Does anyone else find that games today are just too good and the nostalgia wears off pretty quickly when playing old arcade games at a bar or wherever?

I agree. Went to barcade in Manhattan. Lots of classic games but the nostalgia has worn off. Having said that I’m waiting for my raspberry pi retro gaming machine to be delivered with mame and 60 console emulators and 100,000+ games so maybe the nostalgia is still there

But those pinball machines…

Well scroll shooters were pretty okay.

Or Double Dragon and similar games.

I think the biggest difference for me is that old school games, you die too quickly, the game is too hard, and for ones that you have to use quarters for, we run out of money too fast. Most of these games are actually a lot of fun and the fun is extended when you can alter the difficulty or continue with infinite lives.

I think the biggest difference for me is that old school games, you die too quickly, the game is too hard, and for ones that you have to use quarters for, we run out of money too fast. Most of these games are actually a lot of fun and the fun is extended when you can alter the difficulty or continue with infinite lives.

I love the arcade cabinet restoration scene. Shout out to Galloping Ghosts

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I think that's pretty much the purpose of arcade cabinets, they were designed to be fun enough for people to want to play it, but also to be so hard it kicks you off the cabinet so you either spend your quarters to play again or to let someone else play and spend their quarters. It wouldn't make an arcade money if some kid hogged a machine for hours off of one quarter

I think it is. Big difference as adults in a modern world is we have emulators and raspberry pi and the ability to basically call up any games we remember as kids, play them for a few minutes and move on. I recall being like 7, at my local malls arcade and with a handful of quarters trying to decide which games to play to make it last.

Actually I finally fulfilled a lifelong dream and got an arcade cabinet. I only had it set to unlimited lives for a day and it sucked all the fun out because there were no steaks. I went back to quarter only and have a bunch of quarters lined up by the controls. This way you get unlimited lives but you still have to work for it a little which has made it fun again!

*Stakes

And you are right infinite lives breaks the fun of most arcade games. For me it was the simpsons. At this point I only ever play off one credit in the game and see how far I get

I have a mame cabinet. I certainly don't play it as much as my ps5. However I will never ever ever get tired of the OG Tetris. I used to dream about pieces falling

Looking back (I was an 80s kid), it’s probably good that they cost a quarter. It slowed us down, made us really focus and prevented binge playing which is a critical consideration. Once Nintendo arrived on the scene, the binge playing lifestyle also arrived and it has only gotten worse. Some people can handle. I watched two guys in the dorms get kicked out of school (one for Starcraft addiction, the other N64 in general). It has enormously changed society, good and bad.

One of my son’s classmates invited him to hang out for the day. I drove my son to his friends house and went passed the open garage. My jaw dropped. It was a fully working 80s/90s arcade. His father collects old arcade games, gets them refurbished and sells them or keeps the ones that were special to him. I got invited into their house and it was full of working arcade games. His father showed me around and said I could stay and play whatever I wanted. And I did. Best play date EVER.

I once got to play at a private event at an arcade where everything was set to infinite lives. I spent the entirety of the 2 or 3 hours at one machine (I think Streets of Rage) and we didn't beat it. That was definitely a quarter sucker and I regret not taking the time to explore the other games there. Having stakes definitely changed how you play.

You see, I find the opposite is true. Today’s games are more story and less game, are much easier, and way too long. These older arcade games get funner when you realize you can complete them on a single credit. They are hard but that’s what makes them rewarding.

Any advice on where I could go about getting a good mame cabinet? Thanks!

Arcade operators must have hated that one deaf, dumb, and blind kid.

No. I find that games today are too immersive, too demanding of your time and attention. I prefer old arcade games because I can pick them up and put them down a couple of times in an hour. That helps prevent them from becoming life-consuming time sinks.

I am sorry, I don't know. I got mine as a gift. It just showed up on a semi one day

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This. If you look at sales materials for old pinball and arcade machines they explicitly talk about revenue generation and returns on investments.

I also choose this kid’s father.

I worked at an arcade bar, and we started a pinball league with the 5 pinball machines we had. Unfortunately they were always breaking down and quite costly, so we had to host the league 1 night a month to keep up. Well the league took it into their own hands to host the other 3 nights at their homes with their personal collections. The eldest of the group, had a basement with 71 pinball machines. I saw a video of it as I wasn’t in the league, but some of the players valued his collection at over $1 million worth of pinball machines. All kept up and maintained by the man. Which makes him, the man.

Most people either make their own. Either by retrofitting an existing commercial cabinet or making their own from scratch.

It's not that games today are good, it's that they're addiction factories. They're designed to keep giving you psychological rewards to get you to keep playing. It's the reason why every game keeps getting level systems and loot drops even when they don't help keep the game interesting - they're just skinner boxes that are training you to enjoy the experience.

That's not to say older games didn't also use them at times, but they are a whole lot more prevalent in modern AAA productions.

Also as others have mentioned, older games are generally not designed to take up as much time as modern games.

You could find somebody selling an arcade1up cab for cheap and then put a Pandora Box inside it. That’s what I did and it’s fuckin badass. Or you can put in a raspberry pi in it instead, whichever you want, they are both great!

No lmao tf

Yes we had limited quarters and were forced to learn to make the most of them ! I was never that great but when I recently went to a bar with retro games , I beat the high score !! That deeply embedded fear that it would be over if I died again kicked right in 😂

Addams Family pinball selling for 10k is not surprising. But 15 years ago it was not junk, it would’ve sold for probably 4k-not an amount I would ‘toss in the bin’

Galloping ghosts is the best! So many fighting games

Recroommasters will supposedly be back in business soon. They were one of the good ones.

Totally - if the mechanics are solid in the first place it still holds up. Final fight and NBA jam are two shining examples.

Pinball is the best thing ever.

"“There’s a pinball machine, a 1966 electromechanical model we’re just about to put on sale, and we’ll refuse to sell that to nine out of 10 people who contact us because we know it won’t be suitable for them. These machines are like classic cars: they are specialist pieces of equipment and need constant care. If I sell it to someone who just wants a working machine, they’ll be fed up after five minutes – we’ve got to choose the right customer for it. Someone who is able to tinker.”"

Liar. You don't reimport containers of games to NOT sell them.

My second pinball machine was an electromechanical game. Most of them (bingos excepted) are not THAT complicated that an average person couldn't get through them.....they're just lazy and don't want to learn. When you properly rebuild an EM game...they require very little other than being occasionally played to stay in good condition. I haven't had to do 'maintenence' on my Crescendo in 5 years, mechanically speaking.....just the normal cleaning and replacing balls and rubber. If you're too lazy to do that, don't buy pinball machines.

Modern solid state games break just as much 8f not more, are more expensive to repair, and may require SMT soldering skills which is a hell of a lot more of an ask than adjusting a damn leaf switch.

Grand Theft Auto Vice City almost got me flunked out my freshman year.

Search mame cabinet

Gee wow why thank you

Thank you will look into that

Did you use period tokens too? Bucket list item added thankyouverymuch

Major Havoc ftw

I disagree, arcades were far more expensive per hour for the vast majority of people ("Just one more quarter and I'll win"), even at prices of games back then. They were also much more addictive, consisting of short simple challenges and playthroughs but with a high difficulty curved. They were 100% engineered to get a player addicted.

With today's prices you can buy an average game on sale for like 30 attempts (25 cents is the 80's is nearly a dollar today).

You could easily bankrupt yourself from it, hell there's even a SpongeBob episode about it.

Also once you had the ability to save, you could turn it off and walk away without losing your current attempt.

It depends on the game. Multiplayer games with battle passes and microtransactions yes. But there's tons of quality single player games out there.

The thing people forget is that arcade games were addicting, and designed to be. They were relatively short high score challenges with a high difficulty. That's a lot more addictive than a modern single player game with chapters/missions and a definitive end.