I have many fond memories of going to the local arcade. I remember my mom rewarding my good behavior and giving me a roll of quarters to go blow on street fighter 2. This was at it's peak in popularity and they had the machines set up in an entire row. Crowds always blanketed the machine and it was hard even to see the game in action.

I played many games of super off-road, pitfall, poll position, karate champ. The laserdisk classic Dragon's Lair always left me dumbfounded and broke. A sega game starring a cowboy set in a futuristic setting was quiet cool. It had a huge sculpted cabinet and almost appeared in a hologram. Dang hard and dang expenisve.

One game that still confuses me to this day is a sonic game similar to that of marble madness, but with sonic in a ball. It was controlled with a track ball.I saw it once, returned the followingday and it was gone. I haven't seen or heard of it since.

Once the light-gun games like virtua cop started coming around I lost interest in the arcades. I started getting older and the interest wasn't there. Foor a good while it was the thing to do for a teen and I'll always remember it.