They say all good things come to those who wait. Sometimes you just have to wait a bit longer than you think.
That was the case with the Speed Shot watch which I’ve been looking for for more than 10 years, probably closer to 20…
I saw a grainy picture of it in a Popular Mechanics magazine article from July 1983 almost too long ago to remember but, despite looking and asking in every old watch forum and Facebook group I could think of for years, no one could produce a photo of one, which made me think it was either a prototype that never went into production, or a different module had been stuck into an odd case (the display bears a striking resemblance to the Flash Multi Melody Memory watch with the combination standard and dot matrix display).
So it became my grail watch, once I would always look for in random watchlots that appeared on eBay, set up automated daily searches on various websites. But nothing appeared, for years and years.
Until one day in 2024 when a small lot appeared on eBay UK and a familar-looking watch looked back at me.
The photos were pretty dark and I didn’t want to draw too much attention to the auction but did contact the seller to request that they let it run for the duration and didn’t pull it early if they got a cash offer, like so many sellers do. This seller was one of the good ones, though, who assured me it would go the distance.
I’ve never known 10 days to pass so slowly waiting for this to finish, and it was going to end in the middle of the night so had to make sure I was prepared for it.
Long story short, the auction finished, I won it with little competition and eventually it made the journey from the UK to NZ.
It wasn’t working, but that’s never a surprise and I wouldn’t have let a small detail like that put me off. Amazingly the battery bay was empty with no signs of corrosion which is almost unheard of, and while it took a battery that is no longer made (the 3v oval battery that can be found in Sanyo radio watches, and many other Sanyos of the same period) I used a pair of 392 batteries and it sprang into life – amazing!
The only thing that made it a little less than perfect was a missing piece of plastic on the front of the case (the bottom piece) but I hastily fabricated a makeshift cosmetic piece from an old SD card, and it looks fine unless you examine it very carefully. I contacted the seller but he didn’t have the tiny plastic bit (it wasn’t there in the auction photo either so probably disappeared decades ago). Once of these days I’ll find a piece of plastic the correct colour and will fashion a better replacement but it works for now and is better than having nothing there.
Functionally, the watch is quite interesting too!
It displays the time (12 hour only) and the day of the week. This is the only date function interestingly – there is no way to set date/month/year so the day of the week is all you get!
It has a backlight. It also has a memo function which uses the dot matrix display to allow you to set 12 scrolling characters (alphanumeric with a few mathematical symbols too). The memo displays when you press the top-left button in regular time mode, or when the daily alarm goes off. The alarm is a ‘beep beep’ affair and always scrolls the memo. If there is no memo set it scrolls a series of zeros.
The main draw of this watch is the game – SPEED SHOT!
This uses the regular LCD for the score, and the dot matrix display for the action. You have a gun (on the right) and things appear on the left. If a number appears on the left which is the same as the number on the right of your score, you can shoot it to be awarded that number of points. If you shoot the ‘wrong’ number, 9 points are deducted from your score. Sometimes a strange looking character appears and you can shoot it for a bonus 9 points.
The ‘villain’ is a right-facing arrow that shoots at you. If it hits you, you lose 9 points and a life. You have three lives before the game is over. If you should the villain first, you score five points.
Even if the villain shoots first, if you time it right you can shoot his bullet before it gets to you which destroys the bullet and you don’t lose any points. This is tricky to do but you do get a nice animation if you succeed.
I’m sure if you score enough points you will get some or all of your lives back, but I’m not at that point yet, with my high score just over 200 points so far.
This is a very unique watch and I’m glad the wait to find one is finally over! The game does bear a resemblance to a similar one in the Alba Y760 but has enough differences to make it quite individual by itself!