The Death of the Arcade - digg this
Geek's geek Wil Wheaton has written up a post both on his blog,WWdN: In Exile: Geek in Review: Pac-Man Fever, and Suicide Girls (not gonna link that generally NSFW site) that has to do with the passing of an American icon, the video game arcade.
I have to say that as a person born in the seventies I have many happy memories of plugging buckets full of quarters into arcade games.
When I was a wee laddy in Arkansas there was an arcade that you could go to on a dreary Saturday morning and pay just a few ducats to play for four hours. It was here that I first saw Dragon's Lair and Space Ace. I remember playing a game that involved steering a hook and ladder truck. Tapper, Centipede, Pac-Man, Wizards of Wor, all of these games and more filled the smallish space with a cacophony.
I remember a game show that involved besting your opponent at a variety of video games.
I remember playing Ms. Pac-Man with my Mom while we waited for our laundry to dry.
As I got older I remember hitting the arcade with my best buddy Bear and blowing serious change on Zaxxon, Cabal, and a side scrolling plane shoot-em up that he rocked at.
I remember the game room in the basement of Mendenhall.
I don't know that I lament the Arcade's passing as much as Wil does and I'm not sure that it's gone all together. I do know that if I ever get to build my own house though, it will have a game room and I will teach my kids the joys of hearing "Prepare to qualify."
