[HEADING=3]A long time ago, in a poorly lit, obnoxiously loud, dirty-carpeted, pizza-filled series of awkwardly shaped rooms and corridors; people would walk up to big machines that had one single video game inside of them and put in little shiny round silver discs in exchange to play the game ONE time, then go home happy.[/HEADING][br][hr]
Besides that being the story we tell our grandkids, you might be surprised to learn how many of the newer generation of "born after the Xbox" gamers have never stepped foot into an actual arcade. When we go nuts over re-releases of Final Fight and After Burner or the announcement of upcoming games like Marvel Vs. CAPCOM 3, a lot of the younger people in today's gaming scene might not understand the appeal. They never had the experience of playing against an actual, honest-to-goodness stranger in head-to-head combat to the bitter end, in person; or teaming up with an awkwardly dressed eleven year-old boy to help save the world in 20 minutes or 5 dollars, which ever came first. I mean... who in their right mind would develop a game that was hundreds to thousands of dollars per unit to distribute, that could effectively be beaten in less time than it takes for your family's name to be called to pick up their order of suspect-quality cheese pizza and spotty pitcher of RC Cola?
Logically, video arcades were completely asinine in concept; development of the games themselves was a nightmare and hideously expensive, with many games being built from the ground up on their own hardware platform, let alone their own engine. The cost of cabinets to purchase and upkeep was atrocious and the cabinet's value was equal to the temporary popularity of the game, let alone having to purchase multiple cabinets of that same game. Somewhere out there, there is a garage filled with cabinets of Street Fighter II, Street Fighter II: Championship Edition, Street Fighter II: Hyper Fighting, Super Street Fighter II, Super Street Fighter II Turbo, and Hyper Street Fighter II: Anniversary Edition, all lined up in a row, collecting dust, and awaiting the close of their respective auctions on eBay. At nearly four figures per cabinet purchase, arcades were an insane investment, but somehow back in the day, also a profitable one. Some of us "close to 30-somethings" can remember the days of standing in an actual line for ten to twenty minutes to play a video game for less than two. We remember how freakin' awesome Time Crisis was because the chambers of its blue and pink plastic guns moved when you pulled the trigger and how sitting inside the whiplash-inducing After Burner cockpit made us feel as though we were actually flying (behind) the jet from Top Gun.
Flash-forward to the world of twenty-ten and playing against complete strangers does not require you to actually have to smell them during matches. We've gone from biting our tongues in frustration against the person standing next to us to all-out, no-holds-barred racial slurs, sexually derogatory tongue-lashings and rage-quitting. Gone are the days of "Oh, that was an insane combo, can you show me how you did that?" and awkward high-fives of people you've never even spoken a word to for successfully using your light gun and pocket full of quarters to defend against the zombie horde while uncovering the badly voice-acted government conspiracy threatening all of mankind. Somewhere out there, there is still some poor late-teen still using a microphone and PA to announce and commentate on eight-person races in slowly dying full motion Daytona USA machines from 1993, but the sight these days brings forth a mixture of nostalgia and apocalyptic, end-of-days sadness. In today's "in-the-box" kind of world, gaming has become more social than ever, but seeing the other person's face is usually optional at best. People pay up to hundreds of dollars to get that "arcade stick" with the "real parts" to replicate that true "arcade feel" for their upcoming fighting games, but soon enough, the newer generation won't have any concept of what "arcade feel" even means.
Today, we try and mimic the experience at best. One curious little venture was the aforementioned re-release of Final Fight (called Final Fight: Double Impact) for the respective DLC services. The game features a view of an arcade cabinet and a virtual TV-type arcade screen which you then "play the game on" (SD TV < 26" owners be damned) to try and recreate that "in the arcade" feel. Other releases like Xbox Live's Game Room (not to be confused with the Xbox Live! Arcade) attempt to capture that arcade feel by using your virtual avatars standing in virtual arcades putting virtual quarters into emulated arcade games. While this is certainly a definite attempt to capitalize on a feeling that you'd be hard-pressed to find in real life today, the lineup of games available seem to be targeting the pre-Nintendo, late-thirties to early-forties crowd and largely, contrary to form and purpose, is comprised of mostly single-player games. Why, other than for pseudo-educational purposes, developers are trying to emulate this type of "experience" is completely beyond me, when newer generations and their wallets are probably not that familiar with the original experience to begin with.
With the advent of the Wii and its Move & Natal cloned brethren, the peripheral-centric side of the arcade... that is to mean the types of games that could only be played effectively in the arcade due to form-factor wackiness; is becoming very easy to reproduce at home. I'm eagerly awaiting the inevitable Wii port of Time Crisis that uses a chamber moving light-gun and the Balance Board to reproduce the pop-up action of the original cover-based shooter. Plus, with the previously mentioned "arcade sticks" that fighting game enthusiasts swear by dropping in price (and quality), soon there might absolutely no reason to step foot into a room housing the real-deal. Sure, alcohol-fueled bowling alleys will always have their arcade rooms tucked away in the back for the people who get dragged along who actually hate bowling, and for a long time to come there will be little sad late-90's cabinets inside your local movie theater and somehow, somewhere, there will be Dance Dance Revolution... but the days of physically-social gaming, that is, standing (yes standing, not sitting) next to the person you're playing against will become an awkward thing of the past.
[sub]SavingPrincess is a consistently disagreed-with, late-to-the-party game editorial author who would love to hear the language and demeanor of your average Xbox Live! match used in a downtown Los Angeles arcade circa 1995.[/sub]
[hr]
Besides that being the story we tell our grandkids, you might be surprised to learn how many of the newer generation of "born after the Xbox" gamers have never stepped foot into an actual arcade. When we go nuts over re-releases of Final Fight and After Burner or the announcement of upcoming games like Marvel Vs. CAPCOM 3, a lot of the younger people in today's gaming scene might not understand the appeal. They never had the experience of playing against an actual, honest-to-goodness stranger in head-to-head combat to the bitter end, in person; or teaming up with an awkwardly dressed eleven year-old boy to help save the world in 20 minutes or 5 dollars, which ever came first. I mean... who in their right mind would develop a game that was hundreds to thousands of dollars per unit to distribute, that could effectively be beaten in less time than it takes for your family's name to be called to pick up their order of suspect-quality cheese pizza and spotty pitcher of RC Cola?
Logically, video arcades were completely asinine in concept; development of the games themselves was a nightmare and hideously expensive, with many games being built from the ground up on their own hardware platform, let alone their own engine. The cost of cabinets to purchase and upkeep was atrocious and the cabinet's value was equal to the temporary popularity of the game, let alone having to purchase multiple cabinets of that same game. Somewhere out there, there is a garage filled with cabinets of Street Fighter II, Street Fighter II: Championship Edition, Street Fighter II: Hyper Fighting, Super Street Fighter II, Super Street Fighter II Turbo, and Hyper Street Fighter II: Anniversary Edition, all lined up in a row, collecting dust, and awaiting the close of their respective auctions on eBay. At nearly four figures per cabinet purchase, arcades were an insane investment, but somehow back in the day, also a profitable one. Some of us "close to 30-somethings" can remember the days of standing in an actual line for ten to twenty minutes to play a video game for less than two. We remember how freakin' awesome Time Crisis was because the chambers of its blue and pink plastic guns moved when you pulled the trigger and how sitting inside the whiplash-inducing After Burner cockpit made us feel as though we were actually flying (behind) the jet from Top Gun.
Flash-forward to the world of twenty-ten and playing against complete strangers does not require you to actually have to smell them during matches. We've gone from biting our tongues in frustration against the person standing next to us to all-out, no-holds-barred racial slurs, sexually derogatory tongue-lashings and rage-quitting. Gone are the days of "Oh, that was an insane combo, can you show me how you did that?" and awkward high-fives of people you've never even spoken a word to for successfully using your light gun and pocket full of quarters to defend against the zombie horde while uncovering the badly voice-acted government conspiracy threatening all of mankind. Somewhere out there, there is still some poor late-teen still using a microphone and PA to announce and commentate on eight-person races in slowly dying full motion Daytona USA machines from 1993, but the sight these days brings forth a mixture of nostalgia and apocalyptic, end-of-days sadness. In today's "in-the-box" kind of world, gaming has become more social than ever, but seeing the other person's face is usually optional at best. People pay up to hundreds of dollars to get that "arcade stick" with the "real parts" to replicate that true "arcade feel" for their upcoming fighting games, but soon enough, the newer generation won't have any concept of what "arcade feel" even means.
Today, we try and mimic the experience at best. One curious little venture was the aforementioned re-release of Final Fight (called Final Fight: Double Impact) for the respective DLC services. The game features a view of an arcade cabinet and a virtual TV-type arcade screen which you then "play the game on" (SD TV < 26" owners be damned) to try and recreate that "in the arcade" feel. Other releases like Xbox Live's Game Room (not to be confused with the Xbox Live! Arcade) attempt to capture that arcade feel by using your virtual avatars standing in virtual arcades putting virtual quarters into emulated arcade games. While this is certainly a definite attempt to capitalize on a feeling that you'd be hard-pressed to find in real life today, the lineup of games available seem to be targeting the pre-Nintendo, late-thirties to early-forties crowd and largely, contrary to form and purpose, is comprised of mostly single-player games. Why, other than for pseudo-educational purposes, developers are trying to emulate this type of "experience" is completely beyond me, when newer generations and their wallets are probably not that familiar with the original experience to begin with.
With the advent of the Wii and its Move & Natal cloned brethren, the peripheral-centric side of the arcade... that is to mean the types of games that could only be played effectively in the arcade due to form-factor wackiness; is becoming very easy to reproduce at home. I'm eagerly awaiting the inevitable Wii port of Time Crisis that uses a chamber moving light-gun and the Balance Board to reproduce the pop-up action of the original cover-based shooter. Plus, with the previously mentioned "arcade sticks" that fighting game enthusiasts swear by dropping in price (and quality), soon there might absolutely no reason to step foot into a room housing the real-deal. Sure, alcohol-fueled bowling alleys will always have their arcade rooms tucked away in the back for the people who get dragged along who actually hate bowling, and for a long time to come there will be little sad late-90's cabinets inside your local movie theater and somehow, somewhere, there will be Dance Dance Revolution... but the days of physically-social gaming, that is, standing (yes standing, not sitting) next to the person you're playing against will become an awkward thing of the past.
[sub]SavingPrincess is a consistently disagreed-with, late-to-the-party game editorial author who would love to hear the language and demeanor of your average Xbox Live! match used in a downtown Los Angeles arcade circa 1995.[/sub]
[hr]
[HEADING=1]Other Articles from SavingPrincess[/HEADING]
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Smashing Brothers: Old V. New [ROUND 2] - Super Mario Bros. 3 Vs. New Super Mario Bros. Wii [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.192275]
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A Princess Worth Saving: Suikoden (I & II) [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.189268]
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A Princess Worth Saving: Eternal Darkness [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.176643]
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A Princess Worth Saving: Mirror's Edge [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.176636]
A Princess Worth Saving: Heavy Rain (No Spoilers) [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.182291]
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A Princess Worth Saving: Phantasy Star [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.186357]
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A Princess Worth Saving: Resident Evil [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.184382]
A Princess Worth Saving: Hot Shots Golf [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.182525]
Hey Dragon, You Can Have Her: Mortal Kombat [ http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.190299]
Hey Dragon, You Can Have Her: Final Fantasy VIII [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.180899]
Hey Dragon, You Can have Her: The Elder Scrolls IV - Oblivioin [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.190959]
Hey Dragon, You Can Have Her: Halo - Combat Evolved [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.183686]
Hey Dragon, You Can Have Her: World of Warcraft [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.187830]
Hey Dragon, You Can Have Her: Call of Duty - Modern Warfare 2 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/326.182551]
In Another Castle: Memento and the Nostalgia Effect [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/9.191241]
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Smashing Brothers: Sex V. Violence [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/9.178178]
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BONUS: Ten (Plus) Lessons Video Games Have Taught Us [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.189488]
Secret Link [http://www.savingprincess.com][/sub]
