old Contemporary arcade

Captain Schnemo · Post by **Captain Schnemo** » Dec Sat 12, 2009 6:17 am

Does anyone have any pictures or video footage of the old Contemporary arcade? Particularly the shooting gallery section...

Man, I could hardly imagine anything cooler than that when I was a kid. I guess that's where The Wave is now?

Last time I was there, the arcade was crammed into a shop and didn't have anything unique.

yodiwan1 · Post by **yodiwan1** » Dec Wed 16, 2009 3:27 pm

Schnemo, while we may have not always seen eye to eye, I guess we have found common ground. When was younger I used to love going to the arcade just for the shooting gallery. Just reading your post reminds me of spending hours with my grandparents shooting my first air riffles. I always stop in adventureland now to shoot off one round just for the memories.

Jacca5660 · Post by **Jacca5660** » Dec Wed 16, 2009 4:35 pm

I have searched for a few days. I mean I can usually find almost anything if given the time. I can't get much of anything on this. It's actually kinda weird. I will continue the search though!

Post by **Len90** » Dec Wed 16, 2009 4:35 pm

I have to agree with Schnemo too on this one. I remember when we stayed at the Contemporary in 2000 or 2002 (can't remember) my brother and I played there every night when we went to refill our mugs. It was right next door. We saved up all our tickets from the week and got a big flashing light. I still have the light and remember how much fun we had playing there.

On our trip in 2008, we stopped off at the arcade when we at at California Grill. It was sad to see such a small, crammed, and boring arcade. We played two games of air hockey and left.

Schnemo, I believe you are correct. The wave took over the game room. The game room took over Fantasia (under the monorail) and Fantasia moved into the middle. where a small stand used to be. Unfortunately I can't find any pictures. I too have searched but found nothing.

Captain Schnemo · Post by **Captain Schnemo** » Dec Thu 17, 2009 3:49 am

Thanks for looking, Jacca. I was surprised when I couldn't find anything about this when I did a simple search.

I talked to the people in the store next to the arcade (the one with the silent fiber-optic fireworks show that always fascinated me) and they weren't happy about the situation either. After being shoved into corner, their business went down considerably and they said the new location of the arcade generated a lot of unnecessary noise in the echo chamber there.

The manager of the shop in the middle of the lobby wasn't entirely happy either, but she did help me find the five-legged goat in the (now endangered) mosaic.

Anyway, I remember that the shooting gallery was rebuilt at least once, but it remained the same in principle.

I still think about shooting the barrel and the rum-drinking skeleton popping up. And that giant wall of horses that ran the races. The place had a very different feeling from a mall arcade. Good stuff.

mindflipper · Post by **mindflipper** » Dec Thu 17, 2009 9:42 am

Wow! There's a blast from the past! I remember it, but I also remember when I stayed there a year or two ago I couldn't find the arcade - now I realized that it just got downsized! But then again, they did away with the old-fashioned arcade on main-street few years ago as well. I think Disney got rid of the old and just went with pinballs and video games everywhere.

Captain Schnemo · Post by **Captain Schnemo** » Dec Thu 17, 2009 11:02 am

I found one photo here:

I can't remember if this is the original configuration or not. It seems to be missing some stuff (like the wizard you could shoot in the wrist), so maybe this is a primordial version and they added things later. A number of the elements are very familiar, so I don't think this is the second version.

But maybe. My brain isn't what it used to be. Storing data in meat is a silly idea anyway.

Jacca5660 · Post by **Jacca5660** » Dec Thu 17, 2009 3:54 pm

I had looked through that site and it didn't seem to have any of the original stuff or pictures. The hunt continues!!

Captain Schnemo · Post by **Captain Schnemo** » Dec Thu 17, 2009 9:48 pm

Now I'm thinking that the wizard and the skeleton in the barrel were to the right of what's in this image, so it is possible that this is the original configuration.

I assumed it was smaller than I remember as a kid, but maybe the thing actually was quite large.

alsirrap · Post by **alsirrap** » Jan Thu 07, 2010 3:27 am

Back in the 70s, when air hockey was just becoming popular, that game room must have had about 20 or more air hockey tables. I loved that game back then. We stayed up all night once then doing nothing but air hockey, and eating expensive hamburgers.