BLOOMINGTON - Mark Alpiger, organizer of Saturday's annual Classic Arcade Gaming Tournament at Pro Putt Family Fun Center, explained the appeal of classic arcade games.

"Let's be honest," he said. "Games are fun."

The two children and seven adults who competed Saturday, the second day of the three-day event, seemed to be having fun playing their choice of six of 14 games from the peak arcade era - the early 1980s - such as Frogger, The Glob and Galaga.

"Everybody plays games," Alpiger said. "Even your grandmother plays checkers or bridge or dice. If she doesn't play games at age 80, then when she was 50, she played something."

He refers to some new video games as "garbage new games," because they "have flash, and the easiest way is violence, and that (violence) is garbage." Newer games use "movie-quality graphics," he said, but the qualities that he values in classic games are quality of design and quality of "game play."

Unlike classic games, newer games, such as Halo, can be "accomplished" so that the player has no more reason to play it and buys a new game.

"They design it that way to keep the money coming in," he said.

Another reason he gives for the appeal of classic games is competition.

"Newer games have no score. That's dumb. The competitive edge is another factor of why the older games have draw. I want to beat this guy. He wants to beat me."

Alpiger, a 45-year-old computer consultant from Louisville, Ky., co-organized the event with Mary Lou Nelson, owner of Pro Putt Family Fun Center, which features more than 50 classic arcade games.

Nelson said when children play classic games, they find that operating the controls requires more energy than their games at home. She said that at the end of the day, children say they are tired because, "They actually have to use muscles instead of slouching on a couch."

Alpiger, along with two other players at the tournament, Donald Hayes and Pat Laffaye, were featured in the documentary, "King of Kong," a 2007 documentary in which a middle-school science teacher and a hot sauce mogul vie for the Donkey Kong Guinness World Record.

Alpiger set a world record in Crystal Castles by scoring approximately 133,000 points, and he wore a T-shirt Saturday attesting to it. With his hand over the track mouse of the game, he elegantly guided an animated bear along a maze-like screen, gathering gems and avoiding enemies.

Alpiger said the game has the simplicity that he admires in classic games.

The only woman in the tournament, Angela Spindler, came from Mount Vernon, Ind. She compete despite the effects of multiple sclerosis that make it hard for her to grip some controls.

Spindler's husband, Jason, also competed. They have a home arcade, where they teach their children to play video games.