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Olympic Village Features Sweet Soviet Union-Era Arcade Machines
Everyone's eyes are appropriately transfixed on the Olympics, but they aren't the only games that are taking place in Sochi, Russia. At least one of the Olympic villages has an arcade in it, with a few fully functional games from the Soviet Union-era on display. Take a look at them in our gallery.
My brother is a coach for the U.S. Ski Team, and he says he thought of me when he walked past the machines (Awwww...). As you can see, they're hard to ignore. I bugged him to take a few more pictures for me, and got his impressions of the games, too. Matt wrote a story about arcade machines from the Soviet Union a few years back, and it's worth a look, in case you're interested in learning more.
Магистраль ("Highway"):
"This reminds me of the old Atari 2600 game 'Enduro,' or maybe 'Bump 'n' Jump' (without the jumping, and not the NES version)," he writes. "It also reminds me of one of the battery-operated, mechanical driving games I had when I was little, with the little steering wheel and the stationary car you moved around the rolling mat of obstacles."
Here's a closer look at the unit's instruction card. "This is particularly 2600-esque, as there's only a gas pedal, and no brake," my brother says.
Cнайпер-2 ("Sniper-2")
"I don't know what 'Sniper-1' was like, but this appears to be a basic light-operated gun target-shooting game like you'd see in Northern Wisconsin bars circa 1978," writes my brother. "I didn't have any rubles to play this one, and I wasn't inspired to get any after looking at the set-up."
In addition to the old-school games, Nintendo has set up an array of Wii U kiosks at Sloboda Endurance Village. There is a mirror, my brother helpfully points out, so there aren't quite as many as you might think.
There are also some other arcade machines...
...As well as the planet's loneliest disco. As it turns out, athletes either don't like disco dancing during daytime or they're too busy competing. Go figure.
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