At New Wave, we spend a lot of time studying original machines.
Not just the obvious things like the artwork, controls, or overall shape. We find ourselves drawn to the little details most people never notice – the kind of things that make you stop and ask, “Why would they do that?”
One of our favorite recent examples is the original JVC RC-550 boombox.
At first glance, it’s exactly what you’d expect from a boombox of late 1970s, early 1980s. Big speakers. Lots of chrome. Bold styling. But the longer you look at it, the more details you begin to notice. Different textures seem to cover nearly every surface. Knurled knobs. Brushed metal. Molded plastics. Speaker grilles. Chrome accents. It’s almost as if the designers challenged themselves to make every part of the machine feel just a little different from the one next to it.
Then there’s the carry handle.
Look closely at the inside and you’ll find a completely different molded texture than anywhere else on the machine.
Why?
We honestly don’t know.
Maybe it was purely decorative. Maybe it created a little resistance as the handle folded back into place. Either way, someone decided it was worth designing, tooling, and manufacturing.
Once you notice something like that, it’s surprisingly hard to stop.
You begin looking at old machines differently. Every switch, texture, label, and mechanism starts to feel like another clue in a mystery. Sometimes the reason is practical. Sometimes it’s aesthetic. Often it’s a little of both.
That way of looking at things has shaped the way we build products at New Wave.
As we’ve recreated these machines over the years, we’ve found ourselves asking the same question over and over:
“Should we include this?”
Sometimes the answer is obvious.
Other times it makes absolutely no practical sense.
Take our USB Charge Machine.
On the original change machines, the TEMPORARILY OUT OF SERVICE light served one main purpose: when the machine ran out of quarters or tokens, the light switched on automatically so employees knew it needed attention.
Most people never noticed it – or if they did, it was a source of annoyance.
So of course we had to include it. Does a USB charger need an Out of Order light? Of course not.
But once we noticed the light on the original machine, it somehow felt wrong to leave it out. And once we included it, of course you needed to be able to turn it On and Off. Obviously.
The same thing happened with our Q*bert Replicade.
Longtime arcade rats would remember that the original cabinet included a real pinball knocker – a solenoid borrowed from Gottlieb’s pinball business. Every time Q*bert tumbled off the pyramid, the machine responded with a loud THWACK! It was one of those wonderfully quirky details that reflected Gottlieb’s pinball heritage and helped give Q*bert its own personality.
Naturally, we recreated that too. We even included the knocker during attract mode, just like the original machine. The funny part is, not long after the machines shipped, customer support tickets started arriving.
“Every once in a while my Qbert makes a loud knocking sound. Is something wrong?”
Nope. In fact, it was doing exactly what the original arcade machine did.
For many collectors, that unexpected knock became their introduction to a little piece of arcade history they never knew (or maybe forgot) existed. And for us, that’s one of the most rewarding parts of recreating these machines – every once in a while, a tiny detail ends up reminding us what's cool about these classic machines.
Including them rarely make a product more useful, but they definitely make it more enjoyable to own.
And they reward curiosity. They encourage you to pick something up, look a little closer, and discover something you didn’t know was there.
Then every once in a while you discover a detail that makes you smile, and suddenly you feel connected to a small piece of history – and we think that's pretty cool.
– The New Wave Toys Team