What Was So Great About Arcades in the 80's & 90's?

In my experience arcades in the 80's/90's was amazing! I was only a kid/teen back then so I often used to go out with friends from school/college for some multi player mayhem!

Seafronts were the ultimate places to hang out. Prices for standard joystick cabs were 10p/20p a go depending on season (winter being cheaper to attract more people in during the cold months). The more advanced cabs like driving games (Ridge Racer/Daytona) were 50p/£1 a game. Playing Daytona with a mate was the biggest laugh we ever had, the multiplayer was amazing!

Machines were much cheaper for arcade operators to buy so in a typical seafront arcade you get a very vast choice of games, old titles left and new titles came in quite often. It was always exciting to come into an arcade and find a new game to have a bash on! You could quite easily spend the whole day with some top fun with your friends.

The only gripes I had were joysticks malfunctioning by overuse and abuse (e.g SFII fireballs stopped working or crouch blocks due to diagonals breaking). 

You're new to a game and you get a gang of kids watching you play (not at your best) laughing and saying you suck which puts you off.

There were good times where you're so good at a game (e.g 1cc House of the Dead with a Rank 1 good ending) people watched you and said how good you are, you end up being friends and joining their community.

Arcades now are just boring. It's all about spending lots of money for carnival luck redemption machines that last 10 seconds a credit, maybe a few minutes and you only end up getting a few tickets. The lack of real arcade games are seriously deteriorating. People don't watch you play games. Arcade operators are struggling to buy or rent machines as they're so expensive with the cost of living crisis. There is rarely anything new. VR games are expensive to play which is the current next gen simulator. I go arcade travelling and the last few years haven't found anything amazing to play on (like latest Sega machines which are so rare to find). It's getting to a point where soon there's nothing left.

The days of the CRT 

some people never experienced it

so i doubt they can ever understand 

no online,updates or cards just coins

the great simplicity 

Edit: Nevermind, figured out how to edit and sort it.

Anyone know how I can fix the thumbnail not showing up in the 'Emuflix' index? I thought you just needed a picture in the thread to make it show up (this seemed to work earlier in the day, but not now), but having said that, I notice all the other videos here are displaying their thumbnail correctly without anything else in the opening post...

Also, how are people making their embedded videos so big?

Thanks in advance for any answers!

Undoubtedly!

Something that cannot be described, only experienced, when a simple coin was everything for a good time of adrenaline.

It was the GOLDEN AGE !!

The age of innovation.