Reviewing China’s AAA from Afar
But with Keen Eyes on the Ground
by Adam Pratt, Arcade Galactic & ArcadeHeroes.com
While the U.S. market tends to focus on three main trade shows a year – Amusement Expo, Bowl Expo and IAAPA – there are many more of significance around the world. The global nature of our industry and the growth of product options have led to shows every month. Among them is the Asian Amusement & Attractions Expo (AAA) which was recently held in China.
Although I didn’t get to attend myself, I have a great network of people I rely on for coverage. I would like to specifically thank Oga-Shi of Sega, Cassie at Wahlap, and Walter Kern of PrimeTime Amusements, who provided more than enough information to make me feel like I was there. And now, I’m going to pass that along to you. By the way, I won’t spend time talking about tariffs and trade, but even with those challenges in mind, I think there’s still a good chance many of these games, which have been designed for the West, will find their way here. I’ll confine my coverage to just those games, excluding mentions of games developed for Eastern markets.
Now, on to the show!
One striking thing about this and other expos in China, like GTI, is that certain companies take the “home field” advantage to a higher level than what we usually see here. The spectacle manufacturers, such as Wahlap and UNIS, as well as smaller ones, put on a show that goes far beyond what I’ve seen any company do at IAAPA. They employ extensive LED matrix panels, stages with overhead lighting, giant props and tournaments where they give away valuable items, such as cars, and more. You can’t help but feel at least some sense of envy when you compare events.
Wahlap had extra reason to celebrate this year as the company marked its 35th anniversary with much pomp and circumstance. This included a dinner and a show with a couple of company executives addressing the group, followed by a speech from Play Mechanix’s George Petro. A dance troupe performed a number or two, and all had a good time.
On the show floor, Wahlap had one of the most elaborate setups of the expo. Their expansive space showcased several Wahlap originals along with games from partner companies. Among those I think will (or probably will) show up on our shores was a modified version of 3MindWave’s Alpha Ops VR Strike (sold in the West by Sega Amusements), though some changes made to it won’t be implemented for our market. The company also showed Monster Eye 3 Unite, an update on Monster Eye 3, which LAI Games sells here as Kaiju Rampage. It was sporting an upright cabinet style and four pistols.
Raw Thrills is collaborating with Wahlap to bring Marvel: Contest of Champions to the Chinese market in a completely different sit-down metal cabinet. Finally, the company also showcased several redemption and prize machines, including a new JAWS-themed pusher and a new video backboard basketball game called CyberHoop.
Wahlap works with companies like Sega and Bandai Namco, serving as a Chinese distributor for those companies. They were showing off the likes of MaiMai DX and Initial D: The Arcade (Sega) and Taiko No Tatsujin (Bandai Namco).
UNIS, which celebrated its 35th anniversary last year, also made a big splash. The company instituted a “no photography” rule on several new games, which didn’t apply to imports like Top Gun: Maverick or previously unveiled racers like Neon Rush. However, it did apply to two new racers, Dragon Rider and Super Flyboard. Perhaps we’ll see those over here before too long.
Ace Amusement, while not as large a company as the first two, is undoubtedly one American operators should know. Many of their games have been brought stateside (Coastal Amusements has done so, for example) and the company gained greater exposure to the U.S. trade by taking their own booth at IAAPA 2024.
They continue to produce a lot of content, coming to AAA with new racers and gun games. A motorcycle racer they’re quite proud of is Bikers Madness, which utilizes the popular two-stacked-monitor setup (like UNIS’s Neon Rush). Also in the driver category are Jet Ski (with two screens) and Racing Extreme (a single-screen video).
In the gun game genre, Ace showed Dragon Kingdom (their answer to Adrenaline’s Drakons) and a surprise called Wild Hunting. If the latter sounds like it might be their take on Big Buck Hunter, it’s because it is (one of their cabinet models also comes with four guns). It’s unknown if it has any online features, but it is the first time we’ve seen someone challenge Big Buck in a long time (however, I doubt that anyone over at Play Mechanix is losing sleep over this one).
Wahlap, UNIS and Ace are what you could call “China’s Big Three” manufacturers, at least in terms of what we tend to see imported to the West. But that wasn’t the entirety of game makers showcasing equipment with booths that out-spectacle any Western arcade game developer at IAAPA. Some, like Baohui and Superwin, have teamed up with the likes of Sega or LAI to bring a product or two over to our shores, while others, like Yuto Games or Huatai Baishun, have been focused on striking it out on their own when it comes to overseas sales.
From the media I received, it appeared that the amount of “high seas” content (i.e., pirated games or content violating intellectual property) has diminished from its past levels. Still, some companies will list such games on their websites but avoid bringing them to shows like AAA, knowing that some of the Western IP holders will be in attendance. That doesn’t excuse the behavior, in my view. On the upside, it seems like most importers avoid doing much business with these companies anyway.
Influences, on the other hand, abound in spades. Raw Thrills’ idea of double-stacked screens sure has taken off, and a surprising number of companies are suddenly coming up with their version of Adrenaline’s Drakons.
Conversely, an influence that has considerably waned in appearance at this show, and U.S. expos as well, is virtual reality.
Many of my industry colleagues have spent years promoting VR tech, with some going as far as proclaiming it the future of the arcade industry. I haven’t agreed with that stance, and my skepticism about it hasn’t made me many friends. But at IAAPA 2024, AEI 2025 and this show, I’ve noticed a distinct decline in the number of new or available VR arcade machines. This is unexpected to some degree, given that Raw Thrills’ Godzilla Kaiju Wars VR has performed exceptionally well. Still, I figured that by this point, we’d be seeing a ton of Godzilla clones being churned out instead of Drakons.
It wasn’t many years ago, that I would see a large percentage of booths at a show like AAA selling and promoting VR products. The Chinese market was eager to jump on the trend, and with greater enthusiasm than the West ever did. It was tough to find a company that didn’t show at least one game that used a headset.
Games like Godzilla or Virtual Rabbids prove that the right concept can make good money. But from my perspective, for every one of those successes, you can find a warehouse full of duds. I’m not convinced that wearable display tech will ever achieve parity with non-wearable displays.
To summarize the main trends at this year’s AAA, think motorcycle racing games, dragon shooters, rhythm games and either double-stacked screens or vertically mounted displays. I recall that some games employed this latter approach about 15 years ago, but that fell out of favor because the displays of those days were too narrow. With today’s big TVs this is less of an issue, so you can achieve the same kind of effect as the double-stackers without the big black bar in the middle. I imagine that before too long, we’ll see the curved displays that are prominent in Vegas casinos, used both vertically and horizontally. Either way, the displays provide an element of gameplay that’s impractical to recreate at home, which our industry needs to pursue as it continues to push the envelope of creativity and prosperity.
Special thanks to Sega Amusement’s Oga-Shi for supplying most of the pictures for this report.
Adam Pratt is the owner and operator of Arcade Galactic near Salt Lake City, Utah, and also publishes the Arcade Heroes blog site. He can be reached at [email protected].