Thursday, January 28, 2010

Goodbye Arcades

From June 5, 2008, Chicago Tribune. "Get your Frogger fix fast. The game room is down to its last quarter" by Christopher Borrelli.

I never was a big fan of them because of lack of reflexes and quarters, but just one more of the old things passing away from us with all this new technology. And that is arcades. It used to be that every town had one and definitely all tourist spots.

You'd walk by and find lots and lots of young folks hard at work spending their quarters. But those days are on their way out.

Gameland in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, closed in the fall of 2008. The building still sits empty today, but something appears to be going on inside.

It's machines, some dating back to 1982 will go silent. The place opened way back in 1944, the games will be auctioned off, a victim of XBox, old machines, big electric bills, and an overwhelming lack of youthful interest.

The manager said most visitors in the last years were older folks looking to reconnect with a memory.

There are still a few places remaining with the arcades, but these too will be going the way of the mom and pop or even the bigger record stores, a victim of the times.

Always Missing the Old Days. --DaCoot

2 comments:

Unknown said...

It may not be like it was in the 1980s, but there is still a following of classic gamers and arcades, although few and far between, to give them their fix. I may be a little biased, but Star Worlds Arcade in DeKalb, IL just celebrated their 25th anniversary!

RoadDog said...

We'll be out there this coming Friday. reckon I'll have to check it out. Thanks.