It’s been awhile since arcades have been the center of the video game world, but for those of us old enough to remember waiting impatiently with quarters in hand for our chance to get our butts kicked in Mortal Kombat it was a golden age. A company called All You Can Arcade wants to bring that back, or at least cash in on the nostalgia. They offer a Netflix-modeled service that lets you rent arcade cabinets for a monthly subscription.
All You Can Arcade lets users sign up for one, two, or three game plans and charges $75 per month for each. It’s likely that the service will be more appealing to businesses who can make their money back by charging customers to play the game than it would be to private gamers who just want to relive their youth.
Like Netflix, you can keep the game as long as you want assuming you keep paying the monthly fee, or return it to get a new one. There’s no cost to ship the games, which is a key factor since shipping a giant arcade game is probably rather expensive.
Unfortunately, they’re currently only operating out of the San Francisco and Sacramento areas. There is hope for people outside central California though. All You Can Arcade has opened up their site to allow for partners to join the service. Anyone with a game they’re willing to rent out can sign up with the distance they’re willing to travel to deliver it. This has the potential to open up a wider network, where All You Can Arcade would act as more of a broker to match owners and renters.
Users can check the site for any available games in their area. Sadly, at the moment there are no games available in New York City, so my plan of getting one for the Geekosystem office is a bust for now.
(via All You Can Arcade, image via Sam Howzit)
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