The quality of the arcade fluxuates. There's no way to tell if the next game wheeled into the place is good, unless you work there. You get your standard driving games. Your puzzlers.. andthose little "Enigma 5000" machinges with literally 5000 games in them. But once in a while, a game catches your eye; makes you stop and consider it.

Samurai Showdown IV: Amakusa's Revenge.

It happened when I was still in school. I'd catch the bus to downtown, and stop in the arcade.. my little chump change would get me a good 4 games of the latest Street Fighter. But then, that crowd... you know that when there's a crowd, there's only three reasons. One, someone is showing off his/her most flashy moves. Two, lots of people are playing, in a sort of self-tourney... perhaps, with a $5.00 bill on the line... each game. The other reason? A new game.

So, alright.. tired of getting my behind whipped, I move to the crowd. As it's only Wednesday or so, the schoolchildren leave quickly to do their homework at home, and the adults haven't really begun to enter. Slowly, I worked my way up to the machine.. and lo and behold, I saw "it."

Do I play? Do I sit on the side and watch? Scout for another day? Ante up.. I set my quarter on the machine's top border, and wait my turn. Losers and winners decided in a simple button press.. a shadowy man uses a portal to.. throw his tri-blade [I'd come to know him as Basara]. I'm a bit amazed.. this was a bit different from SS3... very different from SS2, graphically.

My turn's next. I pull my quarter from the line, and slip it into the machine.. confirmation sounds, and I press start. Oh, what a cast! I see Ukyo again.. Galford, Nakoruru... who's the one with the fire? Oh well.. I'll find out later. I do the newbie thing and pick of the "Ryu/Ken" Characters... Slash Haohmaru.

And then I die. Seriously.. up in air, the body was split apart by that firey ninja... Kazama Kazuki. I'll learn him, definately. But now, I hve to go tend to my own affairs. Running to barely catch the next bus, I think for the whole 30- minute ride of my tactics.. what to do, who to do it with.. and I hope that I can catch the game when it's free.. no challengers. Maybe, a Sunday or something.

Can't go Thusday... test tomorrow.

Friday.. Ah, TGIF. I'm there, and I'm early enough to beat the primetime rush. Quickly, I go the process again, with Haohmaru. Whoa, there's actually a storyline to follow and time limit! That doesn't matter, because the CPU decimates my old- school "jump and use the SLOW hard slash" tactics.

New plan... what about Kazama? I enter the next quarter... and lose worse, only because.. this dude is too fast for me. [well.. you start running to someone, and do a Hard slash.. you'll see how fast he really is.. but this IS back then. I've pretty much mastered him.] Try Bust mode, and he's that much better. This game.. I like.

The process goes on for what seems like forever, but.. it's only 2 months.. when the all knowing and extremely wise [sarcasm noted] Novelty Company workers switch my new friend with... Bubble Bobble.. like we DON'T already have one in there!

.....Days like that.. times like that.. they don't happen. You'll get your rehashes.. driving games are all the same [::coughcoughRushcoughCrusin"whatever"::].. company versus company versus yo momma vs you baby daddy games... and your No- name- games- from- B- list- companies- that- are- good- but- still- unknown- and- will- remain- that- way type... take your pick.

Samurai Showdown IV: Amakusa's Revenge was the ONLY game that got me that excited. Granted, I did get a 38 vs win count in SS64 [I'm not lying, I have people to vouch for me].. it wasn't the same.

Why can't arcade's do that anymore.. spark that passion for the unknown, the untested.. the wild, yet to me mastered? I don't know.

Just the way things are.