Like most people I know, I woke up on New Years day sore and suffering of a headache, except the pain was only coming from my knuckles. I forgot how much it hurt to play on an actual Pop’n Music arcade cabinet. It had been a year since I had last done so, easy.
In what can be considered foreshadowing for the rest of the year, a couple of my friends and I took a trip to our favorite arcade in Northern California, Sunnyvale Golfland. We came pre-loaded with Del Taco (oh god yes) and hit the place up nice and early. A lot has changed since I last stepped foot upon her slightly smelly property. Mainly a whole lot of games have gone missing, only to replaced by redemption games like the electronic jump rope and Deal or No Deal. You slip in your token and Howie Mandel comes out grinning. He wrings his hands a bit and lets you know how totally fucked you are.
And then you get tickets.
I don’t blame SVGL for trimming the fat though. Even though it’s one of the best arcades in the country for competitive play, they didn’t need two 3rd Strike machines and the like. It just made things twice as awesome. The dancin’ games are largely the same as when I left, but it was great to see that the Pop’n Music machine had been upgraded from the lowly 8 to the greatness of Fever. I feel guilty about it, but I played the Super Mario medley more times than I could remember.
I wish I could go more often, but it’s just too much of a hassle to do it these days on my formerly regular basis. Should things go according to plan, however, I’ll definitely be seeing it again soon.
