Arcade Appreciation Post

[Dynaknights]

I decided to go on a little adventure to a local retro arcade after work today (because I need to get out of my house more...), which got me thinking: do other people still like arcades, or did I just reread Ernest Cline's Ready Player One too many times as a tween? I tend to hear about arcades in the same breath as liminal spaces, but do people still go to them?

So, what are your favorite (and/or weird) memories? Favorite games, food, prize (if your arcades have/had those), etc. Places with arcade machines (I typically see them housed at bowling alleys) also count. :)

[oro_junestar]

I really wanna go to a retro arcade! There was a local one near me and I really wanted to take my best friend there, but when we got there, it had been closed and turned into a trading card store

Every year, my family goes to Wildwood, New Jersey for vacation, and the boardwalk has a retro arcade in it. It has a Ms. Pac-Man cabinet, and I'm getting so good at it, I keep setting the top high score every time I play :P

[Horsey Chobunso]

I'm lucky to be near a city that has a lot of options for arcades. There are two paid arcades, one of them more general retro and one more rhythm game focused. There are also two completely free, community run arcades. Both of them are rhythm game focused, but one has a pretty wide variety at this point. In my lighter parts of the year I go about once a week, but right now I'm too busy to go very often.

[rnottelovesowls]

at a popular pizzeria/bar in the UP, where my family's vacation home is, there's an arcade game from midway called "Timber", and every time we go there, i think about playing it... and sometimes i do. i've gotten a hi score on it once or twice. it's amazing the machine is still maintained; it must have been there ever since i was a kid. maybe even ever since the place opened!

but for more "local" attractions, an arcade bar opened in downtown a few months ago, and it's got pac-man and the ghosts lining the siding. i really want to go there one night. not much of a drinker, though; i just want to play some games