What was your favorite arcade hang out back in the day?

[+Random Terrain]

I only got to go to the arcade a few times a year, so no hanging out and my family moved around, so there wasn't just one arcade I went to. Luckily, various grocery stores and department stores had arcade games, so I got to at least look at various arcade games, even if I couldn't always afford to play them.

[VectorGamer]

Fun City at the Park City Mall in Lancaster, PA.

 

BTW, to answer the two questions in the original post...

 

No, it closed down a LONG time ago...

 

Here are some of the games I remember...

 

Death Race

Space Invaders - they had an upright and a cocktail version

The Safe - that game where you guess the combination and win a token

Sea Wolf

 

Those games where you hold a rifle and shoot guys in a town in the old West on a projection screen...

Similar to the one above only you're shooting ducks

 

They had a bunch of pinball machines and some pool tables.

 

It also featured a whole bunch of people in jean and leather jackets slumped down on the floor in front of the arcade smoking cigarettes.

 

Can you believe that's all I remember them having in that arcade? I do - heck, I think it closed down 30 years ago, which may be accurate since the games I listed were all produced before 1979.

[cimerians]

Cool reading some of these.

 

I forgot some of the games mentioned above.

I need to fire up MAME soon.

 

Speaking of "gun" games, Crossbow was really cool when I first saw it in the arcade.

[+thanatos]

'Beyond', in Green Bay, WI.

 

Because my dad owned it.

 

I was a master of Punch Out, Spy Hunter, and Star Rider.

[AtariLeaf]

In downtown Windsor, on the waterfront, Riverside Drive, there was an arcade called "Fast Eddie's" that me and my buddies would usually hit once in a while if we were downtown on a Friday or Saturday night.

[Jurai29]

Fantasy Isle in downtown Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. The first floor was a D&D shop, which was cool in itself, but if you took the spiral staircase up to the 2nd floor it was an awesome arcade. They did up the walls in paper mache or something to look like a cave. It was dark, it had a great selection of games for being a smaller place, and they'd have occasional deals like Sunday afternoon $5 to enter with all the games on free play. I loved that place, but it's long since been out of business.

 

The Alladin's Castle in the mall lasted a long time, well into the 90s, but I have no idea if that's around any more. I went because it was there, but it was a typical bright mall arcade, and didn't have the mojo of Fantasy Isle.

 

There was a place in downtown toronto like this, Arcade and console sales on 4th floor, middle 2 floors were D&D and other games, basement was other hobbies like model kits. Was called Gameways Ark, also long long gone, was late 83 or early 84 as I remember. It saddened me to see one place with all my hobbies turned into a camping supply store.

 

All the other arcades in the Toronto area I remember are all long gone as well.

[fiddlepaddle]

I used to hang out in a dive bar called McNasty's on High St in Columbus Ohio that had a Space Invaders and 4-player Atari Football game. Later got a job at a little arcade called Coney Island, and played everything for free .

[brojamfootball]

Here's a little something to jog everyone's memory: http://bpulliam.smugmug.com/gallery/4918209_3RCNf

Awesome! Thank you so much for that link! I remember those scenes well.

Man, we sure liked our short pants short and our tube socks knee high back then...

[carmel_andrews]

I had a couple, but they were in the west end (not local), one was in Wardour street (allegedly the cheapest one in central london at 10p a go, where everywhere else was like 20 to 50p a go) and the other one was in Old compton street (just off wardour street) though that one was more one armed bandits then arcade games

 

My brother and I used to call the old compton street one 'the shrine' as he kept on winning on the one armed bandits

[BydoEmpire]

Here's a little something to jog everyone's memory: http://bpulliam.smugmug.com/gallery/4918209_3RCNf

Is this your site?

No - I found the link on a Digital Press thread. I bookmarked that sucker, though, it sure is fun browsing. I definitely miss those days.

[Dauber]

Does it still exist? What games did they have?

 

Mine was Friar Tucks game room in Cal City IL. and Lincoln Mall if I remember the name in the Chicago area.

 

Lincoln had a huge game room with the oddball Universal and Exidy titles.

 

They had Bally's Aladdin's Castle, formerly Lemans Speedway. I remember how it seemed that every time I went there, they expanded it. (I lived in Bourbonnais back in the day, and Lincoln Mall was the nearest mall; we'd take monthly trips there, and my dad gave me a dollar to spend at Aladdin's Castle.) Yeah, that place was huge...they had all the classics, all the latest, and they even had a video jukebox -- which, in 1983-1984, was the coolest thing in the world! I seem to remember they had a room full of NEO-GEO as well, but I could be wrong. Man...when the late '80s and early '90s happened, it was sad - the place got smaller and smaller, to the point where it was just two rows of games...by 1996 it was completely gone.

 

Our local Sears also had a big arade room on the 2nd floor where I first saw Joust and Gorf.

 

The Sears that used to be in Kankakee at the Meadowview shopping center also had a game room. Not a big one, though. I remember one day my mother said she went past it and it was closed, with a sign posted saying that the game room was permanently closed because some kid got brain damage from playing the games. Sound suspcious? It SHOULD be -- over a year later I was there and the game room was still there! In fact, for some reason Robotron was free! Needless to say, I played a lot of Robotron that day.

[Sgt.Pepper1983]

I didn't have a favorite arcade hang out back when I was a kid, but I do have two favorites now. The arcade at the mall is half classic machines like pacman, donkey kong, mario, galaga, and dig dug. The other one isn't really an arcade but a pizza place. They have two ms pacman machines, a crusin world machine, a donkey kong, a centipede, a golf game that I don't know the name of and phoenix. All but one of the ms pacman machines are the originals from when they were new.

[VectorGamer]

I didn't have a favorite arcade hang out back when I was a kid, but I do have two favorites now. The arcade at the mall is half classic machines like pacman, donkey kong, mario, galaga, and dig dug. The other one isn't really an arcade but a pizza place. They have two ms pacman machines, a crusin world machine, a donkey kong, a centipede, a golf game that I don't know the name of and phoenix. All but one of the ms pacman machines are the originals from when they were new.

 

Sweet! Where do you live?

[Sgt.Pepper1983]

The places I was talking about were Bumpernets at the Riverchase Galleria and Jim Davenport's Pizza Palace in Mountain Brook Alabama.

[snorlaxnut]

In the 80s and early 90s there was one small arcade in one mall around where I live, but the mall was torn down. In another mall at the same time there was one called Gold Mine, now called Tilt. But the only place I played any games was in the corner store 2 blocks from where I live. But there was a fire there several years ago, and they remodeled it without a place for games. I just play games at home now.