It’s that time of the year again. Every spring, the seasons change, and the road calls me. These days I mostly stay in one place, but I still make it a point to leave town at least once a year. I had a lot of options this year. Omaha, Chicago, California, and Flordia were all tossed around as potential options. Ultimately, I decided I wanted to go somewhere with as many arcades as possible.
When you think of places full of arcades, California and Las Vegas are usually the first two things that come to mind. However, somewhere in the United States exists a place where two arcades across the street from each other are a common sight. A place where any given arcade could potentially house a treasure. A place where some of the oldest arcades in the country still stand.
That place, of course, is the Eastern Coastline.
11:55 AM: Minneapolis Greyhound Station
It was time to set off for my journey. I could have flown, but what fun would that be? The Greyhound is way more exciting. Not only do I enjoy the sights of the open road, but think of all the worn-down game rooms I get to see on the way!
“Wait, how would you see game rooms while you’re stuck on a bus?” you ask. Clearly, you’ve never actually taken a bus across the country.
But first, I’d like to talk about this machine a bit. When I first moved to Minneapolis, I’d walk by this Greyhound station almost every day. Through the window, I’d see this Time Crisis machine and wonder what else was in there. Security would never let me see. On the day I finally got to see it, it turned out that this was the only machine. Why did they have a giant “PLAY” sign for just one game?
3:54 PM: A truckstop somewhere in Wisconsin
When traveling by bus, sometimes you have to go without food and resort to eating Mcdonald’s instead.
I had about five minutes left after eating, so I decided to run over to the truck stop next door and grab a Pepsi before the bus took off again. I had almost forgotten myself that these places often have small arcades tucked away in a corner. This one only had the lone FrightFearLand machine and the claw machine behind it. It’s a pretty uncommon game to run into, especially at a place like this.
I like truckstop arcades, because of how unpredictable their game lineups are. You can find all sorts of random stuff in them. Hopefully, I’ll find a real one somewhere before the trip ends.
7:50 PM: Milwaukee Greyhound Station
Milwaukee’s a nice place. I think I’ll pay it a personal visit someday…
11:22 PM: Chicago Greyhound Station
This was my first transfer. I was only here for 20 minutes. At the last station, they told me to get my tickets checked when I arrived here, but nobody here had any idea why they’d say that. My 20-minute holdover was reduced to about 5 minutes.
Which means I didn’t get to spend any time here. I didn’t get to play any of these thanks to that screw-up, but I did have time to get some pictures. Let’s take a look.
By this point, we’re all used to seeing Terminator Salvation at any given arcade. The more interesting game here is Target: Force GOLD. The non-GOLD version was Raw Thrills’ very first release back in 2004. To think that their legacy would start with a game that was abit outdated even when it was released…
Remember the title “Target: Force GOLD”. It’s important information for later.
I have no idea what this was. The marquee says Pac-Man’s Arcade Party, the screen shows 1943, and the machine’s art looks like it’s from a cheap multi-cade. If only I had been able to play it.
I’ve seen this game at quite a few other arcades I’ve posted about, but I think this is the first time I’ve run into the deluxe cabinet. Take a look at the establishing shot again if you want an idea of how ridiculously big this thing is. I mean, it’s no deluxe Daytona machine or anything, but it’s still way bigger than you’d expect from something like this. I have to give credit where credit is due and admit that this is a nice-looking machine.
These things always pop up in the strangest locations. I’m not entirely sure where they’re “supposed” to go. Video rental stores? Small pizza places? Grocery stores?
You usually only see fortune-telling machines in tourist traps. Why do they have one at a bus station, of all places? This game room is weird.
Unfortunately, that’s all the time I had here. Let’s see where I ended up next.
6:11 AM: Cleveland Ohio Greyhound Station
This isn’t the bus station. This is a building outside I took a photo of because Cleveland is a cool-looking town. The nice-looking buildings give the impression that this town is trying its damnedest not to be a ghetto, but it ultimately can’t keep its head above water. Hang in there, Cleveland.
Also, the building had “Cleveland” written on the front and I knew I’d forget where I was otherwise.
This is the actual bus terminal. After pulling an all-nighter, the sun was starting to come up while I waited for my next bus to take off. I get tired just looking at this picture.
I dig the outside look of the building, but the inside had so many bugs that three birds had taken up residency. The surplus of moths inside kept them well-fed. There was one specific hanging light that they kept returning to. I wonder if they had a nest in there?
I was worried that the other two photos were making Cleveland look a lot cleaner than it was. Here are the remains of a pay phone.
But of course, this is what interested me most about the bus terminal. This kind of reminds me of the arcades you sometimes see at larger restaurants. I think that these days, a “core” game room consists of at least one shooting game, one racing game, and one retro game. This one is a great example.
First, the racing game. F&F here almost always fills that quota these days, but San Fransisco Rush and Crusin’ used to be the go-to games. I think a big part of it is the availability. Midway Games and Atari Games were both stationed in the west, so they could offer much better distribution deals for places that didn’t want to order a whole lot of machines. Nowadays, it’s pretty much just Raw Thrills who have a monopoly on non-redemption games. That’s not saying much, considering how closely related all three of them are.
Next up is the obligatory shooting game. This could be almost anything. House of the Dead, Time Crisis, one of Raw Thrills’ many movie-based shooting games, or even something completely random like Carnevil or Welcome to FrightFearLand. In this case, it’s the original House of the Dead. I was kind of surprised to see it, considering its 20 years old. I learned nothing from Las Vegas.
The “Play at your own risk” signs on the wall are probably referring to this game since the guns didn’t work. As long as they have the signs up, they can keep using it to steal money from people. No wonder it’s lasted 20 years.
You. You I do not forget.
It was the summer of ’00 at the Rivera Casino in Las Vegas. Many a token was lost trying to get a single Pokemon Action Flipz of Clefairy out of one of these. Eventually, the machine claw accidentally knocked a lid off one of these containers and we got that instead of the prize. After two days, we got the technician to agree that knocking the lid off counted as a malfunction and we were rewarded with the Clefairy Action Flipz. We must have spent over 10 dollars trying to win something that you buy in a pack of five for 2.
When traveling cross-country on a bus, you never know when you’ll be able to eat, so you have to settle for whatever’s nearby. This time, it was Greyhound Station Pancakes. These are the worst pancakes I’ve ever eaten in my life. They were so dry that they got stuck in my throat and I could only take a few bites. I spent the rest of the day hungry.
11:00 AM: Pittsburgh Greyhound Station
Running low on food, sleep, and spirit, another pit stop was made at yet another Greyhound station. The bus was running late and was supposed to leave immediately after arriving, but due to delays, I was able to get off and take some quick photos of this one.
You might remember that the last time we saw Target: Terror GOLD it had a different title. Raw Thrills learned the hard way that 2004 was a bit too soon to be making a game about terrorists hijacking an airport. For the GOLD edition re-release, two versions were made, “Target: Terror” and “Target: Force”. The new name made family establishments slightly more willing to house it, even though the game is otherwise unchanged. Plus, the censored title makes it a bit more obvious that it’s a pseudo-sequel to Maximum Force.
When looking through my old blog posts, I realized that I’ve never actually posted a picture of this game before. It turns out that nearly every Fast & Furious machine I’ve taken a picture of was the original. I grabbed a photo for future use in case I didn’t get another opportunity. As it turns out, I worried for nothing.
Like Target: Terror/Force GOLD, a second version of this game supposedly exists, although I’ve never run into it. This game came out right as Raw Thrills were losing the Fast & Furious license, so later printings had to remove the license and shorten the title to simply “Super Cars”. These games have absolutely nothing to do with The Fast and the Furious anyway, so nothing else had to be changed aside from the title.
5:30 PM: Somewhere in Delaware?
I finally transferred from the cross-country buses to a more local state bus. I couldn’t get a good picture, but we passed through a Coke vending machine warehouse that had a gigantic wall of vending machines in the back. This was relevant to the blog somehow, I think.
This large body of water is known as the Ocean. It’s the largest body of water on Earth, engulfing about 70% of the world’s surface area. It’s home to many creatures, including but not limited to Horseshoe crabs, leafy sea dragons, giant squids, clione, and the cast of Spongebob Squarepants. Lots of crazy stuff down there.
This was the waiting area for my last bus transfer. I think it was the cafeteria of some kind of adult job training facility. There was a cafeteria, but nobody was operating it at this hour. I had to venture out to find food, badly.
If it’s world famous, why hasn’t anyone in Minnesota heard of it?
This here is Royal Farms, a line of gas stations with a surprisingly elaborate cafeteria inside. You make your order, print your ticket, then ring it up with everything else at the gas station counter. My options for food were this place or a local gas station with a closed Subway.
More importantly, this gas station also sold Clover chocolate milk! I haven’t seen that stuff in ages.
After the last bus ride, I had one final trek. A long foot bridge separates this pier town from the mainland. As you cross the sea, the lights of Ocean City come into view…
It feels like a long voyage so far, but my journey finally begins tomorrow.
