By this point, I was probably getting as sick of Ocean City as you. The weather was just getting worse and worse, while my motel was still half a mile up the road. Alas, I came to Ocean City to visit arcades, so that’s what I was going to do.
This large indoor/outdoor mini golf place was next door to Electric Quarters. Out of the 20-30 miniature golf places they had in this area, this was one of the very few to have any indoor part. The course itself was also noticeably higher budget than most. That pirate ship is probably the most elaborate thing any of them had.
Old Pro Golf is the name of it. I had to stand out in the rain for like two minutes to get a shot of this “GR8 Arcade” advertisement that would flash by. There was a second one that said something like “Amazing Retro Arcade!”, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to stand around getting any more soaked than I was. However, I believe these signs are important context, so I had to get at least one of them.
The main building of Old Pro looks like a giant warehouse that had been emptied and converted into an indoor miniature golf place. The entire course had a boardwalk going along the top, for people who just wanted to admire the scenery. On a day like today, business was booming.
Here it is! Old Pro Golf’s GR8 Arcade! It looks pretty promising. Given how heavily they push the retro aspect of the arcade, there must be some surprises waiting for us here. Let’s check it out.
Arcades visited: 8
…or we could just skip this arcade because you can see everything in it from the two photos.
This is the last arcade of the day. Unlike the sham above, this place turned up on Google Maps, so I knew to keep an eye open for it. The rain was coming down hard and I was faced with a problem: I couldn’t figure out where the damn arcade was.
The confusion stems from the signs above. Both of these signs are for the same building, but they’re far enough apart from each other that it looks like they’re advertising two different places. Since the building has “Laser Tag” in big letters on the side, I assumed that there would be a much smaller building somewhere called Fat Albert’s. It turned out that there was just a bank on the corner that shut down, so this place just rented the bank’s old sign because it stood out more than the one they were using. Had I not been in a rush to get out of the rain, I’d have probably noticed that the two signs have the same, exact telephone number…
Another big part of my confusion is that there’s a really big miniature golf course in front of the building, so you can’t see the building until you get closer to it. I mean, look at this. There are so many trees in the way that I wasn’t sure where it began and ended. And again, I was in a hurry to get out of the rain before my luggage got soaked.
If I could see this sign, I wouldn’t have spent 10 minutes trying to find it. Let’s just get it out of the way so I can figure out where my motel is.
Arcades visited: 9
As you can see, it’s not exactly the fanciest place in the world. It kind of reminds me of those shitty arcades you find at old Go-Kart places. I guess they couldn’t afford real tables, so they just went with some cheap picnic tables. Or maybe it was some kind of weird design choice?
I guess it does have a vaguely nautical theme if you squint.
You can see the kinds of games they had here. It was mostly the standard ticket stuff you see everywhere. I’ve been to nine arcades today, so I’m just going to go ahead and skim through the more interesting ones. I’m sure anyone reading this is as tired of this day as I was.
First up is Sega AM2’s After Burner Climax. The original After Burner was one of AM2’s very first games back in the 80s. AM2 managed to keep its name after the other AM branches were disbanded because their logo had become so recognizable. If you don’t know what it looks like, it’s the palm tree emblem on the back of the seat. AM2 was known for featuring that logo pretty prominently on anything they made. Once you know what it looks like, you’ll start seeing it everywhere.
I only point out AM2 specifically whenever I see one of their games because most people don’t realize how prolific they are when it comes to arcade games. You’ve probably played 5 or 6 of their games without realizing they were made by the same people. Hell, do you see that G.H.O.S.T. emblem below their logo? That’s a reference to the Ghost Squad games, another one of their popular arcade series. They get around.
Here are the machines on the other side of the row. Absolutely nobody cares about these games, but I still try to take a picture of them out of obligation. You see, sometimes I find an arcade that’s out of the way that used to have a machine I’ve been looking for. Since the trips are often too far to bother with unless the machine is still there, I have to resort to skimming Youtube walkthroughs of the arcade, since they’re the most recent footage I can find. Nine times out of ten, the video will either be people in their 20s who seem fascinated with common ticket games or a 40-something who outright ignores any game that was made after 1990. I can’t stand it when I finish a video like that still unsure whether the machine is there or not.
So if you’ve ever wondered why I try to be thorough, that’s why. I don’t want anyone to think I’m just ignoring a big chunk of the arcade and might have missed something interesting. If there’s ever something in an arcade I don’t mention, it’s probably just “who cares?” machines like these.
I will mention this self-proclaimed “Hot New Game”, though. You’ve probably seen slot machines in a few of my photos if you’re observant. It’s common to modify slot machines to work with tokens instead of quarters and plop them in arcades. If you ever see a slot machine in an east coast arcade, you can be sure it’s a token arcade.
Or a casino/arcade hybrid. There are a few of those we’ll be getting to, too.
I wonder if the Ripley’s Believe It or Not buildings from before have this pinball machine in them somewhere? I’ve heard that a few of them have Ms. Pac-man machines near the exit.
FYI, all of these coin-catching orbs are supposed to look like soccer balls. It looks like someone had to get some cheap replacement parts…
By the way, three otherwise identical versions of this game exist. The main difference is that they have either a creepy basketball or creepy football on the top depending on the version.
You can’t see it from any of my photos, because it was raining so hard outside, but this small “Game World” shop is attached to a giant Laser Tag building. I love that fancy score counting display and Final Assault Laser Tag sign juxtaposed with the door having a paper sign taped on the front.
The very last place we’ll be seeing in Ocean City is Down Under Golf. I didn’t photograph this place for the arcade, because there isn’t one, but because it’s easily the second-best minigolf theme in town. It’s no Dragons of Legend vs. Ancient Warriors, but it still deserves an honorable mention. The American flag in the middle of the course is my favorite part.
Oh man, a terrible motel room has never looked so nice in my life. Of course, as I found out an hour later, all of the food places in this area close around 4 pm. I had to venture out in this weather again to find anything that was still open. Even the stores were closed. I did manage to find a Dairy Queen close enough to take the food back without it getting soaked. Who has Dairy Queen for dinner?
While checking the room for bugs, which it was surprisingly free of, I discovered many peculiarities of this particular motel. This door, for example, clearly had one of those fire safety signs on the front at some point. Judging by the looks of it, it was on there for a long time.
The air conditioner is plugged into the lower outlet, while a higher outlet that looks like it was made specifically for the air conditioner goes unused. Also, the cable hook-up seeming comes out from behind the mirror.
There used to be a picture hanging here. I strongly suspect it was stolen.
I found the chair like this. I call it “lawsuit in the making”.
This sink is loose, so the people who own this motel stuffed a brush handle in the gap to stop it from shaking when used.
This is the only light source in the bathroom. This light fixture looks like it came from the same era as most of the local arcades. I wonder what that outlet is meant to be used for.
The blinds were slightly too wide for the window, so it looks like they just cut a chunk out of the wall and called it day.
On the bright side, it has an actual showerhead and not one of those energy-efficient pieces of garbage. You can’t even wash the shampoo out with those things. At the last motel, I had to dump a bottle of water over my head because the water pressure was so bad.
Last but not least, there seems to have been an issue with the ceiling at some point.
Overall, this motel was a dive. I love it so much.
That’s it! Two months later, I finally finished writing about the first day of a two-week trip. It feels so nice to finally get that one out of the way. They won’t all be like this, will they?
