Arcade games at theaters.

M1A

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After starting the other thread, I started thinking about how fun it was to goto movies in the 80s and part of the fun was not just that the 80s were filled with great movies, but the theaters often had great games.

What did you play and where?

For me, there were two theaters that had games when I was growing up. First, the Keith Albee theater in Huntington, WV. They had several games over the years, but the only game that really sticks out from when I was a kid at this theater was Wizard of Wor. I played the shit out of WoW at this theater. The great thing was, the Keith Albee was a very old theater. Originally, it was built for vaudeville acts. It had very ornate decorations and was always very dimly lit. There were stories of dark tunnels underneath the theater and a catacomb/maze of tunnels. There was a balcony with a walkway that went around the entire top of the theater. The bathrooms were way down under the theaters through a series of steps with lots of turns down this wide hallway. It was a very creepy place for an 11 year old, but a great place for movies. The overall decor/ambiance of the theater being creepy was the perfect setting for Wizard of Wor. The creepy organ music and voice of the Wizard were just perfect for this setting. A very fond memory.

Then, there were the theaters at the Huntington Mall. These were sterile, box theaters of the 80s. However, they always had games. The two I remember the most at this theater were Crystal Castles and Marble Madness. While my memories aren't as clear of this theater, I think it is because the theater was not impressive, and the games didn't really add to the experience the same way WoW added to the Keith Albee experience. But, I always looked forward to movies at this theater because of these games, both of which I played a ton.

Interested in hearing your theater/arcade game stories.

- M1A
 
I've got nothing to say on the matter but wanted to see where this goes so I'm posting into this thread...

Matt
 
I often saw movies at the Waldorf Twin Theatre in Waldorf Maryland, which was converted into a Gateway Country store in the late 90s, and I believe has since been divided into other smaller store fronts.

I saw movies like Return of The Jedi, Ghostbusters, Transformers: The Movie, Big, Scrooged, and The Craft there over the years.

Anyway, they had a game room in 1982 or so which had Defender, Qix, Berzerk, Mr.Do (in what I believe was a dedicated cab), Galaxian, and interestingly enough, a cockpit Night Driver. Certainly by 1982, Night Driver was an "oldie" that looked out of seriously out of place among the more modern titles of the day.

By 1984, they had a new line up, including both a dedicated Tempest, and a Major Havoc in a Tempest cabinet, in addition to Robotron:2084, Popeye, and Ms.PacMan. By 1985, all the games were gone. :(

Oh, and I went to a theatre once in PG County MD, around 1982 sometime that had a row of games in the lobby consisting only of five Ms.PacMans, and two PacMans. That's some serious Pac-Mania right there! :)

Kyle :cool:
 
movies and games

during the 80's i did'nt goto the movies much other than with my Grandma.


Mostly remember games in Pizza places and 7-11'S
 
The theater we went to the most in the 80's was 20 miles away. I vividly remember going

to see E.T. in 1982(I was 12) and the theater lobby had a Pac Man and a Centipede back

to back, and over against one wall a Defender and a Joust. I remember someone was

having a good game of Pac-Man and there was literally about 25 people trying to get close

to see the action. We had to walk way over against one wall to get around everyone.

Forget about playing any of the games. Usually after the movie was over the older kids

split to go drink and then I had a chance to play. I liked Defender and Joust the best.

The atmosphere was truly magical for lack of better words. These games were "in" and if

you could show everyone some good gameplay you were the man.

A couple of years later they added a Paperboy; which stayed in the lobby LONG after the

other 4 were gone. Strange but true. Those were good times man.
 
I often saw movies at the Waldorf Twin Theatre in Waldorf Maryland, which was converted into a Gateway Country store in the late 90s, and I believe has since been divided into other smaller store fronts.

Kyle :cool:


Been there many times. We would go there to see some movies that our local theaters didnt get.
Our local theater still has a few games, about 4 or 5. None that im interested in but at least they have some.

"Oh, and I went to a theatre once in PG County MD, around 1982 sometime that had a row of games in the lobby consisting only of five Ms.PacMans, and two PacMans. That's some serious Pac-Mania right there! "

I have a seperate room in the basement for my pac machines. I have nine of them lined up around the room, its a pac fans dream. I wish I had room to put my pac pinball in there with the vids.
It wasnt uncommon to see a row of pac/mspacs in arcade, they brought in the most money. About a year ago I was at an arcade that had 4 reunion cabs lined up and all of them were being played!
 
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Growing up in the SF Bay Area (East Bay), there were a handful of arcades that I went to as a kid:

1. Starcade at the Dome Theater in ghetto Concord. The theater now only shows old movies and some new releases and the arcade space is now a separate fitness gym. It was a pretty big arcade from what I can remember.

These next two aren't theaters, but decided to mention them anyways:

2. Aladdin's Castle at Sun Valley Mall in ghetto Concord. This was THE arcade that I would go to with my brothers. They had everything from classics to lasers and then the beat-em-up/fighter era hit in the early 90s and you can probably guess what games came during that time.

3. There were a handful of Nickel Arcades (One in Concord, one in San Ramon, and one in Walnut Creek) that always had the "Classics Free Play" wall and you'd actually coin up with nickels on other games. I think they all closed down due to too many complaints of gang violence and drug dealing. There's still Nickel City in San Jose. Never been, but I heard it sucks hard.

Man, I miss those days. :(

Now that I live in Livermore, the two theaters I go to are:

1. Regal IMAX at Dublin Hacienda: They have an Indy Pin, Guitar Hero, and I think Time Crisis or some type of shooter. That's about it. Lame.

2. Livermore Theater: They have a Galaga/Ms. Pac, Star Wars Trilogy UR, and two or three shooters that are broken.
 
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Theaters around me all still have arcades in them was just at a Regal Theater last week the had a Neo Geo with Metal slug 2 but I already have it lol. A few of the Regal Theaters have rather large arcades in them near me.
 
I've got nothing to say on the matter but wanted to see where this goes so I'm posting into this thread...

Matt

You don't need to post to a thread if you just want to follow it. At the top of the thread there is a "Thread Tools" option that will allow you to subscribe to the thread.
 
Our local mall had both an arcade and theater. Not too long before Tron hit the theaters they indeed had Tron the video game at the arcade. For about a week I *refused* to play it before I saw the movie. After all, I didn't want to spoil the movie! :p
 
The movie theatre in Shrewsbury, NJ (aside from having this awesome lemonade-type of drink called Lotta Lemon way back when) had a Time Pilot, a Dig Dug and a Pole Position IIRC.
 
Damn, this goes back to the late 70s for me. I lived about 2 miles from the movieplex and Id walk over there on Saturday and spend most of the day. I went to school with all the ticket takers so it never cost me anything to watch the movies. Between movies all my money went into the Asteriods (and I cant remember the other game, they had just 2 until 1980). The shopping complex it was part of (anyone remember the Hills department store chain?) is long gone, replaced now by a Super Walmart, but the theater is still there
 
I, as has been said here before, was a frequenter of the same theaters as M1A, just a few years later.

I spent the majority of my time at the Huntington Mall Cinema. Boy do I have some memories from there, but Keith Albee is a very close second.

The Keithe Albee never really had games when I was going there. They had 1-2 crappy games in the lobby, but that was about it. What M1A didn't say was that there were 2 other theatres just a block down the street. They were much smaller theatres (one of them is still around as a 2nd run theater that we went to last week), but the Camelot theatre across the street had a nice gameroom. I remember playing alot of MKII and TMNT in that gameroom.

Ah, but back to my true home cinema gameroom. The Mall cinema always had an awesome array of games that changed regularly. The main entrance lobby had both sides of the walls lined with games - 10 or more on each side.
I remember that they had a Laser shooting game for many years. It had the Mad Dog Mcree games over the years, but also had the cool quick draw game.
They always had 2-3 pins on hand at the beginning of the left wall row. I played Star Wars pin a whole lot!

Even after the 2 (you read that right 2 arcades!) Gold Mine arcades shut down and was replaced with the sterile Tilt arcade, the Mall Cinema gave me my low-light, seedy fix of game playing. I'll never forget the smell of popcorn, the excited crowds waiting in line for the newest blockbuster, etc.

M1A may have seen it as sterile, but to me the mall cinema had as much or more dark, seedy personality as the Keith Albee.*

*Unbiasedly, Keith Albee was still WAY cooler/darker/seedier though.
 
The local theater has a few games. They just got rid of a huge one that was always broke... Some truck game...Route 66 or something... I never got to play it because it was always broke. Before that was a huge ass Lucky & Wilde game there... also always broke. They have a Time Crisis 2 there... some other cheezy shooter...Maximum Force or something. They also have a Buck Hunter type game (not in to them at all)... and a single lonesome fighter ... I want to say it's a Soul Calibur but don't quote me on that. Just outside of the official gameroom they have a "Stacker" redemption, a few other "toy/gizmo" vending machines, as well a the newer Alien game (shooter in the same vein as Terminator 2 but with much nicer graphics).... as well as a pair of drivers...I want to say they're Tokyo Drift cabs or something.

Not a classic on site.
 
The Camelot and The Cinema never had games when I went there. Kids my age were cheated. :(

Funny, I can remember TONS of movies I saw at the Camelot, but only a few at the Cinema.

I saw Trading Places and 48 Hrs. at the Cinema. Best Defense, too. Weird - all three of those are Eddie Murphy. I think I saw Alien there, too. Oh, and I saw The Road Warrior there.

I saw Ghostbusters, Young Guns, Fletch, Good Guys Wear Plaid (or whatever that was called), and tons of other movies at The Camelot.

I saw Blade Runner in the main theater at The Keith Albee. Also saw The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi in the same theater.

I saw Star Wars, Close Encounters, and Moonraker too, but don't remember the name of the theater as I lived in Alabama then.

- M1A
 
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When I was growing up in northern NJ, my dad and I would go to the Essex Green movie theater in West Orange. They not only had the best sound system in the area, but also the best movie theater arcade. It was the first place I remember seeing games like Frenzy and Bosconian. We went to see the Wrath of Khan on the day it came out and I remember the line for the movie wrapped around the entire building.
 
In the early 80's I was a doorman at the Cineplex 9 in downtown Edmonton.We had a Frogger,Ms Pacman and of course,a Galaga there.Always being played on weekends.
 
The Camelot and The Cinema never had games when I went there. Kids my age were cheated. :(
- M1A

Camelot is a restaurant now or something.
I was pleasantly surprised the the Cinema last week. We saw Drag Me To Hell. Of course, my back yard theater setup is about 50% as big as the screen, but I didn't let it bother me. :)

The video/audio quality was better than the brand new stadium theaters at the new Huntington Mall cinema. For some unknown reason, the new theater only installed one digital screen. The rest are film and stereo sound. You read that right - a brand spanking new theater with zero speakers along the walls.
 
Here's the current state of my hometown theatre's game room:

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