The title of this entry is taken from the above book, which I bought a few months ago. It’s a beautiful ‘mook’ (magazine book) showcasing home arcades built by dedicated Japanese enthusiasts. While it’s in Japanese, I was able to read it using a translator.
I’ve also become a fan of topic-specific Japanese books like this, and have already purchased (and read through) similar ones about the history of certain game genres. The writing and detail in those impressed me, so I had high hopes for this one as well.
I was not disappointed: this book is fantastic, and the mania of some of these collectors fills me with profound respect. Page after page of beautiful photography shows rooms – sometimes multiple – of Japanese homes where every square inch is now dedicated to reproducing a Game Center in their house. We’re not talking one or two machines, but ten or more, including massive things like fishing games or even hydraulic sit-down cabinets.
There’s loads of wonderful and awesome anecdotes, of which the following is just an example
- One man modified his home to add a massive external door on the second level so large cabinets could be installed from outside using a crane.
- One man – a massive fan of the train game series Densha de Go! – has an entire room dedicated to arcade cabs of the series and even twice rented a train line so he could play his arcade cabs on actual running trains.
- There are several stories of people having ceilings/floors reinforced to handle the weight of games, or removing doors, closets or even walls to make extra game space.
- One guy took years to ‘brainwash’ (his words) his wife into letting him get his first arcade cabinet. A few years later he had a room full.
- One man installed public toilets in his house incorporating fixtures he obtained from a closed Sega arcade!
- Another man obtained an electricians license so he could rewire his home rather than pay someone else to do it.
- One guy built his Game Center into a closet so it didn’t eat up living space can be invisible to guests (or family) when the door is closed.
- An accountant converted his business waiting room into an arcade!
- Several of the home arcades include common 1980s-era arcade extras – such as drink machines or coin changers – but one guy took it further to only include Showa-era coins in his money changer. (This is like a retro USA arcade only using 1980s quarters for their machines.)
Most allow friends and local children to play the games, and many are members of enthusiast clubs. The latter is important since maintenance is often cited as a big issue and being in a club would make it easier to find someone with the skills required to keep 40+ year old tech working.
I’d love to be able to do this myself, but for many reasons that’s impossible so I enjoyed living vicariously through this wonderful book. It was successful enough for a second volume, which I also own, but I’ll probably leave reading that one for when I return:
