Somewhere north of Chicago, so far north I’m not sure if it was still considered part of Chicago, there’s a crappy strip mall in a run-down part of town. You know, the kind of place where you’d expect to find a Big Lots and a bunch of small businesses who need a cheap place to set up shop. Close enough to a suburban area to be within walking distance for those living nearby but in just the right part of town to feel like something on the side of the road. This is where I went looking for an arcade that almost slipped under my radar. Everyone knows about Galloping Ghost, Gameworks, and the others, but this one is quite a bit easier to miss.
Here it is, tucked away in a corner between a now-closed Hobby Town USA and a furniture store. Just look at how discreet this place is. I bet most people who’ve driven by assume that it’s some laundromat. Even I had a bit of trouble finding it at first.
The first thing you see upon closer inspection is a poster featuring Capcom’s classic 90s fighting games. This poster says a lot about Nickel City, as we’ll see in a moment.
As soon as you walk in, the air of this place hits you immediately. This isn’t something like Garcade, which was built to pay homage to classic arcades. This is 100% an authentic 90s arcade that somehow survived into the late 2010s. There are a handful of modern games mixed in, but the vast majority feel like they’re here just because they can’t afford to replace them. This is a remarkable arcade!
Before we take a closer look at the games, let’s see what kind of place this is. This isn’t a typical arcade, even disregarding the unique game selection. For starters, there’s a two-dollar entry fee (that I didn’t notice until I left, so I didn’t end up paying). The reason for the two-dollar entry fee ties into one of the most unique things about this place.
The name isn’t for show. This is a real-life nickel arcade. Every game here only takes nickels. I’ve heard of these, but this is my first time seeing one in person. I thought they were a myth.
Despite how small the building is, they have quite a sizable room for birthday parties. I can’t help but feel a bit nostalgic whenever I see a small, local arcade with a ghetto party room. Or maybe I’m only reminded of my arcade growing up because the walls are a similar color. This awkward shade of teal was really popular at one point, you know.
Look back here. They’ve got an entire small dining area where kids can grab lunch. Don’t let the photo fool you; I got the ENTIRE dining area in this shot. It’s much smaller than the picture makes it look. Can you imagine growing up near this place? Paying the two dollars to get in, getting 20 plays for a dollar, then chilling out here afterwards? That may explain why Nickle City has survived so long, even though it’s a fossil of a bygone era.
Now let’s take a look at the games. The games housed here are something special. But before we get to those, I want to look at the ticket games. Rare, I know. They do well to paint a picture of just how unusual Nickel City truly is.
We’ve run into this game once before, and it mentioned it then too, but this is a ticket game that was super common in the 90s. Most arcades have long since gotten rid of it because of the elaborate pink color scheme making it evident that it’s a leftover from the early 90s.
Here’s another one from around the same era with a similarly annoying color scheme. This game, however, was meant to work with quarters or tokens. Nickles don’t work so well…
Oh, wow. This ancient thing here is Sonic the Hedgehog. It’s one of those standard coin-rolling games, except branded with Sonic stock art. The most interesting thing about it is that it was made VERY early in Sonic’s life, so there’s no sign of characters like Tails. Instead, they only had art of generic enemies like Robot Fish and Robot Crab. I’m not sure if this was the first Sonic arcade machine of any sort, but it was one of them.
Speaking of Sonic, here’s something I’ve only ever seen once before, back when I was trying to track down the Cici Pizza DDR machine in Kansas City. The version I saw didn’t have Tails in the spinner, so this machine got re-released with an upgrade at some point. Given that Sega are arcade guys first and foremost, it’s no surprise that Sonic pops up on ticket games every few years.
This one is Alien Moon Rally, a very high-end ticket game I’ve only seen at one other place. This is a machine that was extremely common at Chuck E Cheese but pretty rare anywhere else. I wouldn’t know since I never really had a Chuck E Cheese near me. Surprising, huh? I was a Peter Piper Pizza kid.
There were lots of other old ticket games from that era, but I feel like I’d be talking about them forever if I kept photographing them. Plus, I didn’t have much to say about most of them besides “they’re old”. That’s not what you’re here for anyway.
First up, let’s take a look at their racing game selection. Here we have Initial D version 3, the most popular version of the game. This isn’t anything too unusual, except…
It only costs five nickels to play. God damn it, I’m jealous. Growing up, this was one of my favorite games, but we never had it at any of my local arcades. If we had a 25-cent version of this game, I’d have dropped more money than I’d be willing to admit on it. God damn.
You know an arcade is ghetto when the Fast and Furious Drift machines are converted Rush 2049 cabinets. I see some version of Fast and Furious at nearly every arcade, but I think this is the first time I’ve seen an arcade so poor they had to put the game into a different machine.
Speaking of things I don’t think I’ve ever seen before, here’s Super Bikes for one player.
Next up, let’s see the rhythm games. I’m told they had a DDR machine until recently, but it seems to have been converted into ITG3. I remember when there was still a taboo against running this game in public since it’s outright illegal. Oh well.
When DDR took off the way it did around the turn of the millennium, many arcades quickly expanded their rhythm game selection. It was common to find games like Beatmania, Guitar Freaks, Drummania, and other similar machines sitting right next to DDR. None of them were as popular, outside of places with extremely hardcore Beatmania or Pop’n players. The most true mark of an arcade that’s survived since then without many changes is that they still have the little rhythm game section full of outdated machines. Nickel City has one of the purest examples of that I’ve ever seen.
Oh, by the way, this is probably one of the last public Beatmania 6th machine in the country.
Take Dance Maniax here, for example. This was a very, very short-lived game that was a popular import entirely because of DDR. Unlike DDR, it never took off, and most arcades eventually got rid of it. Not Nickle City. Hell, they still have the original cardboard upgrade advertisement taped to the side. And the machine was set to the maximum number of songs per round, so it was something like six songs for 10 cents. I want to live next to this arcade so much.
Now let’s take a look at my favorite part of the arcade: The Free Play area. This is the hall of arcade machines that aren’t popular enough to even charge a nickel to play. Once you’ve paid the 2 dollar cover charge (or accidentally walked in without paying it), this whole area is fair game.
Star Gladiator is one of Capcom’s earliest 3D fighting games. However, this isn’t Star Gladiator. I don’t have any idea what the hell this is. Judging by the font, it’s something from the same era, but I’m at a complete loss beyond that. Neither Star Gladiator nor Whatever This Is are games I’ve ever run into before. Oh boy, this arcade is something.
Edit: It’s Puzzloop. I’m not as inexperienced as I used to be!
It wasn’t working then, but this is Giga Wing, a 1999 Raiden-style game from Capcom. Wikipedia‘s Reception tab for this game says:
The game was not well received, with average scores across the board.
Now’s probably a good time to mention these games are all stored in Capcom Big Blue machines. From the looks of it, these machines have switched games pretty often, to the point where this one never bothered to take off its “New Game” marquee. You can also see that both this machine and the one next to it were Marvel Super Heroes at one point (or they switched screen guards at some point).
Let’s go back to that poster at the beginning again. In the 90s, Capcom was the king of the fighting game genre, constantly releasing a barrage of new fighting games every year. This arcade, you can feel just by looking at this back corner, was once a place where people would gather to play the latest Capcom offerings. It was an arcade that took pride in following the latest trends, as evidenced by their rhythm game section. However, nowadays, fighting games are mostly confined to the back. I wonder if the local kids still come here after school to practice. It would be nice, wouldn’t it?
And this machine is nothing. I have a very strong suspicion of what it used to be.
Here you see arcade marquees hung up for the proper reason for once: to honor the fallen. Given that my sources tell me they had Darkstalkers until pretty recently and the size of the missing marquee on the broken game, I suspect that’s what it was.
Also, look at that Project Justice marquee. This was an arcade that loved Capcom.
So, of course, we’re not done looking at the Capcom games. The game on the right there is Puzzle Fighter, which I’m sure you’ve heard of. I don’t think I’ve ever seen this game in the wild like this. The other one is a far more obscure game called Tech Romancer. It was another attempt at starting a new 3D fighting franchise by Capcom in the late 90s, where they were churning out new fighting games one after another. Except this one is about mechs.
There are a few things in this image I want to talk about.
- I’ve never seen Mega Man the Power Battle in an actual arcade before. I’ve run into at conventions and Galloping Ghost (but they had so much weird stuff that nothing found there feels like it “counts”), but never just sitting in a random arcade like this.
- Battle Balls, or Senkyu as some people know it, is a freakin’ rare arcade game. I don’t think you’ll ever find this at any other arcade in the country unless Galloping Ghost gets their hands on one and somehow finds room for it.
- This row uses a different type of stock cab than the others. I’m no expert, but they might be converted Neo-Geo cabs.
- Those generic Scramble and Tetris marquees reek of the 80s. You don’t think Nickel City has been around long enough for those to have survived since then, do you? Maybe.
I run into Tekken 2 a lot, don’t I?
How long has that Escaflowne poster been hanging there, and what does it have to do with this arcade?
Here’s their Neo-Geo lineup. As you’d expect, they’ve got the fighting games like Samurai Showdown IV and Fatal Fury, alongside two other random games. I get the feeling KoF wasn’t very popular in these parts.
When most people think of Midway arcade games, they usually think of obnoxious digitized graphics, annoying voice clips, and their strange sense of humor. Super High Impact was one of the first Midway games with the “Midway feel”. There was a basketball game with extremely cartoony graphics a few years before this called Arch Rivals. In 1993, Midway Games seemed to combine these two games together into a single whole to produce NBA Jam. The rest was history.
Speaking of digitized graphics and annoying voice clips, this is Twin Eagle II. If you thought Midway overused them, you’ve never seen this game. Jesus.
Before we take a look at the last game of note in the Free Play hall, the handful of fighting games over here are the last ones that still charge nickles to play. I wonder if that means people still play them. Or maybe it’s just because they’re in showcase cabs. Probably that.
Yes, YES! It’s Die Hard Arcade, holy crap! This is the prequel to Dynamite Cop! To think I’d run into here, of all places. When you think Nickel City can’t get any better, it decides to top itself. If I weren’t so picky with S-class ratings, this would be the thing that tips it over the edge for me. But if I’m too stingy to give Funset Boulevard one, I can’t justify giving this place one, either. However, this was definitely my favorite arcade in Chicago (if it even is in Chicago). Sorry Galloping Ghost and Gameworks, you’re not a mysterious relic of the past frozen in time. Well, Galloping Ghost isn’t, at least…
With the arcade explored, archived, and illegally broken into, it was time to find me some food. Just look at this. Do you see how in the middle of nowhere Nickle City is? Thankfully, civilization was only a couple of blocks away.
I was still hellbent on finding my Chicago-style pizza but found this place instead. This is Mod Pizza, a pizza place that operates similarly to Subway. They have a bunch of ingredients up at the front, and you get to pick which you want on it.
I have no idea what combination of cheese and seasoning I put on this pizza, but holy shit, it was the best I’ve ever had in my life. It was so spicy it burned in all the right ways. It’s still disappointing that I came all the way to Chicago but can’t find one of those super deep-dish Chicago pizzas. Oh well.
