Golden Arcade Era

all of the above.

85 TO 90 Would be best. With Sega's deluxe cabs heard over everything else in the arcade of the day welcome to the fantasy zone get ready!. Op wolf. Chase HQ. Shooter's galore v/h. What's not to like.

For me, the golden era is the 90's ! ;-)

Still surprisingly waiting on Juno First which would be one of my favourite (competing) arcade games. Assume similar hardware/chipset as Defender?

Can my golden era include both Mr. Do and Puyo Puyo Tsū?

two great games that mame never get it to runs

i vote for cruis.n exotica and marval vs capcom 2

I’m with the other posters for like ‘87 to ‘92 or so. TMNT, Golden Axe, Altered Beast, Double Dragon, Contra, 1943, After Burner, X-Men. Of course the earlier days are also pure gold, but these are the games that I just couldn’t help but plunking down my last quarter into.

Really I'd go for something like 1987-1993 or so, but the 85-89 slot is probably closest of those options.

90-95 for sure was the peak. Sega and Namco pushing technology forward with increasingly complex deluxe cabinets and 3D graphics, the fighting game explosion, beat 'em ups and shoot 'em ups were plentiful.

For me the golden era is early 80s : Galaga, Pac-Man, Donkey Kong, Frogger, Super Cobra, Tempest, Dig Dug, Star Trek: SOS, Joust, Turbo, Space Invaders, Scramble, Centipede, Q*bert, Asteroids, Star Wars… etc etc. It was a great time to be alive. I still have such fond memories of it all.

I prefer 1985 through 1989, but 1990 through 1995 also had a lot of good games.

Somewhere between the 2nd and 3rd choices

so many great games from 90-95... but my first experience with arcade games was in the 80's. Asteroids is still my favorite game of all time. I grew up on Pacman, Asteroids, Space Invaders, Centipede, QBert and all of those... (eventually Gauntlet, Forgotten Worlds, Rush'n Attack...)

For me 1988 to what was a marvel in seeing Ridge Racer and Daytona was magic

Salamander, gradius II gofer, parodius, so 1985-late 90s ❤️

Yeah i like the older games all these games today are to heavy and to much going on

85-95. 😂

1987-1991 the one on one fighting games killed the beat em up genre in late 1991 and that killed arcade gaming for me. Thankfully beat em ups are back and not going away thanks to them being revived in 2003 onward.

Missing option: 1985-1995

Podría ser del 85 al 95?. Could it be from 85 to 95?

The "Mortal Kombat" battle cry still gives me all sorts of warm vibes. Hard to imagine a childhood without access to arcade's golden era. Its the reason why middle-age men build fightsticks.

'The Arcade' as a kid, was always the 4Player TMNT.

The "16bit" arcade era for me, Sega System 16, Neo-geo, Capcom CPS2 Irem M72.. so uuhh.. 1990ish.. (M2 Daytona is a special exception.. peak SEGA doing arcades)

This is hard to decide but i have to lean on the fighters era in the 90's for SF2, Mortal Kombat 1/2/3 etc. , Virtuafighter , Killer instinct etc etc

That’s a difficult one - going to pick late 90s, though, as I was a huge fan of Tekken 2 back in the day, so much so that I actually own a Tekken 2 cabinet now.

Starts with space harrier for me , so mid 80's on wards , but do have a love for the later periods also

Tough choice. So many great machines back in the day - Space harrier, Pleiades, Track and Field, 720 - But I also love 90s games such as SF2 and some of the Neo Geo fighters.

Aladdin and mortal combat 3

I grew up in the 90s, so I'm may be a little biased. Although I do have to say that I have played some of the arcade games from the 80s on the actual cabinets, and they are a real treat! Like Asteroids... Holy hot dang! An emulator can never do a vector display justice.

Agree with you guys - ‘85-90 and ‘90-95 is almost wrapped in one for me 🥰 born in the spring of ‘80 so to me going from Operation-Wolf/Rampage erra … (Street Fighters right in the middle 😁) … all the way to the Mortal Kombat II/Killer Instinct erra is like my childhood in a nutshell 🤩😍🙌🏼

I actually spent more time at arcades 1995 and on, but it was chasing the fun I had in them in the early 90s. Considering by the end of the 90s the Dreamcast came out, the arcades essentially had nothing more to offer.

1986-1990 was the golden era for me.

I love to see Mr do! mainly do run run....

Very hard to choose as I love the whole 1985 to 1995 period the most, but i'll go with 85-89 coz i'm a kid of the '80s so that's where most of my nostalgia is

For me it's 2001-2009, with CAVE best shooters.

Choosing between 1985-89 and 1990-95 is quite difficult. I love the 16-bit era of gaming, and that was basically the late 80s in a nutshell. The 1990s games started becoming technically more advanced, and there are loads that never got really good ports. I ended up choosing 1990-1995 because that was the last era where arcade really had much relevance, at least for me.

Jotego, animo a seguir depurando y ajustando el Core System16, que no está del todo preciso. Saludos

Yeah echoing the sentiment above I straddle 1985/1990. I won't want to have to choose between a Chase HQ core and a Virtua Racing core.

Don't let the nostalgic tinted glass cloud your vision. Street Fighter 2, Virtua Fighter, Parodius, Violent Storm, pretty much every genre had defining games between the 90-95 period.

Operation Wolf is one of my 5 favorite arcades machines

Despite what the polls say, the golden era is the mid-80s, which was when the only way to play an "arcade quality" game was at the arcades. End of the 80s and the start of the 90s we already had computers and consoles that gave that same quality so the magic in the arcades started to fade quite rapidly.

1985-1989 e.g.: 1943, Black Tiger, Bubble Bobble, Commando, Contra, Gauntlet, Golden Axe, Green Beret, Gun.Smoke, Operation Wolf, Out Run, Pang!, Rastan, RoboCop, R-Type, Shinobi, Silkworm, Sonic Boom, The Speed Rumbler, Splatterhouse, Terra Cresta, Tiger Road, Vigilante, Wonder Boy, etc. In terms of sheer volume of great games there's no objective contest to 1985-1989, although pre-1985 laid the foundation and have some of the most seminal games ever, such as Galaga, Ms. Pac-Man, etc. Some great games from 1990-1995, a couple of my faves. But quality in terms of pure gameplay and innovation was somewhat in decline with more focus on cheap spectacle and graphics that rapidly date instead.

Wonderboy in Monsterland, Wardner, Nemesis, Bonze Adventure, Splatterhouse, Mr Heli, TMNT, WWF Superstars of Wrestling, Wrestlefest, Vulcan Venture, Karnov, R-Type, Saint Dragon, Quartet, Gauntlet 1 & 2. :) Guess my choice is clear hehe

1992 to 1994 was the sweet spot, SF2, MK, Daytona, VF2 etc

Golden Age stopped when it became possible to have faithfull conversions on home consoles

I went 90-95 but almost went 85-89 But my games were more 89 onwards.

Ok, we already have System16 and it is great so maybe System18 is on the queue list as a X-mas present? 😉

hard to choose. I overlap 2 of them

Although after 1989 there were amazing arcade games, the 16bit consoles had already arrived. Before that the arcades ran supreme. There was simply nothing that could compete with it...

I'd love namco sys 22

I’m in the 80’s because of Double Dragon. It’s my all time favourite cabinet.

Arcades in general are a golden era for me but I chose 1990 because of Street Fighter 2. The competition in the Arcades was fierce back then. Mortal Kombat 2 vs Super Street Fighter 2 phew awesome times