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When you were a kid, life didn’t seem as bad. You had the routine of school, hanging out with friends, going home to spend time with family, and then you were off to other hobbies. During this time, you’d branch out into those hobbies and if the latest fad or toy didn’t burn you out, some of them would stick to you.
One of my hobbies was a step towards the future: video games.
The 90’s
I grew up a 90s kid, but I would always gravitate towards an arcade. Something about the serene, neon atmosphere and subtle zapping and beeps in the background put me at ease in my comfort zone. It wasn’t just a place to dump my quarters into; it was a monumental social experience for me.
I played all sorts of games. A majority of my gaming preferences I carry today stem from arcades. The main genres I stuck to were shooters (light gun games like Silent Scope or Area 51 come to mind), as well as fighting games like the classic Marvel Vs Capcom 2 and (paid link) Mortal Kombat. I also played Skeeball, wack a mole, and other gimmicky ticket games. This was also the golden age for Beat’em up games like Turtles In Time, Sunset Riders, X-Men, and The Simpsons.
The arcade was a magical place. Yes, you could have spent your money on other things, but it was something you had to be there to experience. I couldn’t afford home consoles (yet), so when I got the chance to check out an arcade, I definitely went for it.
Reminiscing
My arcade tour started with a place in Stillwater, Oklahoma called Aladdin’s castle. It was included in a Strip Mall (that later got bought out by the local university over here), but until that happened, it was my go-to place for the weekend. I would work on keeping my grades stable in grade school, but then I would be awarded with going to the arcade on the weekend. They had all the standard arcade cabinets, but most of them were older, including the NES era of games like Spy Hunter, Donkey Kong, and others. There were no pinball machines, but they had mainly other ring or ball throwing arcade ticket games.
The prizes were never worth it, as you’d have to invest double the cost that you’re putting in to get at least a decent prize, but if you did it for fun, you could always get some collectible mini figures or erasers. And the coveted bragging rights over the weekend adventures too.
The Decline
Near 2000, that arcade and others would shutter. The longest lasting ones to this day in my area were Tilt (until it got cleared out, but the arcade scene was revived with something later), and Celebration Station. This was a family fun center, but it has seen better days. I stopped by one time after my main job for training, but it was empty, shadowed by its former glory days.
Looking Ahead
I am not discounting PC gaming. At this time, we had a family computer with dial up Internet, so the most socializing I could do on there was maybe for a couple of hours, and then I had to log off. Games I played included Command And Conquer and a bunch of other RTS games. I also played some platformer games like Commander Keen. FPS games played a role in my gaming library. Some examples were Counter Strike, Doom, Quake, Unreal Arena, and Team Fortress. Of course, PC gaming wasn’t cost effective for me, so I stuck to console gaming.
I mainly played Halo and Halo 2 a lot during that early middle school and high school era. They were events that would unite my friends of all backgrounds and shoved them into my tiny house, or other houses of friends, and an endless night of multiplayer. The cap on Halo was 16 players. When Halo 2 and Xbox Live took off, it was that, but plus you to 32 online. We would play for hours, lots of laughs, explosions, a high or low Kill/Death ratio, and then pass out dreaming about how to get better.
LAN parties eventually expanded into board games, having a movie on in the background, and going into other hobbies that weren’t just the “partying crowd”. That wasn’t me. And that wasn’t our group of friends.
Well, we all got older and soon it got more challenging to keep gaming as the glue that kept us together. We all found different hobbies, got significant others, and continued our lives through college or onward.
I long for those days again. Technology got better, and this gave us more ways to try new things.
The Online World
MMOs that were free and paid blew up during the mid 2000s, as well as more console games and online gaming. I tried my fair share of different MMOs, and even made some life long friends from it too! It was a different landscape, but this also allowed more ways to still have the social aspect of being with friends in person, but also jump into the gaming community. Halo 2 was a big part of that for me, even after the LAN parties ended.
Handhelds
The other thing that evolved as time went on were handheld games. We had the Gameboy, Sega Game gear, Neo Geo, and others, but soon, our phones turned into everything I needed. You could look up the answer to anything, talk to friends, and even play games! The device we used to originally listen to music, the iPod, eventually had that technology more standardized on smartphones. And that became the rise of mobile games.
I didn’t really get into mobile games too much. This was because of the microtransactions, as well as eating up too much memory. So I only played a select few games and called it good. It still was fun to communicate online with others through my phone, though.
The Comeback
History has an interesting way of repeating itself. We went from the arcade boom of the 90s, it dying off to consoles and home gaming and now, we have some modern arcades like Round 1, that are resurrecting the feeling from all those years ago.
I find myself humbled that I was able to have those fond memories with friends and those iconic video games. They had a way to transcend every difference we had, with the controller or keyboard instead.
Whatever I had of the past, my history lies with video games and the impact it had on my life. I spent my later years in college spending more time with friends I made and being more active, but as things wound down and friends moved on, I found myself taking comfort in the first friend I had to escape my troubles, video games, and sometimes, that’s all the socializing you need to feel connected to the world.
Charle Subketkaew is a passionate gamer, storyteller, and daydreamer. When he's not immersed in a fresh new video game, he also enjoys creating art, graphic design, spending time with friends, watching movies or anime, listening to a podcast or custom playlist, writing, collecting, working out, and scouting out his next weekend adventure.
He runs a design page and website, Fortis Ideas. This is an evolution of his design and media career over the span of a decade. He works with different creators in different disciplines on a multitude of projects to push himself to create new ideas.
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