RolandDeveloper: Sega-AM3, Year: 1998, Arcade: Taito Hey, Location: Akihabara

Fathers, Sons, L.A. Machineguns

RolandDeveloper: Sega-AM3, Year: 1998, Arcade: Taito Hey, Location: Akihabara
Fathers, Sons, L.A. Machineguns
20200228 - L.A. Machineguns - Father and son at cabinet in Japanese game centre - Sega-AM3 - 1998 - Taito Hey - Akihabara - Resized.jpeg

Seemed harmless enough, in 95, shooting people so they die. Just a game, dad – god!

But when it’s your own kids not giving shits as the corpses flop, you see it for what it is: maybe yet another way you’re fucking them up.

Is it really OK to roleplay the helicopter massacre of L.A Machineguns? Aren’t *you* the one, knowing better for having known both sides, to cut the curse before the next generation?

Shut up and drop another coin, son!

Photographer and writer covering Tokyo arcade life – the videogames, the metropolis and the people

RolandSubject: Street Fighter Alpha 3, Subject: Street Fighter Zero 3, Subject: Egret II, Subject: Arcade Interior, Developer: Taito, Developer: Capcom, Year: 1993, Year: 1996, Year: 1998, Arcade: Taito Hey, Location: Akihabara

Blood Warrior

Mortal Kombat was supposed to be a Jean-Claude Van Damme game. No JC in the end, so they went for guys in pointy hats and balaclavas pulling each other’s spines out. And lo, born was a multimedia franchise up there with Care Bears and My Little Pony.

RolandSubject: Street Fighter Alpha 3, Subject: Street Fighter Zero 3, Subject: Egret II, Subject: Arcade Interior, Developer: Taito, Developer: Capcom, Year: 1993, Year: 1996, Year: 1998, Arcade: Taito Hey, Location: Akihabara
Blood Warrior
RolandArcade: Taito Hey, Developer: Bandai Namco, Developer: Sega, Location: Akihabara, Subject: Arcade Interior, Subject: Border Break, Subject: Tekken 7, Year: 2009, Year: 2015

Staring Down the Brown Tube

The lights in Hey are famously blue. First foot off the IN escalator is *that* row of a dozen or so Egrets on either side. They actually have a Kodak PhotoPoint(TM) standee there now, yellow greyed by the blue light, with a cutout for where experts say to point your camera. That’s actually true!

RolandArcade: Taito Hey, Developer: Bandai Namco, Developer: Sega, Location: Akihabara, Subject: Arcade Interior, Subject: Border Break, Subject: Tekken 7, Year: 2009, Year: 2015
Staring Down the Brown Tube