Arcades.

It's all about pride. Do you want to stand up and be counted? Do you wear your videogaming badge with honour? When someone asks you what you did at the weekend are you prepared to stand proud and say, "I clocked Defender"?

I was one of a generation of kids who grew up into a dazzling new world of technology. I was one of those early adopters. It didn't make us fashionable or make us friends with the cool kids but it was OUR thing.

”Right. That’s the high score sorted. Now, if only I could find a way to detach my feet
from this carpet…”

Some of us hid in the shadows, behind net curtains, tapping away on our keyboards, learning the skills to shape our new world... and some of us strode out into the light, heads held high, pockets full of oversize ten pence pieces, prepared to take on that new world for a game of doubles.

I love arcades because it didn't matter if you were built like a brick shithouse or the guy that always had sand kicked in his face. Arcades were the great leveller. You could earn the respect of your peers through nothing more than a spot of precision pumping and a well-timed rock drop in Dig-Dug.

If you could sail through the more garish skies of Missile Command no-one was going to be mugging you for your lunch money on the way home. There's something supremely satisfying about challenging the toughest kid in the school to a nail-bitingly close game of Space Firebirds, not only to walk away with the victory but also a handshake and the offer of a fag.

”This is rubbish, mate. You want to try Painkiller. Amazing rag-doll physics. Right. I’m off back
to the future…” … “Wanker”.

What class you were in and what job your dad did counted for nothing there. It was our adolescent utopia where your Asteroids saucer-hunting skills decided whether the other kids offered you their chips or not. Your social standing was no longer a simple popularity contest. It was there, burnt into the phosphor, top-center of every screen. Best of all... our parents never knew.

Halfway between clubhouse and fairground, the arcade was our secret home from home. Precisely the kind of place our parents warned us about – which only strengthened its pull on us. Where we saw a colosseum for our videogaming spectacle, they imagined thieving, gambling, drugs. We welcomed the darkness, the gloom, the perfect playing conditions and they ran from it, fearful. Those dark corners were pockets of pure escapism. No phones, no clocks and no distractions. Nobody calling us down for dinner.

Those ‘80s fashion quirks didn’t seem quite so heinous in a darkened arcade.

Now I'm older, I can play my games wherever and whenever I want. I've tried setting up consoles in the lounge, the bedroom and my study but it never feels quite right. Even the most exhilarating perfect race on Project Gotham can never compare to the thrill and immediate kudos of the first and only time I fluked a 99% on Qix in front of a couple of strangers.

Every time I square up to a cab, roll a coin into the slot, glide my fingers over the controls and press ‘Player 1 Start’, I am back there again. The adult world of mortgages and careers falls away and there I am in the light, gunning for the highscore, as unashamed now as I was back then.

FUSEBALL, July 2004.

Something to say? Click to comment!