Posts Tagged ‘Video Games’

2026 – OFF THE CHAIN IN ALL THE BEST WAYS!

Posted: 10/23/2026 in Uncategorized
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2026 has been probably one of the busiest and travel heavy years on record for me, though most of it was based on family vacations and weekend trips. However this year, the family vacation and The Midwest Gaming Classic overlapped which had me going from New Hampshire to Wisconsin to South Carolina and back to NH in a weeks time and that ended up just being the start!

The latest trip however was to Retro World Expo that took place in Hartford, CT back in September and was an absolute blast in so many ways! Getting to be a featured guest of the show was humbling and putting us right in the middle of the convention made our booth hard to miss. The video above shows my recount of the weekend, but one of the coolest things that has happened this year isn’t just about my perspective, but those of the attendees and how many impressions they’ve made of my/our projects.

And by this, in particular, I mean the amount of coverage said projects have received from a variety of You Tubers and other social media influencers in the Retro Gaming fields. While it’s always cool finding yourself in the background of someone’s game hunting video or things like that, these past 2 years of MGC and RWX have had us front and center to some of the biggest Retro Tech creators out there and it’s mind-blowing to me to see the response they receive!

So, just so I could get a feel for the scope of how much other creators have supported Downing’s Basement (and by extension, BitBuilt) through their content, I’ve compiled a list of embedded videos by creator, that have directly showcased a project of mine at MGC 24, 25 & 26 as well as RWX 25 & 26.

I’ll include time stamps if you wish to skip ahead on some of the longer form videos, but I do highly recommend giving these videos a watch and help support the creators as much as possible!

And I know it is difficult to actually quantify how much of an impact some of these actually made, especially with some being over 30 minutes into a video, it still means a lot to me that they made it there to begin with and will always be counted as a win to me!

John Riggs

Lazy Game Reviews – 33:07 & 12:39

Macho Nacho – 10:15

RAD Junk – 2:27

Russ Lyman – 21:27

Retro Rick

Ray Out There – 41:35

And I’m sure if I looked, I’d find several others, but this is just a taste of the kind of stuff that keeps me in love with this hobby and all the people in it! Though I wouldn’t mind if 2027 was a bit less hectic, we’ve got some very cool momentum that I doubt is going to slow down any time soon! So stay excited people! We’ve got a lot more to come!

MGC 2025 & A KIT REVEAL!!

Posted: 04/16/2025 in Uncategorized
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As always seems to happen, The Midwest Gaming Classic has come and gone in record time, but what a time it was! Every year this show get’s bigger and bigger as does the number of modders and projects in the Bit Built Console Makerspace Room, which I believe we just about maxed out this year and was incredible!

That said, this year was particularly special for me though as after nearly a year in the works, I’ve finally been able to reveal one of my most ambitious projects yet!

Over two years ago, this started as a brand new portable Nintendo 64 design for my first new commission which had been almost 4 years prior to that! And when I say new, I mean a complete redo from the ground up with all new modern components, circuitry and case design.

Working with GMAN from 4 Layer Tech on creating a new integrated motherboard for the system that used existing 4 Layer Tech modules like the PMS Lite and UAMP for power management and audio, I started to get the warm and fuzzies about the idea that has eluded me for so many years…and that of course, was realizing every consoles modders dream that a “hand-holding” Kit for making a Portable Nintendo 64 was here!

More information about the kit itself as well as status updates are all going to be on the dedicated page in the header or you can just click the image above.

But the main goal is to have a Kickstarter live for the first week of May, 2025 and see where it goes from there!

So that’s the big news! There was much more to MGC this year though that I hope to be compiling in a new video as well as uploading the FULL Bonus Stage video of the kit reveal. So keep an eye out for that!

Other announcements, I will again be attending the Retro World Expo in Hartford, CT on September 12th through the 14th, but this time as a guest of the show! Not only will I have a showcase booth for Downing’s Basement, but I will also be joined by the one and only GMAN from 4 Layer Tech and Crazy Gadget of Bit Built!

This will be my first time showcasing at this event as well as BitBuilt’s but after roaming the floor for a couple of days last year, I think we’re going to fit in nicely!

I’ll have more info about this as it get’s a bit closer, but this is a good event for all my East Coast New England friends!

Ghost In The Machine

Posted: 05/09/2013 in General News
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GhostinmachineKS

Last month as most of you know I had a few visitors over to the house for what some have dubbed “Geek Fest”. Essentially that is what it was but regardless of that, one of the “Geeks” who attended was RIT student [Julian Hammerstein] or better known as [BETA].

He and [Mike Moffitt] had been in development of a new computer game called [Ghost In The Machine] which [BETA] had brought with him to the meet-up. I gotta say I was pretty impressed with how well and how smoothly it worked and the 8-bit sounds and music really kept with the nostalgic nature of the game play which apparently is extremely challenging, just like old games were.

So anyway, the two have started up a KickStarter to bring this game to a larger market via Steam (I think) so if you’ve got $5 bucks, back their project and get the game after the KS concludes. Hard to go wrong! Check out the video on the KS page with the big pic above will take you right too and get the full low down on the project!