New Arcade - London

[skate323k137]

Kind of why I was thinking bar... Ok, so you loose the under 18 crowd, but surely most arcade patrons these days are in their late 20s/30s... You could do competitions, i.e beat the local donkey kong high score, get a free pint/pitcher (depending on how high it is..) Recon you'd snag a fair few of the city crowd after work if you had a decent beer list along side the classic cabs...

Yep. "barcades" seem to be the new trend anyway. The place I was talking about has a nice beer selection too. http://www.sharkclubhowell.com/pinball.php
They don't really have anything on their website about their games, but the selection is at least as much if not more than their pinballs (all of which were in exceptionally good shape).

 

[theMot]

Kind of why I was thinking bar...

Yeah, can't wait to let drunk idiots play teh street fighter toos on my cab.

Give it up people, Arcades are no longer viable. The only way to do it is scale it right back and just set up some cabs in a grage or industrial shed. Charge a membership and open it up one or twice a month.

 

[SNKorSWM]

There's a Retro Game Plus shop recently opened in the neighborhood. There are a few arcade machines (MK2, Outrun) in there, though that's more of a side business to the game sales.

 

[ebinsugewa]

There are quite a few people who play SSF2T at this joint if you're into that sort of thing. Join here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/grandmasterchallenge/

 

[K-2]

If I came into crazy money, one thing I'd do is open a place like this. Except it would be smaller and with a shooter theme and be in a swankier locale. And I'd give zero fucks if it ever made a dime.

More power to these guys, hope it continues to work for them.

 

[xsq]

Give it up people, Arcades are no longer viable. The only way to do it is scale it right back and just set up some cabs in a grage or industrial shed. Charge a membership and open it up one or twice a month.

Yeah, I believe that would be the safest and more successful route. A (non-profit) registered association might do the trick if you find enough people willing to sign up. I've thought about founding one myself, but Münster is way too small and there are too little arcade enthusiast around these parts. Once I'm done with my university studies and get a decent job in Berlin however...

 

[Crush Roller]

It looks okay to be honest but Despite living in Birmingham I do not visit London very often,I think the last two times was to two separate Game On events at the Barbican and Science museum.I wish them luck with this as they are not the first to try this and I am quite sure they will not be the last.

 

[mr aize]

Was there on friday an it was really busy. Actually most of the people were playing on newer consoles in the back room. Seems like organising fighting game tournaments on new consoles might be the way to support it. Still, plenty of people in the actual arcade machines section, so that was definitely good to see.