When I was a little girl in the ’80s one of the biggest treats was going to Morecambe with my parents and being allowed to spend time in the Arcades there. Some of my fondest memories are of playing the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Star Wars, Double Dragon and Golden Axe, whilst my older brother played Out Run or Afterburner.
Also, there were things like air hockey, one armed bandits, claw machines and whack-a-mole. The 2p shove game, how could anyone forget those?! And then this weird horse racing machine that I wasted far too much money on. Luckily it didn’t lead to a crippling gambling addiction. Honest.
And Bingo! Can’t forget Bingo, with the rows of colourful bingo cards and the bored sounding caller rattling off numbers.
Time to Hunt…
My love of arcades followed me into my teenage year in the 1990’s. Now games like Mortal Kombat, X-Men, Virtua Fighter and Killer Instinct separated me from my hard earned pocket money. And set me on a lifetime of coping with real life problems by beating up video game characters. I was so obsessed with the Alien vs Predator arcade game, I somehow managed to finish the damn thing, something I had never done before, and never have done again. I didn’t even know arcade games COULD be finished, but I did it!
There was also an excellent Aliens 3 shooting game that I swear to god could have given you Vibration White Finger.
Even back in those days though I began to notice a change. There always were the gambling machines in the Arcades of my childhood, but slowly arcades began to have more gamblers and less games. Bingo disappeared from the arcades. When the Frontierland theme park went all of it’s arcades with it, and they were followed by the Alhambra Leisure arcade.
Those were the days
Don’t get me wrong, there are still arcades in Morecambe, but they are nothing like the were when I was a child. Nowadays they are mostly filled with 18+ gambling machines and mechanical games like the 2p shove and claw games, anything that makes far more money than they give out and spit out tickets you can save up for plastic tat (not that we don’t love a bit of plastic tat every so often). There are some arcade games, but nowhere near as many as there were.
So what happened? Simple really. Gaming at home became more accessible with the advent of consoles. Why go waste your hard earned money on playing a game in an arcade when you could play the game at home whenever you felt like it? You could play Time Crisis at the arcade for £1 a go, with a dodgy plastic gun that had seen better days. Or, you could play it at home on you PS1, sat on your sofa with a cup of tea. Arcade owners aren’t running these places out of the goodness of their hearts. They had go the way that brought more money in. Times change, a businesses have to change with it.
So what now?
During my pub management days I always said that when the right venue then I’d have an arcade cabinet for my customers. It never game to pass; I had to give up my career before I ever got to that point. But I still would, given half the chance. But then I’d also do things like serve mead, so I’m guessing my pub would be way too niche to actually work.
The arcades of old aren’t total gone though. There is a relatively new venue in Blackpool called the Arcade Club. It has games, old and new, and you pay a flat entry fee rather than per game. Who knows, maybe it will catch on and a more places will open like that. Until then, I know this is waiting for me there.
