The Trocadero is a well-known retail business center in London and one highlight of the location would certainly be the Funland facility there, home to many great arcade games as well as serving as a prime spot for many location tests of various upcoming coin-op game products. It’s one of the few locations we had a specific tag for since news of these tests often made their way to us. It’s one place that I had always hoped to visit if I ever made it over to England but it looks like I am going to miss out on that now. One of our readers, Rjay63 tipped us off to this a few days ago and now news has broke as to what is going on. You can read the full statement about why the Funland is 
closing here at Intergame Online but to break it down to a nutshell – the management and the landlord have had some sort of dispute and after the landlord disconnected the power to the facility on July 3rd, the negotiations broke down completely from there. At present, that leaves 95 people unemployed now and who knows what will become of the awesome games the Funland had on hand. There is a sign there currently however telling people to head over to the Las Vegas arcade at 89/91 Wardour Street, perhaps they will help pick up the slack here. Also suggested to me as an alternative location is Namco Land at County Hall by the London Eye.
Our friend and contributor Kevin Williams has an online album showing some recent before and after shots of Funland, it was the kind of location that leaves a very noticeable mark on the entire mall there with it closed.
I pop in their every year or so when I’m visiting London and the place has been on the slide for a decade or more. The building is well located but seems totally dead for some reason. The layout isn’t the best for some reason and things are just placed at random without any sort of flow, it’s hard to put a finger on it. That said the range of games is pretty interesting although you have to trawl through a million boring racing and lightgun games to get to the good stuff. The place just didn’t have the atmosphere of other smaller locations like Casino on Goodge Street (the best arcade in the UK in my opinion). It just lacked that certain spark since it changed from being associated with Sega.
Full statement can be viewed here for free:
http://www.coin-opcommunity.co.uk/news/2693-funland-trocadero-closes/
As you may be aware from my Segaworld/Funland post on the Arcade Heroes’ forum, a new hotel is currently being built on the top floors of the Trocadero (the old Segaworld floors). I guess this would make the location more desirable to business that could easily woo the hotel crowd (bar, casino, boutiques, travel agents). So maybe that why such a drastic measure was taken so quickly; the landlord can easily get new tenants to fill the Funland space.
Just to address some background:
– Funland was two arcades (Funland and LunarPark, a bowling ally and bumpercar component
– Funland sat in two floors of the original SegaWorld venue at the site
– The facility had a great visitation – the Troc the best foot-traffic in EU
– All manufacturers tested new machines at venue
I will miss the venue and feel for the 95 redundancies – wish all the best, and hope we see a new FEC site in there soon.
This is terrible news. I were gonna go down in a few weeks to have a go at darius bust another chronicle but now I can’t. I had a look on Intergame Online but I can’t view it for some reason. Can anyone post it on here so I can see why its been closed? Seems a bit drastic due to a power surge cuz of some dickhead landlord or whoever decided to pull the power. Whatever happens I hope it gets relocated or opens soon.
You have to pay to join Intergame, check this free link instead:
http://www.coin-opcommunity.co.uk/news/2693-funland-trocadero-closes/
Thanks for the free link RJAY63. I really hope something is done about the lease. We’ll not only loose the best arcade in europe but it will mean the lose of jobs and where all the machines will end up is beyond me 🙁
I just heard from my friend who works for Las Vegas that they will have most of the machines from Funland in the basement. Also upon request and if the demand is high you can request machines. Yay! A mini Funland lol!
Las Vegas is on Wardour Street number 89-91 so please let everyone know asap. You can add them on facebook, share the link and spread the word if it’s popular it may bring Funland back
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/flamusements
So it’s official then? Funland is closing down for good? I never thought that it would ever close down especially because of the hardcore players that go down there. Well looks like I have less reason to go down to london. Does anyone know if las vegas amusements is worth vhecking out? RIP funland :'(
It wasn’t until I went all the way to London did I find out it was closed down. Not often I go to London but when I do I also go to this Arcade and gamerbase. Was really sad to see the shutters down and it looks so empty now. 🙁
What am I going to do with all my tickets? They never even gave us a prior notice so everyone can spend their tickets, not like you can spend them at las Vegas! 🙁
Hi guys. Here’s an article I wrote for Intergame on how the closure of that arcade affected so many of us, thought you might find it interesting.
http://www.coin-opcommunity.co.uk/blog/2784-arcades-changed-my-life-rip-london-funland/