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Thread: Arcade pics 1977 - 1984

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    Cherry (Level 1) shertz's Avatar
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    Default Arcade pics 1977 - 1984

    Thought I would pass this on. 190 pics of classic arcades from 1977 - 1984. Everyone who's into classic games have fond memories of the arcades during that period. These pics really show how big and fantastic arcades use to be. It brings tears to my eyes when I see some of these pics with rows of Pac-Man's and other games all cramed together. There are even a few pics of the arcade I use to goto a lot when I was a kid called Starship Video in Upland, CA! These pics were collected and provided by Brett Pulliam (aka: nutballchamp) who is a fellow arcade collector. Enjoy...

    http://www.bpulliam.smugmug.com/gall...94408939_52KhM
    My Arcade Collection - http://www.ggdb.com/Collectors/ViewMember.aspx?mid=394
    Southern California Classic Collectors (SC3) - http://www.sc3videogames.com/
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    Starman (Level 23) Phosphor Dot Fossils's Avatar
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    My God, but this is magical stuff.

    Those of you who weren't around for the first golden age of video games - please, take a look, soak it up. This only happened once. It'll never happen this way again.

    I'm gonna go stay up past my bedtime looking at the rest of these.

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    omg, those bring back such great memories!
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    Cherry (Level 1) vectrexer's Avatar
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    really cool pics. Hope to realive some of the day when California Extreme (http://www.caextreme.org) happens in July.
    - v


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    Pretzel (Level 4) Kaboomer's Avatar
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    Nice. It's amazing to me with as much time as I spent in our local arcades in Omaha, Nebraska, that I don't have a single photo of me playing an arcade game Oh, to go back in time.

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    Sweet hair cuts...all around.
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    Banana (Level 7) klausien's Avatar
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    Thank you! Truly awe-inspiring. I am just a bit to young to have experienced this, but it looks like pure fantasy.

    My best memory of that time was the relatively small arcade in a local roller rink. Both have been gone for 20 years at this point, but it had that late 70's/early 80's look. I remember playing The Empire Strikes Back there. I was only 3 or 4 years old, but I definitely remember. There was also a pizza place (Hungry House) that had a small attached arcade with about 10-15 machines. Played as much Asteroids and Star Wars (sit in!) as I could, My Mom wasn't into arcades. She saw them as a haven of scum and villainy.

    I spent the summers of my youth chasing what's in those pictures without ever really knowing what I had missed. I was always looking for something as cool as those arcades during the early 90's resurgence brought on by SFII. There were a couple that were fun, such as those on the Jersey shore boardwalks and in some of the local shopping malls (Rockaway, Willowbrook), but none had that ambiance. If only it were possible to keep a place like that open now. There are so few left.

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    Strawberry (Level 2) shawnbo42's Avatar
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    I also remember and miss those days...life was good. On another note, I think it'd be interesting if any one of us ended up with one of the machines out of those pictures, although we'd never know. Too bad operators didn't do a "wheresgeorge" kind of thing, you know, put an index card in the cabinet or something, and track the ownership. I think it would be cool nowadays if you KNEW exactly the history of your cabinet....ah, just rambling. Great pics, definitely captures the feel of how it used to be.

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    Strawberry (Level 2) Nitrosport's Avatar
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    Some of those pictures are just amazing. There was so much money put into these places. I wish I could have experienced all of this.

    "Do not cut school to be here" <---
    Last edited by Nitrosport; 05-14-2008 at 08:15 AM.

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    God, I want a time machine. I miss it...

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    I wonder if that photo of all the assembled Donkey Kong machines is one of the warehouse in New Jersey where Nintendo set up it's East Coast distribution in the 1980's. It's described in great detail in the book Game Over and it looks like it could fit that description! (Page 2, Line One, Photo 4)

    If so, that might even be "Nintendo Fun Club President" Howard Philips in the far right, half off-frame!
    "And the book says: 'We may be through with the past, but the past ain't through with us.'"


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    I just BARELY remember those days. I was born in 1982 but my mother would take me to those places as soon as I was able to walk. My main arcade memories come from around when the first Double Dragon came out, around that era. I do remember my mother bringing me to the earlier arcades though and having to stand on a stool to play Donkey Kong and Pac Man though.

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    Crono (Level 14) Pantechnicon's Avatar
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    Yep. Those were the days. Sometimes it's hard to remember how grand it all used to be.

    - Picture 13: Omega Race and Star Castle juxtaposed...(/drool)

    - Pics 38 and 39: The arcade owner must have been pulling in some serious bank to afford all that protective wood paneling for the machines.

    - Picture 59: sigh...I'm probably going to sell my Pac-Man cab tonight (sorry...I need the space in the garage). This one makes me have second thoughts about the idea. I think I'll make up for it by taking my Lunar Lander cab off the block.

    - Picture 73: Somebody pick PDF up off the floor, kthx.

    - Picture 183: "ARCADE" = The panacea for terminal boredom when being dragged off on some horrible family vacation: "Mooooom?! Daaaad?! We don't want to go see the river! When can we go to that arcade?!"

    Maybe I'm overstating it a bit but it seems like there were very few places back around 1982 where there wasn't at least one cab. I'm talking about stores of all types: grocery, convenience or department, as well as restaurants. I think I miss that particular ubiquity more so than I mourn the death of the Big Arcade. Anybody else feel that way?

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    Quote Originally Posted by mailman187666 View Post
    I just BARELY remember those days. I was born in 1982 but my mother would take me to those places as soon as I was able to walk. My main arcade memories come from around when the first Double Dragon came out, around that era. I do remember my mother bringing me to the earlier arcades though and having to stand on a stool to play Donkey Kong and Pac Man though.
    I was born in '81, but I was the same way. When I was able to understand what was going on, I remember constantly hitting my arcade's Super Mario Bros. Vs. cabinet along with various shooters and platformers. This was back when arcades could still stretch about half the length of the mall with the newest and classic games and $5 bought you hours of entertainment. By the time I was able frequent arcades on my own, the Double Dragons and Final Fights were everywhere and I heavily got into the one-on-one fighting game craze when it first launched.

    At least in my area, I can remember when arcades were actually packed with people. You had to wait in lines to play stand-up cabinets - if it was the brawler games you had to wait until someone ran out of quarters to take their spot or you waited in the fighting game coin lines to challenge the winner. Now in this area, you're most likely the only person in any given arcade unless you go during a time where all the school-age kids gravitate around a DDR machine or redemption games. The fact I have to drive an hour and a half to find a decent arcade any more should speak volumes about how horribly arcades died here. I really miss those days.

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    Crono (Level 14) Pantechnicon's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kaboomer View Post
    It's amazing to me with as much time as I spent in our local arcades in Omaha, Nebraska, that I don't have a single photo of me playing an arcade game
    Gizmo's at West Roads Mall FTW!

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    We never really hadmany arcades in sweden in the 80īs or at least not where I lived. I did visit finland quite a lot though and on the ferry I got to play quite a lot of games over the years.

    I remember playing games Like Congo Bongo, Robotron, Karate Champion, Outrun & Yie ar kung fu to death.

    And like all others I played an incredible amount of VS matches on SF2 & Samruari Showdown cads in the late ryears. Then it just....died.

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    Strawberry (Level 2) guitargary75's Avatar
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    That case that they put Grand Slam in has to be the ugliest pinball machine case in the history of pinball, just hideous.

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    Kirby (Level 13) diskoboy's Avatar
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    As Archie and Edith Bunker would sing:

    "Those were the days!"


    And that picture of all the DKjr's in the Nintendo plant.... I'm willing to bet mine's in there, somewhere...

    And pic #180... Is that girl sitting inside a Sinistar cockpit?
    Last edited by diskoboy; 05-14-2008 at 12:22 PM.

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    Wow, that's some fun stuff. Thanks for posting, it totally made my afternoon! I had a couple cool arcades in Fond Du Lac, WI where I grew up, but they were all way smaller than these. That pic with the row of Pac Man cabs was pretty amazing. It's also cool to see all the families in there playing together.
    Last edited by BydoEmpire; 05-14-2008 at 01:01 PM.
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    Strawberry (Level 2) cityside75's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Pantechnicon View Post

    Maybe I'm overstating it a bit but it seems like there were very few places back around 1982 where there wasn't at least one cab. I'm talking about stores of all types: grocery, convenience or department, as well as restaurants. I think I miss that particular ubiquity more so than I mourn the death of the Big Arcade. Anybody else feel that way?
    Yep, as magical as the arcades were to me, when I play Donkey Kong Jr. I can almost smell the laundry detergent from the laundromat where it was located near me. Playing Stargate or Make Trax bring me back to Dominick's grocery store near the service desk, and playing Frogger or Phoenix bring back memories of ragtime music and peanut shells on the floor at our local Ground Round restaurant. It seemed for a time that you couldn't go ANYWHERE without having a game nearby. I miss those days as well.

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