Coin-ops

So, how much money did you waste down thems old machines? I blew quite a few pound coins as a kid on Spiderman, Time Crisis, Space Dual and the like, and wondered if anyone else recalls the glory days when you were lucky to have an 8-bit console at home and went down the arcades for your serious gaming?

I remember blowing 5 dollars in quarters to beat Aliens.

No, I don't remember those days. I wasn't aware of the existence of arcade machines until years after playing NES for the first time.

I didn't went to the arcade before the snes was out. A went a few times after then I forgot about it for years because I didn't had any money. I started to go back every Friday to the arcades for about 8 months now and used at least 700$ just on DDR and maybe 10$ on drummania(I just started). I don't care about money now that I'm full of it.

I remember those days. I'd put in a few quarters in games like Gyruss, Gorf, Arkanoid, 1943, and various pinball games like Star Trek (70s version, not that cheesy one I've seen recently). Eventually, I was good enough on Arkanoid where I could waste nearly an hour playing on a single quarter and beat the game with a score few could even hope to beat. Some old classic pinball games I remember are: Pac-Man (yes, there was a Pac-Man pinball game), Star Trek, Space Invaders (got high score on this one regularly), Black Knight (magnets, heheh), Meteor, Hercules (world's biggest pinball game, the pinball was close to the size of a baseball), Genesis, Xenon (another high scoring game for me, and one of my favorites), Pinbot, and Super Mario Bros.

I only really remember Arkanoid.

ahhh, memories.
I probably spent over a thousand dollars easy on arcade games... probably several thousand. =/
Atari == Asteroids, Space Duel, Gravitar, Steel Talons, T-Mek, Race Drivin, Hard Drivin, Frenzy(Berzerk's sequel)
Williams == Defender, Robotron, Sinistar, Stargate
I got pretty good a several of the games... I've played Frenzy and Race Drivin for over 8 hours each (for example) on the same quarter.
nothing, not even DOOM or Quake2 online can reproduce the arcade intensity and experience. I would play Robotron or Defender for 3 hours straight(one game) and just be exhausted afterwards; that rush for me, I imagine, was what taking drugs is to other people.

These were the first games that appealed to me for speed-running... Atari's games were coded in a similar way to DOOM... the times were real, thus you could improve your records. I used to have a 'Best times' list for Steel Talons and Race Drivin on my family's refridgerator. =P
(This comment may sound stupid, but Namco's racing games have always cheated the times, if you are losing you can go faster -- fun, but very stupid!)
lastly, these were the first deathmatch experiences for me as well (note: Wolfenstien hadn't even been imagined yet).
Just like pc-gaming today, most people look at MS-Golf or even Tomb Raider as a fun excursion for relaxation, but there are a few games (like Doom or the arcade games I mentioned) which offer so much more.
too bad the hardware support on the arcade games themselves are/were so poor -- I'd probably own several of them if that wasn't true. :(

By the time I was old enough/had money to use arcade machines, arcades had gone out of fashion. Plus, they never were that big here in Europe to begin with.

I really sucked at most of these games, so didn't play them all that much (it would have become very expensive).

The ones I played most were Space Invaders (because it was the first), Galaxian, Phoenix, Defender and Battlezone. Battlezone was the most like Doom and the only one where I could generally get onto the high-score table, mostly because hardly anyone could get to grips with the controls, and so shooting a single saucer would often suffice.

I recall a school trip to the beautiful Swiss town of Interlaken, where the main things us kids spent our time doing were playing with Rubik's Cubes and the Phoenix machine. One guy there was really good, and could get through the whole cycle of tunes (over a hundred, IIRC).

At college, they had a Rastan machine where the coin-op bit got buggered up, so you could get unlimited credits by using a suitably shaped bit of plastic (I think an engineering student worked that one out). Some guys ran a kind of relay to keep the game going and eventually got to the dragon on level 10 - the key to it seemed to be mastering the manoeuvre that became known as the "down-twat", so at tricky moments they summoned the down-twat specialist. Heh.

Lord FlatHead said:

they never were that big here in Europe to begin with.

They were absolutely everywhere in Britain. Or maybe it just seemed that way because I was living in a seaside resort at the time...

Grazza said:

... mastering the manoeuvre that became known as the "down-twat", so at tricky moments they summoned the down-twat specialist. Heh.

Okay, I think I know what I want to be when I grow up. :)

Yeah, they were absolutely everywhere in Britain, and a surprising number exist, though it's often alongside pool tables and at seaside resorts only nowadays, or by the cinema where teh prices mirror the food, i.e. rip-off central.

Gimme LAN and £1 hotdogs over arcades nowadays sadly.

Come to think of it, Kingswood Arcade is still going. God only knows how it survives.

DEMOn: I think the main down-twat specialist was the son of an MP (member of the British parliament). You've got to be well-connected to get these top jobs, you know.

I'm not sure which one of you has the more annoying avatar. :)

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I never really played arcadegames much. There's hardly any game I can remember, except a Terminator 2 game you could play with pretty cool guns.

I used to damn near live in the arcade. It was bad scene overall; a week wouldn't go by with out at least 6 fights and an occasional drug-bust. Still, during the summer months, I spent my fair share of time there. My most vivid memory is that of the huge, bigscreen Mortal Kombat setup they had there. It was usually hard to get a quarter in due to the constant in-house "torneys" going on, but fun nonetheless. T2 was another one I wasted change on, and I dare not recall how much money I wasted on Alien and Golden Axe amidst many others.
Alas, mostly due to parent outrage over the fighting and near constant drug pedaling, the old mall arcade was shut down. I had long since moved away, but the memory remains as one of the cornerstones of me growing up in that area. I haven't been to one since.

I really liked the Mortal Kombat arcade machines, but heh, whenever I'd play against another person, it was usually against a person that practically lived on that machine, so I'd get whooped in 10 seconds or less. But when I'd play single player, I'd usually whoop some ass then spend about enough to buy a car just to beat the last boss.

heh, didn't have one where i live so i only went to them when i was staying with my grandparents. i think my favourites were stuff like TMNT, X-Men, The Simpsons, and NBA Jam. actually my very favourite was this one called Crime City, but i only got to play it once. next time i went to that arcade it wasn't around anymore :/

That's the name of the one I was trying to remember for the Good co-op games thread. The theme was very similar to the Ninja Turtles and Simpsons game, but it was made before either of them, and for some reason, I didn't like it quite as much as the other two. Still, it wasn't a bad co-op game

Opulent said:

I'm not sure which one of you has the more annoying avatar. :)

Don't worry, mine will be replaced with something more tasteful very soon.

Gahz..#¤" seizure >____________<

It's your fault. My head's about to explode.

I used to play Terminator 2 and time crisis A LOT.
For the last 6 months I've wasted about 50 bucks in Pump it up...

Mortal kombat 1, II, and Samurai Shodown were 2 big quarter munchers of mine. The WORST wone was Terminator 2. Me and a friend brought 10 bucks EACH, and that's more or less what we needed tp finish the game... what fun..

I never played much arcade games, averaging a trip to the arcade once every year or two. I tend to stick to pinball machines when I do. Theres this place in Seattle though called GameWorks...I think its a chain but I remember it made a lot of news when it was built because it was the first. Basicaly, its an arcade the size of a warehouse. About 3 storeys of games from classics such as space invaders to whatever the newest thign is. They also have a multi-story arcade game where whenever you go up a level, you literaly go up a level, and when you get your ass kicked you go down. I think it's called Vertical Reality. If you get there early enough you can spend $20 for 2 hours of play. :D

I used to play that Aerosmith game all the time. With all the money I spent on that I probably could have bought my own machine.

I never used to spend too much in the arcade. No more than $20 every two or three weeks. Now I spend about $25-50 a week on DDR alone. Even though I have DDR at home, too. It all used to go to whatever was at the arcade, though. And alot of my money went to Aliens and one of my faves, "S.T.U.N. Runner".

Never had the money. :(
I remember it was a special treat when my parents would have a few spare bills to change when we would go to Peter Piper Pizza in El Paso with the church or something...

the_Danarchist said:

Theres this place in Seattle though called GameWorks...I think its a chain but I remember it made a lot of news when it was built because it was the first. Basicaly, its an arcade the size of a warehouse. About 3 storeys of games from classics such as space invaders to whatever the newest thing is.

/me orgasms

Lüt said:

I used to play that Aerosmith game all the time.

Revolution X? Hahaha... Wait... you were serious? Let me laugh harder! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...

There was this game called Sunset Riders, and my Mom was so desperate to take photos of me (for Christmas Cards and the like) that she gave me $12 worth of quarters! She harldly ever let me "waste money" on videogames!

i remember me and a friend spen close to 500 bucks on just a game of marvle vs capcom. later, the owner gave me the game, mainly because i was the only one playing it!!! yep 500 in one sitting.

The last coin-op game I played was time crises, and that was 2 years ago.