Cheesy arcade memories connect Spokane family
I was indoctrinated to video games at an early age. The youngest of four and only girl, I can still recall tagging along with my brother Kevin to arcades and watching as he blew up tanks in a game called Battlezone. After Kevin had extended the life of a quarter into the 15-minute range multiple times, I’d often wander off into the chaotic mixture of flashing lights and electronic sounds to locate a challenge that better suited my novice gaming skills. The deafening ambience of booms, crashes and boisterous male voices captivating me as I bumped and shoved my way past throngs of teens huddled together in front of screens.
While traditional arcades offered hours of amusement in their own right, the added lure of pizza was a tasty game changer. Back then, our family lived within walking distance of a Seattle Chuck E. Cheese’s Pizza Time Theatre and I would often stop by to visit my best friend, Kris, who worked there. She even donned that iconic rat-mouse costume for me from time to time.
After moving to Spokane in the mid-1980s, I was saddened to learn about the recent demise of a Shadle Shopping Center Chuck E. Cheese’s Pizza Time Theatre, but later discovered Lincoln Heights Pizza, where I delighted in displaying my prowess with a joystick to the men I dated. My high scores on Space Invaders and Frogger often earning coveted position at the top of screen leaderboards. Those victories solidified when I entered the initials BNZ, short for Bunz, a nickname I had inherited from my older brothers.
When Chuck E. Cheese’s reopened in its current north Spokane location, I welcomed the opportunity to inaugurate my son, Brayden, with that same rite of passage I remembered from childhood. His hand freshly stamped and eyes aglow when he met the Big Cheese for that first time. Pizza sauce smeared across his face as he gripped a plastic cup filled with tokens and bolted back and forth between video games, which he tackled with limited success. I was often tempted to jump in and assist, but resisted that urge. It was his turn, not mine.
After my daughter Brianna was born our arcading horizons expanded to include Savage Land Pizza and Five Mile Heights Pizza Parlor where we celebrated countless birthdays with family and friends. My two children were inseparable as they traversed plastic tunnels, flailed in colorful ball pits and plotted intricate strategies for scoring oodles of tickets on gaming machines. Their skills with a joystick eventually surpassing my own. As they played, I refilled drink cups, guarded precious items they had plucked from gumball machines and heeded those endless pleas for “just another dollar” worth of tokens until my wallet was exhausted. Last, but certainly not least, we’d hit that prize counter, where the process of selecting small pieces of candy and chintzy toys often lasted 20 minutes or longer. Those tiny treasures unceremoniously dumped on cluttered bedroom floors a short time after we arrived home.
As the years passed, our visits to local pizza arcades dwindled. Many of the locations we once frequented closed. When I reflect back on that time spent together with my children, I’m often reminded of the camaraderie we shared and people who briefly touched their young lives. That Chuck E. Cheese’s owner with a friendly smile who always slipped Brayden a few extra tokens. The man who watched silently as Brianna attempted to win a stuffed firecracker toy from a claw machine and later snagged it for her himself. Pizza and video games brought all of us together and as cheesy as it might sound, that was our biggest prize.