Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

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LegoYoda
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Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by LegoYoda »

Morning everyone,

Does anyone know of a decent arcade in Singapore? Here for a week or so and suddenly realised that, even if arcades in London are gone they may not be in other parts of the world. Googeling yealds a few results but none really show whats there (most are obviously more "redemption" based than game based). So if anyone with local knowledge can pont me in the right direction that would be great! I dont want to miss the oppertunity if there's something worth visiting!

Many thanks all,

Alec
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by Shou »

LegoYoda wrote:Morning everyone,

Does anyone know of a decent arcade in Singapore? Here for a week or so and suddenly realised that, even if arcades in London are gone they may not be in other parts of the world. Googeling yealds a few results but none really show whats there (most are obviously more "redemption" based than game based). So if anyone with local knowledge can pont me in the right direction that would be great! I dont want to miss the oppertunity if there's something worth visiting!

Many thanks all,

Alec
Go to Bugis Junction, it's in B1 of the mall. The is the place to go to for fighter competition and has the latest deluxe cabs, some which are Asia exclusive. In the other end of the mall, Bugis+, there are a bunch of internet cafes on the top floor and a small arcade with deluxe cabs of stuff like OutRun 2 SDX, Hummer 2 SDX, Asian version of Raizing Storm, etc.
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

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Make sure you don't soil the cab in any way shape or form. lest you get your **** caned and imprisoned for a decade.
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by LegoYoda »

Thanks! I'll check that out today :-) Will be nice to visit an arcade that sounds like it's actually maintained!!!
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by davewellington »

Bugis is the only one I found while we were there. We won lots of toys in the sega ufo machines, pretty easy if you focus on knocking the toys with the claw rather than lifting them.
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by Shou »

davewellington wrote:Bugis is the only one I found while we were there. We won lots of toys in the sega ufo machines, pretty easy if you focus on knocking the toys with the claw rather than lifting them.
There are some others like in Singapura Mall in Orchard but Bugis is probably the best.
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

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Well, went down there for a quick spell the other day and ended up spending 4 hours there! a VERY impressive place given the slow, painful, death of UK arcades. I did find a few others in smaller malls but the VirtuaLand at Bugis Junction is miles, miles better than the others. VERY large and remarkably cheap with an impressive selection of games from the last 20 years or so. I think after buying $20 of credits (with a little promotion) THe classics / fighting games worked out at 20p / credit! Everything was buys with people enjoying them selves and all the machines actually worked!

I know it's a chicken and an egg situation but when things are being run like this is's suddenly less of a surprise why some of the UK ones went (too rigid a pricing structure for games that might not be working correctly). Lord knows why the UK operators didnt implement the network functionality properly either...

Sigh, have toi go home now so it looks like that was the last arcade fix for a while.... Still, good while it lasted.

So, thanks for the points int he right direction @shou and others. It was a detour well worth taking.
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by Shou »

LegoYoda wrote:Well, went down there for a quick spell the other day and ended up spending 4 hours there! a VERY impressive place given the slow, painful, death of UK arcades. I did find a few others in smaller malls but the VirtuaLand at Bugis Junction is miles, miles better than the others. VERY large and remarkably cheap with an impressive selection of games from the last 20 years or so. I think after buying $20 of credits (with a little promotion) THe classics / fighting games worked out at 20p / credit! Everything was buys with people enjoying them selves and all the machines actually worked!

I know it's a chicken and an egg situation but when things are being run like this is's suddenly less of a surprise why some of the UK ones went (too rigid a pricing structure for games that might not be working correctly). Lord knows why the UK operators didnt implement the network functionality properly either...

Sigh, have toi go home now so it looks like that was the last arcade fix for a while.... Still, good while it lasted.

So, thanks for the points int he right direction @shou and others. It was a detour well worth taking.
Glad you enjoyed it but Bugis doesn't hold a candle to Japan's arcades :) I do visit Bugis almost everytime I'm in Singapore though as it's down the street from one of the main game store plazas.

There are a lot of reasons into why Western arcades have failed. One of the main factors was not adapting the Japanese model of more modular and versatile cabinets instead of the fire hazard behemoths that were sold. Another factor was that operators and distributers are not educated enough on what their clientele would want to play and were focused on at the moment sales. Price fixing is whole another sticky issue. A good example of this is that say for the latest MVS KOF, it would cost nearly 1800 quid for the kit in Japan, but only 800 quid in the States and maybe half of that in SE Asia, all for the same product. Ignorant operators would be going for the loca option not realizing how much they wer eoverpaying.
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by Molloy »

Bugis is class. I had great fun there playing SSF2T with a dude and getting absolutely demolished. He was just sitting there for hours with his cute girlfriend sitting in his lap and watching patiently.
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by gabe »

Shou wrote:Price fixing is whole another sticky issue. A good example of this is that say for the latest MVS KOF, it would cost nearly 1800 quid for the kit in Japan, but only 800 quid in the States and maybe half of that in SE Asia, all for the same product. Ignorant operators would be going for the loca option not realizing how much they wer eoverpaying.
US operators didn't have much of a choice in the matter, thanks to the American Amusement Machine Association. The AMAA is "considered to be an advocate before the United States Government and the United States Congress dealing with issues about video games." Their board of directors is made up of high ranking officials from big arcade manufactures; Sega, Namco, Stern, etc. In any event, back in the '80's they successfully passed legislation protecting their right to price gouge American operators. Operating an "unauthorized" game is a federal offense, punishable by 6 figure fines and prison time. In most cases, out of region games are indeed unauthorized. Here's a notice from a US In The Hunt manual from IREM circa 1993:

Image
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by LegoYoda »

Geez... that explains a lot. I do want to get to Japan one day (never been) as it's always seemed to be the the epicenter of the arcade. Still, back now and I'll just have to settle for a few beers and some Blast City action at home or brave the weather and try to find something playable at the seaside (even that's getting harder)...
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Re: Anyone Know A Good Arcade In Singapore?

Post by Shou »

gabe wrote:
Shou wrote:Price fixing is whole another sticky issue. A good example of this is that say for the latest MVS KOF, it would cost nearly 1800 quid for the kit in Japan, but only 800 quid in the States and maybe half of that in SE Asia, all for the same product. Ignorant operators would be going for the loca option not realizing how much they wer eoverpaying.
US operators didn't have much of a choice in the matter, thanks to the American Amusement Machine Association. The AMAA is "considered to be an advocate before the United States Government and the United States Congress dealing with issues about video games." Their board of directors is made up of high ranking officials from big arcade manufactures; Sega, Namco, Stern, etc. In any event, back in the '80's they successfully passed legislation protecting their right to price gouge American operators. Operating an "unauthorized" game is a federal offense, punishable by 6 figure fines and prison time. In most cases, out of region games are indeed unauthorized. Here's a notice from a US In The Hunt manual from IREM circa 1993:

Image
Except that even major operators were buying from overseas. Many of the Sega deluxe games of the time are actually Japanese imported units that have language configurable test modes (almost all Model 1/2 games). While the AAMA has said this and all Japanese games list this warning text, I've never heard of any litigation around this issue.
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