I've never previously had a reason to want to go to Illinois, but this place makes me want to take a trip:

I've never previously had a reason to want to go to Illinois, but this place makes me want to take a trip:

gallopingghostarcade.com/games-list/

The place currently has 528 games running. It seems like every cent the guy makes goes into expanding the building. Apparently he has over a thousand cabinets and plans to keep expanding until they're all out and running.

The place has a shitload of imports and prototypes and other stuff that just doesn't exist anywhere else, like a Beavis & Butthead arcade game.

Apparently it's 15 bucks to get in, and all the games are set to free play.

Can you think of any other reasons to visit Illinois? Make it easier for me to justify this trip.

Other urls found in this thread:

examiner.com/article/splatterhouse-chicago-woman-sets-new-arcade-game-world-record
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Wow that's super cool.

Guess Im going to Ilinois

Jesus fuck

I've been there. They have THE baraka mask the motion capture guy used for mortal kombat. I didn't out it on because it's small as hell & fragile) but wow, that was a cool thing to have in my hands.

Also played the ONLY KNOWN COPIES of the Beavis & Butthead arcade game and the ONLY KNOWN COPY of Primal Rage 2.

Go dudes, it's completely worth it, & there's a pretty good hotdog place down the street where you can get mozzarella sticks.

I also met JAX, dude is still built as fuck. One guy was going for the Ghouls & Ghosts world record recording himself on his phone.

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reposting, fucked up my previous post

At one point in the video he shows this scoreboard screen, they record the high score for every single game in the place with a little symbol next to it if it's the world record.

It's right around the point where he mentions the creator of Pac-Man just showing up one day to take a tour and just loving the place.

when I was there every machine had a printed business cars on top of the cabinets. One had the house score, the other had the world score.

Unfortunately, the f-zero AZ machine broke an hour after I played it, & their metal slug machine was VERY dark & blurry. Probably needs the capacitors replaced.

Meant AX. Still, it's there if you want to play it.

WHY CANT WE HAVE NICE THINGS?

Yeah, pretty much all their neo geo machines which lines the back were faulty or in disrepair, but then you realize you can play speed racer right next to it & you don't care anymore because you've played metal slug 100 times anyway.

Their Neo Geo section is pretty sweet. They've got like ten cabinets each set up to hold six games.

You guys sound like massive shills but Ill probably go there anyway.
There are literally Zero arcades in my country.

It's a great arcade, but it's not perfect. I chewed out the owner for not having a copy of Planet harriers.

I figured if I went I'd have to go two days, as bored as my girlfriend would be by the second day. She's never been to an arcade and doesn't get why I think so highly of them.

My attention would be split between wanting to play all the shit I'd never seen before, and having her try out all my old favorites.

Holy shit, there's a fucking F-Zero AX cabinet! I thought that there were none in the states and were Japan only. I have to get my ass over there some day.

That looks fucking amazing.
Gameplay looks pretty generic though, but I dont know the control scheme so It might not be.

Environement of that first stage reminds me of Battle Engine Aquila.
Holy fuck man, I miss when games were actually good.

Oh fug, time for a road trip.

Did I mention it's a co-op cabinet?

Noice.

I guess it's a grass is always greener thing. I'm sure if I went I could spend several days there and still not get to try out every game I wanted to, but when I first loaded up the games list I found myself hitting ctrl + f and looking for everything they didn't have.


But I guess that's like complaining there's no skeeball, big bertha, air hockey or that game where you shoot balls at clown's teeth.

The arcade has a clear focus, the guy probably has half those games sitting in storage, and the fact that he doesn't have those out probably eats away at the guy.

My dick can only take so much
plus the reminder that the golden age is over and there is only stagnation depresses me, I miss Daytona, SoulCalibur, Pinball, Star Wars and both Jurassic Park games

My uni used to have an arcade in the student union.


Shit was so cash, but they closed it down in my sophomore year.

Punchmania may be my favorite arcade machine. They didn't have it.

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It's alright, I don't live near Illinois anyways. Would still kill to play that game in an actual cabinet though.

How does that even play? God damn, there are so many arcade machines I've never even heard of.

Galloping ghost is okay, a lot of their machines are showing their age though.

There's tons of stuff with screen burn-in and weird colors, their mystara machine seems like it's limited to the game boy olive green and oliver green palette. If there's an arcade game you really love you're probably better off with MAME and a fightstick.

But this is the ravages of time and age, still pretty fun to hang out there. It's kind of like a museum you can vidya in, and if you approach it like that it's pretty damn amazing.

That's mad gay.

My student union only has one arcade machine, and it's a non-functioning NFL Blitz cabinet.

brb, applying for green card

Fucking retarded. So any dipshit can just sit there and hog a single machine the whole time?

A lot of the machines are unreleased prototypes. It's not really fair to charge per quarter for an unfinished game.

On top of that there are over 500 games and a lot of them support 4 players. There would have to be 500 people in there for game hogging to become a real issue.

Also in videos I've seen of people in there, the place seems to have developed an etiquette, and unless you're going for a record, standing on the side of the machine has the same effect as putting your quarters up, and people tend to instinctively stop playing if someone else wants to play and they lose.

Even if someone did hog a cabinet, how many arcade games take more than half an hour to complete?

Why did arcades have to die in the west? And why is it the only arcades these days seem to be shit like Dave and Buster's or kiddie places like Chuck E. Cheese?

Online gaming, XBox Live, WoW, Steam. Arcades stopped being able to offer something you couldn't get better at home. PC and console gaming generally offers a better experience than arcade machines these days, even the social aspect is covered.

Same thing that happened with blockbuster, redbox and netflix.

But then why do they still thrive in Japan? Japan also has consoles and online gaming, but still has those huge game centers that are popular. Is it just because Japan is weird like that?

They serve no purpose, why go to a place to play a limited selection of games in public when I can play all of them and more at home?

The rule about Japanese culture is that once something gets popular there it never stops being popular there. That's why they still like kimonos and why their art community continues to thrive.

Because there are some games that only get released for arcades and never get a console port. Plus, you can go to the arcade to try out some games that you don't own yet and decide if you want to buy them.

So I was googling about trying to find pictures of the outside of the arcade to see if they could actually expand to house all the games the guy wants it to, and I came across this.

examiner.com/article/splatterhouse-chicago-woman-sets-new-arcade-game-world-record

Angle shots aside, this lady set the world record for Splatterhouse there. And that is not an easy game.

She's probably married.

I must be too new, because most of the games there weren't all that great.

I'd rather burn my cash at Round1.

Different control schemes and immersion.
Japs going to arcade is like going to a mall, its socially acceptable there unlike in the west.

I lived in 2 western countries
None had social restrictions on arcades, everyone went because it had neon, pizza and machines
Of course there was casuals and tough people, the casuals went to air hockey, Daytona/Cruisin' and House of the Dead.
The cool kids went to Metal Slug, KoF and some shmup i dont remember its name
I think only americans see it badly, and not so much because they have plenty of them

F-zero AX cabs are floating around the country.

I know the Arcade at Castles n' Coasters down in Phoenix Arizona has one, has had one for as long as I could remember, would go there all the time when I was like 12.