FA+
Shop
2604
Views
Views
35
Favorites
Favorites
Category
All / All
Species Unspecified / Any
Size 1280 x 828
File Size 332.2 kB
Report this content
★
More from rabbi-tom
Listed in Folders
OLLLLLLDDDDD SCHOOLLLLL
This place, Nerdhaven video arcade opened up officially in Madison Wisconsin on Halloween night. For weeks I was watching this once long empty business front located on Cottage Grove road, just east of Monona slowly being filled with classic video games. And I mean CLASSIC, as in 'Golden age' games like Centipede, Frogger, Missile command, Digdug, Donkey Kong, Asteroids, Q-Bert, Dragon's Lair , Star Command, Tetris, Armor command, Red Baron, Space Ace and a host of numerous other games from the 80's and 90s. Well over 60 games.(*EDIT* I stand corrected, 115 games and counting https://www.nerdhavenarcade.com/arcades) Plus a huge variety of classic Bally's pin ball machines, including the infamous Xenon (AKA the Female orgasm game). Around 30 pinball games. (List here https://www.nerdhavenarcade.com/pinballs)
Neat thing is, the games still only cost a quarter (Actually a token you buy). Sadly the shop owners didn't plan on Covid -19 when they initially signed the lease lasting this long. They insist on mask wearing during game play. They have an all day unlimited play for $15.00!
They are closed Monday and Tuesdays, 3-9 Wednesdays, Thursdays, 11am-midnight Friday, Saturday, 11am-9 Sunday.
I really hope they can survive this pandemic, talking with the owner, he's even planning on filling the basement with more games. Basically he's a video game collector and allowing the public to play his games.
But after seeing a 'current video arcade' in Tucson , in a ex-Sears, where it was horrifically loud, mainly current Japanese games, all modern and horrifically expensive ($1.50-$2.50 per game) And you pay via a credit card or loaded game card. Even my partner, Richard Konkle, a huge fan of classic pinball machines, was disappointed they had only 4 pinball machines and they were set to difficult. He'd last at tops 2-3 minutes, mostly less than 30 seconds.He'd blow $1.50 for less than 2 minutes. Nerdhaven assured me they don't tweek the settings, they want you enjoying yourself!
Neat thing is, the games still only cost a quarter (Actually a token you buy). Sadly the shop owners didn't plan on Covid -19 when they initially signed the lease lasting this long. They insist on mask wearing during game play. They have an all day unlimited play for $15.00!
They are closed Monday and Tuesdays, 3-9 Wednesdays, Thursdays, 11am-midnight Friday, Saturday, 11am-9 Sunday.
I really hope they can survive this pandemic, talking with the owner, he's even planning on filling the basement with more games. Basically he's a video game collector and allowing the public to play his games.
But after seeing a 'current video arcade' in Tucson , in a ex-Sears, where it was horrifically loud, mainly current Japanese games, all modern and horrifically expensive ($1.50-$2.50 per game) And you pay via a credit card or loaded game card. Even my partner, Richard Konkle, a huge fan of classic pinball machines, was disappointed they had only 4 pinball machines and they were set to difficult. He'd last at tops 2-3 minutes, mostly less than 30 seconds.He'd blow $1.50 for less than 2 minutes. Nerdhaven assured me they don't tweek the settings, they want you enjoying yourself!
Category All / All
Species Unspecified / Any
Size 1280 x 828px
File Size 332.2 kB
Listed in Folders
That was a great game. I'm betting you never saw the follow up game called Red Baron. As far as I recall, the arcade by me was the only place that had it in the country. The place was so popular, they used to be the test marketing place for many coin op companies. including Atari.
Oh I saw i think all of the vector Graphic games, "Battlezone", "Red Baron", and the rarest one and I only saw one machine, "Tail Gunner" that was at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, that had a huge arcade in the 70's and 80's. Every time I went i would drop about a buck into Tail gunner.
I like that you advertised exactly where they are to drive more business to them. Too bad I'm about 2,000 miles away or I'd be going there on a regular.
God I miss arcades. I wish more would come back. And not ones with games that cost $150-$2.00 to play. I'll pay a cover fee to get into the arcade if the games were $25 to play again.
There used to be a franchise called "Nickle Nickle" that used this format. You payed a $10.00 fee to enter the arcade, and all of the games were rigged to take nickles. Ranging from 1-5 per play. With older games like Galaga, Pacman, Michael Jackson's Moonwalker, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the back of the arcade rigged for free play if you ran out of nickles.
God I miss arcades. I wish more would come back. And not ones with games that cost $150-$2.00 to play. I'll pay a cover fee to get into the arcade if the games were $25 to play again.
There used to be a franchise called "Nickle Nickle" that used this format. You payed a $10.00 fee to enter the arcade, and all of the games were rigged to take nickles. Ranging from 1-5 per play. With older games like Galaga, Pacman, Michael Jackson's Moonwalker, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the back of the arcade rigged for free play if you ran out of nickles.
Reminds me of the arcade we got over here, Quasars, which is not huge but is very fun and has a good mix of old and new and a nice pinball selection. I'm so glad they are still running even during the restrictions for Covid and hope they survive everything. I mostly would go for pinball. Once I get another job secure, I'll be sure to head back for more pinball goodness. :3
There is a local place up in Portland Or called Quarter World. They are in what used to be an old movie theater. They use the newer way to pay, but one thing they have that is cool, in the main part of the arcade, they have Tesla Coil and will put on a musical show with it.
https://www.quarterworldarcade.com/
https://www.quarterworldarcade.com/
I was just looking them up online. Did you know there is another in Portland?
Electric Castle's Wunderland https://www.wunderlandgames.com/movies.asp by coincidence also an old theater.
Looks like they are far away from the chaos that in Portland. Hopefully they will come out of the plague to entertain us one again.
Electric Castle's Wunderland https://www.wunderlandgames.com/movies.asp by coincidence also an old theater.
Looks like they are far away from the chaos that in Portland. Hopefully they will come out of the plague to entertain us one again.
Wunderland is okay. A far cry from what it was years ago. they had nickel arcades and at lease one of them was a free play once you pay the entrance fee. Now it's more like a Chuck E Cheese from what I have seen. There are 2... one off Hawthorn I think, and the other in Gresham.
In my youth, I thought I wanted to go into electronics. So I took a course to get an AA in Electronics engineering. Unfortunately, that meant I needed heavy math since nearly everything in electronics was a mathematics problem before you do much of anything, or was a problem in the software so coding. I dropped out and changed majors to Welding technology that depended upon knowledge, not analytics. And unfortunately, Welding and really all skilled trades are a gypsy business, you travel to the job, once the job is over, you wait around or go hunt up another job. You don't get in the Union, you don't get a retirement, and you get paid less than everyone else. My Dad told me to learn a trade and do that. I learned 30 trades, none of them were any good because I still had to work for all the worst bosses regardless of hard it was to get hired.
ANYWAY, the reason for this post: I finally after twelve years finally got a job working for an Arcade repairman company in Northern California where all the best games were. The circuit board inside the game can be changed to become anything, collecting arcade machines, both pinball and electronic are easy to change to something else. the original art deco like movie theater-style artwork graphics are difficult to find. The box is a cheap bunch of pressed wood. Pinball actually is harder to work on than any digital arcade game. I quit to get a job with a welding outfit, it paid more. on the circuit board, there is a dial (rheostat) that controls difficulty level. In pinball, it is a board of switches, at the top of the machine mounted on the inside right or left under the table. I still am amazed at how I remember so much of what I did to do the stuff to stay alive and I can still remember everything I used to do.
Hopefully, this guy can stay afloat until the vaccine comes out. I used to play the arcades while in a suit after doing cookie sales in my best jobs while carrying several thousand dollars in my pockets in small bills from all the deliveries I made earlier in the day, it was my bosses' money, not mine, but I like getting change for a hundred that was fun in 1982.
ANYWAY, the reason for this post: I finally after twelve years finally got a job working for an Arcade repairman company in Northern California where all the best games were. The circuit board inside the game can be changed to become anything, collecting arcade machines, both pinball and electronic are easy to change to something else. the original art deco like movie theater-style artwork graphics are difficult to find. The box is a cheap bunch of pressed wood. Pinball actually is harder to work on than any digital arcade game. I quit to get a job with a welding outfit, it paid more. on the circuit board, there is a dial (rheostat) that controls difficulty level. In pinball, it is a board of switches, at the top of the machine mounted on the inside right or left under the table. I still am amazed at how I remember so much of what I did to do the stuff to stay alive and I can still remember everything I used to do.
Hopefully, this guy can stay afloat until the vaccine comes out. I used to play the arcades while in a suit after doing cookie sales in my best jobs while carrying several thousand dollars in my pockets in small bills from all the deliveries I made earlier in the day, it was my bosses' money, not mine, but I like getting change for a hundred that was fun in 1982.
Comments