I would go to the local arcade if...

[cools]

There aren't any arcades that have video games local to me. There's an over 18's only fruity place round the corner, and another one further across town but that's it for about 10 miles, till you hit the coast. Then you're into train ride, then bus ride, then a 2 mile walk to get to a reasonable one. By that time I've spent half the cash I would've been using for games and it hardly seems worth it. So I've never bothered.

[theevilfunkster]

I still go to the arcades but I'd go a lot more if there were just a little bit more variety, every arcade in this town has Outrun 2 but none have SP Also cab maintenance, the only two Jamma cabs have **** controls and most of the racers have dodgy feedback. The broken seatbelt on the F-Zero AX means the hydrolics don't work any more.

[_xizor]

btw: Thanks for all the great comments!!

In North America the "Fruity" Arcades are called government owned or regulated. They are called VLTs (Video Lottery Terminals) and since the government regulates them they have modest payouts and mediocre locations outside of the Casinos. Usually they are cramped into a corner of a bar and there are no other games at all. Just VLTs.

The only locations across Western Canada that have any resemblance to an arcade are in the movie theaters. They will have anywhere from 8 - 24 games. Mostly older racing titles and general "PG" titles. One or two fighters at max. The locations are usually poorly maintained and there is almost no roll over in titles. There is a location close to my office that has not changed titles in 6 years now.

In a past life, I maintained the arcade at an amusement park. We had room for 16 titles plus pool tables, air hockey, pinball and the such. We would usually have 4-8 racing games (1 player cabs), a mix of standard fighting. (Marvel vs Capcom / Third Strike were standard fare) I would usually have a minimum of four Japanese or overseas titles playing. (Two player Gundam, Dimahoo and Monkey Ball were the last I put in)
Titles would be rolled three times a year usually. Twice in the summer months and one more time in the fall.

The one thing we wanted to get into was holding events, but found that it was taking a lot of time to manage the process.

Does anyone own or know of an arcade that does a good job of managing / holding events??

[John James Pacinelli]

In North America the "Fruity" Arcades are called government owned or regulated.

Arcades for homosexuals... ok... I don't judge

[Alec]

...they had some cave games i haven't played yet.

[John James Pacinelli]

...there was a local arcade.

[markedkiller78]

well iv been having good results some of my places here in ireland ,
First off i charge 3euro per hour and have the games on freeplay goes down well with the nannys who babysit the kids they both know how much time they have ,every half hour the wristband colour changes ,and you can only go in on the hour or the half hour .it suits me the operator.
normally 50 machines max 25 change games and 25 dedicated ie car gun games enough for both boys and girls .
when i opened first i charged per game lucky if i made 250euro to 300euro per day over the summer now its up to 1500 plus weekends doing 2500 per day
only takes two people to run max 100 people in at one time there has never been a row never had to bar people, no robberys because no coin in machine they just want to play as many games as possable in the hour or two ,free juke box max 5 songs can be played at anyone time great feelgud factor and if you nanny or parents spend 100 euro on the gamblers she gets a free token for two hours for the games room for the kids .Parents know where they are and what time to come back .

I need to bump this thread as I’ve never read it before

Hats off to you for making the business work. I know it’s not easy now-a-days to keep an arcade open, never mind make money. It sounds excellent & I cant wait to the first meet in Ireland

[poolchamp]

I need to bump this thread as I’ve never read it before

Hats off to you for making the business work. I know it’s not easy now-a-days to keep an arcade open, never mind make money. It sounds excellent & I cant wait to the first meet in Ireland

Cheers bud

[Molloy]

well iv been having good results some of my places here in ireland ,
First off i charge 3euro per hour and have the games on freeplay goes down well with the nannys who babysit the kids they both know how much time they have ,every half hour the wristband colour changes ,and you can only go in on the hour or the half hour .it suits me the operator.
normally 50 machines max 25 change games and 25 dedicated ie car gun games enough for both boys and girls .
when i opened first i charged per game lucky if i made 250euro to 300euro per day over the summer now its up to 1500 plus weekends doing 2500 per day
only takes two people to run max 100 people in at one time there has never been a row never had to bar people, no robberys because no coin in machine they just want to play as many games as possable in the hour or two ,free juke box max 5 songs can be played at anyone time great feelgud factor and if you nanny or parents spend 100 euro on the gamblers she gets a free token for two hours for the games room for the kids .Parents know where they are and what time to come back .

Where do you operate out of? They used to have a place operated like that above Supermacs in Galway. Practically lived in there back in the day. The only thing I've heard about operating a place like that is all the small kids absolutely destroy the joysticks. Still, if you were making that kind of moolah you'd be able to afford to replace them.

For me a crucial part of an arcade is a range of gamestyles. Most arcades in Ireland only have lightgun and driving games. I'd like to see an even selection of driving, lightgun, Vs fighter, scrolling fighter, shmup, sports, pinball, dance, puzzle, platformer, retro etc. There's no reason to go back to a place because there are the same games at every location. The other element is price. You should be able to get a couple of hours of entertainment at the arcade for about the same price as a couple of hours at the cinema, but it'll end up costing you 3 times as much most of the time.

[tmcleroy]

Okay, since I've had similar aspirations for a couple years now, here's what I see as needed for me and others to go to arcades again.

1) Working games - Can't have broken or otherwise nonfunctional games eating up floor space. I think the japanese were onto something in the use of universal cabinets. Game dies, replace it, maybe change a marquee and be done with it quickly and efficiently.

2) Perfect controls - This is an extension of the first but I think it's just as important, and the most overlooked. I can't explain how many times I've been to an arcade where the games are lit up, but it either doesn't having working coin mechs to accept credits, or even worse, it takes your money, and then the controls are so screwed up that you can't effectively play. I think this is the biggest reason arcades in north america have failed big time.

3) New games - Not saying I'm not a fan of the good old games, but no one cares about your arcade if you have nothing new to offer. Lots of arcades (near their death) just stagnated with their game selection, trying to leech out the last few dollars out of a 10 year old game. The unfortunate thing here is that the investment required into new arcade games is really freaking high so one game that doesn't earn its keep can possibly destroy you.

4) An experience - The reason most "arcades" have nothing but light gun, dance, and race simulators is because they can (and have to) charge more for a more immersive experience. Again, kinda hard to make the old school game types do any new tricks, but I think the new hi-def cabinets 1 player per cab head to head setups are at least helping in that department (even if it does cost an arm and a leg).

5) Cost - Unfortunately we've been spoiled here in the US. While japan has been charging 100 yen or more for games forever as far as I can tell, we have been paying 50 cents until recently. It's going to take a while to get people used to paying a dollar for a credit. Now that games cost more, operators are forced to charge customers more, and that **** people off...especially with how difficult arcade games HAVE to be. This one has been rattling in my brain for a while now. It seems like anyone trying to charge too much per credit dies, and anyone trying to charge a flat fee dies too, so I'm wondering if a combination of the two is in order. Charge a cover rate just to cover cabinet maintenance and then a reasonable per credit charge for the games. That way you keep the non-paying cabinet rapers out for the most part, and people don't feel like they are getting ripped when the computer/another patron kicks their **** and they have to dump in more money to continue.

6) Events - People like to compete. Gotta have events on a near regular basis. If the big arcade companies want to get arcade games to thrive in the US again they need to start sponsoring tournaments, and working with operators to stir up demand and competition.

7) Exclusivity - I know this is the age of the consoles, but arcade games just aren't big enough anymore to have a lot of lead time on the console release. To make things worse the companies usually make the console version better than the arcade release. Either by fixing bugs, or adding more modes and characters. The arcade version NEEDS to keep evolving (at minimal cost to operators) to always have a leg up on the home release. If there's no incentive to playing at the arcade, why do it? I know operators have no control over this, and that's why the developers, and publishers need to step up and make it happen.

That's all I can think of for now. Hopefully that's all mostly coherent...

^^^This man knows what he is talking about. My local arcade (Arcade UFO in Austin, Texas USA) has about 30 candies, about 5 of which they switch games on at least a few times a week and one of the cabs has a CPSII 18 in 1 with instructions on how to pick a game (great idea IMO). 8 of their cabs are Delta 32s on which they run SSFIV on 360s and BlazBlue and KOFXIII on Taito X2s. Some of their regulars include 3rd strike, SSFIV, BlazBlue, MvC2, Metal Slug 6, Tetris, Tekken 6 BR, Arcana Heart, and a few cave shmups and puzzle games. They also have a decent selection of dedicabs like DDR, Time Crisis 4, Pop'n Music, some DJ game and some really fun racing game which I can't remember the name of. At night and on the weekends the place is usually packed with hardcore fighting types and a few casual observers, of course I'm sure much of the arcade's popularity is due to the fact that it's located extremely close to a number of student housing places for UT students. They also hold events pretty frequently and have extremely nice Sanwa sticks and buttons on every cab. UFO is a wonderful example to follow if you plan to cater to the hardcore...which is probably not the most profitable thing for most locations but hey, I guess it works for them, being located right in the middle of a large college town.

[ratson]

Nice bump on a 2 year old topic,

[davewellington]

Thanks for bumping though, good read Our local arcade is has 5 non-dedicated cabinets, with two of those being Tekken 5DR and SF4. More JAMMA games, and less vandals / idiot teenagers (who roam in packs and are incredibly low class) would make me more interested in arcades. Would be good if they dropped the swipe card system, but what can you do.

[pubjoe]

It's funny actually. I went to Eastbourne Pier the other day for the first time in ages and there are now a lot less fruit machines and more arcade games again. All big simulator driving cabs (or gun/dance/football/golf and ticket prize games) with the fruit machines mostly contained in their own area at the back. It's almost gone back to the same arrangement of 20 years ago.

My boy had a go of the afterburner remake. Looks pretty good.

[subbie]

I know it's an old topic but for me what would get me back is...

1. Good location (like near where I live or work)
2. Good/Decent game selection (not hard to accomplish)
3. Upkeep on the machines (They have to work god darn it!!)
4. A clean environment

that's really all I need. Sadly I don't think there are any good arcades left in downtown Toronto. Sucks because when I lived in Montreal there was an OK place a block away from me. Me and my Wife would go there quite frequently for an hour or two on the weekends to just have fun and relax. They didn't have much in the way of new games (other then SF4) but that was fine since 99% of the time everything worked, the place was kept clean and if yo go at the right time there is nobody really there so you can freely go from one machine to the next.

[Devil Soundwave]

I still go into the Trocadero once a week and play Puzzle Bobble 2. Silly really as I have the game at home, but I do love the Jaleco machines in there...

[tmcleroy]

Do most of your local arcades take cards or tokens or legal tender? Arcade UFO here takes legal tender (quarters and dollar coins) so I assumed that was the norm.

[Devil Soundwave]

Cash.

[Casey120]

I would go to any local arcade if there actually was one to start with

[tony starks]

I still go into the Trocadero once a week and play Puzzle Bobble 2. Silly really as I have the game at home, but I do love the Jaleco machines in there...

Where is that located in Troc my dude?

[yosai]

It's in one of the Ponies that are in the arcade upstairs and to the right as you come in from the Coventry Street entrance.

There are two sets (seven machine in total) one set on the lower level behind the escalators, and the other upstairs overlooking the elevators.