Strong Museum Leveled Up!

Sunday night was our annual, much anticipated Strong Museum night through the company that holds the investment my grandma set up for me.  We were really excited this year because a new wing opened since our last visit, so there was a bunch of new stuff to explore!  Jacob decided to stay home (he is such a party pooper sometimes...teenagers, ugh) but we weren't going to let that ruin our fun!  When we got there, we went through the parking ramp to the new entrance, which is actually closer to the original entrance than the temporary one was last year.  We could get a glimpse of the new wing above us, but opted to walk through the museum to try to find the entrance to the new outside board game garden, which was actually at the far end of the museum.  Unfortunately they had it roped off, but the glimpses we could get from outside made it look pretty cool.  Maybe another day.  

Since we were right there, we opted to go to the nearby pinball room and play a few games.  We did some of our favorite themes - Indiana Jones, Simpsons, Super Mario, Tron, Ghostbusters - and then Carter and I found this odd baseball one where you pick a pitch and press a button to swing at the ball with a "bat".  A miss could be a ball or strike, but if you hit it, it determines whether you got a hit or out based on lights lit in the outfield where your ball rolled.  It was fun trying to get a home run when a ramp popped up around the pitcher's mound.

After that we skipped past all of the usual stuff to make a beeline to the new stuff!  After all, we only had a couple hours so we wanted to cram in as much as we could.  Off one of the main play areas upstairs, there was the route to the new stuff, starting with a whole section on the game "Age of Empires".  Carter liked the throne!

I don't think any of us had played that game so we just walked through.  I have to think a big donor was the one who decided to do an entire section based on that because it seemed a little random to dedicate that much space to one specific game, and to my knowledge, one that isn't that particularly noteworthy.  I mean, it's been around close to 20 years and I'm sure it was influential, but how many other games are more well-known and impactful?  I feel like with that criteria it could have been The Sims or Mario or pretty much anything else that has influenced gaming over the last 40 years.  But knowing what I know from my job, money talks, I think.

The new Digital Worlds section nearby was pretty nuts.  There were statues and fun character portraits on the way in.

 
There was also a giant Donkey Kong game!

Brings back memories of our old Atari!

They had been promoting these OLED butterflies as a sponsorship opportunity around when the wing opened.  They actually weren't as cool as I thought they'd be, but they were a nice touch over the new entrance.  Supposedly they're interactive through augmented reality and have a name digitally attached to each one, but I haven't determined how you experience them.  They flickered but I didn't see anything that would indicate how they worked.  I don't know, it wasn't what I expected--I think even the lights were almost too bright to really enjoy the colors.  It's still pretty, but oh well.

The main play area was really interesting.  You got a bracelet and you could scan into activities.  You can make an avatar, play interactive games or old arcade games for free, vote on things, etc.  It was cute but seemed a little over the top and some games were hard to get the hang of, which is tough when you're likely dealing with crowds and just trying to get through things efficiently.  There was one where you'd try to roll a ball within its holder to move a ball on the screen, and it was like a big exercise ball that was too rubbery to move smoothly.  There was another with dice rolling that didn't read the dice right.  Don't get me wrong, a lot of it was cool, but the learning curve on some made it seem like a better thing for someone who might frequent the museum more often.  It was also a better big kid area for the most part, but they did have a couple cute things, like a real version of one of those online games where people ask for a meal and you needed to pick the right ingredients.  It used rather realistic play food that you'd throw into a bowl, and it would sense whether or not you did it right. 

You really know you're old when your toys start showing up en masse in a museum.  There are plenty of toys elsewhere, too, but I had the orange Speak 'n' Spell below, as well as the blue one that's second from the bottom on the right.  That one is a Game & Watch with a Super Mario theme.  And of course I really wanted the top right...but that was one Christmas wish that never happened.  This looked like a vending machine, and on this one you could use the keypad to vote for your favorite and the most important.

This was a game where it would sense your movement and move through the course.

These were big screens to show our custom avatars when we scanned in. 

The whole area was huge.  This was just one space and there were a couple other rooms this big.

Craig and Carter played an NBA Jam game and Carter and I played an old sit-down space shooting game that shook when you were hit.  I played an old school Tetris video game and did pretty good--I think I quit around the 5th level.

This was a demolition derby game.  The steering wasn't very intuitive, but we had fun. 

We wrapped up our time in that space, dropped off our bracelets, and moved on to the very fancy World Video Game Hall of Fame.  It was really cool.  We didn't have a lot of time to look at the exhibits (maybe next time), but we played a bunch!

There was a giant Pong game on an old school TV, but my picture turned out blurry.  I played the real thing back on my little B&W TV thanks to my uncle letting me borrow his back in the early 90s.  This felt harder!  There was also an old school football game with little light blips as players!

There were a bunch of big screens you could play on, but sadly the Super Mario game wasn't working.  I think the boys are playing Mortal Kombat here.

Here was another piece of my history in the museum--I had that same box of "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego", except that was a Mac version and mine was an Apple II GS version.  I LOVED that game and played it all the time.

There was a giant Pac-Man battle game with eight players and you could watch it on the wall.  You could set up smoke screens (to hide from ghosts?) and get big and eat other Pac-Mans.  It was chaos!

After we wrapped up there, the boys ran off to play in the main video arcade for a bit--bubble hockey was calling!--and I decided to try to get into the butterfly garden for a bit.  As much as I used to hate it--and still cringe and duck when they fly past me--I really enjoy trying to get pictures.  Last year I dragged poor Carter up and down the paths there trying to get a picture of a blue morpho with its wings open, and what was the first pic I got this year?  You betcha.

This is one with the wings closed, but this is probably a pretty as that moth-like look gets!

They were really up for posing that night, I think.

I mean...orange on orange?  Yes please.

This one sat in place for almost the whole time I was there.

After I joined back up with the boys, we popped into the short-term Barbie exhibit for a minute, just to see what was there (for my benefit, clearly) and Carter took my picture on the surfboard!

It was closing time, but we couldn't leave without a visit to the crooked room.  It's Carter's favorite and I have to admit, it is always a fun mind trip!  I finally figured out it looks cooler if you try to make the room look straight and let yourself be crooked.

Here's the video--I held it with the natural slant originally and then when Carter tried a second time, I turned it so you get the weird tilt.

It's so weird!  It did make Craig and me a bit dizzier this time.  It really messes with your head, and I think it's because your brain is trying to stabilize you--compensating for the tilt but also being confused by what it's seeing.  It's so weird and very hard to walk through...but we love it!

I grabbed some fish pics on the way out, as usual. 

This one below was new.  You could color a fish, scan it, and have it appear in the aquarium.  We didn't have time, but it looked cool (almost real from a distance) and if you look close you can see that some are more scribbled than others.  It's really cute and I'd like to do it next time.

On the way out I grabbed a couple pics from the parking ramp looking at the game park. 

Hopefully we can sneak in a visit another time to see that and hit up the stuff we didn't get a chance to do this time.  Not that we haven't done most of it before, but there is always new stuff on display and there are things we like to do repeatedly.  If I'm home when Carter has his one random late April day off (I was with Jacob last year, so he and Craig went to the science museum), maybe we can go here instead since it'll be manageable with mostly preschoolers and other Greece kids.  But you can't beat a free night with small crowds!  So happy we were able to enjoy it again--definitely a great way to kick off break week!