Welcome to the last 2025 edition of Location Watch, a regular series here on Arcade Heroes that covers brand new arcade locations which have opened all over the planet. That has the caveat of only being locations we hear about, but thanks to various readers, our own research on social media, and other arcade news sites like RePlay Magazine and InterGame Online, we do our best at making it comprehensive.
If you missed the news on our previous Location Watch posts from this year:
- Location Watch Japan Special
- Location Watch February
- Location Watch March
- Location Watch May
- Location Watch July
- Location Watch August
- Location Watch October
Onto the latest locations!
North America
Replay Classic Arcade (Pacifica, CA)
Starting off with a place that was just flagged up in the AtariAge group on Facebook (thanks Brendan), behind an unassuming entrance is this new retro freeplay location, including a few rarities like Atari’s Space Lords and Konami’s Police 911, as well as all the usual classics that give them their name. Find their official website here.
Quarters Arcade Bar & Grill (Camden, TN)
This new arcade bar in Tennessee has already held soft openings, with their grand opening coming up on January 9th. Their selection isn’t enormous, consisting mostly of what you see below (and a few games off to the sides), with vintage pinballs to a Golden Tee 2005. Find them on Facebook here.
Game Lab (Waldorf, MA)
Heading further East, we come to a new arcade that is billed in this Facebook reel as a “retro-style” arcade, although they do have many new games in addition to a few old favorites. With the redemption area, it’s something of an FEC mix, but does have what appears to be a larger selection of video games than you might expect from such set ups. They operate on a free play model at $15 unlimited play.
Go Play Arcade (Brick, NJ)
This redemption-centric location just opened up, with a modern, albeit not 100% new-new selection (i.e., many of the games are several years old). They do have a standard Monster Kart and a Bigfoot Smash, and a separate room just for crane machines. Visit their website here; reader and arcade location connoisseur S1ckH4nds also has a full tour up:
Game On (Clermont, FL)
Headed down South, this is one that we missed from the October post, by the name of Game On. They are set up as an FEC with a strong focus on sports. That includes a sports simulator, which allows multiple players to enjoy several different sports in a small suite. For the arcade side, they have a mix of redemption, cranes, and a few video titles like Big Buck Hunter Reloaded and Fast & Furious Arcade. Visit their website.
Level Up Arcade (Omaha, NE)
This small new arcade inside of the existing Maplewood Lanes bowling alley in Omaha, Nebraska is pretty ticket and prize-focused, but does have some newer video redemption offerings that sneak it into this post, such as Angry Birds Boom! and Zombies! Ready, Deady, Go, as well as the Galaxy Hunter pusher from LAI/Playmore and Pop-A-Shot Elite. Find their official website here.
Arcade Monsters #7 (Murrieta, CA)
“The biggest Arcade Monsters ever built” is now open as the company continues their expansion with a second location in California. This location fills 28,000 sq. ft. and is mostly an arcade, aside from the full-size roller rink and addition of mini-bowling. The games as usual come from straight across the decades (mainly 80s to now), including many Japanese imports. Thanks to BossSaladTSR for giving us an extensive pre-opening look at this one in the Discord.
Macy’s x PAC-MAN Pop-Up Arcade (New York City, NY)
Bandai Namco have been experimenting plenty with pop-up arcades recently, mainly centered on their little yellow wonder, with the latest at the big Macy’s in NYC being done to celebrate his 45th anniversary. The only thing that stinks about pop-up arcades is that they’re gone just as soon as they’re open, but fortunately S1ckH4nds was there to document this one while it lasted:
FEC Openings & Updates
Netflix Opens First “Netflix House” Location In Philadelphia; Location #2 In Dallas, TX – #3 is coming to Vegas in 2027; this has a number of uniquely modified arcade machines on their game floor, including a K-Pop Demon Hunters StepManiaX cab that drew attention
Malibu Jack’s Opens For Thornton, CO
New emojiPlanet Venue Opens In British Columbia, Canada
Chuck E Cheese Adventure World (Arlington, TX) – Which apparently uses AI Wall Art
Clawcade Company PARTEA Expands Into Los Angeles, CA
Fly Extreme Sports Park Opens In Metepec, MX
Mundo Divertido In Tijuana, MX Unexpectedly Closes – Well-known to tourists. Thanks to Project for sharing
New Tour Of Pixel Paradise, Now Up To 180 Games From 40 – Thanks to Chris
Lucky Strike (Aliso Viejo, CA) – Thanks to Jdevy
NRG Adventure Park (Springfield, NJ) – Thanks to S1ckh4nds for the vid
Round1USA – Willowbrook Mall (Houston, TX)
Europe
Urban Fun #2 (Kingston, England)
One rising company strongly incorporating arcades into their entertainment mix is Urban Fun, who started out with their first location in Reading, England in late 2024, and are closing this year out with the second, found in the Kingston area of London. As they come under the same ownership as Sega Amusements, you will find plenty of their games there including Apex Rebels, House of the Dead Scarlet Dawn, Alpha Ops VR Strike and Mission: Impossible Arcade, alongside numerous other titles like LAI Games’ Ubisoft All-Star VR (which their team flew over to check out) and the first UK installation of Bay Tek’s ICEE Slush Rush redemption game.
Continue Arcades #3 (Swansea, Wales)
Now onto their third location, this next growing chain is on a very different tack, opting for the flat fee freeplay approach at all of their locations. This is their first outside of the south of England, now moving into the city of Swansea in Wales. They’ve also changed their branding a little more recently to focus on them also having a retro console lounge, but they still have plenty of actual arcade games, as this pre-opening video from local media and their own Facebook shows, including Transformers Human Alliance, Luigi’s Mansion Arcade, H20verdrive, and a few recent Stern Pinball releases like The Mandalorian and Avengers.
Game On Arcade (Huntingdon, England)
Making for the second location under this name covered in this post (though at least these guys are in another country), Game On are a new entrant, having only just opened this location on the 27th this month. Unfortunately they have held their cards very close to their chests on how their place looks and what titles it specifically has, so this photo of the outside and their promo art description of “racing, air hockey, boxing, basketball and prize games” will have to suffice here. Local news media also has a little coverage of them.
Game Station (Barcelona, Spain)
Spain has got a new bar arcade to call its own with this latest addition to that type of location, Game Station. We’ve covered one or two other Spanish examples of these this year, but these were on the smaller side and retro-focused, with this one being much bigger and largely focused on newer pieces (contrary to InterGame’s “retro” headline on it), mainly being imported Chinese ones by up and coming names like Ace, Arccer, Leon and even Joint Fun. Find their official website here.
LOG Lot Of Games (Rome, Italy)
Another location with a lot of Chinese product is this one in Italy, coming under the LOG Lot of Games string of locations. They have recently came to Rome’s “The WOW Side” shopping mall with an installation running Sacoca’s cashless system… so when in Rome, one can now play Ace’s Fast Racing, Bikers Madness, and Leon’s Master Sniper, among many others, you’re in luck. Find their website here.
FEC Openings & Updates
GENDA Expands Further Into Europe With Full Acquisition Of Indigo Playnation – This news has been bubbling under for a little while, but only just fully panned out early last month
New Arcade For Southampton Bowling Alley
Fairgame FECs Bought Up By Tenpin
Hollywood Bowl’s Revenue Booms
New King Pins For Belfast, Ireland
South Shields, UK Arcade Destroyed In Fire
Asia/Middle East/Oceania
Silk Hat Akihabara (Tokyo, Japan)
It was a little surprising this summer to hear about a GiGO shutting down, especially one as famous as the very first that Sega had originally opened in Akihabara – but most arcades that have closed in Akiba of late have actually ended up reopening soon after. If you happen to be there, then you will now find Silk Hat occupying the old big red (now more white) building on the street corner, with the basement floor still dedicated to Mobile Suit Gundam EXVS, three levels full of crane games and purikura, and a fourth for trading card games. But more than any other genre, Silk Hat are pushing their rhythm games hard, with the fifth, sixth and seventh incorporating them, including a “BEMANI Studio” specifically for Konami’s titles.
The above streamed tour should give you an idea of how things look inside; PhotoAkiba also have some good snaps of the opening day here, including a long waiting line and a lovely floral gift from Sega.
PLAYit (Melbourne, Australia)
This new Australian location is apparently the first of what is planned to be a chain, starting out with this one in Melbourne. They have a good mix of prize games and video, with the likes of Maimai DX and Sound Voltex for the rhythm gamers, and Godzilla Kaiju Wars VR and Neon Rush for big deluxe shooters and racers, among others. InterGame have a piece on them here.
FEC Openings & Updates
A Bear Sighting Delayed The Opening Of A Round1 In Japan – Apparently, there has been several bear attacks in this region recently, to the point that they’ve had to call in soldiers to deal with the problem.
Timezone NUSTAR + Venice Grand Canal For Philippines
Timezone Also Opens Latest New Zealand Location
New Big GiGO Location For Susukino, Sapporo
GiGO Japan Experiments With… Poker Rooms
Taito To Supply Hundreds Of Crane Games To Japanese Convenience Stores
Are any of these new arcades near you? Then be sure to go out and visit them! Doors can’t stay open on the basis of likes and hashtags.
Coming Soon
Level99 Social Gaming Facility Coming To Disney Springs – Just reopen DisneyQuest and do it right. This shouldn’t be hard for them to figure out.
Flip Side In Memphis, TN To Re-Open After Redesign In 2026
A Pittsburgh Church Is Being Turned Into A Pinball-Focused Arcade
Construction Starts On Dave & Busters’ First Mexican Location
