Korea Life Blog - At the Arcade (1)

Ahh, remember the days of Moon Patrol, Donkey Kong, Kung-fu Master, Karate Champ, and Punch Out? When I was a kid, I was a regular at the arcade and those were my favorite games. I spent so much time at the arcade that the guy who ran it used to leave me in charge of the place while he smoked pot with his friends in the office (he got busted a while later which ended the days of rigging my favorite games with hundreds of free credits and stealing tokens for future use.) Anyway, over the years games got to be bigger, more complex, more expensive and in my opinion much less fun. Wow - I'm really sounding like an old fart tonight. Anyway, here are a few pics of one of the game rooms near my home.



The standard games. It's cool that you can sit down and play them. However, they are usually sorely outdated fighting games or sports games like soccer and tennis that make you wonder if you're really even controlling the players. They even have Tetris. I always hated that game.



Here's a neat machine. I haven't played it for fear of looking like a moron, but I guess you hear music and do your best to hit the beat.



I get a kick out of these mini-norae bang room machines they have. You put in some coins, pick your song and sing away while watching those ever-cheesy Korean scenes on the screen.



Time to sit down and sing your favorite Celine Dion tune. The only time I was in one like this was after my girlfriend and I broke up in Pusan. She sang "Nothing Left to Say but Goodbye," which ended with her crying and me trying hard to conceal my laughter at being in such a weird situation.


Stay tuned for future posts in this exciting series. I have to get up to Seoul to snap some pics of the ever-joyful dancing games...