Friday night was all about hanging out at the mall with friends. Our local mall was designed for teens to come spend money. There was a Cobb cinema, Pizza USA, Carvel Ice Cream, Rainbow Records & Tapes and our video arcade, Shazam, all at one end of the mall!

The arcade was dark inside, lit mostly by the many electric screens buzzing within. Tokens cost a quarter and, unlike the usual 3 plays-per-token at other arcades, you’d get 5! Here’s the thing about these video games: they were not delicate. The buttons could withstand being hammered, the joystick jammed in any direction and the trackball spun endlessly.

The games themselves were challenging but addicting. I’d tried them all to figure out what I was good at so I could get the most gameplay out of each quarter. For me it was Tempest, Centipede, Space Invaders and Galaga. If someone was already playing, I’d place one of my tokens on the corner of the screen to let the player know I was waiting. There would be a line of waiting tokens on the new and popular games, like Dragon’s Lair, which cost two tokens to play. Some players thought that was a rip-off but many, like me, poured pocketfuls of tokens into that magic animated machine hoping to be the one to rescue the titillating Princess Daphne.