Back to the Arcade 80's in South Mall Allentown, PA (NEW Spot)

[Thenasty]

If I'm in the area, I will stop by fer sure.

[Thenasty]

I noticed that a a lot of the games using LCD monitor (not original CRT).

CRT is running out so, need to replace it with LCD.

This make you wonder, if it's an original BOARD running and not EMULATOR of some sort.

I seen TNT used an LCD on MOON CRESTA running on original board. Todd made a converter to make it work.

[pbj]

Arcade looks fun but man that mall is depressing.  We've had a couple of these arcades/barcades come and go recently in the Houston area, but a few of them have held on successfully. 

 

[BadMouth]

What strikes me most about the video is that there are actually people there enjoying it.

I've been in a couple where I had the place to myself.

We've had a couple of these arcades/barcades come and go recently in the Houston area, but a few of them have held on successfully. 

The places with staying power seem to make their money on craft beer.
Nothing wrong with that.   

Arcade looks fun but man that mall is depressing.   

The five anchor stores at our local mall sat empty for about five years then all of a sudden new stores moved into four of them.
The bad part is that I enter these stores from the outside and rarely go into the actual mall.  The last time I did, it looked about like this one.

The fifth store was purchased by a casino company years ago, but people are fighting the planned mini-casino... so it still sits empty.

[Shartzy]

I'm honestly kind of shocked that malls still have arcades. Or that there are even malls still. Last time I went to one, half the stores were closed and it was nothing but a food court and a bunch of kiosks for cell phone carriers.

[Ropi Jo]

That place is fantastic. Better than anything we had in North London BITD.

As a kid I looked forward to the annual family holiday to Leysdown. Mainly one arm bandits, bingo and dodgems. A few electro-mechanical games, but still awesome.

As a young teen, before I could drive we had to get the bus into Edmonton to hang out at a real sleazy pool hall where they had a Quasar.

Some of the chip shops / burger bars had some fruities (so did the pubs if we didn't get chucked out for being under age).

There was a greasy spoon by the railway station in Brimsdown that had a Space Invaders (I think is was anyway)

Went to Majorca and the hotel had a Scramble. Think it was the latest thing. My fav to this day.

Then I started college and they had a Defender and a beaten up mechanical pinball.

Once we got our car licenses we could get to Southend and that was just paradise.

Last went to the arcades at Southend around 20 yrs ago and it was dreadfull. Nothing but pushers, grabbers, bingo and redemptions. The odd driver but the automation never worked so boring as hell. And £2 a go!!! If they actually worked maybe I wouldn#t have minded the price, but this was just a joke.

An arcade like the one in the video is so special but in Broken Britain it would be trashed in no time.

[RandyT]

I'd go there just to play L.A. Machine Guns.  That's an experience you just can't get at home.  This kind of machine, along with a bunch of pinball machines are probably key to any kind of business longevity nowadays.   A bar in the back wouldn't hurt either.

But honestly, when I see a place like this, I almost feel bad for the owner.  You can tell that there has been a lot of love and commitment put into that space and the machines.  But without a lot of foot traffic going past the doors, it will need to be a destination unto itself.  And I'm honestly not sure how much of the population is left which will be attracted to a space like that as anything more than a 1 or 2 visit curiosity.

The guy doing the video kind of unintentionally summed it up.  "Scramble?  Never heard of that one."  The poor guy probably didn't even drop a token in to see what he was missing out on before he left.

[Ropi Jo]

The guy doing the video kind of unintentionally summed it up.  "Scramble?  Never heard of that one."  The poor guy probably didn't even drop a token in to see what he was missing out on before he left.

Along with Defender this was the whole reason for me getting into Mame.

I'm amazed by the number of people my age who have never even heard of these 2 classics.

By the time I left the Majorcan hotel I owned the entire leader board on Scramble. The only time I even got on to a leader board in my life. Probably why it's holds it's place as my number 1. As for Defender, there was a Chinese guy who owned the leader board at the college. Signed himself as YEH. Watching him play was good enough for me.