The death of the arcade - like the infuriating and thankfully now mute line about the death of the PC - is one of those statements that have become worn down, over-repeated and often exaggerated. But these days it's impossible to deny the stark truth within.
The past few months have seen two stories pass in silence, final nails hammered quietly into the coffin of this once vibrant scene. First, the Trocadero's Funland - once an anonymous arcade before being rebranded Segaworld, but a thriving arcade whatever its name - closed its doors, a long-running dispute with its landlords seeing the lights turned out this past July.
And then this month one of the relationships that was once at the backbone of arcade gaming is severed as Yu Suzuki officially leaves SEGA, departing to work full-time with his own company YS NET.
It's another downward twist in an arc that's been as limp as it has been inevitable, and it's worth taking the time to mourn the loss of an arena that was once so vital to games, and one that helped form the foundations of much of what we love today.
It used to be that if you wanted a glimpse of the future, you went to the local arcade. For a child obsessed with the world of video games, a trip there was like a mini-E3, a digital World's Fair wherein you'd see technologies unimaginable and spectacles impossible for our then-humble home consoles to replicate.
It's likely that anyone who grew up in or around London in the nineties has a story to share about a trip to the Trocadero's arcade. A personal favourite comes from visiting when Daytona USA had just been installed, cockily jumping the queue and sitting in one of the eight gloriously oversized cabinets as camera bulbs flashed around me - I felt, fleetingly, like Dale Earnhardt trapped in toy town.
Here it was possible to come face to face with polygons and the then brave new world of 3D, to marvel at the wizardry that conjured up these surreal landscapes to race around and to gawp at the artistry and bravado of these garish machines.
And of course Yu Suzuki's own games were synonymous with a certain golden age. Picture an arcade in its pomp and it's easy to imagine a line-up of Suzuki's career highlights: the gleaming red hulk of a deluxe OutRun cabinet, or the gyroscopic joy of a deluxe Afterburner all the way through to a spinning R360 or the full-spec three-screen F355 Challenge.
It's these excesses that would arguably get the better of Suzuki, the multi-million folly and subsequent flop of Shenmue ensuring that his output diminished to the point that, upon his imminent departure, there's little fanfare; a strange fate for someone who was once as entwined with the character of SEGA as Shigeru Miyamoto is with Nintendo.
Suzuki's future seems more modest as he works with YS NET on Shenmue Town and extends into social and mobile development, asking no longer for 50p pieces that fuelled his arcade creations but chasing the change that swills around the Android, iPhone and other handheld markets.
The arcade's own excesses were equally unsustainable, and so long and steady has been their decline that it's sadly unsurprising that when the biggest of their number in London goes under it barely registers. The reasons for the downfall are many and obvious; the rise in power of home consoles negating one side of the arcade's attraction, the ascent of online gaming negating the other, more social draw.
Like Yu Suzuki's own trajectory, the arcade's future in the UK now seems more modest. Venues persist, though they're shadows of the multi-tiered carnivals of old, and whereas arcades used to present a slice of the future they now serve a more retrospective and esoteric purpose, acting as museums that preserve a moment that's passed.
Exeter's Arcade Barn is one such time capsule, run by enthusiast Shaun Meldon from an unmarked corner of an industrial estate. Here you find an evolving line-up of cabinets in pristine condition and free-to-play, a small cover charge allowing paying punters an entire day spent snooping around the various machines. A loose cut-off point of 1990 reinforces the retro flavour of the collection.
Elsewhere, London's Casino Leisure arcade - sitting on the more sedate end of Tottenham Court Road - offers a more contemporary collection, although it's more hardcore in its concerns. Beneath the rattle and hum of fruit machines on the top floor there's an ever-changing line-up of cabinets taking in the latest 2D shmups and brawlers, with arcade boards often kindly donated by a dedicated community.
Both are vibrant and well supported, though a long way from the bustle of the Trocadero in its nineties heyday. A part of our history has been lost, and a once-important pillar of gaming has disappeared while suffering the ignominious fate of going un-mourned. It's worth taking some time to pay our final respects.
