The heat wave has finally passed, so you know what that means: I can finally do my laundry without the clothes instantly being soaked in sweat again as soon as I go outside. Our first order of business today is to hit Sunshine Laundromat and Cleaners, one of the most exciting laundromats in NYC. I think. I’ve only been to the one laundromat out here, so I could be wrong.
Arcades visited: 37 (I forgot to count the last three)
As soon as you walk in, you can immediately tell this isn’t your run-of-the-mill laundromat. Not only is it so cramped you can barely move, but those light fixtures don’t exactly scream “laundry.” I’m kind of curious about what was here when this place was built.
It doesn’t take long before you realize that the bizarre atmosphere is entirely intentional. Among other things are a single washing machine with giant googly eyes, a bunch of weird dog paintings lining the wall, and an FAQ taped to the wall that slowly becomes more and more ridiculous.
Sitting on top of the washing machines are the remains of several old pinball machines (and House of the Dead). This isn’t just a laundromat. It’s also a storage room.
I wish this one had been working. This is that weird tiny Super Mario Mushroom World pinball machine that dispenses tickets. You’re never going to find one of these anyplace that doesn’t pride itself on its pinball collection.
They only had a handful of machines working in this area. Even I wouldn’t go out of my way to use this specific laundromat if this was all it had.
I’ve seen hundreds upon hundreds of arcade machines in my life, but this is easily the most unique. It’s a washing machine that someone converted into a fully working Area 51 cab! I’m using “fully working” loosely here since it was broken down at the time. Just getting a photo of this oddity is enough for the time being.
Their vending machine was worth mentioning for all of the random stuff in it. Here you can buy an eight pack of D batteries, dollar bills, and an I-forget-what with a bonus 5-dollar bill and Hot Mess Snickers bar attached.
I’m honestly having trouble putting into words how novel this laundromat was. Maybe the photos will speak for themselves.
Before we leave, there was one more mysterious set of unassuming washing machines against the back wall…
Those machines are actually a well-hidden door that opens to one of the biggest pinball bars in New York! It wasn’t open, and pinball wasn’t my thing, but I had to see this place at least once. I’m a sucker for hidden doors.
With the scent of sweat washed out of my clothes, it was time to hit one of the most famous arcades in NYC. When you mention an arcade in Chinatown to any hardcore rhythm or fighting game player, only one place comes to mind.
This is the legendary Chinatown Fair, once known as one of the biggest competitive fighting game, and later rhythm game, scenes on the East Coast. Some have gone as far as calling it one of the last real arcades in the country. If you’d like to know more about this place, there’s a heavily dramatized documentary called The Lost Arcade. Some locals from this area have told me it does a good job capturing what kind of arcade this was before it…
In the early ’10s, CTF closed its doors. It reopened sometime later under different management. While I can’t speak too much for this arcade, everyone I’ve talked to agrees that it’s currently a shell of itself. Let’s see for ourselves what this place is like nowadays.
Arcades visited: 38
Well, here it is. Nearly all of the trademark fighting games are long gone, with only a tiny handful struggling to hold their ground against the influx of ticket games. I came here knowing that this place had gone to hell, but I still couldn’t help but feel an overwhelming sense of disappointment. New York’s Last Great Arcade wastes most of its tiny floor space on gigantic ticket games. This is depressing to look at.
On the bright side, quite a few imported rhythm games survived. This is still one of the central hangouts for the local rhythm game community, but they constantly complain that the machines are usually in an unplayable condition.
In December 2018, about half a year after this photo was taken, someone ripped the joysticks off this game and took them home. Even I wouldn’t wish that fate upon Groove Coaster.
CTF was still the best place in the city to go for rhythm games during my visit. A few months after I left, a new Round 1 location opened up in a mall to the south. Fed up with the Beatmania machine falling into a state of disrepair before being sold, the locals have slowly been migrating over. Can Chinatown Fair support itself once the rhythm players abandon it?
This was also once where the local Initial D players call home. I’m not sure if they still come here now that Round1 is open, but there’s both a ver 7 and 8 machine here. At least now I can say I’ve played 7.
They had this game in Round 1, but I can’t remember if I discussed it during that blog post. This is Elevator Action: Death Parade, a game loosely based on the memetic retro game Elevator Action. It’s a standard arcade rail shooter with an outright bizarre gimmick. The plot has the characters slowly working through a skyscraper filled with enemies, so they frequently duck into elevators to avoid fire. As you mash the “close door” button, a pair of real elevator doors will close in front of the screen. The machine they had at Round 1 didn’t have the doors working right, which should tell you how little the doors matter to the actual game. They worked fine here, though. The small screen at the top shows you what’s happening when the doors are closed.
Oh yeah, they had Pump It Up, too. I’m not sure who would play this when DDR is right there, but it must see play if they bothered to get such a recent machine. Or maybe the new owner just saw the shiny new dance game in a catalog and ordered it since the other two dance games see so much use.
You may have seen this game before, even if you’ve never seen it in person. This is Cho Chabudai Gaeshi, one of the go-to examples of weird-ass Japanese arcade games. In this game, you get annoyed by various characters and pound the table rapidly to try to shut them up. Finally, your rage builds up enough that the game lets you grab that giant plastic table and flip it! Calling this a game is a real stretch since you’re just paying a few quarters for a chance to flip that table. Totally worth playing.
Sound Voltex has survived so far. I often lurk the NYC rhythm game discussions to keep tabs on the state of things out there. Apparently, these buttons are in a constant state of “they said they’d be fixing it soon.” I usually like beat-up arcades, but not when the beat-up machines are this recent. This is just sad.
I’m not all that versed in Tekken, but as far as I can tell, this isn’t what a Tekken Unlimited Tag Tournament machine looks like. Honestly, I have no idea what the hell this is. If it’s a custom job, it’s a very well-made one.
This one definitely is a custom job, though. It’s one of the most busy-looking multicade machines I’ve ever seen.
And I’ve seen a lot.
I mean, look at this. There’s a headphone jack, what looks like an Xbox360 memory card slot, and a place for volume buttons that aren’t there. I feel this was originally made for someone’s living room, where it was meant to hold a home console. I once remember seeing a version of Super Smash Bros Brawl that was hacked to work as an arcade machine so that it could have also been something similar to that at one point. I don’t know. I’m not an expert.
Street Fighter 4, shoved inside of a Tekken 5 Candy Cab. I bet there was a lot of celebration when this was first set up here. When Street Fighter 4 was first released in Japan, it was almost immediately pirated in the west. Japanese fans were much less enthusiastic about it since these pirated versions had the hidden characters unlocked long before they were even announced for the legit Japanese version. Capcom became very careful only to add hidden characters through DLC updates after that fiasco.
There are so many modern rhythm games that I can’t keep track of. Japan’s currently in a strange phase where they’re constantly churning out new rhythm game IPs that rarely stick. I sat here for a few minutes trying to remember what NeonFM was like before I finally Googled it. It turns out very few of these machines exist. I assumed it was one of those weird indie releases like ReRave, but it turns out it’s a big enough game to have done a crossover with Sega. Maybe it’s from somewhere in South-East Asia? I’m usually happy to find weird machines like this, but these iPad rhythm games rub me the wrong way.
Oh boy, a Puri booth. I mentioned this at R1, but our local Tomodachi store used to have one of these (I took low-rez pictures of it that I’ll share whenever I get around to doing a post about Mall of America). My DDR partner at the time was a huge weeaboo and loved taking pictures in it, so I once got to see how they work without it being awkward. She kept the sticker half without asking and gave me the non-sticker half. I still have those pictures, even though I’m no longer speaking with that girl. That wasn’t why we stopped talking, but it was a sign of things to come.
I’m not going to pretend I’m a local who understands how severe a blow it was when CTF turned from what it was into what it is today. I still feel like I missed out on seeing a fantastic arcade by not coming here a decade sooner.
There is a silver lining. After CTF collapsed, the local fighting game community moved to a small game store called Next Level. I wanted to see it, but I chose not to go. How do I put this? When you’re passionate enough about something, it stops being something that people who don’t share your passion can understand. I’m not a fighting game player, so it’s not a place where I belong. I feel it would be belittling to go in there just for sightseeing, you know?
If you want to see what kind of place it is, someone did a youtube walkthrough of it.
I spent far less time at Chinatown Fair than expected, so the rest of my day was free. There was one place in New York that I wanted to see but I wasn’t sure if I’d have time to make it. Things worked out pretty well for me.
Ladies and gentlemen, Coney Island. If we’re talking about the most famous amusement parks in the world, this place is second only to Disney World. It also houses the most famous arcade in the world. “Seriously, what the hell are you talking about?” people who’ve been here are probably asking. Well, I’ve got a very good justification for that claim. We’ll get to that in a moment.
It sure as hell isn’t this one, though. You can’t put the word “arcade” above four prize games and expect me not to call bullshit on this.
No, THIS is the most famous arcade in the world!
Arcades visited: 39
…and inside, there’s nothing of note. I’ve heard a big chunk of this arcade got destroyed in a hurricane a few years back. I heard another rumor that one of the last few Ridge Racer machines managed to survive and was still housed here, but it seems to be long gone. Didn’t I ask someone to check on it for me before I came? Hmm…
EDIT: According to a friend who worked here the year after, most of the arcade really was destroyed during hurricane Sandy in 2012.
So why is this half-baked arcade the most famous in the world? Why not something like Club Sega in Japan, Galloping Ghost, or even Chinatown Fair? That’s simple. The entire Luna Park amusement park was so famous that arcades worldwide stole the name and general style of the place, including the Luna Arcade. The Luna Arcade was copied so often that the term “Luna Park” became synonymous with small boardwalk-style arcades in Belgium. Want to know what the word for small, stand-alone video arcades is in Belgium now?
You can make a case for many arcades in the world being more famous than this one. Still, it’s hard to argue when this arcade was responsible for naming an entire category of them in a random European country. That’s the whole reason.
I was out of arcades to visit for the day, so I turned in early. I remember someone recommending Promised Land chocolate milk a while back, so I decided to grab some while I had the chance. I had to go way out of my way to find any place that sold the stuff, but it’s not availablewhere I’m from.
I got both types available in case someone tried to claim I got the wrong kind. Honestly, I wasn’t impressed. It tastes more like really sweet coffee than chocolate milk. Similar texture, too. This is a drink that can only be enjoyed by people who have never tasted Kemps. Or maybe it just appeals to coffee drinkers.
Today I visited an arcade I claim is the most famous in the world. Tomorrow, how about we visit the most important arcade in modern America?
