The Last of Manhattan's Original Video Arcades (nytimes.com) 60
Video arcades -- those recreational arenas of illuminated screens and 8-bit soundtracks -- have been fading from the cultural landscape since the end of the Donkey Kong '80s. The advent of home video game consoles, hand-held gaming devices and smartphones has all but rendered them relics of a Gen X childhood. Yet somehow, Chinatown Fair Family Fun Center lives on.
From a report: The cramped downtown institution is among the last of the city's old-school arcades, often filled with gamers too young to remember Street Fighter IV a decade ago, let alone Missile Command in the Reagan years. "Chinatown Fair should have closed years ago, along with all the other arcades in the city, due to rising rent and the shift to online gaming," said Kurt Vincent, who directed "The Lost Arcade," a 2016 documentary about the arcade's enduring legacy in the city. "But it's still there on Mott Street after all these years because young people need a place to come together."
Say this about Chinatown Fair: It has been defying the odds for decades. The place opened in the 1940s as an "amusement arcade" in an era when Skee-Ball represented the apex of arcade fun. As youth tastes changed in the ensuing years, so too did Chinatown Fair. The arcade survived the rise and fall of pinball, the rise and fall of Pac-Man, the rise and fall of Super Nintendo, and perhaps most unimaginably, the rise, and rise some more, of Manhattan real estate prices.
Say this about Chinatown Fair: It has been defying the odds for decades. The place opened in the 1940s as an "amusement arcade" in an era when Skee-Ball represented the apex of arcade fun. As youth tastes changed in the ensuing years, so too did Chinatown Fair. The arcade survived the rise and fall of pinball, the rise and fall of Pac-Man, the rise and fall of Super Nintendo, and perhaps most unimaginably, the rise, and rise some more, of Manhattan real estate prices.
It's not really still there (Score:2, Interesting)
It reopened a few years ago under new ownership and is now basically a ticket-machine / DDR family arcade alla a boardwalk arcade or smething like that. It is definitely not the competitive fighting game haven that China Town Faire once was
Re: It's not really still there (Score:5, Funny)
I bet there is a lot of noise pollution
That must be a disappointment for people that go to game arcades for tranquility and quiet introspection.
Barcades have the non ticket games / pinballs (Score:2)
Barcades have the non ticket games / pinballs
Not Consoles, but Internet Connected Games. (Score:4, Interesting)
While Consoles may have put a dent in the popularity of the Arcade, But the Arcade could always compete against the Console, because by the fact that they are so expensive to own, you can just have top of the line graphics and sound built in, always being a generation or two ahead of the Console.
However what really was the killer was Multi-player internet connectivity. Part of the fun of the Arcade is playing with multiple people. Many game had duel or I have seen up to 4 set of controllers so people would play against each other. Now with internet connectivity people never needed to go miles away to interact with real people.
All gaming hardware tends toward PC in a shell (Score:3)
But the Arcade could always compete against the Console, because by the fact that they are so expensive to own, you can just have top of the line graphics and sound built in, always being a generation or two ahead of the Console.
That used to be the case a long time ago. (And even back then with a few exceptions, like NeoGeo MVS and AES being virtually the same hardware, and SEGA being very often inspired by their arcade hardware (System16, various Models, Noami) to make their home consoles (MegaDrive, Saturn, DreamCast) through with some cost to manufacturing vs. performance compromises).
Nowadays, if you look at the actual hardware: console, arcades and PCs have all more or less converged (look at the later iteration of SEGA arcade
Re: (Score:2)
The arcade fell behind on graphics some time in the late 90s. Sega started using the same hardware for arcade as for home with the Dreamcast, so you had lots of perfect home versions.
Arcade could still offer things like a proper dance platform or other unusual controls that were not practical at home.
Nowadays the classic games use obsolete hardware that is hard to replicate at home too, which keeps them a cut above emulation.
Re: (Score:2)
Prepare to joust, buzzard bait!
New York Slashdotters, how do they make rent? (Score:2)
Dear New York Slashdotters,
This question has bothered me for years. How do places like this along with the numerous I heart NY t-shirt shops make enough money to pay Manhattan rents? It seems like their margins would be so tight that just staying open would be a miracle.
Re: (Score:2)
some people have brains and bought the property their business is in
Re: (Score:2)
i have a family member who did just this with his store outside of manhattan. Now the area is growing and getting more expensive but since he owns the building, he's set.
Lots of diners and other small businesses did this and some are cashing out by selling the land for tens of millions of $$$ and closing their worthless business.
Re: (Score:2, Flamebait)
Re: New York Slashdotters, how do they make rent? (Score:1)
Money laundering
Own your building (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Amazing since I saw a few days ago on the PBS NewsHour that some jazz club went out of business in NYC. IIRC it opened in 1977 and paid $499 a month for its lease. When it closed, they were paying $30,000 a month.
It seems impossible that a place where people pump quarters into games that could last 10-15 minutes if they're decent could ever stay in business in that atmosphere.
There are a number of them around here (Score:3)
This isn't an "old school" arcade, judging by the pictures. I know of many arcades with modern video games of that style. Myrtle Beach has several arcades (including one with dozens of 1957 Williams baseball style pinball machines https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] ). The closest mall to me has an arcade. Pigeon Forge has a number of arcades. Most any tourist destination type area have them and they're doing well.
I'm not sure how unique the one is in TFA, besides being in a vastly overpriced real estate market.
Different demos? (Score:2)
Not sure the model they use in NY, but here in Denver a fourth one has just opened up. They're all full bars, some of them full kitchens, and they're definitely not expecting teens to keep them afloat. It's a nostalgia fest plus sports bar and it's thirty-somethings that are the main crowd so they're not necessarily trying to compete with consoles and kids whose minds can't comprehend 8-bit graphics and chiptunes.
Re: (Score:2)
Dave & Busters doesn't count ;-)
Re: (Score:2)
I mean, the SID chip has been an integral part of so-called EDM, hip-hop, you name it for 15 years now. Pixel graphics makes up a significant number of the top games in the Console/PC/indie/mobile space (feel free to google sales for Into the Breach, Dead Cells, or Stardew Valley.), to say nothing of the runaway success of the NES and SNES Mini.
Gosh , and to think some suggest slashdot seems like its out-of-touch and skew
The Arcade is back to its prior social role (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
though you can count on finding some version of Big Buck Hunter.
Every arcade has big buck hunter LOL.
Indeed you just repeated what I said. Were you trying to say something else?
Re: (Score:2)
I remember when most arcades had a sit down Star Trek Strategic Operations Simulator that had been converted into a sit down Choplifter. Always a major annoyance.
Re: (Score:2)
Station Break (Score:1)
Sad to hear that the City is down to one...
I've done work for them, here's how they survive (Score:5, Informative)
I've done repair and upgrade work for Chinatown Fair, there's a lot of things keeping them afloat. For starters, CTF is not the only arcade Lonnie owns, a bad month at CTF doesn't call a death sentence for the whole arcade, and buying and selling games constantly to keep the lineup fresh is something Lonnie is somewhat good at. The location is a bit smaller than I would like if I was opening an arcade but in Manhattan that works to your advantage. You *CAN'T* keep deadweight games in CTF - it's too small. If a game stops making money in another arcade, many operators and owners will hedge on it and be like "Yeah well, we can wait a few months before we think about an upgrade or a replacement." At CTF if a game stops taking in cash, enough to defend it's existence, it's out, within days. Often to another location where it will do well for a while and cover the cost of buying it.
He also does private party rentals (Follow their Facebook page, probably once a week the place is closed to the public) and caters heavily to groups of players who can't get the same experience at home. Music Games, Fighting games, those are big parts of Lonnie's business model at CTF but not so much at his other locations.
And for what it's worth: He's not the only operator in the NYC Area doing this, and doing it well.
loong (Score:2)
We have in Cleveland . . . . (Score:3)
VR pinball is still off a bit from real other then (Score:2)
VR pinball is still off a bit from real other then it's does not brake down.
Re: (Score:2)
If you programmed it re-entrantly, one of the games could be "Video Arcade Simulation".
Chicago (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
For what it's worth (Score:2)
I was always bummed out (Score:2)
Funny thing, the final nail in the coffin for coin op was smart phones. Apparently they were still bringing in hundreds of millions at laundromats and restaurants and the like right up until smart phones got cheap. I remember all of the sudden you could pick up a Neo-Geo cabinet
Arcades were awesome... (Score:1)
too young to remember Street Fighter IV a decade ago, let alone Missile Command in the Reagan years.
I have to wonder how old the author is. I'm too old to remember Street Fighter IV, but I do remember Missile Command. I like to think I grew up in the golden age of arcade games. My father liked pinball and used to take us out to the pinball parlor somewhere until the police busted it because people were dealing drugs there. My father wasn't into drugs and that was basically the last I got to play pinball except for the odd quarter I managed to beg off my parents here and there.
But then came the video
Re: (Score:2)
I have visions of filling my basement up with video games and maybe a few pinball machines as well, but would I really play them enough to be worth it?
In case you wander back to read this post, I own a dozen machines, and you sound about my age. If you buy the original machines, know that they are aged, and hence they break. The more of them that you own, the more you'll have to deal with that annoying issue (expensive too, if you don't fix them yourself). ...Just a tip.