The Screen Savers tonight asked the question if arcades are dead. I could remember them in all the malls. Just recently, the last true arcade in town was replaced by Petite Sophisticate. Way back when, every visit to my grandmother's we would always go shopping. To spare us (and them) from our whining, she gave each of us a dollar to spend at the mall arcade. I sucked and my dollar was quickly spent.
Tilt! was the name of the arcade at the local mall that we frequented. It was right next to the movie theater, and captured a few of my quarters (and Nana's)every now and again. Unique about Tilt! was that every game they had was for sale. I remember Tempest was $250, and Centipede was a little bit more. But Star Castle was only $30. After much begging and pleading, the parents said yes, and my brothers and me pitched in $5 each, my dad filled in the remaining $15, and the game was soon in our basement.
As with every distraction from school, there would be strict discipline placed on the time spent playing the game. My Dad locked the game and tried to hide the key. That was found within a day. While in possession of the key, Mike came up with a brilliant idea. In order to provide your credit, there was a lever on the inside of the machine that was activated when your quarter passed through. The genius was the string he tied to that lever, and hid in the change return. Simply push the change return gate in, pull on the string a few times, and just like that, you had your evening (days) entertainment.
Not that Star Castle was challenging. You had your ship, and there was a mother ship surrounded by three force fields. Once you penetrated those force fields, you could blow the mother ship up, but he could fire these mammoth fire balls back at you. Like all other video games, I sucked. But it sure was fun.
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