Rush Arcade

Before I was an adult running around Vancouver, I was a teenager just looking for something to do in Richmond. Since there were only so many movies we could watch and malls we could roam, Rush Arcade was always the one stop shop where we could all just hang for hours on end.
It was a dark, dodgy arcade spot, dominated by a bank of terminals all LAN’d up for everything from Star Craft to Counter Strike. There was also the random lines for DDR (#1) and almost always a wait for Time Crisis (1,2,3, etc.). This was a spot where gamer novices need not apply. It was a time before broadband internet had hit the masses and large, bulky, arcade machines were the most exciting games before any high end consoles had come along.
If the place is dominated by a high school crowd, it’s safe to assume the prices were cheap enough to warrant an all day pass to be here. The machines were good and so was the service. It was definitely vampire friendly, not a drop of light would peer through the murky interior and the cigarette smell was practically a Richmond trademark.
But now, I’m told its closed. I noticed the last time I drove on No.3 road last year, it did look a little deserted here, but it almost always does during the day time. It’s inevitable with all of the technology kids have access to nowadays — but I wouldn’t mind to sit down for one more headshot in a multiplayer FPS game.
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(#1) If you have no idea what this means, you can stop reading now.

SHORYUKEN!
BOOM! HEADSHOT.
Dam Dariram Dariram Dariram…
These sounds overlapped each other as our hero pounded vigorously on the 3-​button «Japanese button mashing game» against his friends.
Rush Arcade is a well-​hidden arcade and LAN gaming center on a busy street that always has a lot of lowered import cars in their parking lot and Asian kids smoking outside. They have a whole bunch of up-​to-​date LAN machines, and various arcade machines that are fairly recent. The people that play here are so hardcore that they use the bars on the back of the DDR machine to hold on to when their legs flail around like Michael Flatley, Lord of the Dance. This place is even designed to keep you in here as long as possible, with a small café in the middle to provide sustainance and only one exit.
PROS:
— Fairly well run and managed for an arcade.
— Usually has most of the latest arcade games.
— Very nice LAN gaming machines with gaming mouses!
CONS:
— A lot of high school students, often cutting class.
— Smells like cigarette smoke in here all the time.