[Arcade] Do Arcades still exist?

Originally Posted by ramoth

A slight bit of hijacking, but I think the DDR is horrible for arcades. A number of people have mentioned it.

The machine is large and ugly, has bright flashing lights all over the place, and makes a ton of noise. Plus it attracts weeaboos who have no interest in playing any games except that. I know it's a turn off for me to see a machine in an arcade, and I'll bet a lot of other people who aren't interested in playing DDR feel that way (perhaps they're not even aware of it). Since less non-DDR people come, and you can't sustain an arcade on JUST DDR players, the arcade will eventually close its doors.

Sure, there are a ton of other reasons why arcades are closing, but DDR sure isn't helping, IMO.

DDR doesn't help arcades? From a business standpoint, how can a group of people hanging around a machine for several hours a time, at $0.75-$1 a pop not help? If there's a large group of them waiting their turns, most likely they're playing other games as well, and most of the DDR players around here seem well-behaved, from what I've seen. If the hardcore players aren't around, curious n00bs are more than willing to plunk down their money to give dancing a try, even if they suck, because it looks like fun. Your standard arcade cabinet doesn't have that kind of draw. Besides, I'm a little sad everytime I see an arcade without DDR. There's a tiny arcade in downtown DC in a building across from my office, but without DDR, I'll probably never go over there.

Arcades are having to adapt to compete with the home market. The arcade of yesteryear is gone, but newer more expensive machines with features that can't be replicated at home (at least not cheaply) are taking its place. Games like DDR, Sniper Scope, House of the Dead, etc aren't cheap, so small scale arcades that used to fill every mall can't keep up. Places like Dave and Busters will survive, as long as newer innovative arcade machines are built.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Kaelin, you must be in Springfield, VA; I'd recognize that mall anywhere.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Baltimore is passable for arcades. The one in White Marsh closed recently, although they moved the DDR machine to the theatre across the street. There's an arcade and laser tag at the Eastpoint Mall in Dundalk, an arcade in the Harford Mall north of town, a small arcade with a DDR machine in a Brunswick bowling alley in Ellicott City (across from where I live), a small arcade (not really worth mentioning) in the Owings Mills Mall. There used to be one in the Towson Mall but it closed. And of course there's a Dave and Busters in Arundel Mills. Oh, and there's Cyberden in Columbia, one of those pay-to-play places with console games, but I think they have an ITG and DDR machine as well.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.