Wil Wheaton on the death of the arcade
by Kyle Orland 
{ Feb 8th 2007 at 2:45PM }
Wil Wheaton (yes, that kid from Star Trek) has a touching column on the slow death of the arcade over at Suicide Girls, of all places (page is safe for work, but links to NSFW content). Wheaton lays out some interesting historical analysis on what actually caused the game center's slow decline (endless fighting game clones might be as culpable as powerful home systems), but just as interesting are Wheaton's carefully laid out sensory memories from the gaming rooms of his youth.
More than the games themselves, the pizza-stained, Mountain Dew-infused social atmosphere of the old arcades are what give them a special place in many an old fogey gamer's heart. These young whippersnappers don't know what they're missing with their online deathmatches and Xbox Live Arcade downloads and what-not. In my day, we played standing up at a wooden cabinet in a dimly lit room... and we liked it, dagnabbit!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Norm @ Feb 8th 2007 2:54PM
Wheaton gets props from me for supporting both the SG and the Old-school arcade cause.
JodyAnthony @ Feb 8th 2007 2:59PM
I agree with norm. Also Wil Wheaton will always be Gordie Lachance to me.
Crono @ Feb 8th 2007 3:02PM
Wesley Crusher FTW!
BIGGEN @ Feb 8th 2007 3:05PM
i remember we had this arcade in our neighborhood called the Silver Coin that my older brother would take me to. it was behind a biscuit shop in an alley and had a fight club feel as you entered, like you just entered an underground arcade domain. there, i was introduced to donkey kong, defender, the pac man games, and pinball of course. from then, i was hooked on video games and have been ever since. that's why when i see people argue about BS like system specs and movie formats, i just remember a time when the word fanboy, n00b, and pwned didn't exist. the only thing we knew back then, was the word fun. *as a tear rolls down my cheek*
Jose @ Feb 8th 2007 3:11PM
We didn't like it; we fucking loved it. There was always a positive correlation between how good the pizza was at a joint, and how many rad games they had. I'd spend ten dollars at one machine in one sitting just to see the end levels of The Simpsons or Wild West C.O.W. Boys of Moo Mesa arcade games.
Chocolate Starfish @ Feb 8th 2007 3:30PM
My reasoning for abandoning arcades: the cost. I remember when a typical game was 1 credit and 1 credit was 1 quarter. Then they started charging 2 credits per play. Then 4. Then a credit was 2 quarters. All of a sudden I'm putting $2 into a machine who's game play is often a matter of memory (sudden explosions that leave you dead if you're not in the right place) which force you to play through multiple times regardless of how skilled you may be.
An hour in the typical modern arcade makes a PS3 seem inexpensive.
Brian @ Feb 8th 2007 3:17PM
That was a fantastic column by a Wheaton that could have been written by many of us. I am just a year older than Will and some of my best childhood memories were hanging out in various laundromats, convenience stores and arcades playing new games that came out.
My favorite arcade gave you a $5 deal where you got a coke, chips, a roast beef sub and four tokens. Add another dollar in and you had a full afternoon of fun. Not to mention the crowds that people would draw if they really rocked at a certain game. You didn't even have to spend your own money to have fun...just lean over someone's shoulder to see how it was done.
I love my consoles, but how much fun you could wring out of a single quarter was a real test of skill when you compare it to some of the gaming today.
I don't know if it's a good or bad thing that most gamers have no idea what a line of quarters on the top of an arcade machine signify.
wait in the car @ Feb 8th 2007 3:18PM
I beat Sega's Rad Mobile on one quarter once. Never in my life have I gotten more bang for my buck out of a video game.
I also greatly miss the days of the uber-excellent vector graphics Star Wars game.
Rob Holiday @ Feb 8th 2007 3:22PM
I wish I could still remember the patterns I used on Pac-Man. I probably spent enough quarters on that game to buy a new one. I still can't remember what happened to the coin-op Space Invaders Deluxe me and my brother owned.
Je2037 @ Feb 8th 2007 3:25PM
Sportime in Elmsford, NY anyone??
pe @ Feb 8th 2007 3:37PM
My best memories of arcades are playing multiplayer games like the enormous X-men arcade machine. A group of people who never met before sharing money because someone ran out of quarters on a boss is a beautiful thing. You don't see that sort of community in gaming much anymore.
GhostBox @ Feb 8th 2007 3:38PM
Well there used to be a bowling lane that was just a short walk from the house I grew up in, it had about 30 arcade units.
And I certainly do remember the days of pizza and fries drowned in ketchup while we crowded around arcade screens.
I had some good arcade memories and some bad ones. The older kids would sometimes come in and snatch the quarters that would be resting just below the screen. Some would just push kids out of the way while they were playing.
There was a kind of unspoken etiquette about the whole thing. You didn't touch anyone else's money and you patiently waited your turn. But not everyone followed the rules and an occasional fight would break out that would get some kids tossed from the establishment.
My best memory was when an arcade machine that let me play continuously on just one quarter! The quarter just kept dropping down the slot so I just kept right on playing. The following day I found the machine unplugged and then off to repairs :(
F1ghter @ Feb 8th 2007 3:57PM
The real problem with arcades is that they have nothing left to offer. Virtually all games found in any given arcade are available on home consoles, which have grown tremendously in popularity. Many of the games that try to overcome this are gimmicky and/or don't work well (I'm thinking that one sword-fighting game), with the exception being games like DDR.
What is left for a gamer? Not much, and when you combine this with the ever-increasing prices it leaves you pretty well stranded.
There is hope, however. I believe that in the next couple of decades, arcades will morph into something more like DisneyQuest (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DisneyQuest), featuring simulators and bleeding-edge VR equipment. Arcades need to integrate more of the amusement-park feel in order to attract enough attention to stay open. Unfortunately for the nostalgic, though, these places have little in common with the atmosphere of the 80's arcades.
32_Footsteps @ Feb 8th 2007 4:10PM
Arcades being filled with knockoff games didn't kill anything in the old days. How many shoot 'em ups crowded arcades in the old days? What about side-scrolling brawlers? Arcades were almost always packed with the same kinds of games repeated ad infinitum. Fighting games were just the last such genre heavily cloned for the arcades before they died out.
I think the death of pinball, for the various reasons it went, is an understated part of the failure of the arcade. What does it say that one of the most popular tables, if not the most popular, was the one for the Addams Family movie? Namely, that pinball ran on fumes way too long.
And if I could ever afford one, I'd love a refurbished Addams Family table.
Steve @ Feb 8th 2007 6:07PM
Wow! So little Wesley Crusher managed to figure out the extremely complicated reasons behind the death of the ol' Arcade. Gee, I wish I was a celebrity because they're so gosh darn smart. It would have taken a regular Joe like me months to even begin the process of tackling a topic that hard.
As a former star, Wheaton has plenty of time to tell us all of his deep thoughts. Maybe he can explain other difficult mysteries in life like how to cook a bowl of cereal or how to fasten velcro shoes. (Not on the same day of course! I'm not an entertainer so I wouldn't be able to handle that much mental stimulation in one day!)
I guess this is why the world needs celebrities, you know, to have them share their infinite wisdom with us.
Norm @ Feb 8th 2007 4:13PM
RyAnderson, go home.
wait in the car @ Feb 8th 2007 4:20PM
Top 5 Pinball Games (in no particular order)
1. South Park
2. Star Trek: The Next Generation
3. Star Wars
4. Jurassic Park
5. Indiana Jones
Arbuz Chokaro @ Feb 8th 2007 4:26PM
I remember arcades, not too long ago. I used to go and play DDR and Pacman a couple of times a week with my friends. Then I moved.
Last I heard they shut the place down and put up a Burlington Coat Factory or something.
Sad.
Mr Khan @ Feb 8th 2007 4:35PM
The kind of people that REALLY supported arcades all play consoles or PC games now.
Sure there are still passersby, but the addicts all game at home,
Thus the industry died...
I always found arcade games too frustrating, and generally any game that doesn't save files frustrating, but then again, my first console was a Sega Saturn (soon followed by an N64)
Probot @ Feb 8th 2007 4:37PM
Chocolate Starfish,
Can you blame the arcade makers? According to Vlad Cole, the only reason people played arcade games was to put money into them.
http://www.joystiq.com/2006/12/30/quarter-gobblers-are-broken-on-xbla/
SSBR @ Feb 8th 2007 4:41PM
Street Fighter 2 and Champion Edition version is the best arcade came ever, period.
http://www.rolesor.com
Evan @ Feb 8th 2007 4:43PM
@32_Footsteps
They really pushed the limits with knockoff games. I remember a Simpsons game that was a direct rip-off of the 4-player X-Men game. Marge swinging a vacuum cleaner! The gameplay was similar, the cabinet was similar, only the sprites in the game and the graphics on the cabinet were different!
But it wasn't ripoff games that killed my local arcade, it was vandalism and a rougher crowd.
NintendoFanbot @ Feb 8th 2007 4:44PM
I go to a couple arcades that have games like Tekken 5, SoulCalibur II, MvC2, Mario Kart Arcade GP, F-Zero AX and such.
Yes, it's a bummer that arcades are largely gone unless part of a place that offered food, parties and such.
Someone said that consoles made arcade games more popular in the home, but not all home conversions were perfect. Lightgun and joystick peripherals do not change this. They for the most part lack the solid feel of the Arcade versions, and I'm sure if many, many more had the option they would choose such. Unfortunately it's something that gamers really don't have controller over.
And 32 Footsteps is right on. ADDAMS FAMILY PINBALL FTW.
Also, HOOK.
NintendoFanbot @ Feb 8th 2007 4:53PM
#21
Is it really ripping-off if The Simpsons was made by the same company as the arcade TMNTs and X-Men?* Anyways, I thought losing health over their mutant powers blew, while having Team-Up attacks in The Simpsons is still a fairly underutilized mechanic even today. But that's my opinion. :P
It was the same with SNK, Capcom, but even then people had a decent knowledge of which were the cream of the crop, so to speak.
*Konami
Brendon @ Feb 8th 2007 5:30PM
Ah, back in the day. Nothing like the buzz of having a crowd of other socially-challenged misfits watching over your shoulder as you get to levels and screens not yet achieved by anyone else in town ("Woah! Red Tempest screens!"). It was a great escape for us geeks and losers as the "cool" kids wouldn't be caught dead in such a place.
We used to have a scam to support our playing habits (or even make a few bucks). Instead of sticking a dollar in the changer to get four tokens, we'd put in a fiver and get the extra dollar's worth for doing so. Then we'd stand by the changer and ask people with single dollars if they'd like four tokens ("I got extras; don't need 'em"), and exchange our singles for fives at another store in the mall. Lather, rinse, repeat! Of course, the attendant eventually caught on to what we were doing, kicked us out, and starting doing it himself.
This guy has some great arcade recordings of when he was a kid:
http://www.coinopvideogames.com/sounds.html
Jeff @ Feb 8th 2007 5:10PM
"The real problem with arcades is that they have nothing left to offer."
You mean, other than socializing with real, live, other people?
That's what the arcade experience was really all about. Very few people went to the arcade to play by themselves (some did, I'm sure, but it's not my personal recollection of those days). Today's online services try to recreate that to some extent, but they really just can't. You can't virtually recreate the experience of standing there next to somebody with a crowd of people around you watching and have it feel the same.
I also think it's not for nothing that people always mention pizza and some form of soda when talking about arcades. Food is a social thing too; and pizza and soda is the food of teenage kids and regular guys. It all ties it back to the arcade being a social gathering place, not a place where people go solo.
"Arcades being filled with knockoff games didn't kill anything in the old days. How many shoot 'em ups crowded arcades in the old days? What about side-scrolling brawlers?"
In the early days, not many.
I don't think you're going back far enough. The heyday of the arcade was really the early 80's - not the mid to late 80's that it sounds like you're thinking of. What you're talking about was really the beginning of the end, when events were set in motion that would start to bring the arcades down.
Back when I first started going to the arcades, almost every game was new and novel. Who ever played a game like Tempest before? Asteroids? Space Invaders? Lunar Lander? The original Donkey Kong? Pac-Man? Scramble? Sure, knockoffs to these games appeared after they became popular, but the difference was in those days people ignored those knockoffs. Later, developers got better at making knockoffs, they started stealing more and more attention and "copies" and "bootlegs" morphed into "genres", where a lot of games started to look basically the same - that was really the start of the downward spiral.
But think back, way back, to the time when the games that REALLY got the attention - you know, the ones people would actually crowd around - were always the newest games with the freshest ideas, and not the sequels and knockoffs that we now know as "genre" games. Those days did exist, once. There was nothing like Pac-Man before Pac-Man.
phillosmaster @ Feb 8th 2007 5:24PM
That brings back memories. Particularly the TMNT co op beat em up game. I probably unloaded a small fortune on that game. I wish they would make more co op beat em ups for the consoles. Actually I wish Sega would get around to making a new Streets of Rage game. Those were so fun. Then agian the new versions of Final Fight and NARC totally sucked. Final Fight Streetwise ruin Cody's character IMO and NARC was just embarrassing. I'd hate to see Streets of Rage get the same type of treatment.
Frankie @ Feb 8th 2007 6:00PM
Arcades were some of the most important parts of my childhood. I made friends there and found a comfort hanging out with other people that loved games as much as I did. Two of my fondest moments in the arcade:
1. Walking into a Shakey's Pizza afterschool (6th grade) and seeing the brand new, shiny TMNT 4-player machine! I ended up spending my entire weekly allowance of $5.00 dollars on Donatello (still my favorite turtle) with a bunch of strangers. We ended up high fiving each other and having a great time! And to this day, no online MP, MMORPG, or Live game has gotten close to recapturing that much joy!
2. The 1st edition of Street Fighter 2. Not only did Capcom reinevent the arcade industry with this game but it was a primary contributer to my future career in the video game industry. After playing Ryu for the first time I knew I wanted to work in the industry and make games that could capture the hearts and minds of gamers like SF2 did for me.
Regardless, I really miss arcades. There was never anything like them before and surely nothing afterwards. *sniff*
Vexorg @ Feb 8th 2007 5:37PM
As with most places, arcades are all but dead around here, but I actually bought a JAMMA cabinet when I moved into my apartment, which I can use to play a number of my arcade favorites (many of which never got ported to a console) whenever I want, and without quarters (just don't ask how many quarters the thing cost initially...) I'd love to get a pinball table at some point, but I don't have the space right now, and the prices on 90s Williams/Bally stuff have gone through the roof in recent years.
My personal top 5 list for pinball machines:
1. Twilight Zone
2. Attack from Mars
3. Getaway: High Speed 2
4. Medieval Madness
5. F-14 Tomcat
mushiking @ Feb 8th 2007 5:50PM
arcades are alive and well in the rest of the world. just cause they're dead in america, doesn't mean they are everywhere else.
rdaneel72 @ Feb 8th 2007 5:53PM
You pinball people are crazy. The greatest pinball table ever made was easily GorGar. Not only was it the first pinball/arcade machine to use digitalized voice, there was also a totally radical song about it by Helloween. You can't compete with that.
Bughunt @ Feb 8th 2007 6:35PM
Ahhh...the good ol day's of 7-11 and the first Chuck E Cheese...not to mention Showbiz Pizza. I agree, nothing tops the original arcade experience, and never will. Now if you will excuse me I need to play Space Ace on my PC :p
dsub @ Feb 8th 2007 6:38PM
I've recently taken action on my love for arcade games and built my own MAME cabinet. I've also got a PS2/XBOX/Dreamcast running in it as well. Overall it cost me around $700 and I love it. I no longer have to go to Dave & Busters or Gameworks and blow $50 in one night to get my arcade gaming fix.
robotrock @ Feb 8th 2007 7:29PM
to wait in the car -
Theater of Magic was more fun than Jurassic Park OR Indiana Jones. Good call on the rest though!
It seems there's a lot of us "old timers" who are eager to reminisce about the good ol' days. I'm glad I'm not alone.
Diskoboy @ Feb 8th 2007 7:31PM
I remember the first video gamer I ever played like it happened a few hours ago.
December 1979. I was 5. It was at a convienence store called Zippy Mart. They had just added a machine in the corner called "Space Invaders". I had never seen a video game prior to this, much less knew a game could even be played on a television. My mom took me with her when she went to get some chips for a christmas party. When I entered, I was mezmorized by the artwork on this odd looking machine in the corner, that had scary looking black aliens, holding what looked like javelins. As I stood in front of it, and watched it a minute to get the grasp of the game. I then took out one of the quarters in my pocket, and played it. My very fist score: 780. About a year later, they changed out the Space Invaders for a Pac-Man. And also added a Galaxian next to it. I knew I was hopelessly addicted after I discovered Pac-Man.
NoHitHair @ Feb 8th 2007 8:03PM
@2:
Chopper, sick balls!
refinedsugar @ Feb 8th 2007 8:28PM
... and how about that greasy guy in the corner peddling dope. Hello? Anyone? ... okay I'm done.
Campion @ Feb 8th 2007 8:41PM
I still get a Pavlovian twinge of excitement when I get change back and there are quarters in it.
Oh, and Steve? It's the internet, not Maximum R'n'R. Go fuck yourself.
samfish @ Feb 8th 2007 10:07PM
I still remember vividly going to Chuck-E-Cheese a few times a month with my parents (my dad was the regional accountant or something), playing the ever-lovin' hell out of Donkey Kong and Galaxian...and Galaga, which for the life of my, my 5 year old mouth could not pronounce right to save my life. I still have a few old-skool Chuck-E-Cheese tokens laying around somewhere.
I remember when TMNT Arcade came out. That was still pound for pound the best time I ever had playing video games. It was great when other people would jump in and help you out, especially when you were in a particularly rough spot or at a boss and you'd start giving each other quarters or tokens if you ran dry.
Then there was fighting games. The BEST fighter ever was, in my opinion, Marvel Vs Capcom, just because I'm a comic book geek to this day still.
The only thing I hated about fighting games was when you were playing solo and you were damn close to the end and someone came in and challenged you to a two player match. If you lose, the winner almost ALWAYS got to pick up where you left off! Man, I HATED every time that happened!
Questworld @ Feb 8th 2007 11:25PM
I think arcades have simply evolved into cyber cafes or internet/gaming cafes. Now if you mix the best of both worlds you can theoretically bring it all back. All this needs is a more economical way of distribution. Instead of ordering big cabinets solely for one game, you can have cabinet standards for most games, buy game cartridges (even through online distribution), and swap when needed (or let gamers choose the games they want to play). Labels on the cabinets should be easy and cheap to send too. Things like Percussion Freaks, or those racing and flight games with specially designed cabinets and cockpits would be harder though but for most it should be cheaper. Lastly, exclusives. Arcades should have more games exclusive to them.
Bughunt @ Feb 8th 2007 11:32PM
Heh, here is an arcade experience you just gotta love. All I can remember is that people at my local bowling alley hated me because I was good at KI (best Bowling Alley ever, half of it was dedicated to the arcade..just huge) I remember vividly walking up to the KI machine with a crowd around it, when they looked my way they all sighed. Ahh good stuff. And to top it all off, about 9 years later I was walking through the mall past the arcade a guy said to me...Hey, are you the guy that use to have long hair and played KI at the bowling alley..I laughed and said yeah, he then told me "I hated you" WOOT :p
Galley @ Feb 9th 2007 10:46AM
I'm 42, so if you do your math, you'll know that my high school years coincided with the golden age of the arcade 1979-1983. Aah, what magical times!
edrxpark @ Feb 9th 2007 5:35PM
I remember as a kid growing up in the 80's my friends and I would ride bikes to the swimming pool. We would swim, eat greasy hamburgers, and then ride our bikes to a 7-11 and play videogames. Nowadays, kids aren't as innocent. If arcades were more popular these days, you'd probably have some type of Columbine massacre at the arcade. It's a sad world we live in...a world where we yearn for human interaction, yet for many, that interaction is soley through a computer screen.
Hale-Bopp @ Feb 10th 2007 1:14PM
#43, I hear what you're saying and it breaks my heart. I thought I might have been the only one thinking it, but yeah, we've definitely lost a lot of our innocence. The early '80s were wonderfully simple and enjoyably sociable times. The arcade was where it was at. God, I sometimes long for those days. I remember having seen some HUGE arcades. Every game you could think of from pac-man to dragon's lair. Good times. They're very much missed.
#10, I think you hit it on the nail for me. Anytime I discover a new arcade, it's mostly barren. Then I discover that the games actually worth looking at cost me $1.00 to $2.00 per play. I know that when I step up to one, it'll take me at least $4-8 just to warm up to it before I'm good enough to want to play more and even then, the gameplay doesn't last for long. It's just not worth it.