77 replies to this topic

[SoulBlazer]

rmaerz, on Thu Apr 14, 2011 7:27 AM, said:

Also, a hot l00king lady employed as arcade operator is reason enough to bring people through the doors. They do it at health clubs all the time - if you're hot you get a free membership.

This is a old thread (but a great one) but I wanted to comment on this since I missed it the first time around.

There's MAJOR truth in this guys. A young good looking woman would be kind of sexiest but it does draw in the guys.

I recall going to a big arcade with a friend at Fisherman's Warf in San Fran about....oh, ten years ago now, I think. I can't recall the name of the game, but they had this big multi-player sit down game from Namco that was a rail shooter. It was about six people who all played together as a gunner on the space ship as you blasted through various foes and finally fought a boss. There was a small room where the game was, due to it's size.

There was a arcade operator employed there, a young good looking woman with a Namco shirt who operated the game. She let people in, told us quickly how to play, and encourged us doing the game. It made the experience ten times better.

At my local Dave and Busters most of the bar girls and the servers are women...they seem to realize that.

Last time I went a few weeks ago I really enjoyed the Terminator game they had. They also had added a new Rambo game, along with a couple of other new ones.

[JamesD]

I really don't see arcades springing up everywhere again. Home gaming has gotten too advanced to really wow people enough to draw them in with economically feasible technology.

Places like Dave & Busters are successful because they have food, pool, games, a bar, etc... all under one roof.
And then you have upChuck E Cheese on the low end. The thing they have in common besides games is food and people aren't just there for the arcade. But that's just not practical everywhere. I suppose you could have 7-11 style hotdog cookers and drinks but I think you need more to appeal to adults.

The only thing I see having a chance would be a mix of old school games, higher priced games that are difficult but not impossible to have at home (you have a cockpit at the arcade, heads up display, etc...), and some sort of pay by the hour gaming.
I've seen PC based games used for by the hour play in a mall but they just aren't enough to draw for an arcade.
The thing I see as having the wow factor would be a World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, or Halo type of game with 3D headsets that let you look around just by moving your head. The capability has been around for a while but it's pretty expensive for home use. Especially if you want to go on a quest/mission with 4 or 5 people in a party. The drawback is that you need multiple setups so that you can have several groups going at the same time. Otherwise people would get sick of waiting.
The ability to switch between death match games, fantasy RPG, and war games would offer enough variety to appeal to a broad audience. Hmmm... imagine Portal played with a 3D headset and a handheld gun... that would be cool.

[potatohead]

Perhaps make them mobile?

On my drive home yesterday, I saw a guy driving "The X-Bus" featuring multiplayer gaming!