No Quarters Given

Space Invaders

On a brisk afternoon in late January, 30 Assembly Square looks the part of a forgotten shrine. The entire lot sits empty save three cranes and a huge drill-dozer. Dirt and rocks have been stacked into small hills, the use of which remains unclear. Bales of hay soak in muddy water. Massive beams rust on the ground. Chain-link fencing surrounds the premises, commingling with thick tree trunks, the wood grown around the metal.

This is the former site of Good Time Emporium, an arcade in the guise of a sports bar that Dan Hayes opened here in Somerville, Mass. in 1991. The name lent a certain mystique to the pleasures found within; peek inside and one expected a vision of exotic spices, of black magic charms hidden behind velvet curtains. During my single visit, in search of that eponymous feeling, I confess to an implacable arousal of the senses. My first quarter plunked into Capcom’s Gun.Smoke and I could smell the gunpowder. It had been a decade, at least, since playing the game. Woozy with nostalgia, or my pint of Sam Adams, the second level’s knife-throwing boss cut me to ribbons. This was a good pain.