You probably think that you know what an arcade cabinet looks like. It's a big stand-up machine with a screen, a joystick, and a bunch of buttons, right? Well, not always.
Arcades are no longer the big attraction that they once were, and there's less incentive for game developers to really go all-out on arcade cabinets, but plenty have created arcade cabinets that stand out for their size, unique features, and just all-around weirdness. Just try finding these wild, wacky machines at your local Dave & Buster's.
10 Boong-Ga 🤪Boon🐼g-Ga
On this list, you'll see many arcade cabinets with unique and innovative features... but this is the only one that you control with a fake butt that's built into the machine.
Boong-Ga Boong-Ga (also known by the rather descriptive English name Spank 'Em) was built by the South Korean developers Taff System, and its gameplay is centered on the practice of kancho - pranking someone by poking them in the butt while they're not paying attention. Who says arcades can't be educational?
9 🎉 ✃ Time Traveler
Developed by Rick Dyer (best known for creating the iconically frustrating 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Dragon's Lair) and manufactured by Sega, Time Traveler doesn't look like an arcade game at first glance. Instead of the familiar stand-up screen, the cabinet has a low-slung half-circle opening that's sunk beneath the controls.
This is because, through the magic of early-90s technology, the game projects its action into that screen-like opening. It's the first holographic game ever made. The game itself hasn't aged well, but the effect is still cool as heck.
8 🐽 Densha De Go!! ꦗ
Densha De Go! is a long-running franchise in Japan, where you play as a train conductor... driving a train. It's pretty simple. But Densha De Go!!, the most recent arcade installment, tricks out that straightforward concept with the most impressive cabinet in the series.
It features three huge screens that surround a full-size recreation of a train dashboard, simulating the view from the cabin with impressive realism. And to top it off, it's encased in a huge full-size model of a railway car.
7 🐬After Burner 𝔉
Another innovative Sega cabinet, After Burner is an Ace Combat-style shooter with a long legacy - it's been referenced in Sega console games from Shenmue to Bayonetta. It's not hard to see why, since the game was a blockbuster hit when it was arrived in arcades in 1987.
This is thanks in no small part to its awesome cabinet, which is built to move in sync with the onscreen action. When you fly your jet up, the cabinet tilts backward to match. When you turn, the screen tilts to enhance the effect. At the time, this kind of technology was mind-blowingly immersive, and it's still pretty awesome today.
6 🍸 Discs Of Tron 🍌
But After Burner isn't the only impressively immersive cabinet of its era; for proof, look no further than Discs Of Tron. There's a pared-down standard cabinet, which looks cool but is still a pretty straightforward machine; but the environmental cabinet is the real stunner.
You stand up inside the machine, mimicking Tron's stance on the screen, while surround speakers play voice clips and sound effects around you. The whole experience is just like being in the movie - which is pretty much the point.
5 🉐 Typing Of The Dead 🃏
Typing Of The Dead famously got a home console release on the famously quirky Dreamcast. It's certainly weird there, but if you squint you can sort of see how it might work, since many people do have keyboards in their home.
But there was also an arcade version, which is way weirder; it literally has a keyboard on the cabinet where a joystick and regular button inputs would normally be. Actually, there are two keyboards, in case you wa🎀nt to play with a friend!
4 ♒ The Tablecloth Hour
If you've ever seen a magic act, you may have seen the trick where the performer pulls a tablecloth off of a table laden with dishes, keeping the dishes in place. If you've ever wanted to pull that trick off yourself, you could try it in real life with fragile china... or you could play The Tablecloth Hour, which literally lets you do that.
Briefly installed at Taito Station Shibuya, the game features a fake red tablecloth attached to the machine, which you'll have to pull on quickly and decisively in order to avoid knocking off dishes.
3 X-Men (1992) ♛
There have been plenty of arcade beat-em-ups, and plenty of arcade games based on the X-Men. Some of them have even been pretty solid. But Konami's 1992 take on the concept is the only one with six player inputs - in fact, this may b🌼e the only arcade game ever m🐲ade that supports that many players.
The cabinet makes this playable by using a nifty reflection trick to mirror a second screen next to the main one, making it appear extra-huge. The cabinet is massive as a result, and it'll definitely eat all of your quarters, but it's totally worth it to play with five of your closest mutant friends.
2 🐲 Panic Park
Back in the '80s, arcades had a reputation of encouraging juvenile delinquency. It's silly on its face, but Panic Park makes you think it might not be so far off. In this game, you compete to move your joystick around to your opponent's side of the cabinet, while they have to do the same to you.
It seems like a recipe for good-natured fun, but the issue is that unlike a console game, you're sharing the same control scheme. So you can always just... push your opponent out of the way. I've had multiplayer matches get tense before, but this is ridiculous!
1 F-1
Namco's F-1 is a 3D racing game with full-color graphics where you drive a car around a small racetrack. That all seems pretty pedestrian... but then you realize that F-1 was made in 1976, almost two decades before 3D games were anywhere close to ubiquitous. The game accomplishes this feat through some pretty clever manufacturing.
You see, it isn't a coded video game - the race isn't simulated in a virtual world - but it's actually a mechanical model. When you turn the steering wheel, you're moving a small toy car behind the screen, and the game uses some impressive practical effects to blow it up to screen size.