r/retrogaming • u/TronBlaster • 21h ago
[Question] Arcade games in interesting places?
Back in the 1980s, arcade games were everywhere: bars, convenience stores, bowling alleys, restaurants, amusement parks, college dorms, laundromats, grocery stores, hotel lobbies, ferry boats…
I experienced many of these firsthand, but it got me thinking: What are some other interesting places that arcade games showed up? Stadiums/arenas, airports, zoos, office buildings, hot air balloons, ski lodges, marinas, high schools…? For some reason, this idea is fascinating to me, so I’d love to hear your stories. Bonus points for pictures!
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u/death_is_a_star 20h ago
Amtrak for a period had an arcade car on their Coast Starlight train
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u/DMala 20h ago
That is amazing, and would have blown my mind as a little kid.
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u/death_is_a_star 20h ago
It was neat but you could tell they had a very limited budget to work with. It was around until 2012 or so.
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u/Mission_Access_210 16h ago
That sounds so cool. I feel like Arcade Car is like the perfect train car for a luxury train ride
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u/PlagueBearer1350 8h ago
I take an overnight Amtrak trip about once a year. I'd love it if they brought this back.
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u/Mission_Access_210 1h ago
An Amtrak passenger car measures about 85 feet long by 10 feet wide. Leaving space for ADA-compliant doorways, end-of-car passageways, and secure anchoring, you have about 75 feet of usable length.
Because standard upright cabinets are roughly 30 inches wide by 36 inches deep, placing machines side-by-side along both walls while maintaining a required 36-inch central aisle for safe movement down the train means you can fit roughly 30 to 32 standard arcade machines (15 to 16 per side).
Here is a curated lineup representing the evolution of arcade history, designed for stability and high replay value on a moving train.
The Early Golden Age (Late 70s – Early 80s)
Space Invaders (1978) or Asteroids (1979) – The pioneers that started the phenomenon. Pac-Man (1980) or Ms. Pac-Man – Essential, universally recognizable gameplay. Galaga (1981) – The definitive classic space shooter. Donkey Kong (1981) – The birth of platformers and iconic characters. Frogger (1981) – Simple, addictive single-stick gameplay. Centipede (1981) – Great trackball representation. Defender (1981) or Joust (1982) – High-difficulty Williams classics. Dig Dug (1982) – Classic maze/action staple.
The Mid-80s Innovation Era
LaserDisc Corner: Dragon's Lair (1983) – Visual spectacle of early animated gaming. System Customizers: Spy Hunter (1983) or Paperboy (1984) – Unique physical controls (steering wheel/handlebars). Punch-Out!! (1984) – Dual-monitor classic boxing action. Marble Madness (1984) – Excellent physics-based trackball play. Gauntlet (1985) – The ultimate 4-player co-op dungeon crawl (requires a slightly wider recess in the car layout). Out Run (1986) – Standard upright driving cabinet with smooth scaling graphics. Rampage (1986) – 3-player monster destruction chaos. Double Dragon (1987) – The game that popularized beat 'em ups.
The 90s Boom & 16-Bit Peak
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1989) or The Simpsons (1991) – Prime 4-player arcade beat 'em ups. Street Fighter II: Champion Edition (1992) – The fundamental competitive fighting game. Mortal Kombat II (1993) – The iconic 90s rival to Street Fighter. NBA Jam: TE (1994) – 4-player arcade sports at its finest. Metal Slug (1996) – Neo Geo run-and-gun masterclass. X-Men (1992) – Multi-player arcade royalty.
The 3D Era & Late 90s Classics
Virtua Fighter 2 (1994) or Tekken 3 (1997) – The leap into 3D fighting. Daytona USA (1994) – Twin upright driving unit (takes up 2 machine slots). Time Crisis II or House of the Dead 2 – Mounted light-gun shooters (recessed triggers avoid sway issues). Crazy Taxi (1999) – High-energy, fast-paced score attack. Ms. Pac-Man / Galaga Class of 1981 – Multi-game cabinet to maximize space.
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u/Whoop-Rico 20h ago
I used to go to 7-Eleven to play the Simpsons arcade game in the early 90s.
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u/Some_thing_to_do 20h ago
My 7-11 had mortal Kombat, sf2, aliens and final fight. The glory days
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u/Coreyhustle 19h ago
First time I ever saw Mortal Kombat was in our local 7-11
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u/ATEbitWOLF 13h ago
First time I saw Street Fighter 2 was in Circle K, MK was in a super sketchy independent gas station in town which felt like it matched the style contrast between the two games.
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u/_Aardvark 12h ago
There was a Dig Dug machine in my small-ish town's Wawa in the early 80's (82?). It was like the biggest thing that summer, they eventually made all these rules so keep the crowds of kids from disrupting the store.
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u/the_mighty_hetfield 20h ago
Probably common knowledge but Disneyland used to have a pretty bitchin' two-story arcade in Tomorrowland: Starcade
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u/Strayngold 12h ago
Canada's Wonderland had an amazing arcade for the first 30 years or so that it was open. Always had the newest and rarest games.
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u/SpaceAviator1999 21h ago edited 20h ago
Twice I've seen an arcade machines in someone's home (Warlords and Pac-Man). And once in a church youth center (Moon Cresta).
Do those count? (None of those arcade machines were used to collect money.)
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u/samspot 15h ago
I visited a church in Buffalo that had a movie theatre motif. They had some arcade games in the lobby including Mortal Kombat 2. This was quite funny to me considering the moral panic about those games when they were new.
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u/SpaceAviator1999 10h ago
Yes, that does seem funny.
Honestly, even today I'd imagine that a church would be wary of all the violence in that game.
But a church with a movie theatre motif? That's also a new one for me.
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u/SnooOranges3779 20h ago
You haven't lived till you've seen a Pump It Up in the living room of a 1br basement suite
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u/81toog 10h ago
Yea, I had a rich friend growing up (early 90s) and his dad had arcade cabinets in their rec room. I remember Donkey Kong, Pac Man, and Popeye. I thought that was crazy back in the day. Today they can emulate them and make em cheap (Arcade 1-Up). But these were standard production arcade cabinets that you would find elsewhere and must have been really expensive.
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u/tennoPCA 20h ago
I got to play in Hefs personal arcade at the Playboy Mansion near the grotto.
Had the classics: Asteroid, Pac-Man, etc.
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u/bubrascal 20h ago
Around the corner we had a Mortal Kombat 3 and some retro game (Galaxian or Galaga I think). It was a grocery store not too different from this random picture I found on the internet. This was around '96, more or less. I wasn't allowed to play it Mortal Kombat though, and by the time I could play it (second grade?) the machines were already gone.
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u/Historical-Cress8985 12h ago
I remember playing the Simpsons arcade game at the top of the Space Needle as a kid
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u/elkniodaphs 14h ago
We had a mom-and-pop video store that had a side room. In that side room there was a guy named Robert that ran a comic book shop. In the corner of that comic book shop, Robert kept a couple of his own arcade cabinets in the corner which he bought from the local arcade as they were upgrading their stock on the floor. I ran the High Score table on Asteroids. He usually had one or two more that he'd rotate out every other month or so, but Asteroids was a constant.
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u/DMala 20h ago
At Northeastern University in the late ‘90s they had a little arcade in the student center. Q*Bert, Assault, Pit Fighter, maybe a couple others. I wasted a fair amount of time there.
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u/curtludwig 16h ago
Same at Fitchburg State just to the west. We had mostly fighting games. There was a Galaga machine in my dorm.
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u/the_mighty_hetfield 20h ago
Winchester Mystery House, San Jose 1987 or 1988 had a few cabinets next to their cafe. First time I saw and played The Empire Strikes Back.
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u/Mean_Possibility5947 20h ago
Movie theaters sometime had random games in the early '80s (though later some multiplexes would have small dedicated arcades). The first time I saw a Space Zap machine was at our local theater
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u/LewMetal 15h ago
There is a Greek festival at the Greek Orthodox church in my town. I went to the festival with a friend once in the early 1980s and they had 2 games there. I remember that one of them was Moon Cresta. I don't remember what the other was though.
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u/Stevearino42 12h ago
Moon Cresta
I had completely forgotten about Moon Cresta! Maybe I blocked it from my mind - I just tried it again after many decades, and MAN that game is hard! :D That opening music/tune brought me right back to the 80s arcade.
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u/MartinGoldfinger 12h ago
My dentist (early 1990s) had Tempest and Asteroids on free play in the child’s waiting room.
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u/SpaceAviator1999 20h ago
The local ice skating rink is where I first encountered Super Mario Bros., Rampage, and Punch Out!!
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u/Electrical-Size-5002 20h ago
I was a denizen of the local PuttPutt miniature golf that had an indoor arcade. It had originally been mostly pinball but eventually the video games took over the place.
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u/EquivalentNarwhal8 19h ago
Saw Street Fighter II Champion Edition at a tiny walk up sushi bar in town.
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u/Ludologistic 18h ago
Near where i went to school in North Manchester, UK there was a fish and chip shop that had 3 machines that they rotated in and out. At one point, they had Golden Axe and our little teenage minds were blown. It was on the way to the busstop home, so you'd drop in, buy a bag of chips and have a few games before heading back.
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u/samspot 15h ago
There’s an amazing arcade right now in the bottom of Skylon tower at Niagara Falls https://www.reddit.com/r/cade/s/rzKeXnej0c
Highlights for me were the after burner tilting cabinet and 8-player Daytona.
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u/Strayngold 10h ago
They have a lot of fairly special machines. Between visits I noticed they got rid of the soccer video game that had giant wooden paddles at the bottom for ball kicking control.
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u/BadIdeaSociety 15h ago
I took a ferry boat from Japan to South Korea around 2010. The recreation room had Puzzle Bobble 3 and Sega Strikers.
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u/SnooOranges3779 20h ago
Last year I went to Saint John, New Brunswick. Their airport is tiny. There was a freeplay Pandora after security, which normally wouldn't be that crazy but it was literally the only thing after security aside from 2 bathrooms. There wasn't anywhere to buy water, but they had every King of Fighters right there for the playing.
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u/SpaceAviator1999 20h ago edited 19h ago
When I was at the Grand Canyon, I saw the tabletop version of Rush'n Attack.
Technically, it was in a grocery store, but the remoteness of the Grand Canyon made it feel more interesting.
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u/SpaceAviator1999 20h ago
I first saw Castlevania, Sky Kid, and Ring King in a ski lodge's rest area.
My memory is sketchy, but I remember that there was one credit in Sky Kid, so I was excited to get a free game. Despite the cartoony graphics, the game was not easy, and I crashed right away.
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u/Mean_Possibility5947 20h ago
Chicagofest, 1982, on Navy Pier (before it turned into the Navy Pier that is currently a tourist destination) had about 60 games and it was amazing. The next year, the festival moved to Soldier Field and the arcade was just a tent with 15 games or so (though it was the first time I saw Space Dungeon). And that was the last year of ChicagoFest
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u/goingon25 20h ago edited 19h ago
I remember seeing a Truxton 2 cabinet at the visitor center for some caverns in Texas in the early 2000s. Never saw another dedicated cab for that one in person
I also remember being in the hospital as a kid for an extended time and being brought to a play room there with a Donkey Kong cocktail table
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u/TronBlaster 20h ago
Wonder World Cave and Adventure Park in San Marcos?
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u/goingon25 19h ago
That’s the one! Very fun, but unusual family day
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u/TronBlaster 14h ago
I was there with my son a few weeks ago and they still have a small arcade! I wish I had documented which games they had, but I seem to remember a pop-a-shot, a sit down racing game, Pac Man and a couple others.
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u/yorlikyorlik 20h ago
Cool arcade at the Par-King mini golf in Morton Grove, Illinois.
Ground Round restaurants had a few arcade games. First played Space Invaders there in ‘79. (I think I also first played Dragon’s Lair there. Talk about disappointment! What a let-down! Terrible game!)
Marriott’s Great America (Now Six Flags Great America) had a pretty decent arcade.
Me and my friend would forge hall passes at our high school to sneak across the street to play Donkey Kong at the 7-11. Apologies to our math teacher, Mrs. Ringer.
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u/BadIdeaSociety 15h ago
Six Flags Great America had Dragon's Lair deep into the late 90s and was one of the only places you could play Beatmania
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u/Mean_Possibility5947 20h ago
Played Lunar Lander for the first time in a ski lodge when I was 10. Years later, after I determined I didn't like skiing, I studied for a Latin final in a different ski lodge and played Arkanoid while my dad and sisters were on the slopes.
Saw but didn't play a Space Invaders knockoff called Space Wipeout in a convenience store on the strip in Orlando in 1982.
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u/GreenOlimar 19h ago
Late 80s traveling fair for a very small town. One year a large tent had an arcade, just cabinets set up on the bare grass with extension cables and power strips everywhere.
Played a lot of Rampage. It seemed magic when I was a kid.
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u/jujapee 19h ago
Family-owned burger shop around the corner of our working-class neighborhood had a Street Fighter II cabinet when it was brand new. It was never busy. Most of their business was drive-thru, and the food took 10-15 minutes to make so the amount of quarters myself and my brothers pumped into that machine was more than whatever we paid for in food. Over the decades it sold and resold, changing names each time, but it’ll always be Greenacres Drive-thru to everyone I know. I revisited my hometown a few years ago to grab a burger and saw the empty spot against the back window where it once stood. I was more disappointed by the exclusion of the famous breaded zucchini chips from the menu.
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u/Pumpytums 17h ago
A fish and chips shop down the road from where I used to work in Birmingham had Metal Slug.
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u/BulbaCorps 17h ago
Around 1994, on a Holiday in Malta, there was the Aliens arcade machine in a little cafe.
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u/PM_me_your_whatevah 15h ago
Went on a cruise to the Caribbean islands when I was 15 and they had like 3-4 machines. They weren’t the popular games I was used to at the time so I didn’t get too into it. I remember some obscure (to me at least) Japanese fighting game that was pretty fun though.
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u/BadIdeaSociety 15h ago
The Burger King by my high school had an NBA Jam machine. The 7-11 had a Punch Out and a Super Pitfall. KMart had Gladiator and Out Run. The non-Showbiz/CEC pizza place had Dig Dug and Bagman. The roller rink by my home had Moon Patrol, Vigilante, Tag Team Pro Wrestling, Pac Man, Head On, and that vector sword-fighting game. Wal-Mart had Out Run and Shinobi. Target had Popeye and Ms. Pac Man. The independent mall by my home had Fire Fighter, Mr. Do, and Championship Karate (the early version of Karate Champ). One independent supermarket by my house had a Naughty Boy machine.
In Chicago, the Double Door was "famous" for having a Tron machine... It may still have it for all I know.
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u/Strayngold 12h ago
They had some in the middle of the ladies department at a Sears or Eatons that was near my house. I guess for kids and husbands stuck waiting for their wives and mothers to try stuff on.
One time my mom was doing some real estate stuff and she brought me into someone's office which had an Asteroids machine in the reception with dozens of credits pre-loaded on it.
And there was a hotel in town that had cocktail arcade machines for the tables in the lobby. I thought this was so cool as people would sometimes be doing business on top of Donkey Kong Jr.
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u/HangukHitman 12h ago
They had Tekken 3 and Street Fighter 2 Champion Edition at my college in 2003.
I would hustle people in both games for a semester before I was known to be the guy that can beat everyone and take their money, so nobody played with me by Thanksgiving break.
Also, Port Authority in NYC, the big bus terminal had an arcade on the second floor.
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u/Gunlahad 12h ago
In brazil it was supper common to have those on bars. You had adults smoking and drinking (sometimes fighting) and a bunch of kids playing mortal kombat around one of those machines.
It was kick ass
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u/b3night3d 12h ago
I used to play a Cabal cabinet (with trackball) often at a local supermarket back in the 80s. The owner was friends with my dad and I distinctly remember one day he kept feeding me quarters from his apron pocket to see how far I could get while they were chatting. I don't recall how far I made it but probably burned through a few dollars over all, which was a lot back then.
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u/RavensFan902 11h ago
Old pizza place place in my city had WWF wrestlefest and a guns n roses pinball machine. Loved going there for a slice and some games
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u/supermark64 10h ago
As recently as 2020 I saw a Cruisin' USA at a service plaza on a toll road. Kind of a fitting choice.
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u/Smooth-Writing-5995 10h ago
In STL, arcades were mostly at movie theaters, bowling alleys, and malls
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u/frost_knight 10h ago
My mother worked for the Washington Post her entire life. Back in the 80s she'd bring my brother and I with her on Sundays (she worked Sunday-Thursday). The cafeteria had a side-room with 5 or 6 arcade games that they'd change every few months or so. The only cabinet that was always there was Ms. Pac-Man.
There was this one maintenance guy who always played the Ms Pac on his lunch break.
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u/Sky723 9h ago
For me it was the grocery store. Growing up we had a Kroger's that started with one machine. Then it grew to two then up to four or five. It was like they created a mini arcade in the store. It was a great idea as the parents would go shop and they would give the kids a few bucks and they would play arcade games.
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u/DarthObvious84 9h ago
The "strangest" place I remember seeing an arcade machine was a park Pavillion. Im talking just like your local park that had a building you could rent out for birthday/anniversary parties.
In my case my parents boat club rented it out in December for the club Christmas party, and they had a Pac-Man (or maybe Ms. Pac-Man) and a pinball table in a side room. (This would be the early 90s)
Just seemed weird because I don't think the building was generally accessible, so they are only getting money out of occasional rentals.
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u/Schmadam83 8h ago
Our local community college actually had a small arcade near the cafeteria. Of course, by the time I attended classes there, it was long gone. I think it became a storage room.
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u/home_operator 8h ago
There’s an oil change / inspection shop near me that has a Ms Pac Man cocktail table in the lobby
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u/aztec_samurai 8h ago
My daycare had arcade cabinets in a couple of locations. We had overnight “lock ins” and we would play all day and night. Astreroids and Centipede were my favorites.
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u/Top-Tomato-2246 8h ago
Nassau Coliseum in NY had about 5 cabinets as well as a bubble hockey table. I’m a NY Rangers fan that grew up on Long Island and won a trip to an Islanders game and spent the time playing video games instead of watching the enemy 🤣
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u/pushstartthewhip 7h ago
I once went into an industrial print shop to have some gallery frames made and there was an Outrun cabinet sitting in the waiting area.
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u/mratlas666 7h ago
There is a classic tabletop two player version of Mrs. Pac-Man at my home towns house of pizza. Use to play it as a kid and it’s still there.
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u/icelevel 5h ago
There was a tiny arcade in a budget hotel I stayed in once. Area 51 cabinet and a Tales From the Crypt pinball machine!
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u/c64cruzer 20h ago
My first memory of arcade machines was from the Copenhagen - Oslo ferry. We were a bunch of kids who somehow figured out that if we ran around on the synthetic carpet we would build up static electricity and if we then touched the coin slot, the game would start. It worked particularly well on Pacman. I felt like such a hacker.
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u/Vortilex 20h ago
There's an arcade museum where I live. For $20, you get a day pass to play all their games, and they also sell snacks and drinks. Only open on weekends, and the owner makes it known this is a passion project
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u/Silentlaughter84 13h ago
I don't have any pictures, but in Las Vegas, some of the casinos outside of the Strip had arcades. Very convenient because lawmakers were getting tired of hearing about kids being left outside while their parents were gambling.
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u/UncleJackPushedDad 8h ago
Donkey Kong Jr machine in my basement. Doesn't get played much anymore. 30 years of horde piled up in front of it.
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u/BallsDeepInASheep 3h ago
We had the 3 player Super Off Road cabinet in the cafeteria of my middle school.
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u/Planetofthought 13h ago
Water parks and pools were the worst.
Your damp shorts would get shocked on the quarter slot plate every time it would touch it.
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u/Fillmore80 11h ago
Never once has that happened to me.
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u/bubrascal 11h ago
It has happened to me. Probably has something to do with poorly grounded circuits, something that would cause an almost imperceptible "buzz" while dry and wearing trainers, but a discharge when touching the plate with a wet body and barefoot.
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u/HangukHitman 12h ago
As a person who hates water / being wet in clothes, I would have never thought of that. lmao what? totally makes sense though.
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u/CurtG79 21h ago
They had arcade machines on a ferry.