Here is some interesting news as, Ben Solovey (also known as thefairshot on instagram) has managed to findtwo reels of 16mm film that were originally part of Nintendo’s Wild Gunman arcade cabinets from 1974. The original arcade game made by Gunpei Yokoi used a 16mm projector to display the various gunslingers you were drawing against. The game was first brought to the US in a joint venture between Nintendo and Sega at the time and is different from the more well known NES version.
While film stock is fragile stuff and the surviving prints from the original coin-op are about 50-years-old now, Solovey managed to come into possession of two of the eight reels,:
It should be noted that each of the four selectable scenarios, A-D, were comprised of two reels, and Solovey has everything from ‘Film-D’ at this time.
The game functioned by having your opponents’ eyes flash on the film reel just before they draw. If you were fast enough to pull the trigger, they would fall to the ground, but if not it was game over.
There’s no word just yet on what Solovey has planned for the reels, but this is a major step in preserving video game history.