Our destination today is a small town just outside the twin cities. So small, in fact, that there’s not a single motel anywhere! What on Earth could possibly bring me out to a sleepy town like Jordan, Minnesota?
Well, it is an arcade blog, after all.
The story this time is that another arcade opened here in the Twin Cities. Visiting it bummed me out so much that I was in a funk for a whole week. Finally, I decided I needed to visit a new arcade to snap myself out of it.
But it couldn’t be just any arcade. It had to be one I’d never been to before and one that could remind me why I love visiting arcades. It just so happens there was one a bit too far out of town for me to have bothered with before. Now was a perfect time!
It was way smaller and homelier than I had expected. The outside was run down and in need of paint. The fliers were just haphazardly pinned up on the run-down remains of a corkboard just outside the door. Even the sign looked like it was always on the verge of falling over and killing some unfortunate kid.
I hadn’t been this excited about an arcade in ages!
Before we get to the arcade proper, let’s talk about Zap Arcade. The name’s a bit misleading since it’s a hobby shop first and foremost, with half of the floor space dedicated to the arcade.
A mere three dollars gives you full entry to use the arcade all day. It’s the cheapest arcade I’ve ever seen in my life.
Being a card shop, their main product is trading cards. As someone who spent a lot of time at my local card shop growing up, I absolutely love this setup. That wooden card stand folds like pages of book, allowing them to display a large amount of cards without having to stuff them into a glass case awkwardly. Plus, the commons are just kept out for everyone to see. This is a high-trust card shop.
This is their prize shelf for an upcoming Pokemon TCG tournament. Do I really need to repeat how charming I find Zap Arcade?
Speaking of charming, here’s the card dispenser. I was short on quarters the last time I saw an arcade with one of these, but this time I was fully prepared to take the gamble.
I got a Dubwool V and a bunch of junk.
One last thing before we begin. Most of this back hall was dedicated to used video games. Let’s see if there’s anything interesting, shall we?
Just look at all of those boxed NES games! Why do you have so many of them? The prices on them aren’t even terrible, for the most part. Sure, a few of the big names are on the pricey side, but that copy of Kirby’s Superstar was only around 30. I very nearly bought it myself.
Also, that boxed copy of MUSCLE. See, I have a bit of history with Kinnikuman, so it was extremely tempting. If the price hadn’t been covered up, I really might have walked away with this.
But enough of that, let’s get to the main event! Taking up about half of the building is Zap Arcade! It may not look like much at first glance, but there are well over 20 machines here. It’s bigger than some barcades I’ve been to.
The first thing you notice about Zap arcade is the sheereffort they’ve put into the atmosphere. They have very little space to work with, but anywhere you turn is a movie cutout of some actor, a row of posters, or a random piece of memorabilia.
I think this is the kind of love I was missing from that other arcade I mentioned earlier. The arcade is limited in size and scope, but every inch of it tells you that the owner wants it to be a fun place for the local kids to come hang out.
That also carries over to the choice of games. There’s zero pretence here: Most of these are chosen specifically because they’d be fun for someone to play when popping in with friends or meeting people for the first time.
Hell, despite their limited space, they even have a great variety of different genres. I’ve got to dock them a few points for not having a single sit-down racing machine, but that was probably a space issue more than an oversight.
A lot of times at arcades around this size, their games are entirely obvious picks like Pac-man or Donkey King. This arcade was different. There were a lot of really strange games you wouldn’t expect to see at a place like this. Hell, there were some I’d never even seen before.
The game on the far left is called Dragon Breed, one of the most unique shoot-em-ups I’ve ever played. In it, you play as a guy riding a dragon with a long tail made up of spheres. Those spheres take no damage and follow your movements, so you can position them to block enemy fire. If that wasn’t neat enough, there are also sections where you can jump off the dragon and run around killing enemies on the ground. I spent most of my time here playing that game. It was easily my favorite game in the arcade.
A few of the machines were housing multicade boards. I know, I usually shake my head at multicade machines. But I understand it, in this arcade’s case. They’re a tiny arcade in a small town and want the kids who come in weekly to have new stuff to do every time they come in. Plus, it’s not like they just plopped down a Pac-man, Neogeo, and multicade and tried to call it an arcade.
They had a few different flavors of multicades here. There was one dedicated to fighting games, the standard “classic game” one you see everywhere, and two general “500 games in 1” machines (one of the two had the entire Neogeo library). I really can’t bring myself to fault them for this.
I COULD go through and talk about each machine in detail, but I don’t feel it’s really necessary in this case. This is an arcade that’s more than the sum of its parts. Instead, just enjoy the gallery.
But Zap Arcade has one last surprise I haven’t mentioned yet…
3 dollars gets you into the arcade. It also gets you all-day access to a small room in the back that they’d converted into a gaming lounge.
The gaming lounge contains eight different televisions, each with a different retro console hooked up, a sofa, a TV with a built-in VCR to play their stack of movies, a radio, and even an air hockey table!
This is what finally pushed Zap Arcade over the top for me. This is not the best arcade I’ve ever been to, not by a long shot, but of the 150+ I’ve visited over my lifetime, this is the one I wish I had grown up next to. Can you imagine how fortunate these kids are to have a place like this just a few blocks away? For just a couple of bucks, they can spend their entire day in this paradise sifting through the box of Pokemon cards, hanging out in the arcade, or just sitting on the couch watching strangers play Halo while a VHS of Dragonball Z plays above.
It’s beautiful! Everything about Zap Arcade is beautiful! This is the most love I’ve ever seen condensed into a single place! An arcade like this can only exist if the owner sincerely wants every kid who enters its doors to consider it their favorite place in the world!
I’d have loved to speak with the owner a bit, but just as I was getting ready to leave, a crowd of about 20 kids all showed up at the door at once. I had trouble even getting out of the building with so many flooding in. It’s good to know that Zap Arcade has no shortage of patrons.
Godspeed Zap, Arcade. You’ve shown me a type of beauty that I’ll truly never forget.
Anyway, since I was down in Jordan, there was something else I REALLY wanted to see. It was only about a half-hour walk from the city. But unfortunately, I had a rolling backpack, and there was no sidewalk. My arms were so tired from dragging the thing through the grass afterwards. I really need to invest in a hiking backpack…
Also, the cat tails were pollinating! If I had any way to cook them, I’d have grabbed a few. They’re a great supply of emergency food.
But my second target is here, tucked away in the farmlands.
By the way, the renaissance fair was in town, and it’s pretty close to here. That’s why those people are dressed like that.
What kind of mysterious place does this wooden sidewalk lead to?
As we get closer, we come to this video game mural on the sidewalk. I’m surprised Fire Emblem was mainstream enough to make the cut. But this just further begs the question: “No, really, what is this place?”
Next up is a photo opt with Jelly Belly’s mascot…
…and a mural dedicated to a van that crashed through their wall…
…The World’s Largest Jigsaw Puzzle, a 44,000 piece behemoth that takes up the entire wall (it wasn’t always blue, the colors are just faded)…
…and a Paw Patrol-themed kiddie door.
If you put all of these facts together, there’s only one place this could possibly be…
If you guess Minnesota’s Largest Candy Store, you’re correct! Or you just read the sign in the first photo!
Yeah, that’s the name of it. The building is so large it’s nearly impossible to get a full photo of it. Instead, I had to settle for showing you all of the weird stuff you see just walking up to the door. It’s MASSIVE. The inside is even more interesting.
Wall to wall to wall candy! If it exists, it’s sold here.
If it were just a big candy store, that wouldn’t be very fun, now would it? What really sells this place is the sheer spectacle of it. Let’s go through the various rooms you’ll see when walking through the store.
The building is so big and has so many people that you’re forced to walk with the traffic flow. The path will take you through several colorful rooms with different themes, filled wall-to-wall with candy shelves. The first room is the underwater area. Here you can find statues of characters like Jaws, Ariel, Spongbob, and Baby Sharks alongside murals of everything from Moby Dick to Lapras.
Next up is the fairy tale room, which doesn’t have as much going on as the others.
The superhero skyline! Check out the gigantic Hulkbuster armor on the left.
The… jigsaw puzzle room? Well, it’s also the World’s Biggest Jigsaw Puzzle Store, I guess…
The sci-fi room is the most breathtaking of them all.
There’s also a blue sky room, complete with a somewhat animatronic band that plays every 5 minutes.
I put off writing this post for a long time because… what do I even add to this? Minnesota’s Largest Candy Store needs to be seen in person to be believed. All I can do is take photos for the sake of those who can’t.
With everything in Jordan finished, there’s just one more order of business that needs to be taken care of. Remember when I said there were no motels? I ended up camping in this wooded area behind the senior center for a couple of days until the next bus came. The trees are thick on the outside but surprisingly pretty clear inside. It was the perfect cover to hide away in without being noticed.
I called this area “Spider Grove” because the only things living in it were a bunch of spiders and one owl who decided to wake me up. Every step you take requires brushing away cobwebs because no living human has been back here in ages.
What, do I not strike you as the outdoors type? I’m the same guy who has a habit of going on 4 hour walks with no real destination! Hell, I used to hitchhike! I’m used to sleeping in ditches! I’m always getting stereotyped…
By the way, I bought some candy watermelon slices. They were pretty good.
