Cabinets in Pizza Places

While I'm down here in Ventura, we've been running around every which way.

Earlier this week we stopped by one of the local pizza joints and I immediately started sleuthing around for the arcade cabinets. Any self-respecting family oriented pizza restaurant would surely have some arcade cabinets to go along with the outdated big screen TVs right?

Of course, Santino's in Ventura, CA is no different. Here you can see they have a Neo Geo cabinet, along with a Bubble Bobble machine and an Area 51 shooting cabinet. I can't make out what the cabinet on the far left is, and I don't really remember either. In their small game room, Santino's also had two pinball tables in great condition.

I was happy to see that in the middle of the day, all of these machines were on, and one of them was even in use! Cabinets are so rare these days, but they played such a huge part in my video game upbringing that if I see any powered down, they seem like such strange, square ghosts. I know just because they're off doesn't mean that the cabinet has died, but it does have me worried if it isn't on and telling me that winners don't use drugs.

This Neo Geo cabinet had a particularly nice assortment of games to choose from, including Kind of Fighters '94 and 1945 Plus, both games I don't normally see in Neo Geo cabs up north. While I didn't hunker down and play any of these games, it was nice knowing they were out there for someone else to enjoy.

Do you have a pizza place with arcade cabinets where you live?