Spacewar Simplicity

Just as videogames were advancing past simple lines like Asteroids and Combat, and moving past more complicated stuff like Space Invaders, and into the world of Donkey Kong and beyond, I had a favorite called Spacewar. I liked its simplicity, two ships made of digital lines, flying along shooting at each other, and occasionally going into 'hyperspace' a la the aforementioned Asteroids. Little did I know it had a long and storied history.

The game was originally developed in 1961 by MIT students, inspired by the Lensmen series by E.E. Smith. Two spaceships, the 'needle' and the 'wedge,' maneuver around the gravity well of a star, and try to destroy each other with ray weapons. Based on a simple joystick, there were a few options - thrust, fire, turn left, turn right, and of course hyperspace, that last of which would teleport your ship elsewhere on the screen.

I used to love it, and remember one such machine at the arcade at the Atco Raceway, which we always called The Drag. My friends thought it was boring, and had moved on to the more complex games of the early 1980s, but I always had a soft spot for Spacewar. Apparently Atari made a version of it for the 2600 called Space War, but I don't ever recall seeing it, and therefore never obtained one. I might start looking now that I know about it.

Whatever Happened to the Arcade?

Whatever happened to the arcade? I could just as well ask whatever happened to the mall, as for the most part, that's gone as well, or at least its function as a hangout for teenagers and adults young at heart alike. Back in the day, and I'm talking the 1970s and 1980s, the mall was the place to be. It was where you wanted to be, and where you wanted to work. It had everything. The record store, the fast food joint, the movie theater, the food court, for the nerds the book/game/comics store, and of course the crème de la crème, the arcade.

Every mall had its arcade. Cherry Hill, Echelon, Deptford, Moorestown, Burlington, some had two, heck even the Berlin Farmers Market had its own arcade. As videogames entered its golden age, arcades were everywhere. Malibu Grand Prix took prominence. There was Bally's across from the Cherry Hill Mall, the Galaxy (not the rock club) on Route 70, and even in my own hometown Atco, we had the Sweet Shop on the main drag, Atco Avenue.

Most of the mall arcades began as pinball places but moved forward with the times. The Sweet Shop in Atco started as a penny candy place, thus the name, but soon became something else all together. I remember when they first opened, they had one machine, a tank game, which may or may not have been Atari's Combat. In a very short time they added a poolroom in the back, got rid of the candy counter, and filled the front room with videogame machines. I loved playing Space Invaders and Astro Fighter there notably, and remember how the place was always filled with smoke.

As home video systems advanced beyond Pong and the Atari 2600, there soon was little reason to leave the house to play videogames. It took a long tme, but it eventually happened. I remember seeing my first NES in 1982 at a college friend's house, Donkey Kong, groundbreaking graphics for the time. If you could have that at home, why go to the mall?

While there are some still around, some even as nostalgia museums like Barcade, the arcade is for the most part dead. I think the last tiny one I know of was gotten rid of when the Marlton 8 theatre was remodeled. Malls are dead too, some crushed by 'forward thinking' opportunists, look at what used to be the Echelon Mall for an example of that. That place ironically does have an arcade of sorts, more skeeball and the like than videogames, but still. I guess home gaming and social media have killed the mall and the arcade, and it's a shame.