Skee-Ball and carnival games (late 19th century to 1940s) penny arcade in the 1980s
Game of skill amusements had been a staple of fairs since the 19th century. Further, the invention of
coin-operated vending machines had come about in the 19th century. To build on this, coin-operated automated amusement machines were created, such as
fortune telling and
strength tester machines as well as
mutoscopes, and installed along with other attractions at fairs, traveling carnivals, and resorts. Soon, entrepreneurs began housing these coin-operated devices in the same facilities which required minimal oversight, creating
penny arcades near the turn of the 20th century, the name taken from the common use of a single
penny to operate the machine. Penny arcades started to gain a negative reputation as the most popular attraction in them tended to be mutoscopes featuring risqué and
softcore pornography while drawing audiences of young men. Further, the birth of the
film industry in the 1910s and 1920s drew audiences away from the penny arcade. Driving games originated from British arcades in the 1930s. Shooting gallery carnival games date back to the late 19th century. Mechanical
gun games had existed in England since the turn of the 20th century. The earliest rudimentary examples of mechanical
interactive film games date back to the early 20th century, with "cinematic shooting gallery" games. They were similar to shooting gallery carnival games, except that players shot at a cinema screen displaying film footage of targets. They showed footage of targets, and when a player shot the screen at the right time, it would trigger a mechanism that temporarily pauses the film and registers a point. The first successful example of such a game was
Life Targets, released in the United Kingdom in 1912. Cinematic shooting gallery games enjoyed short-lived popularity in several parts of Britain during the 1910s, and often had
safari animals as targets, with footage recorded from
British imperial colonies. Cinematic shooting gallery games declined some time after the 1910s. The first
light guns appeared in the 1930s, with
Seeburg Ray-O-Lite (1936). Games using this toy rifle were mechanical and the rifle fired beams of light at targets wired with sensors. A later gun game from
Seeburg Corporation,
Shoot the Bear (1949), introduced the use of mechanical sound effects. Mechanical maze games appeared in penny arcades by the mid-20th century; they only allowed the player to manipulate the entire maze, unlike later
maze video games which allowed the player to manipulate individual elements within a maze.
Pinball (1930s to 1960s) Coin-operated
pinball machines that included electric lights and features were developed in 1933, but lacked the user-controlled flipper mechanisms at that point; these would be invented in 1947. Though the creators of these games argued that these games were still skill-based, many governments still considered them to be
games of luck and ruled them as gambling devices. As such, they were initially banned in many cities. Pinball machines were also divisive between the young and the old and were arguably emblematic of the
generation gap found in America at the time. Some elders feared what the youth were doing and considered pinball machines to be "tools of the devil." This led to even more bans. These bans were slowly lifted in the 1960s and 1970s; New York City's ban, placed in 1942, lasted until 1976, Where pinball was allowed, pinball manufacturers carefully distanced their games from gambling, adding "For Amusement Only" among the game's labeling, eliminating any redemption features, and asserting these were games of skill at every opportunity. Some early electro-mechanical games were designed not for commercial purposes but to demonstrate the state of technology at public expositions, such as
Nimatron in 1940 or
Bertie the Brain in 1950. In 1941,
International Mutoscope Reel Company released the electro-mechanical driving game
Drive Mobile, which had an upright
arcade cabinet similar to what arcade video games would later use. From the late 1960s, EM games incorporated more elaborate electronics and mechanical action to create a simulated environment for the player. and the "novelty renaissance" or "technological renaissance" in North America.
Periscope, a
submarine simulator and
light gun shooter, was released by
Nakamura Manufacturing Company (later called Namco) in 1965 and then by Sega in 1966. and had players look through a
periscope to direct and fire torpedoes, Sega's version became a major success worldwide. It was the first arcade game to cost a
quarter per play, and was a turning point for the arcade industry. It was a fresh approach to gun games that Sega introduced with
Duck Hunt, which began location testing in 1968 and released in January 1969.
Missile, a
shooter and
vehicular combat game released by Sega in 1969, may have been the first arcade game to use a
joystick with a fire button, leading to joysticks subsequently becoming the standard control scheme for arcade games. It had a circular racetrack with rival cars painted on individual rotating discs illuminated by a lamp, resembling a windscreen view. It had collision detection, with players having to dodge cars to avoid crashing, as well as electronic sound for the car engines and collisions. Following the arrival of arcade video games with
Pong (1972) and its clones, EM games continued to have a strong presence in arcades for much of the 1970s. Several EM games that appeared in the 1970s have remained popular in arcades through to the present day, notably
air hockey,
whac-a-mole and
medal games. Medal games started becoming popular with Sega's
Harness Racing (1974), Nintendo's
EVR Race (1975) and
Aruze's
The Derby Vφ (1975). The first whac-a-mole game,
Mogura Taiji ("Mole Buster"), was released by
TOGO in 1975. In the late 1970s, arcade centers in Japan began to be flooded with "mole buster" games.
Mogura Taiji was introduced to North America in 1976, which inspired Bob's Space Racers to produce their own version of the game called "Whac-A-Mole" in 1977. Sega released an EM game similar to air hockey in 1968,
MotoPolo, where two players moved around motorbikes to knock balls into the opponent's goal; it also used an
8-track player to play back the sounds of the motorbikes. Air hockey itself was later created by a group of
Brunswick Billiards employees between 1969 and 1972. EM games experienced a resurgence during the 1980s. Air hockey, whac-a-mole and medal games have since remained popular arcade attractions. As technology moved from
transistor-transistor logic (TTL)
integrated circuits to
microprocessors, a new wave of arcade video games arose, starting with Taito's
Space Invaders in 1978 and leading to a
golden age of arcade video games that included
Pac-Man (Namco, 1980),
Missile Command (Atari, 1980), and
Donkey Kong (Nintendo, 1981). The golden age waned in 1983 due to an excess number of arcade games, the growing draw of
home video game consoles and computers, and a moral panic on the impact of arcade video games on youth. The arcade industry was also partially impacted by the
video game crash of 1983. The arcade market had recovered by 1986, with the help of software conversion kits, the arrival of popular
beat 'em up games (such as
Kung-Fu Master and
Renegade), and advanced
motion simulator games (such as Sega's "taikan" games including
Hang-On,
Space Harrier and
Out Run). However, the growth of home video game systems such as the
Nintendo Entertainment System led to another brief arcade decline towards the end of the 1980s.
Fighting games like
Street Fighter II (1991) and
Mortal Kombat (1992) helped to revive it in the early 1990s, leading to a renaissance for the arcade industry. with later arcade systems such as the
Sega Model 3 remaining considerably more advanced than home systems through the late 1990s. However, the improved capabilities of home consoles and computers to mimic arcade video games during this time drew crowds away from arcades. Arcade video games declined in the Western world during the 2000s, with most arcades serving highly specialized experiences that cannot be replicated in the home, including lines of pinball and other arcade games, coupled with other entertainment options such as restaurants or bars. Among newer arcade video games include games like
Dance Dance Revolution that require specialized equipment, as well as games incorporating
motion simulation or
virtual reality.
Decadence Due to the profitability and technological advances in consoles and computers, which came to have hardware superior to arcade machines, as well as the possibility of playing online, the proliferation of cybercafés and other factors, arcade machines gradually lost popularity until they nearly disappeared. This forced companies specialized in the sector, such as Midway, to enter the console market and stop producing arcade machines. Recently, in 2026, the evolution of arcade video games has been scientifically studied as a process of cultural evolution. Dr. Valverde's article analyzes thousands of games to observe how different genres emerge, diversify, and disappear. It shows that innovation and collaboration among developers favor the survival of genres. In contrast, when imitation predominates and innovation is lacking, some genres enter a period of decline and eventually collapse. ==Trade associations==