Proposed dates for 2024 are September 7th and 8th.
Game nominations will be live on the Netherworld twitch channel at twitch.tv/netherworldarcade on Saturday the 8th of June.
BOTA is one of the best events in the arcade calendar each year and is hands down one of my personal favourite events to be a part of.
Format is simple. Two days with your team grinding out for your best scores across 10 different titles. Full format breakdown below.
A quick overview of the event:
Venues all over Oz compete across 10 unique arcade titles for two days
Venue teams can be any size, but only the top 6 players from each team go toward the team total
After some really great feedback from venues last year we have made a couple of small changes to the format. Massive thanks to Neil Cairns for creating and collating an exit survey from 2023. Proposed chnages:
3 month window between game nominations and the event
Noms Date – June 8th
Event date - September 7th and 8th
Where possible, all game settings will be set to default or TG settings
Using default settings will hopefully help eliminate venues playing on the wrong settings and being either advantage or disadvantaged over the weekend
3 year black out period on nominating games previously used
Game unavailable for this 2024 are:
1942
Black Tiger
Blade Master
Bomb Jack
Demon Front
Dig Dug
Donkey Kong
Frogger
Ghouls N Ghosts
Golden Axe
Gunsmoke
Gyruss
Magician Lord
Martial Masters
Metal Slug 2
Ms. Pac-Man
New Rally-X
Nightmare in the dark
Out Zone
Pang
Raiden II
Rastan Saga
Rygar
Snow Bros
Space Invaders
Splatter House
Sunset Riders
The Last Blade 2
Wonderboy
Fingers crossed we see some new arcades in the mix this year and find out if 1 Up Arcade can lock in the THREEPEAT!!!!!!!
Venues invited:
QLD:
Netherworld - YES
1 Up Arcade - YES
Pincadia
Empire
Flipp’d
Arcade Box
NSW:
Astros Arcade Bar
Game Centre - Ben Banasik
Beercade - YES
VIC:
Australian Pinball Museum - YES
Bartronica
Arcade Garage at Welcome to Thornbury
S.A:
Amusement Works
Flipside Barcade
W.A:
Barcadia at Planet Royale
Palace Arcade
TAS:
Replay Arcade
Proposed format:
Game Nominations:
the competition will be played over 10 unique arcade video games
each arcade will nominate 3 arcade games in preferential order
nominations are to be emailed to [email protected] by 11am on the 8th of June and will be read out live on the Netherworld Twitch Channel that morning
arcades can not nominate the same games nominated in 2020/21/22
firstly each arcade competing will have their first nomination included in the list
if two or more arcades nominate the same game in position one, preference will be given to new arcades competing for the first time and or lower seeded venues from the 2023 BOTA results
for example if Pincadia and Empire both nominate DK in position one, DK will be selected as the Pincadia submission and Empires #2 nomination will be added
if we have less then 10 arcades competing the final games will be drawn from the 2 or 3 preferred position from the first time and or lower seeded venues from the 2023 BOTA results
nominated games must ideally be common to all the arcades in the competition or be readily available on MAME or 'x in 1' boards
nominated games must be playable with a standard 2, 4 or 8 way joystick and standard buttons
no light gun, driving simulator, or other games with special controls can be nominated unless all the arcades have that specific machine
each game must be set to TG settings unless different settings are decided upon prior to the beginning of the tournament
all the effort must please be made by each venue to ensure their nominated game:
dips, settings and difficulty can be easily married across all available pcb's, 60-1, Pandora's Box, MISTER etc
confirm that score stays on screen or can be easily read at the end run
or by adding an extra credit
games with added credits are visible in some regard, such Final Fight showing 1 point
each venue must nominate ateam managerwho will be responsible for inputting scores, managing queues and ensuring all games are on the agreed upon settings
Saturday and Sunday 10am to 6pm - The Battle
players may warm up prior to 10am
players may come and go over the two day window as they please
all attempts are to be made with 1 credit only, no continues
competitors may have as many attempts at each game as he or she wishes within the two day time frame, however no single attempt may last longer than 60 minutes
all game scores will be rated amongst all arcades using the USA BOTA software designed by John Bartkiw
once a player has completed a game on all 10 titles, their accumulated points will go toward the team total
each venue may have an unlimited amount of players across the two days, though only thetop 6from each venues scores will go toward the team total
all scores must be entered live as soon as a game is completed, no sandbagging
the end of the tournament each day (6pm) is a hard cutoff and the score at exactly 6pm must be the recorded score
efforts will be made for arcades in different time zones to start at the same time as the Brisbane venues though allowances will be made
as this tournament runs on an honour system, no excessive leeching or glitch abuse allowed
the team with the highest total points shall be crowned the Australian Battle of the Arcades Champion 2024!!
