Back in 1995, my wife and I and another couple visited The National Coin-Op and Video Game Museum that was located at the Laclede’s Landing just a few blocks from the Arch in St. Louis.
When I walked inside I thought it was arcade heaven as they had a super selection of vintage games from the 70's and 80's. I wasn’t able to pull my money out fast enough to exchange it for some of tokens.
We were roadtripping our way to Graceland and this was our first stop. Stopping here was almost a big mistake since my pal Mike and I were going to stay until our tokens ran out. Of course our poor wives didn’t realize Mike only needed one token to play forever on Ms. Pac-Man and the same with me on Tron.
The museum was nicely put together as they had info signs posted about each game along with the original game posters. The transparent Ms. Pac-Man was nice touch and I really enjoyed seeing for the first time a Computer Space machine. Needless to say our roadtrip was delayed quite a bit, but it sure was worth it! Anyway, Elvis could wait since he wasn't going anywhere.
The museum unfortunately went out of business a few years later.
I wasn’t into taking pictures of everything like I am now, but my wife snapped a couple.
Also, I found this great article and collection of photos from the museum at the coinop.org site. You can even look at the list of games that was part of the museum.
8 comments:
Tank! Talk about a flashback.
Nice post NC! That was by far the coolest place in St. Louis. Classic video games, the Superman Museum, and Graceland all in one trip. I'm shocked we survived!! You need to do a post on the Superman Museum. I've got tons of pictures if you don't have them.
Doh! I was just in St. Louis over Easter weekend, and my friend and I were running out of cool things to do after we exhausted the City Museum — This would have been awesome!
Sigh.
Thanks for the review and links — I'll have to hit it the next time I'm out there for a visit.
Grr! I was so dazzled by the concept and the photos that I missed a few salient details, like "The museum unfortunately went out of business a few years later." Now I'm even more depressed that I missed it. Although they do have a nice selection of vintage pinball machines at the City Museum.
Sigh, I'm sad it's out of business! I totally would have gone. And stayed. For a really long time.
that place was great.
I used to go to that place when I was a little kid. SO much fun. Kind of wish it were still around - at least it would give people an actual reason to go to Laclede's Landing.
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