for MAME reminds me so much of the way Harmony Gold handled the Macross/Robotech IP where they just blocked every attempt to make Macross content accessible to the US fanbase for decades until they had the lawsuit and agreement way back 2021. Block people from wide accessibility so that they would have to purchase your system. Not really the most encouraging idea.
And I can relate as well to the South American case where the mail system can be unreliable. I live in the Philippines and whenever I order something from Amazon US, I would have it shipped to a freight forwarding company. That way I get to claim it from their office instead of the local post office and get slapped with whatever charges the officers felt like slapping on my item.
The longevity is also my biggest concern. I only bought a Nintendo Switch last year and I'm already scared about buying the Ray'z Arcade Chronology because I don't know if I'll ever get clears on them before the Nintendo Switch gets replaced by Nintendo's next console, and Nintendo's track record with backwards compatibility is not very promising either.
Yeah the idea that in order to even open the hardware clean breaks warranty is pure madness, especially since it s a PC with fans ... You have to open it at some point. And yes mailing the thing back and forth constantly is just asking for trouble
I own an exa. SDOJ and Aka to blue. This video was really fun to watch and it's crazy because I was thinking of reaching out to you a bit ago to see if you were interested in checking out the exa for a video. Glad you went over how it's pretty sketchy. Basically they want you to trust them, doesn't feel AMERICAN but oh well I can accept that: You wouldn't feel "free" at all living in Japan lololol they be crazy. I view the exa as a life experience, it's more than just spending money because you can. Maybe some can spend large amounts of money without being stressed, but it really hurt me to purchase the machine no matter how "affordable" it is.
EDIT: Also I'm not sure why the person sent you a broken copy of Aka to blue. If it stops working, you can send it back and the process takes about half a month. Pretty long, but it's not impossible to get a working copy again. Exa support has always been responsive to me but I really agree there should be exa servers which perform basic system updates...Networking not too hard in 2023, especially when the machine is built on Windows.
I'm not familiar with Japanese style of business, but I review and judge products by the standard of American consumer law. There are a lot of concerning practices that are legal in other countries I am sure, but the way the exa is currently setup is very anti-consumer. EXA has placed their customers totally at their mercy with the way they have designed the hardware and their policy with the hardware. That is why I talked about it in my review because all of this is designed into the hardware. I cannot in good faith recommend a product that costs so much money and leaves consumers basically no options if customer support doesn't feel like helping them. Also there is still the lingering question of what happens to your hardware if EXA goes out of business?
@@TheElectricUnderground every choice they have made in design was to make sure that consumers do not own the system. It’s anti-consumer by design because they were never trying to make an Xbox.
If you let people open it, then it will get hacked/emulated very quickly.
If you have online update servers, then another avenue is open for gaining access to the hardware.
The exa was made for arcade owners whose concern is buying licenses to legally operate arcade machines. Comparing to the other modern arcade systems, an exa license is really the cheapest out there. But obviously no shmup players are trying to get their hands on some crazy modern $10,000 sega machine.
There is no answer for the longevity of the exa system, because that’s not a question which is answered when designing a commercial product. Business owners use it for a bit while a game is popular to make money.
They made a commercial product with the skin of a consumer product. It looks like something that should be sold as any other pc or Xbox.
Was considering one of these once I did some decent overtime at work in the near future but the cmos battery issue along with the absurd $500 service fee for a password they could've easily emailed the customer killed that interest. Freaking insane they're charging so much for a console that has arguably a shorter lifespan with very little to no failsafe than a dang PS3.
Yeah and now at the very least if you continue towards getting an exa, or other potential home buyers, you are at least informed on what to expect. That way you are not blindsided when the machine shows up in your home with all these warranty void stickers (which are not shown on the website) and then go back and read that all sales are final.
@@TheElectricUnderground Personally gonna hold out until emulation catches up instead of dealing with all that. The ridiculous amounts of consumer rights violations turned me off from it for good. Thanks for shedding the light on all the shady stuff the people behind it are doing. Being protective of your property is one thing but these guys are taking it to a new extreme they're like one step away from always online DRM.
Fascinating video, thanks for lifting the curtain on this beast. I guess the anti consumer nature of it shouldn't be a surprise as it's not a consumer device but still, damn, the anxieties regarding handling and customer support are visceral. Thanks again.
No problem! I think if you are an arcade operator in Japan maybe it makes more sense since customer service is right there, but if you are international it seems really tough to get support and the warranty stickers def are not helping
Interesting and informative video, thanks. I would have liked to hear more about the games though, even if 24 hours isn't very long for full reviews.
I focused more on the hardware in this review because the games themselves I've already discussed pretty much (sdoj and akai katana), so the question of the review was much more about ok but what's going on with the hardware, does the hardware perform as advertised, and then what are the risks of spending this much money on the hardware. I could spend a review talking about SDOJ but that wouldn't capture the whole picture of the situation and I feel like would be negligent on my part as I would be leading a lot of potential buyers from my audience into a possibly very sticky situation.
"power to the exa" sounds maximum cringe. Speaking of, at around 20min you're talking about how powerful this machine is. It's an older generation i3....
But Shou claims it's more powerful than the PS5 and unreleased Neo Geo 2!!
@@Zeether77 🤣Well then it seems Shou is full of shit. I suppose the exa cult loves talk like that, not sure why else he'd make such outrageous claims.
To offer a partial defence of the "all sales final" you've got to remember that these are low volume items, often of limited edition designs with all the artwork and such. If customers start cancelling and sending stuff back for refunds because they change their minds it can be death to a company. Where I work we sell "prestige" things alongside our regular products, it's not arcade hardware, it's not even technology, but the principal is the same. Because they are such high ticket items you get LOADS of "tire kickers" who take time to decide, put a down payment on it, cancel, send it back for refund... if we didn't have the regular high volume stuff to help us ride that out we certainly couldn't afford to offer decent customer service on the expensive stuff. We offer it for sale because it attracts customers, but despite the high price tags, we make very little money directly on them because of the hassles. For such a niche product as this, sold worldwide to a limited market, I suspect they aren't rolling in cash and need to avoid incurring too many big expenses. Consumers tend to look at high price tags and think "that's fortunes!" but they don't realise that company overheads just to keep the lights on can be staggering. I mean, it's not our job to see their business is a success mind, I'm just pointing out the troubles they are likely facing and why they are likely thinking the way they are thinking.
That said, stuff like the BIOS locking and warranty void stickers is a bit much. There are better ways of handling this stuff while still maintaining your software protection. The fact that they've done it the stupid way suggests to me the only reason they haven't been completely bust wide open for piracy is that it just hasn't hit the right people yet. I have my doubts that they've actually protected the software in any reasonable way if they are failing at the simple stuff.
Great points complex! Yes I was thinking of this myself, even with my shirt sales ha, where I need the money up front to manufacturer the shirts and if people started canceling their orders I d bleed money. That being said though I think that combined with the warranty sticker situation is where it goes from being reasonable to the company taking all power from the consumer. Because look at what happened to the patron, he can't return his locked up exa because all sales are final, but he also cannot have it repaired without cost because of the warranty stickers "voiding" his warranty
@@TheElectricUnderground Yeah, it's extremely important to tell people the truth about dealing with companies like this. It's all well and good me defending their practices, but like you said in the video, if Exa shut up shop where does that leave end users when a part fails and they can't replace it without risking triggering some protection check?
And you just know that some day there'll be a Chinese clone on the market and Exa will just say "due to difficulties protecting our IP we have made the decision to end trading. Repair service is no longer available. Thank you and good night." You'd wind up having to replace your $5000 investment with an $800 PC running the hacked code same as the pirates.
@@TheElectricUnderground singaporelegaladvice.com/law-articles/consumer-rights-singapore-recourse/
They use HASP dongles for security so it's pretty much easy to defeat
It’s literally just a pc though…
Fantastic review! Funnily enough I've been seriously considering purchasing one of these the last few weeks, even despite it being a huge blow to the wallet. Mostly for things like Akai Katana and all the cool modes it adds and some of the other cool exclusives. However, having watched this video, I feel a lot better about abstaining from doing so until they release some kind of home/private use version. Especially with the spotty customer service and the battery being on a timer, I think its a lot safer to wait and see what happens. Either way, thanks for the great vid. Your vids are actually what got me super interested in the genre a few months back! Keep putting out bangers : )
I m really glad to help Denver! Yes I'd wait to see what happens with the warranty sticker situation at the very least. In the meantime you can always grab some cheap psikyo boards to play :-) maybe even Raiden fighters or Ray Force, I don't think they are too pricey
But thats what i like about your take is the honesty and sincerity. Exa seems neat but like you financially i cannot justify it.
This review was not a fun time honestly. I d prefer if exa were just more reasonable and I could talk about the games more, but it felt wrong to look at these issues over and potentially lead my viewers into a sandpit
Amazing! Got my shirt today. It's beautiful!! Thank you;
Yayaya 🎉 thank you for supporting the channel! The bonus ep should be uploaded tomorrow if you check your packing slip
@@TheElectricUnderground I didn't get the code, only the small thank you slip.🤔
The Gimmick! remaster for the Exa is pretty fire. Overall this seems like a ridiculous product though. You could build a whole-ass supercomputer with $5000 and get way more mileage out of it, plus it would be infinitely more future-proof. Honestly you could probably get more mileage out of a crusty $30 HP laptop you found at a yard-sale lol.
Yeah I think the dedication to really old school style hardware policy really hurts the prospects of what the system could have offered.
It looks fire! I wish I could play it. :( And that's precisely the problem with exA-Arcadia's market and decisions.
Have you played it then? Did you manage to afford a board?
I was able to borrow an Exa unit for about a month from another local collector. I was running the video through a very similar HDMI-to-VGA converter as the one in your video and my Exceleena's tri-sync monitor handled the output without any issues. So it may have functioned for you on another CRT monitor. As for the issue regarding Aka To Blue, it appears to be some weird compatibility issue with certain I/O converters. The individual I borrowed the unit from was initially having the same problem with the game but after trying some different JAMMA-compliant I/O converters the game decided to boot. I've offered to test both of the NAOMI I/O converters I have (one just handles the inputs while the second has a built-in audio amp) seeing as I had no issue running the game before.
Yeah I figured if I used a different port or converter it would be able to get on a VGA monitor at some point. That io board glitch sounds crazy ha. I ll pass the info on to the patron and see if he wants to try a different io board with it
Thanks for the review, while I find it fun to collect arcade hardware for the nostalgia, I do have a threshold on how much I pay for a game system and the Exa is definitely way out of my league and not enough to warrant the required nostalgia to pay the admission price. I have a friend that collects these expensive boards and he has one, and I personally don't think it's a major improvement to the original versions of inexpensive Steam games they sell such as Infinos Gaiden, or games that have good versions on consoles (Saidaioujou and Akai Katana) or emulators. Especially at a $1500 price tag. I'm not sure that their business model is very sound, the lack of online updates is boss mafia paranoia at best, sorry, this is unacceptable to keep the tabs on buyers and force people to spend more money with them. As for the broken Aka to Blue, it's probably the nvme drive that got corrupted - yeah, Exa cartridges are just glorified SSD disks. Nice to see Filipe as the example of a South American collector. Cheers!
Yes exactly Jogos, the fact that they put all these warranty void if broken stickers on a pc with fans that need to be cleaned to begin with is very unreasonable. So even for a routine clean job you need to spend all this money and time shipping the exa back to them? I don't see the benefits really other than keeping customers in constant contact and in need of help.
I’m just in Tokyo and the Taito Hirose Entertainment Yard in Akihabara has a Exa Arcadia machine with DOJ on a vewlix. Was very cool to see that in the wild. Also that arcade has like every shmup you would want to play.
how many people were waiting to play it, out of curiosity?
If they ever do go out of business, they better hook everyone up with that password.
Is this affiliated with the examu exboard? That looked similar and the bios password has leaked on forums. I'm sure the same will happen with this.
Arcade Projects is the place to find this type of info
I was initially very happy with the Exa project but hearing your concerns about the design philosophy really made me change my opinion. The only option for the preservation of the Exa in the future will be hacking and reverse engineering.
Abundance of money should never make people blind about those issues that are very real, planned obsolescence is a problem here since you can't buy the new model every year and print is limited, we won't see new arcade hardware devs for a very long time.
Right to repair, right to actually own the product (Exa proved it's a problem even in the always offline model), right to schematics for easier repair/modding etc. are the battles we need to fight right now.
Exactly Zavier, the right to repair thing is so critical because building a product that is designed to rely on your own customer service to continue to function is like a combo of ongoing hidden fees and planned obsolescence. EXA could literally just come out with a new model and say, ok now we are no longer supporting the old model, and there would be nothing you could do about that as a consumer except pray the cmos battery lives forever.
great review mark
Thank you Kairi!
I remember when you did your interview on the podcast way back when! Oh ha you just said that…looking forward to listening to this
Lot of it's library deserves home releases. The EXA Gimmick and Batsugun would be day one for me.
I think for home collectors the Exa makes very little sense. Their new ARC-1 cabinet is around $7,500 and loading it up with 4 games brings the total up to around $12k. For a home gamer that could be more than you would spend on console or PC games in a lifetime. Makes no sense from that perspective. But as an arcade operator I think this system makes a tremendous amount of sense. For $36,000 we can get 3 cabinets and 12 games which is as much as we would spend to buy 1-2 games from the large manufacturers like Raw Thrills and Sega. And with the Exa we can cycle in new games into the system for about $1,500 each, which again in the arcade industry is really affordable. My arcade is about to buy 3 or 4 of these machines and we are really excited about it. Will I buy one for my home? Absolutely not. Also I don't think Exa will release a more affordable home console version of the system because if they did their core business of selling to arcade operators would dry up because why would people like me invest in a system that is no longer arcade exclusive and that can be played at home? Bottom line: this is not a home consumer product it's a commercial product designed for arcade operators.
Looks as if those "cartridges" are basically dedicated SSDs in a case, makes me think some kind of corruption or something may have happened at some point with that Aka to Blue copy sadly :(
When I saw the connectors I immediately thought PCIe and those don't have a particularly high number of insert/remove cycles before you wear out the connectors. I wonder if they warn you not to swap carts like it's a SNES... Or maybe they did beef up the connector. So many questions need answering.
Yeah I do not think the carts are built to last, there s no way an old school circuit board is sitting inside there
There are industrial grade connectors for such purposes. I have no idea if they used those here but just wanted to point out that such connectors do exist, rated for many more insert/remove cycles than a typical SATA or M.2 connector. @@complexacious
They should release consumer versions of the games which can't be credit operated so that the games aren't locked to high rollers/ arcades only. That business model really only makes sense from an investment standpoint, if you are buying this unit to put in an arcade and charge people credits per play. It's a little silly to say that the price makes sense when you could just buy a very high end pc for less than the cost of the exa unit and 3 games. IMO the games are what makes the hardware interesting, not the hardware itself.
Yes for sure Dogg, I think all the extra cost comes from the rights to use the games commercially, but from the perspective of the home consumer these rights are basically useless and cost a lot of extra money. One reason why I suspect the EXA is still arcade only is because I think there is some kind of difference between the rights to a game in an arcade setting versus the rights to the game in a home market. So it is possible that EXA might struggle to get the ability to publish something like SDOJ as a true consumer product, but that's just speculation.
As for the CMOS battery, you may be able to replace one while the system is running, but yeah, sucks to be an Exa owner. BTW, it'd be a good idea to do that on my much less expensive TypeX3 - which is just a glorified 10 years old PC 🫢. Glad it's already hacked, so no worries there.
Huge respects to the viewer that sent you his EXA. Getting this type of no bs impressions by a non buyer is great. Now I'm scared to even touch one. 😂
yeah my dude the guy was very cool to lend me his unit, I do hope now people are more informed when making such an expensive purchase!
@@TheElectricUnderground might have something to ask you in a bit
i miss the days when you’d find arcade machines in random locations. I work at the airport in my city and I remember back when I was a kid we had some machines in the hallways of the terminal. Just the other day I spoke to someone here and suggested we get some machines like this to have in the concourses.
Enjoyed this 👍 Especially the restaurant analogy 😊 I think it’s fair to say that some of the price of the coke is for the venue, the chair and the staff though 🍻
Just bought a trans vaginal ultrasound probe from Viet Nam. Thousand bucks. I asked the dude if he thought it was safe to ship to the US and he was like, "yea sure, no prob". Now you got me worried. Luckily it doesn't look like a super cool arcade machine. It would take a real weirdo to want to steal it.
Can you play SDOJ on your transvaginal ultrasound probe from vietnam
Lol XD
I have a PS5 with 97 Arcade Archives, all the City Connection Cave stuff, all the Shot Triggers, 30 ACA NEOGEO, both of the recent Cotton games, all the Qute stuff, all the Darius games, the Capcom Arcade Stadiums, the Psikyo games, the Raidens, Andro Dunos 2... you get the picture. I have everything that's good on PS5 and a Razer arcade stick with Sanwa parts. Also have a Switch full of Shmups inc all the Live Wire ports so far, all the Terrarin games, Crimzon Clover, Rolling Gunner and so on, and an 8 Bitdo Bluetooth stick that's as good as the pro controller. I'm good. ExA just seems so misjudged and it doesn't have any really compelling reason to own one. Then there's they way they conduct themselves online and as you've demonstrated - in business too. I'd liked to have gotten AKA To Blue, but not for $5K. Nah. Hard pass.
Yeah it would be funny to calculate how many console ports 5k would buy you
@@TheElectricUnderground You can buy 1,000 copies of *_Raptor: Call of the Shadows (1994 Classic Edition)_* with that money. :^)
Well, it is like your traditional arcade hardware after all. It is pretty cool as a collector item and for the nostalgic feeling. But it was replaced for other modern technologies for a good reason.
Honestly, even though I enjoy going to the arcade every once in a while, I prefer playing in the comfort of my home.
Yeah I just feel like trying to apply that old school model now just doesn't work, too many things have changed and there are too many alternatives
Do they have an arbitration clause or something in the terms of sale? Otherwise one could drag them to court/FTC for the Warranty Act violation with the unenforcable/illegal warranty stickers.
I think I’m good emulating those same games via Steam Deck. The additional cost just to cut down input lag by a few frames is pretty crazy. Understandable for Arcade places but still. You think you should be able to achieve the same with much cheaper hardware.
I'm sure you can achieve it with cheaper hardware, there's definitely an arcade premium occurring, especially on the game prices.
Thanks for another great review.
Thank you my dude!
It's cheaper just to pay for a ticket to go to Jpn, book a hotel for a few days, and spend some money to play the EXA and all it's games...
Than to buy the EXA hardware and it's games and risk being at their mercy when some shit goes wrong.
Sounds like their whole selling the EXA arcade PC business model doesn't work very well in these modern times.
that is a very good point renedaiden ha. While you are in japan you can also play a lot of other really cool arcade machines.
@@TheElectricUnderground
And still you'd be spending less than it would take to buy an EXA Arcade PC.
Yah! The thought of that being an actual thing is fricken Maad.
The CMOS failure concern is a non issue. There is a video of someone with multiple Exa cabs showing that the cab with a failed CMOS takes about twice as long to boot up and play than the cab with a good CMOS. So failed CMOS doesn't brick the system. Video here: ua-cam.com/video/Zwza_aa7msQ/v-deo.htmlsi=y8m0Ntcpl8nL3cxp
From what I gathered, this system is out of most people's price range, and I heard the hardware itself is actually a few generation behind modern PC hardware. They're taking that "exclusivity" a bit too literally
Now I know why games like Blazing Chrome and Infinos Gaiden had extra features than the base game
I heard the guy who founded EXA used to be someone who's very active in the ROM dumping community, then in an effort to prevent people from dumping his EXA games he ended up recruiting a ton of the top ROM dumpers, and now no one can threaten his games
that guy is Shoutime, he is basically gatekeeper for any future game preservation....
The truth is that even with cabinet use there's still not enough games or Shmups to justify the purchase especially over something like the mister or a gaming PC.
Yeah you gotta be a high roller pcb collector basically
Wow the level of service provided for the cost is pretty terrible. The hardware in itself seems rather good and the games top notch but its environment and the manufacturer's practices aren't on part with a premium product standards.
Yeah the customer is extra right at these prices I would say. The warranty sticker thing really compounds the issues too
@@TheElectricUnderground And the fact that you can't update the firmware/os yourself is also deal breaker to me.
Damn, the hardware choices and preservation philosophy is exactly why I will never buy something like this and forever sing the praises of the Mister. I’ll hold out till the Mister 3 has an exa core in 2050 lol.
💯
The interesting thing to me is that the CEO was all about preservation prior to going down this path. I haven’t communicated with him in years so it is possible that’s still the case if he still tinkers.
Ha yeah the mister is fantastic because of the philosophy behind the hardware, which is open and transparent. Also you may not need to wait that long before the mister might get a core that supports the later cave games, I think it's def very possible.
Great points about the warranty, business practices and hardware longevity. Props to the patron for sending it to you. Might be worth it for businesses but seems like an eventual dead weight in your home. Would still like to play SDOJ Exa Label somehow.
Another superinteresting review...even though I probably will never see one in my life, unless it gets hacked and "ported" ;-) Too bad about Aka to Blue - it's my favourite shmup on phone and tablet. I've even managed to clear the last stage on my pixel 4 phone :-) Would have loved to hear about its bigger brother...
Yeah I was looking forward to aka to blue the most, but alas the cart was out of commission
Thanks for the video! Ran into your channel thanks to finding the Gimmick! EXACT☆MIX game from exA-Arcadia. It's a remaster for Mr. Gimmick for the NES, which I cherish. I was so excited to look into how to play it...but then I learned more about exA-Arcadia and how...that's just not gonna happen. :(
I have nothing against people making and selling modern arcade boards, but exclusifying the games to only those with a lot of money and interested to collect arcade boards (whether to put in an arcade, or for personal use) is just such a toxic decision that feels very...anti-game.
I saw some arguments that the exclusivity encourages those arcade board sales, and those sales are key for recouping the development (and especially licensing) costs; even a few boards make a large profit, and that does make some sense given their prices. I could understand that argument, that offering alternative ways to play the game would hurt board sales...
...But it still doesn't explain why they couldn't just release the game more widely 1-2 years down the line, after everyone who has been incentivized to purchased the boards have already done so. Heck, it would mean additional profits on top of the projected earnings, and likely create a new rush of interest to the game and thus, maybe some additional board sales that otherwise would be missed-out on.
It just doesn't make sense.
Aside from personal desire to play some of these games, I also look at this from a game-preservation perspective. What happens to these games when exA-Arcadia closes? I imagine they will all be lost, except for from the handful of people out there who have purchased the game boards...who I imagine wouldn't have a lot of interest in removing their exclusivity and sharing the data. That's just a damn shame.
I don't encourage piracy, but I think it makes total sense to dump games into roms, ESPECIALLY arcade games as they are some of the most vulnerable games to becoming lost over time. I figured this was more of a historical issue with the modern arcade market being more limited, but clearly exA-Arcadia wants to keep perpetuating this risk.
Heck, other companies making new arcade boards DO usually have other means of obtaining these games. I'm also reminded of companies who make brand-new classic console games, and many of those have roms you can purchase as well. I think this classic-modern fusion market for releasing new games on old systems is totally cool!...but only if it actually is being done for the love of games.
In my opinion, exA-Arcadia aren't selling games. They're selling status symbols. Because none of this really feels like it's for the love of games. It's building and incentivizing an exclusive club for the love of money.
I am curious though! I'm not really part of the arcade crowds. I wonder how many people more hardcore into this scene do treat it like an exclusive club? I imagine some buy arcade machines/boards simply because they have the money and simply have a passion for the content and the games. While others largely do it to be part of that club. But I wouldn't know, myself...I can only guess.
The CMOS thing sounds a lot like another CPS-2 and CPS-3 suicide battery issue in the making via a missguided anti-piracy attempt.
Kinda ironic when those games got removed from MAME, got added into FinalBurn Neo xD
It's kind of the neo geo of today but it's really not because there's no home system version. Theoretically if you adjusted for inflation the AES would be about 1300 dollars in today's money and homecarts would be $500. If Exa decided to go this route- I would buy. And I think the collectors that already bought in with the coin-op versions probably wouldn't sweat it, because they are big tymers and big tymers don't sweat shit.
Yeah I was thinking of doing a price comparison to the neo Geo, but the vid was already a beast to get through ha. At 5k the arcade would need some serious coin turnover to break even
Wasn't being critical of the video, this is without a doubt the most informative video on the Exa that exists and I the I appreciate your work here and the whale that loaned it out to you to make it happen.
Also what truck do you drive? Lol
Mark a question: how is your monitor adding 1 whole frame of input lag when most decent monitors have 5ms (or less) response time?
Those super low response rates typically only take effect on 120Hz, 240Hz or higher input signals. When your source is 60Hz you still have to wait 1/60th of a second or 16ms for a frame to be available for the LCD to process and display. That's why if you're emulating you get better input response if you run retroarch on a high framerate monitor.
Oh great question! So response time is not the same as input lag. Because lcd have to run and process the signal which creates a buffer before the image is displayed. So on a 60fps signal the monitor can't really respond faster than frame, it s at higher frame rates that the monitor can have better lag results
Since this wasn't really addressed the response time is only measured after the pixels receive a signal and the measurement is how fast can it shift from one shade of gray to another. It has nothing to do with the total responsiveness of the monitor and thus the lag and only affects ghosting. As an example TVs with several frames of lag can still have 5ms or less response rates. Think of it as the difference between an old monochrome CRT computer monitor with high persistence phosphors and a monitor with low persistence phosphors. Both have essentially no input lag but one has ghosting with motion and the other doesn't.
You pay $5k for a computer, that f***er better be pristine. And ya, updates should be available for the operator to update via USB or a dongled updatable cartridge
Yeah I m no security expert but even security crazy Sony has to allow for online updates
Wow… this whole deal sounds like a nightmare
Yeah I was shocked, the sticker thing alone was like huh? You literally can't even open it to clean the fans?
Honestly, not surprised at how locked down the hardware is. After they C&D'ed MAME for Akai Katana and SDOJ, I already knew Exa was the kind of company that is crazy about maintaining control over their own products, even though you already paid (a large sum) for it. Couple it with the awful customer service, they're just the same as pretty much any big company out there nowadays. The first part of the video feels so reminiscent of watching Louis Rossmann, just without the (very much justified) rage.
And heh, a Singaporean company. Of course the customer service is awful. In fact, having someone reply to you is already a pretty good outcome. The amount of times I tried to support a local company only to get myself burned at the end... Well, that's what you get living under a pro-business government; there is zero consumer (and labour) protection here, so expect to get screwed over. And the funny thing is, even with Exa situated here, none of the local arcades are running an Exa machine as far as I can tell.
Whatever, it's lame. Gonna side with the pirates here. I didn't care about the exclusive modes on the Exa before and still don't. But they decided to C&D MAME to screw everyone else over, so they deserve to get a taste of their own medicine.
That's fascinating Lunaria!! I didn't know you are in singapore, that's really interesting to hear what it's like there firsthand. And yes I had this big back and forth with the CEO yesterday about the warranty void if broken stickers and his justification for them was that since the payments for the exa are processed in Singapore, then technically american consumer protection law doesn't apply to him and that I should consult a lawyer ha. I was trying to explain to him that even though he is able to get around the law because of this whole singapore work-around, this doesn't mean the law doesn't exist. It's basically like buying bootlegs from south america, sure they can sell them from south america because no copyright law protection out there, but the product is still breaking the law. So in EXA's case, they basically can never have an American office to sell from as that would then break the consumer protection law. Getting around the law is not the same as complying with it ha.
@@TheElectricUnderground Unfortunately, I don't have much good to say about Singapore. It's a country that's increasingly hard to live in unless you're the ultra rich, so I see no future here and am planning to emigrate (hopefully within the decade).
I would be interested to know whose laws will win. And if it turns out it is the US, then I wonder if Exa really thinks that the legal fees are worth the cost savings from dodging a few repairs.
I'm not sure whats going on, but they also have a (vague, truncated) USA address on the website, a bit of googling later, it's a tiny lawyers office in Wyoming, of all places according to google maps, I bet the Singapore office is similar, or just a PO box as the CEO lives in Japan judging from all his forum posts😆
Maybe you should go pay 'em a visit and see what's at the Singapore address lol
@@SeeTDilateburnttoast Hmm, now that you mentioned it, I took a look at Google Maps and it's just a shophouse, so they're probably headquartered in Japan. Not surprising in hindsight, since their business is 99% in Japan.
And now that I reread Mark's reply, I noticed he only mentioned payments are processed in Singapore. No mention of manufacturing being done here. The shophouse I saw is probably for just that: finance and legal teams only. Slimy.
This fact just makes the company look even sadder. Japan is typically known for their quality, and yet, this is what we get out of Exa? Then again, I suppose their situation is similar to Razer (Singaporean founder, headquartered elsewhere), and we all know how Razer's QC and customer service are like.
@@lunaria_stg This is why you should pass by and ask for some flyers or something! The truth is out there lol
The more I see that game cartridges the more I imagine a kid that brokes them with a karate move hit, bam! More than 10,000$ gone
I know the design is def for single men, as there is no way I would ever have such delicate hardware in my home, I could absolutely see my kids getting a hold of a cart and tossing it around.
Hah, knew it, the game cartridges are probably PCIe x1 boards with the rom on it (the structure i dont really know) and the mainboard is probably PCIe hot-swap if you can change the games while the system is on. If they cant be changed while on its just normal PCIe x1
Hi niklas I'm not 100% certain, but think you cannot hot swap the games in, that you need to reboot the system, but I could be wrong about that.
i'm gonna be totally honest, within finishing the video i am divided between feeling it's scam, and saying it's a scam.
this review is pretty thorough, though i feel like you give exA patience they haven't deserved. that being said, i want to point out an expression used in this review that may propagate exA's narrative : this is NOT a high-end system at all. this (essentially) PC is running an 8th gen i3 and 8GB of ram. the average computer sold today would beat this, needless to say both major current consoles (ps5 and xbox) blow it out of the water, and quite frankly the games that this thing needs to play could run on cheap old hardware, and for comparison the switch has no shortage of good shmups to play despite high input lag.
on the topic of input lag, i would rather applaud the software side than whatever exA did. a PC has always been capable of at least 2 frames, and this is basically that.
i wouldn't be too harsh on this if it was sold at, say, a tenth of the price, but at this point the average consumer will never play these games, unless they're lucky enough to be close to one of the very few arcade owners that would actually spend this much money on a potato computer. even then, the arcade operator would never (and shouldn't) buy this for business, it is simply put way, way, waaaay too expensive to get even, you probably wouldn't make it in the green even if you were to run it for like 10 years.
to me, the exA arcadia is not a savior of the arcade scene, but a perpetrator, no better than those scalpers selling saidaioujou PCBs for thousands of dollars. the idea that it is, somehow, a neo-geo of modern times is a marketing slogan they want you to propagate to sell their ludicrously overpriced tower, but it is substantially very flawed. make no mistake, i do think the neo-geo wasn't worth it either, but the neo-geo was, in fact, a high-end machine when it released, basically a full gen above the 16-bit consoles of the time when it came to 2d games. it also came out at a time where arcade was still relevant (or at the very least in japan) and so demand could actually justify such a price, not to mention the actual price we're talking about is still a fraction of the exA today. the modern arcade market is super restricted, a niche of other niches (shmups/rhythm games/arcade racers enjoyers) that has not been doing good in the one place it was before because of covid (mostly), and in that way i can understand supporting something that could help on that front.
but you shouldn't support this. exA is selling a low-end PC and passing it off as a high-end arcade machine. i feel like this alone can justify claiming it to be a scam. please save your money on more honest ventures, like PC ports, or supporting the indie shmups machine. (zeroranger blows most of these games out of the water btw :p)
rant over lol. thanks for the video, hopefully you understand my position as a (now currently casual) shmup fan that wants people to be reasonably able to play these
Excellent points splayr, yeah there is a massive difference in the neo geo and the EXA in terms of hardware and just their placement in the market. On top of the hardware, let's not forget that the neo geo was backed up by one of the strongest and most active video game developers at that time, and that the neo geo was crammed with incredible exclusives that were outperforming what was possible on the home market. I'm no expert on hardware, but def it's clear that on the software side the exa is not outperforming stuff coming out on home consoles like tekken 7 and soon to be tekken 8 and so forth. Or even hyperdemon, which is a really underrated arcade-influenced gem
Exactly. You said everything I wanted to and more. The Neo Geo comparison is ridiculous at best, downright disingenuous at worst. It would be apt if this thing were a PS6 running cutting-edge games you can't get elsewhere, but it's running Xbox 360 and mobile phone games with an arrange mode...
well said. I stil rememebered Shoutime used to sell snake oil by claiming that Exa arcadia is better than PS5... like lol
Excellent post. Lots of great information that I wasn't aware of at all.
The only way Arcades can be saved is if they find ways to attract people again, and I doubt it'll be through ports of existing games.
Arcades need to provide experiences that cannot be had at home, whether it's through exclusive games with unique controllers, or (more importantly) by making them a unique and memorable social event.
Truth is, Arcades simply cannot exist the way they have so far. They need to evolve, and I feel many Arcade owners and customers are not willing to accept that.
Don't quote me on this, but I think it's thanks to exa, you can't play DOJ, Espgalluda 2, and Akai katana on updated versions of mame. I had batocera linux on 2 pc's. one hasn't been updated in 3 years, the other was updated and no matter what my configurations were, I couldn't get it running, except for doj black label (but I think the music was off???).
*kept watching your video* Yeah you brought this up lol. Imagine if Activision took away crash banidicoot from duck station...This kind of stuff doesn't really happen so mame conceding was just weird to me??? But I don't fully understand the legality of this stuff so maybe I'm missing something???
Since then, espgalluda 2 and akai katana has been ported, and doj is on the way, (port quality may vary depending on the devs) But that strike against mame still feels dirty to me.
I think mame could call exa s bluff and battle them in court, and probably win (this matter has already been solved in favor of emulation in the past) but it sounds like the mame devs got scared and gave in
@@TheElectricUnderground I'm curious about that case. Never heard of it before.
I imagine emulation won because the emulators are clearly different from the ROMs/ISOs, right?
Exa only went after Akai Katana and SDOJ for MAME, but you can still play those in older versions anyway and they work just fine
The new Japanese "Revenue sharing" is total BULL S#it... If I were an arcade owner, and I purchase a game the revenue IS MINE, I am the one taking the risk.
So going this way is smart.
I'll never forgive EXA Arcadia for their ripoff prices while gatekeeping the Mr Gimmick remake.
I think it would have to be releases elsewhere at some point? You never know I suppose
I think that's disgraceful for a customer to pay as much as they do for this system and then when the customer reports a "mildewy smell" to the company that the company basically tells them to f*ck off rather than just agreeing to atleast look at it on good faith, especially when subsequently firing the machine up could permanently damage it. If I'd paid that much for the system only for the customer service to then treat me like that I'd want to molotov their offices to be honest. I'd expect that sort of customer service from a local yard sale not from a company that is charging over 5,000 dollars for their product.
Yeah riff I was shocked when the patron told me about his experience. I suspect since exa is based out of Singapore it s probably impossible to do anything about consumer protection, so like I said you are completely at their mercy
Very cool, thanks for doing this video.
Thank you very much Christian!
Oh man, the fact that they've made it impossible to maintain the base machines by its users, with parts that are destined to fail within a few years is more than questionable, especially at that price point... Thanks for this informative video, it is still hard to find thorough reviews of the hardware online after all.
That being said, I love their available title lineup and general concept. But said things are hardly acceptable at the price point of the hardware, and from an preservation standpoint. EXA should release maintenance documentation ASAP, so once the warranty is over, people can fix issues themselves.
Looks more like a PC than anything else. Neat how they implemented the arcade boards into PC slots. This thing seems like it had potential, but a couple of things like the price and the lack of online holding it back. Also not being able to service this yourself, having to ship it to Japan seems like a big hassle. The story of your patron having to buy a 2nd unit is nightmare scenario.
At least the performance of the games was good. And the hardware lets you hook up to CRT which is nice. Still thats about where all the positives end.
it's indeed a PC through and through (win10). The cartridige is basically M2 that hook up into the M2 Sata adapter.
These sound like pretty cool machines for niche collectors and coin ops. But for home use Mister and Fightcade / Retro arch have been good for me. Going to Taito HEY in Japan was pretty cool too.
Yeah playing the exa at an arcade seems pretty fun, since you can just enjoy the game and not worry about dealing with maintaining the hardware
This entire time, I thought the EXA was just another arcade board🗿
Awesome review man. Never heard of this platform before! Is it emulation for some of these games? If it is, a $500 pc could do the trick with the same amount of lag probably
Teknoparrot
Yeah both mame and retroarch are getting lower and lower in lag. Currently you can play these games in arch with 2 frames of lag, and I'm sure with a few more improvement updates it'll be able to hit 1 frame with pre-emptive frames as well
Yeah, paying five grand for what amounts to an outdated PC when you’re a home user seems insane to me. You could get a very good PC for half that, or an insane PC for that same price…not that I’d blow five grand on a pc, but if I had the money to blow, it wouldn’t be on this thing.
"It's just a PC"
So what you're saying is Aka To Blue is potentially just an exe we can boot on windows? 👀👀👀
I'm sure ha, I don't know about windows but it's clearly a pc going on in there ha. Also you can play aka to blue on pc via bluestacks, it's kinda janky but pretty fun
Hold up, what truck do you drive, and is it manual or automatic transmission?
Automatic (don't hold it against me). I have a Chevy Colorado, but the small single cab
@@TheElectricUnderground i don't wanna jinx it, but the small cab long beds seem to last forever at times
Man that update process...Why cant they just ship it on a USB drive or something? BTW got my shirts. They turned out great!
Yeah I feel like there are a lot of much more reasonable ways of going about updating the EXA than having to spend hundreds of dollars shipping it for updates.
I didn't know this existed. $500 for a Nt Mini Noir... Sure, $500 for an aluminum cased MiSTer FPGA....Sure. $5K for an EXA Arcadia console... NOT on my budget and I doubt that will ever change.
Yeah 5k for an arcade machine of any kind for me is just not possible, that is so much money
regarding PIRACY : "IF You own it, WHO CARES, what you play it on."
This just makes me wonder. Who pushed for the port of Touhou FDF 2 (and 1 later) to EXA?
The devs probably got a sweet money deal from the EXA suits.
Touhou is a very popular IP and the FDF titles are some of the most popular fangames in the franchise.
This was 100% a business move from EXA to get more eyes on them.
@@BknMoonStudios Of course it is.
Touhou's a popular IP and yet those hardcore Shmup fans still hate it from what I've seen. Is it just because it's weird to them? I just think it's because they're stuck in the past, so focused on scoring mechanics, that they can't think of any other metric Shmups can excel in.
What do they think of Touhou's Versus Shmups - 3, 9, and the upcoming 19 - and has anyone else ever made a Versus Shmup before?
I'm late, but just saw this. My main question is, and i can't find an answer online, what type of cartridge are the games stored on? They are enclosed, but are they flash carts, or sd cards, or eeproms, or? Eeproms were used in the old 8-bit and 16-bit cartridges and almost last forever. Would be nice to see a return of this for something like the MiSTer, but then in a smaller sd card form. The only drawback is you can't alter eeproms afterwards, it's read only. The good thing is, well actually the same reason, they can't be altered and will store the game(s) almost forever, until the materials themselves start to decay at least. Having the MiSTer software plus only the cores and games you need on an eeprom would be great!
This was an interesting review.
Do you plan on following up on an input test on Progrear on Steam?
I saw that you mentioned you would in the comments from the Progear analysis video.
Also, it appears that the USA rom is much harder than the Japanese rom in the collection.
I don't know if those two topics are enough for a new video but they might be?
Just the thought of being in the same room as this thing makes me feel anxious.
It did make me anxious, just knowing how expensive and delicate the hardware was really drained any sense of fun doing the review, that's for sure.
@@TheElectricUnderground Having that EXA was like taking the money suitcase from No Country For Old Men.🤣
This is an easy pass for me. Too much pain and hassle and time and money if something goes wrong. This is a toy for the super wealthy that don't mind paying again for things that stop working. And as you said, who knows how stable the company is, if they disappear for whatever reason, then you are SoL.
Yeah just stick to playing it at a nearby arcade in Japan ha
Hey Electric Underground, are you going to make a game review on Advance Wars series?
Awesome review!
Thanks Neil!
No man... this customer service is a nightmare. I was interested in this, but I'm not going to deal with dinosaur business practices. I was wanting to use this for a business, but hell no. I am just going to go with these new front ends available to game centers.
Yeah and at least now you are informed on what to expect, so that people moving forward to buy the exa at least know what they are signing up for.
It's cool how respectful you were of the other guy's Exa
Thanks ha! I didn't want to cause him any extra costs, it made it back to him safe and sound
Yeah the cmos thing is ironicly the reason why I would be legally allowed to hack it in my country.
Yep that type of thing I doubt flies in the usa as well. You know apple would be all over that if they could get away with it ha
I already had the impression that was a overpriced PC. Any premium product must have quality, exclusivity and a unique and beautiful design. Unfortunaly exclusivity is the only thing that they offer. I had a relativ expectation for Exa but your vídeo just destroyed (never knew it was só bad).hardware and Game carts that have a suspicious quality, bad client service. What a mess. I may bê wrong , but i think that you could have spoken about different experiences. The arcades that i miss more have gimmicks/controllers that were hard to have at home. Trackballs, wheels, etc. Also they fail in not having the best or more popular (different than best) games on som genres. Not having a Tekken or street Fighter is a major Turn off.
Yeah the lack of cool stuff like lightguns is a bummer, but basically that niche is sort of dead in the water to begin with as they d need to sell you a crt or something with the exa, I love light games though I have my PS2 and two guncons that I want to use on the channel soon.
@@TheElectricUnderground yeah, but now there are lightguns that work with modern monitora like sinden lightgun (don t know if is there a input lag). Arcades nowadays have to offer different things. I renember playing a game with a bycicle and was really entrertaining.
game cartridige is basically M2 SSD with plastic cover ---> hook up to M2 Sata adapter. Nothing new here, 99% is third party off the shelf components
Thanks for highlighting the risks with the hardware. I've surely been tempted at times to get an EXA but not at the expense of it simply stop working one day when the company isn't around anymore.
You have successfully talked me out of buying one of these. I thought about getting one for myself as a big present, but I already have an Xbox 360 in my cab which plays all these games.
Didn't expect it to be so terrible. Idc if it has the lowest input lag or many new game modes.
The costumer service is terrible and everything about it is made in a way to complicate your life and to possibly extract more money from you in the future.
Just wow...
The warranty sticker thing shocked me because you never see the stickers in the promotional art on the website
I have a Vewlix Diamond Orange and a Atomiswave SD, I might consider getting this in the future.
Damn, this whole Exa Arcadia thing is not worth investing at all.
Arcade machines use "IPC" boards not consumer motherboards. That is they have plain green or blue solder mask, no overclocking features, the various heatsinks are off the shelf not fancy custom stuff for viewing in a glass sided PC case. The BIOS setup is text and looks like something from the 90's Basically it's no frills PC hardware designed for an industrial setting not something that's to be sold to consumers. ASUS, Gigabyte etc. all have IPC product lines that they never advertise on their main product pages but if you don't care about overclocking they are a much cheaper option. Newegg and Amazon both carry them even though they aren't supposed to be sold to the public.
Terraonion ( maker of FPGA products) have the exact same unfriendly consumer policies
Not to mention the mockery of krikzz
thanks for this video. I was anticipating the (possibly never) re-release of Daraku Tenshi on Exa when it was first announced so I started looking into this hardware to see what kind of costs I'll be seeing. Hopefully some arcade place has one that will eat the expenses on behalf of my entertainment. I could do without the updates as I hope I waited long enough for them to update the games I wanted besides Daraku Tenshi, but the CMOS battery issues is 100% a deal breaker.
As interesting as this is, this company sounds like an absolute nightmare. It's pretty clear that they are predatory, the warning signs are everywhere. Not to mention, the thing looks like a hobby box. Interesting idea though.
Yeah I think it was built with a very Japanese old school mentality in mind, overly so I think
Exa is known to sue anyone who dare to discuss about their hardwares and they even sued the indie devs who worked with them to port games over to exa... so yeah they are indeed a predatory company....I would steer clear from them
$6000?? Yeah I'll most definitely stick with PC or Mister. People are already emulating Senjin Aleste and other Exa games anyway... 😂