WHERE GAMES ARE PLAYED! Games have always been important and we all reminisce about such and such a game and the High Scores achieved on them. But equally important in telling the story about those early days of gaming is to remember where we played them. Previous features have mentioned how I became a Video Games Addict, here I tell where the High Scores were achieved.
Back in the 80's arcades sprung like leaks in a hosepipe. They were still mysterious, dark, usually smelly places. Backs of taxicab offices, basements, video shops and drinking clubs, they all partook in the Video Game explosion. You see back then this was not mainstream wholesome entertainment and the idea of it being a multinational media industry was unheard of.
A basement down in Ilford became my first haunt. Hence the name of this esteemed website 'The Basement Arcade'. They always seemed to be in basements, away from the public's eyes, in areas that were not being used for anything else. This particular basement arcade was down some narrow steps beside the railway bridge where the mainline track ran into London. The trains rattled by shaking the building adding to the mystic of the place.
Once down the stairs a door would be opened for you by some dubious looking black guy. The smell of pot hit you in the face, but nobody bothered to look up as they were too hooked on their games to bother. We were in the minority because we were white 13 or 14 years old and sometimes still in school uniform. But nobody bothered us because it was like a brotherhood of gamers and if you could claim a High Score, respect was due. I remember a Scramble machine, a Fogger but the rest is just a daze, probably looking back on it, this was inflicted by the hanging blue-ish smokey haze which always hung around in there.
The Classic Frogger!
Eventually the place got raided or something and was shut down. It was a shame but gamers are an industrious lot and as one door closes another opens.
'Pick A Pet' was the surprise wording on the frontage of the building that became my next second home. Again down in Ilford town centre just off the beaten track in a terrace of buildings that were due for demolition, there it proudly sat.
What was once a bad pet shop, which sold rabbits with mixamatosis and goldfish that died before you got them home had been bought by some dubious character and turned it into Ilford's number one arcade. The usual suspects from 'The Basement Arcade' all now hung around 'Pick A Pet'. The glass front of the pet shop was blackened out. The only light you could see was from the flashing machines inside penetrating the glass where the black paint had missed or worn off.
We would cycle down there on our bikes, chain them up outside hoping they would not be nicked and entered the shop, and would not come out for at least 2 hours. We spent all our pocket money and saved our dinner money by starving ourselves through lunch at school. This arcade rocked, serious dodgy dudes hung around it and some real grand masters played the games. The games were rock hard and varied as well. The list sounds like a who's who's of Classic Video Games.
Astro Fighter & Moon Cresta
Asteroids, Astro Fighter, Lunar Lander, Scramble, Phoenix, Space Invaders II, Moon Cresta, UniWars and Space Duel.
Scramble & UniWarS
Asteroids though was the star attraction, sitting in the darkest part of the backroom with the biggest crowd around it. The kings of the arcade held the High Scores here. The game I remember looked pretty hard-core at the time with so many buttons, and kids like us did not want to embarrass ourselves by dropping a credit into it. Also I remember the control panel being very high off the ground (to a 13 year old), so this meant it was definitely an adults only machine in my own mind...yeah real Hard-Core.
Lunar
Lander & Asteroids
The arcade lasted for years and good times were had down there regularly after school. Ahh I have nothing but good memories about 'Pick A Pet'. Today in the year 2006 a whopping great Sainsbury's Supermarket has been built on top of it and the old terrace of shops were bulldozed down years ago to make way for it. Just another modern day example of a multinational company building on every available bit of land to increase its profits and screw the local community. Many arcades have been lost over the years due to such acts of vandalism. But hope lives on, on websites like The Basement Arcade keeping the memories alive for people like you and me.
