You know what I miss more than anything else?  Ash trays attached to arcade cabinets.  You never see that anymore.  Ebeneezer’s had several:  Pac Man, Galaga, Space Invaders;  they all had ash trays attached.  I was reminded of this when I went into a cabinet store in Manassas recently, where there was a stand-up Gradius cabinet for sale.  On the front were four screw-holes where an ash tray had once sat, proudly holding the butts of many-a-cigarette.  There were still ugly black stains where someone hadn’t finished putting out their smoke.

Nowadays, arcades are clean almost to a fault.  The carpets are pristine and vacuumed, the screens are wiped down several times a day, and there’s a ‘no food or drink sign’ visible at every turn.  For some reason, this frustrates me to no end.

Obviously, food, drink and cigarettes can damage the cabinets; it only makes sense to be cautious.  On top of that, not everyone smokes, so keeping the air clean is only polite, but in banning these things, something seems to have been lost, and I can’t quite place my finger on it.

We still have noise, flashing lights, fat dudes with sweaty pits (even more so since the advent of DDR), but we don’t have snack counters to chill at, the lights don’t reflect off the smoke, and that particular stink I find so comforting is missing. (continue reading…)