What was the name of your childhood arcade?

[BetaWolf47]

We had a TILT at our local mall down here. I remember them having some great games there too, such as Die Hard Arcade and Tekken Tag Tournament. They closed but not a few years after the new millennium.

There's also the movie theater, Hollywood 20, which always has a few. They had Aerofighters and Metal Slug many years back. They've also had Arctic Thunder, Area 51, and Tekken 2 many years back. Right now, all they have is crap like those racing games based on The Fast and the Furious.

The best one we have is King Richard's. They have had awesome games over the year such as Virtual On: Cyber Troopers, The Simpsons Arcade, Caveman Ninja, and X-Men Arcade. They've always been the largest in town with around 15 arcade machines. It was always fun joining some random dude in The Simpsons Arcade.

The most nostalgic was a privately owned pizza parlor called Pizza Factory. The arcade there was literally just a hole in the wall with four machines. In the beginning, it was Street Fighter 2, Vs. Super Mario Bros., some Golf game with a trackball I'll never remember (or care), and a pinball machine. They later changed some of those out for games like The Simpsons Arcade and X-Men Arcade, as well as some 3D space racer which may have been S.T.U.N. Runner.

Yeah, Simpsons and X-Men were common here. Gotta love 'em.

[killimgfloor]

Vegas Amusement
Circuit Circus
Lester's

Those were the ones that I use to frequent. The first two I went to more often than the last one as it was not very close to where I use to live. Also, if I needed a game fix there were at least one game in ever convenience store near by. This was during the 1980s.

[Zing]

There was an Aladdin's Castle at the mall, but I didn't really start going there until I was an older teenager to play Mortal Kombat 2, Killer Instinct, and Tekken.

Before that, the arcade of choice was called Funway Freeway. It was at a strip mall and was amazing. Many hours were spent there playing games like Xenophobe, Xybots, Pac-Land, Discs of Tron, and Rampage. I went there for many of my birthdays. They didn't have parties, but if it was your birthday, you got a special deal on a huge sack of tokens.

That reminds me of how annoyed I was when arcades started switching from quarters to tokens.

[hoger]

UNDERCOVER COPS


You can try this check in online arcade game collections, I have a 2.44 G collections, free shipping all in the game hall before the game, should have you want

[VideoGameRescue]

Putt putt golf & games. It's called adventure landing now.

[Scotterpop]

Putt putt golf & games. It's called adventure landing now.

Ah yes, I remember that Putt Putt fondly, enjoying many a game of 4-player Ninja Turtles there after school. And if you lived in Jax long enough, you may also remember Hobby Oasis at Neptune Beach. That's where my love affair with video games began. Every Sunday was 8 tokens for a dollar day so me and my buddy & neighbor Jason Lacey would walk down to this arcade and spend our afternoons (and all our pocket change) there. This would have been around '82 or '83. After my family moved away from the beaches I found myself hitting the arcades in Regency Mall: Aladdin's Castle and Game Emporium (mid to late '80s). Man, those were good times! In the nineties Mountasia was the coolest arcade in town, another Putt Putt style mini-golf/arcade spot. I reeeeally miss that one.

[dgdgagdae]

UNDERCOVER COPS


You can try this check in online arcade game collections, I have a 2.44 G collections, free shipping all in the game hall before the game, should have you want

I...wait, what?

[Mytho]

I used to go to Fun Factory in the Independence Mall near Kansas City a ton as a kid. Since I was pretty young, I spent most of my time playing stuff like Skee-Ball and basketball for tickets. When I got older, I started moving more into the actual arcade itself. My favorite games were Virtual-On and Virtua Racing. I also loved playing Gunblade N.Y. when I got the chance. That massive machine gun rumbled so fiercely it'd leave your hands numb!

Fun Factory also had the full Virtua Racing sit-down cabinet, which absolutely blew my mind. I could barely play the game since I was so young, but damn if it wasn't amazing sitting in that car. Virtua Racing still remains one of my favorite racing games to this day.

I also went to Cool Crest on occasion for birthday parties and such. I played Spinjammers and other assorted Neo-Geo games there when I wasn't playing putt putt.

There is one other place I'm thinking of that I played Outrunners at, but the name isn't coming to me. It might have been Family Golf Park, but I'm not sure. I do remember that there was both a putt putt and traditional golf course, including a driving range. Playing Outrunners there after a round of putt putt was another great Sega arcade experience of mine.

If anyone still lives in the Independence area, I'm curious to know if Fun Factory is still in business. The last time I was there was in 2002 while visiting my grandparents. I wasn't able to find much on the internet, so I'm assuming it was shut down around the mid to late 2000's.

[o.pwuaioc]

I...wait, what?

Spam.

[kiselomlqko]

"Giggles" at the washington mall in washington, PA

played alot of my favorite games there and even had my birthday party there once. my reletive owned the pizzia shop right across from it as well so it was always nice to stop by and grab a slice of pizzia after some arcade gaming

[Genesaturn]

Starport at the local mall. My dad would take me once a week. He would park himself in front of Out Run and I'd wander aimlessly back and forth between every game for 2 hours lol. Starport closed when I was probably 8 or so though so from that point on the arcade at Putt Putt became my local choice.

[Badhornet]

Rocky J's in San Antonio. TX

[guitargary75]

I’ve noticed since I’ve posted this thread, arcades are starting to open up all over the place again! It’s like an arcade revival!

[Slate]

I was late to it in about 2000 - 2001, but there was an "Aladdin's Castle" in a mall that wasn't nearby, but it wasn't in another country, either. I didn't look at every game that was there, since I was about 9 years old and I'm sure that my parents weren't keen on me playing shooters then. I saw some sort of a shooter game, but I couldn't tell you what it was, except I think it might have been a war shooter.

The only arcade games I really remember that they had were:

Hard Drivin'
Lucky and Wild (which was my favorite in the arcade)
Prop Cycle (the one with a bike pedal controller where you're flying a cycling machine. I remember it because that copy was set up to be so difficult to run that I could barely play it, and I only played once.)

Come to think of it, there was also a bowling alley that had maybe 4 or 5 arcade games in the back, too. But I couldn't tell you what they had, even though I played maybe a few of them. I only played them a little bit when I was 9 or 10.

I’ve noticed since I’ve posted this thread, arcades are starting to open up all over the place again! It’s like an arcade revival!

I hope so, but here in the middle of nowhere where I live, the mall I mentioned above still has about 75% of the storefronts closed and the parking lot is still held together with holes.

- Austin

[Greg2600]

I’ve noticed since I’ve posted this thread, arcades are starting to open up all over the place again! It’s like an arcade revival!

Yes here in NJ we have a number of Barcades, Yestercades, and my favorite, Game Vault of Morristown.

In any event, so back at the beginning of this thread, I listed the old arcades I used to visit as a kid during the 1980s. One of which was "Kiddie Land (aka Karnival)" up on Route 46 in Pine Brook, NJ. That was a small permanent carnival style amusement park. I have shoddy memories of playing arcade games in what I half-recalled being an old, dirty church, though. Most people haven't the foggiest what I was talking about, including my mother. So this thread had me futzing around today, and on Facebook, I dig around and discovered the arcade DID exist but was a neighbor to the amusement park. It was an old Methodist Church which for some time was known as Rich's Hobbies, and then Game Town. Eventually it closed and the church was demolished, same as Kiddie Land, and the old Pine Brook speedway around there.




Hmm, the Church building was still there as of 2009. I read it was torn down despite being of historical significance under shady circumstances, but assumed it was long ago. Nope, somewhat recent. Now overgrown with weeds.
https://www.google.com/maps/@40.8593...1664?entry=ttu

[Gametrek]

Fairyland Arcade.

It had a burger-king next to it. It also had some amusement park rides. My baby-sitter more or less my sisters because I was not old enough took us there one time, which I am still amazed by. Ball-room, that caterpillar roller-coaster, and a semi-advance but small more wilder coaster ( nothing too dangerous ).
I love the bop-em games, Simpsons-arcade, and of course many other shooters including Aliens, among others. Only bad part was that just like "EarthBound" and the happyhappygang, my arcade in it's later days had a gang problem. It is because of that $#$@@ Sears, and Fairyland shutdown, and stopped having videogames. Burger King stayed for awhile but otherwise looked abandoned and slowly got absorb into the rest of the area. Stupid and sad. Honestly I out grew that place but I still missed the arcade enviorment. It was the last of the bar/night-club scene where a minor could go and mingle with
adults and everybody was okay. I miss seeing a guy with a snake with glasses or had snake eyes himself, I miss that people was smoking. You want a vivid idea of what most if not all arcades looked like during the 1990's then you have to look at one of those Namco DOS games. A dark area with beautiful games.

Party Fun time.

This had laser tag but you had to pay that stupid fee, but we got tokens. Family fun, was innocent and all. Before $#@$@$ Chuckie-Cheese and Power-Rangers the bleh movie ( that my little mind had no idea how much it really was censored and lame ). That place was packed and had Mortal-Kombat-4d ( the 3d Mortal Kombat where you could launch somebody through a room or even walk via the enviorment ), all those dino games, and variations of pac-man.

I miss playing laser-tag with strangers and being shorter then my fridge. I wish we had more of those times. But your a kid and arcades and laser-tag, and 3d was amazing. Your family was there and they tried to get a long and did not get any of it.

Oh my gosh what happen to our beautiful normal world.

[Tron 2.0]

Beside going to timeout as a kid putt,putt golf and games to came to mind for me.In the 80's i went to it allot not a bad mix either a miniature golf course and a arcade.

[RARusk]

Rocky J's in San Antonio. TX

Wow, I actually used to go there myself when my father was stationed there (Fort Sam Houston) in the mid-eighties.