Review: Arcade Paradise

destructoid.com:

I miss the days when I could still stumble across arcades. A few machines tucked away next to a food court or in a train station. They were the most impractical of ways to play games. They were expensive, noisy, and sometimes just plain broken. However, I feel that an arcade cabinet gives its game a life of its own. This is Metal Slug. It lives in this bowling alley. Not a chunk of plastic on the wall, but a living monolith. Gosh, I even miss the Cruis’n USA that was in Pizza Hut.

It’s funny that the last safe place to experience an arcade is within a video game itself. We’ve had compilations lift the aesthetic and a few indie titles that try to capture that nostalgia, but Arcade Paradise is something unique. It tries to take you back to that time, only without the popcorn, chips with queso, and grape soda. All the neon visuals, the fingerprint-smudged screens, and the horrible radio playing in the background. The arcade is not exactly as you remember it, but Arcade Paradise certainly loves it just as much as you.

Arcade Paradise (PC [Reviewed], PS4, PS5, Switch)Developer: Nosebleed InteractivePublisher: Wired ProductionsReleased: August 11, 2022MSRP: $19.99

You’re a no-good, good-for-nothing young adult, freshly dropped out from University. Your eternally disappointed father has entrusted a neglected laundromat to you. Try not to screw this one up. Not far into the daily drudgery, you find the key to the back room, and within it is imprisoned two arcade cabinets. Encouraged by your sister, you build from those two cabinets to an empire.

Arcade Paradise presents you with some light management requirements. You need to keep the place clean, keep the machines running, and trade in those quarters for new machines. While