In the biggest wardrobe-to-Narnia moment, I walked up to a Final Fight arcade cabinet and realized it was actually playing Michael Jackson's Moonwalker, a hard-to-find game with "game concept and design by Michael Jackson." The Starbase centerpiece may be San Francisco Rush 2049 Special Edition, a driving game that lets players fly around a futuristic S.F. (Including both Star Trek: The Next Generation and High Speed, my two favorite Steve Ritchie-designed pins after Black Knight.) It was fun to introduce Tekken 5 and Soulcalibur III to my 8-year-old son, who had never played an arcade fighting game. Highlights: The three pinball machines were in great working order. But an arcade connoisseur will still find a lot to appreciate. The shotgun-style floor space only accommodates two rows of games, so there are maybe 35 total. A few of the games weren't working or were powered down during our visit. That said, the arcade doesn't make a great first impression. He obviously loves these games and knows everything about them, which gives Starbase even more of a museum quality. Sebastian-from-"Blade Runner" vibe, except he bears a closer physical resemblance to Richard Dreyfuss. Imagine if there was a Bartertown Arcade in "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome." Starbase is old, a little battered and patched together, but very functional. The interior is cave-like, with a series of overhead fabric cutouts designed to look like the interior of a spaceship. It's not as much a flashback as it is a weathered but surviving relic. Above all, the arcade is gloriously authentic.
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