As much as I love to play console video games, I have to admit that I have a soft spot in my heart for the standup arcade coin-ops. When I go up to see a movie at a big theater complex I will inevitably wind up at the game room to play a few shooters or start a little pinball action.
Namco-Bandai, one of the big producers of standup arcade machines in Japan, says that they are losing quite a bit of business to the tune of a 38% cut in expected revenues.
Why? Yuji Machida of Namco-Bandai says it’s due to home game consoles, such as the Wii, taking away their business.
"A lot of the types of games that people played at an arcade can now be done at home. Many Japanese kids got a Wii last year, particularly over the holiday season, and it seems as if much of their pocket money is now being saved to buy more hardware or software for the console."
The amusement arcade business in Japan has gotten so bad that Namco-Bandai has had to shut down 50-60 of the locations due to the dwindling crowds. But Namco-Bandai isn’t the only one to feel the effects of the decline of arcade centers. Sega Sammy Holdings recently announced plans to shut down 100 of it’s arcade locations while Capcom said that its arcade business was hit badly as well.
Is the arcade center on its way out? Considering that the average cost of playing coin-ops can quickly drain your supply of quarters in less than half an hour, it’s probably more cost effective to just buy a game off the shelf. Besides, some would say that the really popular coin-op games eventually show up on PCs or game consoles anyway, so you might as well wait.
[via Gamasutra]
