Rusty Quarters Retro Arcade and Museum

(This establishment has closed)

I like Rusty Quarters a lot, but I desperately wish I could love them.

Rusty Quarters, in case you've never been there, bills itself as a "retro arcade and museum," which is to say they have a bunch of old arcade games. Most of their games are from the golden age of the 80s (Ms Pac-Man, Dig Dug, Donkey Kong, etc), but they also have a couple fighting games from the 90s, and Asteroids, which I think is the oldest game I've seen there. With at least three decades worth of game cabinets, I'll let them get away with calling themselves a museum.

Of course, museums aren't always fun, even when they are fascinating and full of history. As I said above, I like this arcade a lot, but I just don't really love it. I can't love a place that's only fun for about ten minutes two or three times a month, if that. Whenever I'm in that part of Uptown, I try to stop in and drop a couple quarters, but I always end up getting bored after about five minutes or so. This isn't a knock against Rusty Quarters, since it's a nice place with a decent selection of classic games, but that not all of these games really hold up after all these years.

Here is the list of games on their website, but I'm not sure how up to date it is:

Arkinoid
Asteroids
Attack from Mars Pinball
Bubble Bobble (Neo Geo Cabinet)
Burgertime
Centipede
Defender
Dig-Dug
Donkey Kong (2 of them!)
Donkey Kong Junior
Frogger
Funhouse Pinball

Galaga
Gauntlet II
Indiana Jones Pinball
Joust
Mario Bros.
Metal Slug X (Neo Geo Cabinet)
Mr. Do!
Ms. Pac-Man
Q*Bert
Rampage
Space Invaders Deluxe
Tetris
Track & Field
X-Men: Children of the Atom

I always play a round of Donkey Kong, and it's absolutely as fun today as it was back when Shigeru Miyamoto first unleashed it on the world back in 1981. RQ clearly knows this is their best game, since they have two cabinets. The sequel Donkey Kong Junior isn't as fun and doesn't hold up, in my opinion, but it's worth a quarter at least once.

After DK, the other games that hold up fairly well and make a visit worthwhile are Frogger, Ms. Pac-Man, Centipede, and maybe Space Invaders. Mario Bros. is also pretty fun, as long as you're playing with a friend and not by yourself.

Some of the others are worth checking out at least once, like Arkinoid, Q*Bert, and Dig-Dug, but most of these others are fairly forgettable. I was actually shocked by just how awful Gauntlet II was. I rememebr loving that game. Honestly, I'd like to see more games from the late 80s and early 90s. For a while they had a Street Fighter game, but it was one of the later ones so I didn't care for it. Get a just straight up Street Fighter 2 in there! Or some other classic beat em ups, like Final Fight, X-Men, or Turtles.

But I can't complain about what they don't have, since I can't imagine stocking a place like this is easy or cheap, so I'll applaud them on how they've managed to actually create a retro arcade in the heart of Uptown Minneapolis. It's not their fault most of these games aren't actually all that fun anymore. The owners are nice and friendly, and this is their third business venture in the same location. First it was a decent but not all together exceptional comic book store (which failed, I'm guessing, because the Twin Cities has more than a few exceptional comic book stores), then it was a cute but fairly forgettable hipster gift ship, and now it's Rusty Quarters, which I hope is hear to stay. Soda and candy are available for purchase, but I usually stop in after I've already some drinks at either Jackson's or Bryant Lake Bowl.

The cabinets all seem to be in good condition and look great. I certainly can't remember having any problems. Some of the slots have signs over them saying "use other slot," but I've never lost a quarter in one of their machines, and I'm confident that if I ever do the manager guy behind the counter would fix it or just reimburse me. My only real comment would be that the games could be louder. I'm saying, they could be obnoxiously loud, since that's how I remember Arcades sounding when I was a kid. You'd walk in and get bombarded by the sound effects and music from every game at once. I'm not saying they have to crank the sound up that much, but maybe a little more than they are now.

So I say check it out. All of the games only cost a quarter, and almost all of them are worth the price, and at least a few of them are worth even more.