Welcome to December, and with that, it’s time to get you up-to-speed with various new arcade locations that have opened their doors for business. Many of these were supposed to be talked about last month, but IAAPA tends to cause a slow down in regards of posting 😉
Tiltz Now Open In Brooklyn, NY
(Thanks to Michael L. for the tip on this one)
Let’s start with one of the “older” pieces of location news, a sports bar/arcade by the name of Tiltz that has plenty of classic gaming and drinking to go together. Among the titles you’ll find available to play: Altered Beast, Arkanoid, Contra, Gauntlet Dark Legacy, Killer Instinct 2, Jr. Pac-Man, Mortal Kombat, NBA Jam, Pac-Man, Paperboy, Popeye, Primal Rage, Punch-Out, Rampage World Tour, Street Fighter II Champion Edition, WrestleMania, and more. You can check their main website out here; there was also a local article written about them on Bushwick Daily.
The National Videogame Museum (UK) Reopens
If you find yourself anywhere near Sheffield in the United Kingdom, and you enjoy video games, then you are in luck. The National Videgame Museum of the UK has moved locations from Nottingham to Sheffield, opening their doors for people to come in and check out what is certainly the most entertaining museum one can find out there. Any video game-focused museum worth it’s salt also has to have a focus on arcade machines, which NVM certainly does. For a few more information, check out their main website.
https://twitter.com/nvmuk/status/1066344911300190208
The Retro Re-Opens (Millington, TN)
For another location that is re-opening their doors, there is The Retro Arcade in Millington, TN. As their name implies, they are a classic game focused location, featuring video arcades, pinball machines, pool tables, tournaments and food. Some of the great games you can expect to find there (I’ll denote pinball machines with (p)): Area 51: Site 4, Bram Stoker’s Dracula (p), Bride of Pinbot (p), Cruis’n World, Donkey Kong, Earthshaker (p), Genie (p), Jurassic Park (p), Ms. Pac-Man, Road Burners, Space Invaders, Stars (p), Starship Troopers (p) and much more.  You can find them on Facebook here.
The Pizza Ranch To Open Their Doors On Dec. 17th (Grand Island, NB)
While we don’t hear about too many pizzerias with arcades anymore, there isn’t anything that has changed economically that prevents such businesses from reaping the benefits of having an arcade on-site. Unfortunately, I’m not sure what games will be on-hand, as this article only mentions the “Fun Zone Arcade,” and the corporate website shows that this is a chain of pizzerias, with no mention of arcade game rooms on that site. Where Betson had retweeted that news article above, my guess is that they are furnishing the games, which would indicate a modern mix of games.
Prince Arcades (Bolingbrook, IL)
I’ve been following this one for a while, but the announcement keeps getting pushed back. So as of this posting, it is not officially open yet and I’m not sure when. They are teasing that a big announcement is coming soon however, so I’ll just edit this paragraph when it happens.
Prince Arcades has served as a classic game distributor in Illinois for many years, working often with the Galloping Ghost Arcade in sourcing many of the titles found there. The company has also created a number of reproduction cabinets, based on the precise measurements of the originals (this includes titles like Galaga, Burgertime and others). Earlier this year, they decided to jump into the realm of operating a location and we’ve been watching them ever since.
As they have not announced a full games list and are not open at the moment, I’m not 100% sure how big the location is and what they have there. I did ask for a list, but have not received it; looking at their Facebook page also leaves it unknown as they use the same page to tout their other services. That said, I’m pretty sure that it will have a large number of classic games on hand – all the ones you know (Donkey Kong, Galaga, Ms. Pac-Man and so on) along with a number of obscurities and oddities. You can find them here.Â
Round1USA Open At Jefferson Mall (Louisville, KY)
Round1USA continues their expansion across the states, the latest facility opening in Louisville.
Round1 @JeffersonMall Now Open!
Bowling, Billiards, Arcade, Karaoke and MORE~✨
Open Everyday 10am – 2am pic.twitter.com/nIbuEc2lhu— Round1 USA (@Round1USA) November 20, 2018
A Second Location For Arcade Club Coming In 2019
Over on the other side of the pond, the popular Arcade Club location has announced that they have a second location in the works for early 2019. We’ll be keeping tabs on this one for when they open!
Along those same lines, I am also opening up a small satellite location this month – my first route operation – although it is for a private business/break room and not the public. But that sure has been an adventure so far as I spend a ton of money and have to go picking up used games. In fact, I’m about to make a 100-mile round trip to grab a Cruis’n Exotica just for this project, probably as soon as this is posted. 🙂 Should be interesting.
Ok, that’s all we’ve got for now. If you find yourself near any of these locations, be sure to go out and give them your support, not just likes or hearts on social media. If you know of any new locations that we’ve missed mentioning, then by all means let us know!
