It’s now February, which means that we’re a month and a half away from the next major arcade industry tradeshow, Amusement Expo International. It’s often been called “the Spring show”, “the AMOA show,” or depending on your context, just “Expo” – depends on how long you’ve been in the industry. That said, we don’t often hear about games coming to the show until things are much closer, but that has apparently been broken due to a surprise advance announcement from Velocity eSports. Let’s get into what we know about Maimai DX possibly coming to Amusement Expo 2025…
Maimai Recap
As a refresher, Maimai is the legendary rhythm game by Sega in Japan that “looks like a washing machine”. It’s built up a powerful pop-cult following all around the world, even in the West where there is no console or mobile version to bolster that, and finding an arcade example is extremely rare. That’s because Sega has not launched the game to the West, officially, so it’s been the rare import, or interested players finding one while living or travelling overseas.
This is why it was unexpected to see the game appearing on location test here in the States last year – first at Round1USA, then Dave & Busters, and finally at Velocity eSports since last December. While out East the game relied on internet connected features, the online portion was notably deactivated for the last test.
Maimai DX Coming To Amusement Expo ’25?
First off, the reason I’m using uncertain language here is that Sega Amusements has not, as of this publication time, confirmed for sure that the game is scheduled to come to the Expo. We did ask for a request to comment as soon as we heard the news, to which there is none as of this time (this is also why we took some time in posting). We’re hearing about this through the most recent location that has been testing it, Velocity eSports. That all said, I’d say that outside of a last minute decision to not have it there, this is a 99% confirmation that it will be, and that the location tests have been successful.
A few days ago, Velocity eSports put out a low-key message both on their Discord server and on Twitter/X, asking for six good Maimai players to contact them, as they are working with Sega to support the game’s appearance at Amusement Expo 2025. Expenses will be covered for those who are accepted. In the Discord message, it was specifically stated that they have been working with Sega Amusements International on their test – whose involvement with this game has been an open question mark until now.
Having fans of a rhythm game come to expo is not unusual, as it’s often how these types of games go on display at shows. A lot of operators are not necessarily gamers – or the kind of gamer with the co-ordination needed to play a rhythm game well. So, these players will show off the game, so that interested buyers can see how it might draw attention in their venue. Although, there are certain games I’ve seen that operators will play, then others where I’ve only seen the fans giving it a try.
Until we hear more, we’ll have to wait and see, but overall I think that this is great news. Further questions that are still up in the air: what about the online features – will it have them and will they have a cost? If so, what is that cost? How many songs will it have? Will it have any licensed US songs or will it’s playlist differ from the overseas versions? How much will a unit cost? And myriads more. These all should be answered at the Expo, if not beforehand.
What are your thoughts on this latest news about Maimai DX? Would you like to see it at an arcade?
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About the author: arcadehero View all posts by arcadehero
I’m a lifelong fan of video games and I have been operating my own arcade, Arcade Galactic in West Valley City, Utah since 2008. Soft spots in my heart for Atari, Sega, and Nintendo.
