Original subtitles

(electronic arcade music)

(peaceful electronic music)

- [Narrator] Last night, I dreamt

I went to Chinatown Fair again.

I traveled there by train on a clear evening.

The moon was hidden, and the city showed nothing

in the way of malice.

After all these years, the path to the arcade was

ingrained, even in dreams.

As I stood in front of the doors, I could smell the arcade.

The smell was a primordial memory, hidden deep

in my mind.

Somewhere beyond time and space and somehow,

in my dream I connected with this distant

and abstract memory.

I had next.

The quarter was my wager.

It embodied the game, the goal, which could be won or lost.

All my pride and my disappointment and my joy

was held in that quarter.

I had next.

My quarter was lost into the deep abyss,

plunked away with the hundreds of other quarters

that fed the arcade.

There was no way to get it back,

for Chinatown Fair was no more.

- [Narrator] Chinatown Fair was the last arcade

in New York City.

The last arcade that made money from people putting

quarters in machines and playing them.

There was no bar or food, just games.

The crowd was mostly teenagers, born after the

arcade boom of the 1980s, so the scene was

not about nostalgia.

Video games of every type lined the walls

of the L-shaped room.

On the red brick wall, above the games,

next to the Terminator, was a hand-painted sign

that read "No Loitering", which is exactly what most

of the people were doing, hanging out, waiting for their

turn to play.

I began filming at Chinatown Fair after hearing a rumor

that the arcade was closing.

That's when I met Anthony Cali Jr.

He was shooting photographs of his friends when he saw me

with my camera, and introduced himself.

He told me that his parents first brought him

to Chinatown Fair as a child, and that he grew

up in the place.

After meeting Anthony, the story of the arcade

began to emerge.

- I wanted to be one of the at least, few people

to really capture the arcade's closing.

I didn't know how to adjust the light settings,

and all of that, but I was just like, "Fuck it,

if it comes out blurry, I'm just gonna take it,

'cause it's gonna be the last time I see a

lot of these people."

I knew I wasn't gonna see most of them after that.

This is my homegirl, Sarah.

She was one of the people I used to play DDR with.

She used to kinda like, train me in it.

This is one of my oldest friends too, Tory.

It's funny because he's actually like one of the

best DDR players in there right now. (laughs)

He doesn't look like it though; he's a bouncer at

clubs so you never would think that a bouncer at a

club would play DDR, but he plays it, 'cause he just

don't care.

It's just a game, is it gonna hurt somebody?

It was a pretty grimy place, but that's why

I kinda liked it.

It kinda captured that old New York feel,

which was basically grime.

I'm born into that, so it was not a problem

for me at all.

I kinda liked it the way it looked.

I remember walking into it, and I would

just be so excited to see somebody there that I knew.

I'm like, "Yes, the night is gonna be great."

Everybody had a certain group in there,

like there would be a top player, a fashionable dude,

a beautiful girl, you know, that's how it was.

It was one of the few places where I ever

felt that I could be myself.

Here's this book that I was waiting awhile to get.

It's pretty much some photos take from 1980 till 2010

in my neighborhood, which is Lower East Side,

and I really go the book because it had a picture

of the building that I grew up in, which is

this building, right here.

I would go through this rubble to go to my school,

which was across the street.

We used to play a lot of games back there;

we played like stick ball, we played handball,

we played basketball, we played manhunt.

In a way, I kinda miss seeing that, because it

was what I grew up with.

But I'm sure it's not really a good thing,

like, "Hey, I went to my friend's house and

fuckin' burning garbage cans behind his building

and shit like that."

I didn't care if there was pimps and prostitutes

and drug dealers.

I had my games there, so that kinda took my mind

off of that.

- He would just come by the window, "Yo, Daddy!

I need a dollar in quarters, I'm gonna to St. Mark's

and play the games."

I would throw down, like I had a roll of quarters,

I'd throw 'em out.

Then he'll come back later, "Yo daddy, you got

four more quarters?"

- He used to roll the fuckin' quarters in tape. (laughs)

- Yeah, I had 'em prepared already, 'cause I said,

"This kid, he's driving me crazy."

- In a piece of medical tape.

- So I threw 'em out the window, and he'll run to

St. Marks, play his games, come back two hours later,

and get four more quarters.

But he made the quarters last, so that was a good thing.

That's how I knew he was good.

- Yeah, I go there with like one fuckin' dollar,

I'll stay there for like 5 hours, 'cause I was

always was always kickin' people's asses in that shit.

- Yeah, I was into pinball myself. (laughs)

I used to play pinball, but I used to go in

the bars and play.

- The old Gem Spa.

Yeah, so right here, Gem Spa, was one of the spots.

A lot of cats to play games.

Yo, Zoltar, The Great.

- [Machine] I can see your fortune.

- This is the only game they got now, it's fucking wack.

- [Man] So they used to be right over here?

- Yeah, they were like right here.

They were backed against that wall, and then two here,

facing the opposite side and shit like that, yeah.

When it was raining, the rain would just hit the

machines, so when you played the game, the screws

on the game would kinda like electric shock you,

so like a static shock.

But a lot of the cats used to meet up over there

and I guess like around '98 all the games were gone.

Then I started going to Chinatown Fair, and didn't

stop going there after that.

- Chinatown, it is a little, small town in

the middle of New York City.

And dead center in the middle of that

was Chinatown Fair, then above it was the

Port Arthur restaurant, which was one of our

finest restaurants in Chinatown, of the time.

They had furniture with pearl inlay,

it was quite beautiful, it was very special.

And then Chinatown Fair was on the first floor,

it was just jammed with goodies.

You walk in, and play crazy little games like ski bowl,

the thing where you can win prizes with the crane

dropping down, there was a really crappy fun museum

in the back, they called it a museum, but it wasn't

much of a museum.

It was kind of a joke for tourists.

You pay a quarter or something, and you go and see it.

The legendary dancing chicken was there then.

(funky electronic music)

- [Reporter] It's the world-famous dancing and

tic-tac-toe chicken of Mott Street.

If you can beat the chicken, you bring home

a bag of fortune cookies.

But good luck, these chickens were trained

by former students of none other than famed

behaviorist B.F. Skinner.

Hey kid, why do you think the chickens dance?

- You put in a the money, there's a heater

that burns up the bottom and makes it very hot,

and he just dances around.

- [Reporter] All right man, why do they get in the groove?

- 'Cause they hear the music, they start to dance.

When music stops, then they go into their food.

That's their reward.

That's how they're fed.

- [Reporter] Wow, I bet they can't get too much

to eat, can they?

- No, if you over-feed them, they die of a heart attack.

- [Narrator] By the late 1970s, Chinatown had become

a dangerous neighborhood, plagued with high crime.

There were fewer tourists venturing to the area.

A number of new arcades opened in the city,

following the success of Space Invaders in 1979.

The biggest and most popular arcades were in Times Square,

50 blocks uptown from Chinatown.

(uptempo electronic music)

- New York City does nothing halfway.

If you look at how Times Square was from the '70s

and the '80s, it's a city that does things bright,

loud, and wonderful.

And so the arcades were that, as well.

They were the kind of places where, for a small amount

of money, a few quarters, you could get hours

of entertainment with your friends.

It was perfect.

Try to imagine a world where this week it was

Centipede, and the next week it was Defender,

and the week after that, it was Frogger,

and the week after that, Pac-Man.

That's magical.

- [Narrator] By 1981, there were

24,000 arcades in America.

It was the golden age of arcades.

Despite the growing popularity of video games,

Chinatown Fair struggled to compete with the

Times Square arcades, which were bigger and

centrally located.

In 1982, Chinatown Fair was put up for sale.

- So I told my friend, what is this, I saw money

shooting out on the road from the arcade.

He says, "Okay, Sam, come."

So he got the newspaper, he says, let's see.

- Little did he knew that his friend was already

looking at this business sometime.

So when he took him to the place and Sam said,

"This is what I saw in my dream."

- First time I saw the arcade, it was for me,

it was very surprising, was a strange thing.

I never knew that people put money and they

play the game.

- [Ben] He had no idea of running an arcade,

no clue whatsoever.

And how everything just happened, that's only

good lord knows it, I tell you the truth.

- I adapted myself, how to run the business, how to handle

the people, I was not dealing with the machines,

because machines I knew I could fix, but I was

dealing with human beings.

I never had any problems there, never.

(crowd chattering)

- Oh my god, what are you doing?

I thought you didn't know how to play, you liar.

- [Man] I'm trying to play.

- You're such a liar.

- My earliest arcade memory when I was nine.

If I got off school, I would have to wait outside.

That was the only thing I could do back then,

and instead of waiting in the cold back then,

I'd say, "I'll go in the arcade and stay warm."

Everyone's playing games.

They were all shaking their bodies and sweating.

I said, "What's going on here?"

I couldn't get the grasp of what is this.

Why are people playing these games?

That was interesting.

I used to just go and see and stay there for a few hours,

hang out there, until the end of night.

Almost every day, because you know, can't go back home.

- [Interviewer] And why was that?

- Because I couldn't go home.

- [Interviewer] Why?

- I didn't have the keys.

You can't open the door.

I always asked them, "I'm 14 now, why don't

I have a key?"

My friends have keys.

"You don't trust me?"

It was like, "No", that's what they said.

The first time I met Sam was, he was tired one day

and says, "Would you like to sweep the floor for me?"

And I was like, "Sweep the floor?

Are you paying me?"

And then he said, "Yes, I'll give you five dollars."

and I was like, "Oh, five dollars," that's a meal back then.

And a drink.

- Henry was the unique person among all the employees,

unique person.

I could depend on him.

I could leave money and everything and walk out

for him, I depended so much on him.

He was very honest with me.

The money was not the factor for him.

He was not coming for money alone, but something else.

- [Henry] It was the allure of the sounds,

and the flashing screens.

I was fascinated with electronics.

How this machines operates, how they made it.

Because when you pone it there's tons of wires

and what do they do, just tons of mechanics.

What is this stuff?

- He was the one who was like addicted to games, you know.

He worked with me to change the machines and

bring in the new games so that he could play the games.

- I would spend more time playing pinball back then,

because pinball was even more fascinating.

So much stuff moving, and the ball never goes

down the hole, you keep on playing forever.

I was working at Chinatown Fair and all the other

arcades were still open back then.

And CF was completely dead, I would tell you how

bad is it: from six PM there was only me,

Sam, maybe some local kids and some tourists playing

a couple of games.

There was so many other arcades you can go to

besides Chinatown Fair, why would you go to

China Fair, it's like in the middle of nowhere

back then, it was the middle of Chinatown,

like why would you go there to play arcades?

If you wanna play the newest games back then,

everyone would tell you, you have to go to

Times Square, you would have to go to Penn Station,

or you would have to go to Boyer Arcade.

- These guys were basically the titans, they had

all machines.

They had the crowds and they were in Times Square,

so it was really like, it was easy to get to.

It was like so many ways of transportation to get

to them, so they had a down lock.

(uptempo funky electronic music)

- CF was not a popular arcade, it wasn't popping,

there wasn't a lot of customers coming in new,

because there was a lot of segregation back then,

still, between neighborhoods.

- If you were not Chinese, and in Chinatown Fair,

you were a target by every gang in Chinatown.

- You felt a hand go in your pocket, there were

two reactions, either A, you fought, or B, you let it

happen, 'cause you didn't wanna get jumped.

- They had all these guys with leather jackets

and spiky hair, and I'm like, "Okay, he looks,

he looks like he's part of something.

He's looking for trouble."

- [Narrator] During these years, Sam did what

he could to get by.

Occasional tourists came to see the chickens,

and the random film shoot brought in extra money.

In 1984, Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep shot

a scene at Chinatown Fair for the movie,

Falling in Love.

The Late Show, with David Letterman, brought the

tic-tac-toe chicken to their studio.

- It makes the first move.

- All right, the chicken makes the first move.

- [Dave] Go then.

(laughing)

(knocking)

- The chicken makes the.

- [Narrator] In 1995, Wu Tang Clan member,

Ol' Dirty Bastard shot his music video for

the song, "Brooklyn Zoo".

- Dirty Old Bastard?

Yeah, I was surprised, the name, but I had to make money.

(laughing)

So I let him do the piece.

♪ You gonna love this ♪

♪ I'm the one-man army named Ason ♪

♪ I never been tooken out, ♪

♪ I keep MCs lookin' out, ♪

♪ I'm drop science like Cosby droppin' babies, ♪

♪ Enough to make a nigga go crazy ♪

♪ I in the G building, ♪

- I've always liked that video games are challenging.

I like doing that thing that's hard to do.

I don't mind working for it.

Back then, I might have thought of it as an escape.

For me it was just, oh, I wanna play video games.

But I understood, as long as I could go play

something, after I played, I was aight.

I can say that the way I came up, no kid should

have to come up.

The first foster home I was in, at first the lady was nice.

But her daughter didn't like any of the foster kids,

and she didn't like me either.

So that started to create a poisonous element

in the house, and it became to the point where

I was the one that, I was the problem.

Everything was my fault, and I was like,

you know, I'm not gonna put up with this,

I'm not gonna tolerate this, I don't have to take this.

I just started living on the street.

(train running)

In the daytime, I would go on the train and sleep,

'cause I didn't wanna get picked up by truancy.

But at night, the arcade.

Wandering from Central Park to Port Authority

one day, I stumbled on a play land.

I went inside, I saw all the games, I was like,

oh, this place is cool.

And then sometimes, I saw that people would drop

quarters, and like, okay, so there's money here, too.

(chuckling)

And then I got to the point where I got a little more bold,

and I would start going underneath the machines,

looking for quarters, and I'd find a lot of quarters,

and I was like, oh wow.

So I can spend half of this on food, half of this on games.

And then that ratio kinda got fucked up, because then

it would become 90% on games, and 10% on food,

and I didn't really care though, you know.

One night, one of the guys just like, "You know,

I see you here all the time, diving under the machines,

what's up, is everything okay?"

He was like, "Where do you live?"

I was like, I was hesitant to talk, I was like,

but he probably wouldn't say anything, 'cause he's seen

me all the time, he hasn't said anything yet.

So I spilled my guts, I told him I ran away from

a foster home, blah blah blah, living on the streets,

and he's like, "Well, we have a couch downstairs,

and if you wanna help out, you can."

And I was like, "Okay," so I lived in Playland

for a little while.

And it was like a brown leather couch in the basement.

I was all right.

Times Square didn't mean anything to me other than

Playland, and arcades, and places to eat.

And now, it's a bunch of stores, and a bunch of lights,

and no arcades.

That's the worst part.

(midtempo electronic music)

This used to be Playland.

What?

I want the cake, yeah, I want the cake.

But I want my arcades back.

- The first one that closed down was Time Out,

in Penn Station break.

The next one following, within the same year,

was Port Arcade, they closed down 'cause they

lost their lease.

Only Playland was left, and then that closed down.

And then there was no arcades.

- [Narrator] By the 1990s, arcades across America

were closing.

People were playing video games at home,

not at arcades.

There had been home consoles before, but in 1986,

the Nintendo Entertainment System was released,

and proved how great the potential was for home consoles.

- The video games at home became as good or better,

than the video games that you were gonna pay money for.

If they were good games, they would take you months to play.

They didn't have to turn everything into a slug fest.

They could be emotional, they could be long,

they could be interactive in a away that they could

stretch out over hours.

So it didn't take long for them to murder arcade games.

- I didn't like playing at home that much,

cause at home you can't share your experiences,

you only share with yourself.

You know, if you're playing a game like,

yeah, I beat it finally, and you turn around,

it's like only me, you know.

- The console just wasn't as fulfilling

for certain people as the arcades.

That whole chess match, that whole pitting

your skill against other people, either you didn't

have it, and you quit, or you wanted and you

decided to pursue wherever it went.

(uptempo electronic music)

It was like, okay, where does everybody go now

to play, like, oh, we all go to Chinatown.

- [Henry] What happened was, Chinatown Fair

was the last arcade in Manhattan.

The last.

And that's when people started coming down,

a lot of people that I used to know that couldn't

find and arcade, I told them, "Aye, go to

Chinatown Fair, there's only one."

- [Narrator] Sam had kept Chinatown Fair open,

by keeping costs down.

He worked seven days a week, did most of the maintenance

on the games himself.

He was also lucky, the rent in Chinatown had remained low

compared to the rest of the city.

- After Playland closed, we went over to CF,

and well, they had everything that I had

played before, and everything that I had read

in magazines, but never got to play.

And it was just like, holy shit, this place is great.

(uptempo funky electronic music)

- People coming from everywhere and anywhere,

to play at the arcade.

This was the place to be.

- Hey you, I like your shirt, give me money.

Give me CF coins, now, that's it.

(yelling)

- [Narrator] Different communities grew around

the different types of games.

There were the rhythm gamers, the racers,

the shooters, and the fighters, which more than

any other group, came to define Chinatown Fair.

- Chinatown Fair had just rumor going around,

like the best players play in Chinatown.

But then of course, the best players play in

Chinatown; there's no other arcade to play at.

And then, I think a lot of people started

coming down, and started to see that it was true.

And they started to build up this kind of mystique

about the place.

(people cheering)

- This was the spot for Street Fighter, I mean

this was the spot for Marvel, this is Marvel

country right here.

(uptempo electronic music)

- Stop!

- Hit that.

- Everybody comes in, play till two, three in the

morning, sometimes, have to talk to the manager,

like please don't close yet, please don't close yet.

If we had a lot of people that were playing,

we would open, we would be open.

It was entertainment.

- [Norman] When one person would lose,

there would be another person who had their quarter up,

ready to go right after.

People would just line up, put their money up,

get close, feel that they have it, lose.

That's how the arcade scene flourished.

- It became this thing, where every Friday,

it was just a scoop of Marvel players,

they'd come down, they were called the Syndicate.

And people would come from out of state to play them.

The rest of the arcade might as well have been silent

compared to all the noise that was coming from

over in the Marvel 2 area.

- I got (mumbles) next.

- Don't fuck with me, relax!

- I got a dollar.

- No, he's playing again!

- There would be money matches, where people

would play a set, and then people on the other

side, watching and betting.

Those were where some of the best matches

and rivalries were born.

Monday through Friday, we'd be closing two,

three o'clock in the morning, every day.

Saturday, three, four o'clock.

Friday, maybe even five.

Sam would want to close, and he would

call his grandson, and his grandson would come

to pick him up, and he'd just like, "You know what",

"there's so many people here playing," fuck it,

and he'd leave it open for another hour.

I was almost always there.

And then I started working here, and that was just,

that was it.

- [Interviewer] Tell me about how you started

working there.

- I begged for a job.

If you tell somebody, yeah, man my best friend's

"a 65-year-old Pakistani man."

You're like, 14, they're like, "What the fuck?"

But in my case, my best friend was a

65-year-old Pakistani man.

- I knew that he has no other place, he comes

here to play the game, and I wanted to help him.

And I cannot help him by simply giving money.

I wanted to teach him, if you work, you get money.

- Man, I was hired and fired on 13 different

occasions, I was hired.

- That was the tactics I used to use so

that he could come out a good man, again,

and I knew he will be coming.

So I was waiting there for him.

- I don't know why.

The way I came up, I didn't really trust anybody,

I didn't really wanna deal with anybody,

I didn't wanna talk to anybody.

Sam was the only adult that I wasn't scared of.

As a kid, it was really hard to find a adult

that you could just talk to about anything,

for me that was Sam.

And that's something that every kid should have.

(peaceful electronic music)

For almost as long as I had been there,

there had been rumors that oh, CF's gonna close down.

And I'd have to say, "No, no, where'd you hear this?

We're doing fine, we're not going anywhere."

And then, we weren't doing fine.

More and more games, more and more fighting games

that were a driving force behind our business,

came out on console first.

And less and less of those games were

getting arcade releases.

- There's no reason to drive people to the arcades

first anymore, or much less of a reason, and much

shorter of a time period for the arcades to try

and recoup the money on those expensive arcade

cabinets, before it hits home, and then they

have to compete against players who'd just rather

play at their home.

- [Narrator] In 2007, Capcom, producer of the

Street Fighter series, announced that Street Fighter 4

was in production.

To the dismay of the arcade industry in America,

Capcom revealed that Street Fighter 4 would not

have an arcade release in the United States.

The game would be released for the X-box 360,

and the PlayStation 3.

It was the first time a new Street Fighter would not

be in American arcades.

Henry Cin was determined to bring the game

to Chinatown Fair.

Because cabinets were not being imported,

Henry built custom cabinets with parts

he bought from China.

So instead of buying them from Japan, I built

these cabinets in my garage.

It was made out of wood, and...

- [Narrator] He succeeded in bringing

the game to Chinatown Fair eight months

before the home console version was even

for sale in the U.S..

When news spread that Chinatown Fair had the game,

people came from all over to play.

There were long lines, crowds of people watching,

and Sam kept the arcade open late.

It was like this for eight months, until the game

came out for the Xbox and PlayStation.

- A lot of the coming gamers, they won't

experience or appreciate what we had.

You'll never have that experience of a pat on a back,

a handshake, respect, all that, you'll never get

that anymore.

- My brother Tarij, James.

- What's going on, man, how you doing?

But yeah, I knew this guy for years.

I knew Peter for years.

So now hearing that this is closing, we gotta

find another spot to migrate to, we gotta find it,

it has to happen.

If it doesn't, we're done.

(cheerful electronic music)

- If I have to open an arcade, I'll do it.

If I have to do something, just to make a

community, I'll do it.

Whatever it takes, I'll do it.

- [Man] Thank you, thank you so much man.

- Cause you're great.

Oh thank you.

- [Guy] All right, okay, all right.

Thank you so much.

- [Man] Thank you CF!

Thank you so much for hanging out with us

for the past 30 years, man.

(people chatting)

- Game over, game over.

- [Man] Thank you, thank you, thank you CF!

(uptempo electronic music)

(solemn music)

- [Narrator] The morning after Sam lowered

and locked the gate at 8 Mott Street for the

last time, the first epitaph appeared.

Within a few weeks, the gate was entirely

covered in writing.

The corrugated metal was transformed into a memorial.

Many of the messages addressed the arcade as if

it had been a person.

A few were angry that it had left them.

- I don't wanna sign the gate, I don't want to.

'Cause to me, it would be me saying, "Okay",

"I'm done," and I'm not gonna do that.

Me and my family, we got kinda separated at a young age.

So I didn't really get to know my brothers.

A lot of my friends, they became my family.

Most of the time, I'd call them my brothers.

I have about nine or 10 brothers.

Like, these are juts really, really, good friends

of mine, who can do no wrong in my world.

They're just absolutely great people.

And I met most of them at CF.

(grunts)

All I wanna do is stroke his chin, but he has to bite me.

It's not like he's trying to hurt you.

This is just how he responds to everything.

Right?

They don't listen, they're stubborn.

They ignore you until they want you, till you feed them.

And that's just how they respond to attention,

with violence and aggression.

See, now he wants me back.

Right?

One of the first people I started trouble with

at CF, and I'll admit to starting, it,

was with John Gordon.

I thought I was pretty good at Alpha 2,

so I went to play John Gordon.

He beat me in the game, and he made me aware

that I sucked.

And then I came coming back at him, week after week,

after week, getting better and better,

but still couldn't beat him.

To this day, I still, I think I have one victory

over Flash, total.

My need to beat him made me keep going back and

hanging around with him,

and playing against him, whatever.

That's how every friendship in an arcade starts.

It's like, "Oh damn, that's pretty good,

how'd you do that?"

Or you're watching somebody else play, "Oh my god,

you beat that guys' ass, how'd you do that?"

And they explain to you the game, they break it down,

they tell you the pros and cons.

That's all it takes.

- Fuck yo!

- Damn.

(yelling)

- [Akuma] Every time I went to CF, I was happy

as hell.

- (mumbles) Respect.

- It was the one place where I didn't feel like

anything was wrong.

I was actually happy there.

(screeching)

- Let me tell you, fixing these games were a pain

in the ass.

As you see, there's not a lot of room here at CF,

and when I used to pull the machine out,

imagine me pulling the machine out, I'd have to turn

it this way to fix it.

All the customers would always bump into me,

when I'm fixing a game.

So that was not cool.

This color is fire hydrant red, that no one knows.

If you could get the color of it, it's fire hydrant red.

Usually when people would do vandalism or graffiti,

we'd just spray paint over it.

The chicken is actually the tic-tac-toe chicken,

the animal activists came, they brought it to

a farm in upstate New York.

I hope the chicken's doing well.

This chicken was very funny, 'cause we used

to make stink bombs from her eggs, and that was

very intriguing.

We kept like, eggs inside the bathroom, and we used

to put them all the way at the top of the corner,

and wait till like April Fool's to go get these

eggs that the chicken laid, and we used to throw

them at people unsuspectingly.

But that was a long time ago.

That's about it.

I used to play a lot of Street Fighter,

Mortal Kombat, stuff like that.

I started getting very serious about it,

'cause I used to work every day and I'd see all

these guys come and play, and I'd go,

"I can beat these guys."

There were a lot of brand new games coming out,

in like, late '90s, early 2000.

And here at Chinatown Fair, I think we had

a new game every month.

Everyone was changing games, playing like Street Fighter

one day, then they were playing a Neo Geo game

the next month, and then it started

to die down, economically.

I offered Sam money to buy it up.

He said no, and I told him, like, "I'm only doing this

'cause I care about the future of the business,

and the community.

I don't want the community to die."

- There is a time for everything, a time to laugh,

a time to go, a time do die, you know?

So I was prepared for it.

I tried to hold it as long as I could.

The arcade was in my eyes every day, I was dreaming

about arcade, that arcade is open, I'm going

back there...

- And it just, after it closed, he was still thinking,

how can, yeah, he still had faith.

- One day I'm gonna get it back, one day I'm

gonna get it back, one day.

- One day we put it back together, like.

It was hard.

- He left a big part of Sam there in Chinatown Fair.

I still see it.

You know, you spend almost half of your life

in a place, it's a part of him, this is who he is.

This is what he was, and what he'll ever be.

If it was for the money, greed or money,

he would have closed down, and moved on to a

different business many years ago, long time ago.

It was just, he was so connected with that,

that that was his family.

That was his one big family, Chinatown family.

This was my take, that Id not' remember that he

spend that much time with my sisters and me,

he was always busy with company trips,

and always on travel, you know?

What we missed out, Chinatown Fair go it from him.

You know, missed out going places with him,

missed out going to school play things, and whatever.

And I believe those kids in Chinatown received

all that was due to me and my sisters.

So he probably was fulfilling what was inside

of him, and releasing that made up for that, so.

- Well sometime you do, you feel that you

missed them, people and friend that you have there.

But it's same thing, like you have a kid,

he grows up at home, and the time comes,

he marries, and he leaves home.

See?

(solemn electronic music)

- [Narrator] In an issue of Kill Screen Magazine,

a journal dedicated to exploring the culture

of video games, I read a story there reminding

me of the spirit of Chinatown Fair.

The story was written by Jamin Warren,

the magazine's founder.

- Last year, I had the pleasure of visiting the

former British colony of Barbados.

- [Narrator] In it, he recounts a trip that

he took to Barbados, one day while walking

around Bridgetown, he saw a familiar sight,

a Nintendo 64 logo in the window of

a nondescript building.

His curiosity carried him inside,

where he came upon a small shop full of kids

playing video games on PlayStations and Xboxes.

Jamin had discovered an arcade.

The owner was a young man, and he explained

that in Barbados, most kids can't afford

to own their own systems,

so they came to his shop to play.

- [Jamin] He charged all who came a dollar to play their

favorite video games.

Makeshift arcades like this one in the center

of Bridgetown exist as one of the few places

that kids could actually play video games with

one another.

Some travel an hour by bus to the strange and quiet

little outpost to play games

The call to play is too powerful to ignore.

That was so weird, that the strangest little thing,

to kinda see these kids in a totally different

context than my own, doing essentially the same

thing that I did as a kid, and sitting huddled

around a television, saving up money.

They usually have their dollar so that they

can go play for an hour.

The Public Play issue was our opportunity to say,

play is something that predates this era

that we call video games, and that there

are things that happen, particularly around arcades,

in terms of social interaction.

These are things that think will happen in the future.

The closing of the Chinatown Fair was not the end

of arcades, it just meant that there's gonna be

a new generation, such as this tiny little

place in the center of Bridgetown in a small

country like Barbados.

- It's not a family fun center, we're not here

to get tickets and laugh, spend time with the family.

You're here to train, you're here to get better.

You're here for competition.

- I dropped the same combo twice.

Oh my God.

- [Man] Are you serious?

- I suck.

- [Man] What's the matter, bro?

- It's actually doing better that this place

is open, since CF closed, everybody doesn't know

where to go.

But I guess this place, it's going good.

There's a lot of competition, along with a tournament

that happens.

Now people actually know about this place.

- Respect is one of the most important things in life.

That's what I think why people come to competitive

gaming, 'cause they wanna be acknowledged for something.

Someone calling?

What?

Random reset, random reset.

I gotta deal with this.

(uptempo jazzy electronic music)

Oh Han, you came back?

- I always seem to find my way here.

It looks amazing, like wow.

- I know it's changed.

It's different.

They have drinks here at the start when you come in.

That you get some drinks if you're thirsty.

- [Announcer] Someone's Chinese food is here,

please come to the front.

- And we also have...

- [Announcer] Someone's Chinese food is here,

please come to the front.

- We also have a table area where you can sit an eat,

converse, talk about your matches, or upcoming matches.

Some people are waiting for their matches,

playing connect four.

- [Interviewer] Where'd this come from?

- This actually came from Chinatown Fair.

I bought it because it's one of my favorite pieces too.

I like to get in the groove.

This is Ben Fong.

He's doing some repairs on the machines, constantly

doing maintenance to make sure everything's working right.

This large area back here is the stream area.

We stream the tournament here each week, so people

can watch online, live.

The numbers are constantly growing, eight to 10,000

people watch every Wednesday.

Streaming is actually a new advent to the community,

and it's influenced the players that want to come.

They bring hype the store, they also bring hype

to the game.

It's a big aspect of the business these days.

We basically make money off of the venue feed.

So when people come here, they have to pay three dollars

per hour for the first hour, and 2.50 onwards.

And we basically run a lot of our games off the

Xbox system, and the PlayStation 3, and we generally

do that 'cause it's more affordable.

Some people prefer the cabinets because it brings

back the arcade feel, that's it.

But in today's' reality it's nostalgia is not

really quite that profitable.

- Please listen for your name, your name at the station.

You get those things right, you'll have no problems.

When Henry was first finding it ti open Next Level,

I was like, "CF is closing, if you wanna open a new

place, I'm on board."

The venue feed kinda split the CF community,

but the people who came for the games and for

the community, they come.

(uptempo funky electronic music)

Can I have Rob and Lee Chung to the stream station,

you are guys are starting off the AE stream.

(crowd reacting)

- [Man] That's tricky stuff.

- That's a trap.

He got trapped.

Oh no.

- [Man] One more, and he's done.

He's done.

(crowd reacting)

- [Guy] Yes, it's tough.

- [Man] Most definitely.

- It's tough, it's not easy.

New York's finest.

- One of the best, man.

- Yeah, I mean.

- One of the best.

Kevin is the best style in the world.

In my opinion.

- [Man] Okay, yeah.

You think so.

- [Guy] You think so too, aye?

(mumbles) is big news, also.

- [Man] Yeah, Sanford's the guy, come on.

(people chatting)

- Room C, what?

Room C is shit.

All right, I'll talk to you later.

Laters.

So Kurt, did you hear?

Sam says someone's gonna invest money into Chinatown Fair,

and try to re-open it.

My 10 years of friendships with people, and my 10

years of hard work on CF, I was the one who built

everything from the ground up.

Players there won't respect the new owners, and this is

just won't replace them.

No, when I opened, that place would never make any money.

If I open it up, it will make money.

- Chinatown Fair, the sign says it,

we're sticking with it.

You can't argue with the business that was successful

for 35 years, and I think if they had rotated

into what we're doing,

they would have still been successful.

You know, getting rid of all the red,

I think was a great idea.

Like getting rid of all this.

I think this'll be more family-oriented.

When I was young, a friend of mine, Steve and I,

we took a trip to the Panama Canal.

I was I think, 19 years old.

Ang all we did, I should show you, I have a diary

that I took of that trip, and you know, all it talks

about, we went to this arcade in Texas, and then we

went to the one one in Mexico City (chuckles)

All we did was go from one arcade to the next.

So I guess I was pretty arcade-oriented all my life.

Chinatown Fair just seemed like a nice new venture

to get into.

I've had my grandchildren now, living with me

since they're two years old, they're my son's kids.

And my son has his own challenges, so he's not

able to take care of them, so their mother's

been in jail for a year or two.

So I've had my grandchildren now, since they're

two years old and they keep me motivated.

And one of the reasons I got Chinatown Fair.

They said, "Grandpa, do it," so I did it.

They like going to the arcade, and they're gonna

be those guys hanging outside in front of arcades

when they get older, I'm afraid.

I've been doing magic since I was 10 years old,

it's always been a hobby of mine.

And that's my thing.

I always carry something with me, in one of my

pockets, I think it's back here.

'Cause I think maybe you're gonna ask me

to show you a trick. (laughing)

- [Interviewer] I'd love to see a trick.

- So I always have a trick on me.

So I have a pair of hands, what do you see

in my hands?

- [Interviewer] Nothing.

- Now, you gotta look closely, if you look closely

you can see.

I have to lick my hand to get it.

Okay, and then we can see that there really

wasn't nothing, but it was a little

red silk scarf there.

Well, the ultimate goal with the arcade is

as most businesses, to make more money.

And so we're trying to find which pieces, which games

will bring in more people.

Teenagers are welcome here, we want them as much

as anybody else, but we anna bring in the families,

and to bring in the families, there's gotta be more

than just fighting arcade games.

I don't know what we're gonna do up front, there.

See all the graffiti on it, if you saw it,

there's all kinds of graffiti outside on the gate,

gotta paint that.

(cheerful electronic music)

- [Narrator] When you first heard the arcade

was re-opening, what'd you think?

- Yay, that's what I thought.

I was like, "Yes, yes!

Oh, yes!

It's opening, yes, yes!"

That's what I thought.

- [Guy] CF is now open!

(people chatting)

- [Guy] Oh, this kid's a boss.

Don't leave yourself open, kid.

- Oh, I see.

I guess I understand that.

- Fruit Ninja and Guitar Hero, that's all I gotta

say, like.

- It was the only baby-ass...

- [Guy] Fuck Fruit Ninja, I got that shit on my phone.

- We all have to remember that this is the

beginning, the arcade just opened up, and there

is room for change, and I believe in the future,

there will be changes, such as new games and a

new way of running things, so I'm actually looking

forward to seeing the future.

I just hope, I pray that it's actually going to change.

(people chatting)

- If you had bought it, what you have done here?

- What I would have done here?

- The Wizard of Oz is on his way here, he's got

a two-month back up.

- I know, that's a very popular game.

- Have you seen it?

- I've seen it.

Man, this industry is very hard.

Like this man once told me, he's like,

"The worst thing you can do is open something

that you love, because you don't know when

it's time to close the doors."

- You got a good point.

- Yeah, he told me that, and I was like,

"Oh you're so right."

- Hello, Lonnie speaking, how can I help you?

What is it?

No, you take where it's east.

Away from the water, away from the water.

All right, bye.

- I enjoy this business.

A long time ago, in the 90s, I enjoyed it.

- Yeah, go gotta get past the enjoyment,

so if you enjoy it, then you never work

a day in your life, that's the trick,

you gotta enjoy it.

- I do enjoy it, I do enjoy it.

- Nice meeting you!

- When Lonnie reopened CF, I thought it was a stupid idea.

He doesn't know the fighting game community.

I thought it would be risky, because I'm open already,

and he's open, it just marks more competition.

I'm trying to make this community survive.

It's been more than a year, but I wanna survive longer.

It's difficult, thought.

- It's not gonna be Chinatown Fair, it's not gonna be

what it used to be.

I mean, if I'm gonna go to see it just so I can

say that I went, but I'm going there with no expectations.

(somber electronic music)

- I know that, that's exactly what I felt

when I first came here.

That's exactly what I felt, it's gone, man.

- You sed to come here for competition, to face

some of the best players in New York City,

and now you come here and you spin to win.

Can we leave?

- [Interviewer] What's that?

- Are we done here?

Thank god.

(whimsical electronic music)

- The reason I'm disenchanted with Chinatown Fair is

the revenues have gone down 50% since we opened

the first few months.

The redemption games, of course are the ones

that give tickets, like Spin to Win and Treasure Quest.

They're just not making it.

They're doing next to nothing.

It's like this machine right here was doing 15%

of our gross, one machine, which is an amazing thing.

And this machine has died to the point of where

it only did a few dollars yesterday.

- [Interviewer] What games are doing well?

(whimsical electronic version of "Pop Goes the Weasel")

Still sings.

- 32,000 dollars, it better do something. (laughs)

(metal rock music)

You know, once it starts to come back,

I'll be re-enchanted.

- [Interviewer] And you are, you're pretty optimistic?

- Oh, I'm sure we can come back.

I'm 95% sure we'll be successful long range.

I mean, we've gotten quite a few different little

communities that have formed.

The DDR has a little afternoon crowd

of teenage kids, boys and girls, mostly girls

that come and just play for an hour or so.

And then later on, there's a whole different crowd

that comes, and a different community, a different

group, a little clique five, 10, 15 kids,

mostly older kids.

We got a new machine called ReRave that's

doing phenomenal, we've got a big following,

sometimes five and 10 people come here and

wait in line to play it every day.

(cheerful electronic music)

So anything relating to music seems to be

doing very well, and we're gonna probably

get more musical games in the months to come.

- This CF is catering towards a lot of the rhythm

gamers, the music players, the dancers, a lot of that.

I would say, it' a little more friendly for girls,

it's a lighter space, and I think it's a little

safer space as well.

- Slowly but surely, it's bringing the community back,

thanks to beat media.

That's one game that's bringing a new kind of crowd in,

and popping music as well.

Just two weeks ago, three kids came in,

seen me play Dance Dance Revolution Extreme,

they were amazed by how I was playing it,

and they really wanted to give it a shot,

they really wanted to learn.

It's really fun, it's a really great way to

build a community.

- [Interviewer] Have you seen them come back?

- Yeah, I actually have.

I saw them come back last week.

They came back, they were playing by themselves,

I saw them, said hi, we hung out for a little while,

I taught 'em a few new moves.

Slowly but surely, they're getting out of the whole,

joking around, "Oh, I'm just gonna stomp here and there,"

to a more, I'm gonna play seriously, and I wanna have fun

and show that I'm actually getting better.

- Alright!

I already failed, I just failed.

Even though a lot of people do complain that it's not

the old CF, it's still really fun.

So I say that it's not such a bad place to be,

I think it's a really good place.

(cheerful electronic music)

- Sure, I would like to see some of the old people

that used to come here, but that's not the reality.

If you really think about it, there's no drama here,

there's no people arguing about boyfriends,

or stupid stuff, or what happened at this party,

no, it's just people just chilling, playing video games,

what an arcade's supposed to be.

- Nope, you know how it works.

Every week, we expand a little more, like more

and more people know about the place.

I see new faces every day.

I'm personally getting more and more work

days every day, so I'm happy, the place is growing.

- I spent...

- Send a postcard, all right?

- [Guy] I spent all, I had like 30, and I spent...

- I honestly can't tell you what would be next.

I'd like to be here when my hair's gray.

Me, with arthritis in my left hand, still beating

people in Alpha 2.

And the community is huge,

where it's back to what it was at the peak.

Hopefully, the games that come out support this,

and make this happen, because we can't do much

without the games.

You gotta have the games.

(cheerful electronic music)

- If you would like to sign up for the games, starting

play something in front, and (mumbles) and Raider,

we got a next level, whoa.

What challenged me is not the games itself,

it's the people, to understand why people do the

things that they do.

Why do you go to the arcade and play the games,

is what fascinates me.

Why do you have all this enthusiasm about the game?

That's the mystery that I've been trying to solve.

- [Interviewer] Do you always play?

- I'll always be playing.

As long as there's another opponent that wants

to play, I'll play with them.

That's all that matters.

♪ This is the place ♪

♪ The place where everything ♪

(crowd cheers)

♪ This is the space ♪

(crowd cheering)

- Guys, I wanna thank you

for tuning in, as always.

Spooky of course, I wanna thank Spooky

for coming out an streaming.

♪ This is the place ♪

♪ The place where I want to be ♪

♪ And this is the space ♪

♪ The space where we all ♪

(laughing)

Yeah, man.

You know he's walking his toes.

That's Keds, (mumbles).

Yo, what's going on?

♪ The place where I want to be ♪

♪ This is the space where ♪

♪ The space where ♪

All right, good night.

♪ The sun is coming up ♪

♪ I'm in a dream, don't wake me up ♪

♪ And this is the place ♪

♪ The place where I want to be ♪

♪ And this is the space ♪

♪ The space between you and me ♪

♪ The sun has come up ♪

♪ I'm in a dream don't wake me ♪

♪ The sun has come up ♪

♪ I'm in a dream, don't wake me ♪

♪ The suns has come up ♪

♪ I'm in a dream, don't take me ♪

♪ The Sun has come up ♪

♪ I'm in a dream don't wake me ♪

♪ The sun has come up ♪

♪ I'm in a dream, don't wake me ♪

♪ The sun has come up ♪

♪ I'm in a dream, don't take me ♪

♪ The sun has come up ♪

♪ I'm in a dream, don't wake me ♪

(uptempo electronic music)