Cabinet: Arcade Repair Shop

A dead arcade machine arrives on a trolley with a note taped to the glass.

The note is from whoever owned it, and it never uses an electrical word. It hums like the fridge did. The picture rolls like it is on a boat. It was fine when we put it in the van.

You get three tests. Power, board, screen. Each one costs money and bench time, and each one crosses names off a list of eight faults. Then you commit to one, fit the part, and flip the switch.

Three tests will always tell you the answer. Three tests will not always be worth it. That is the whole game.

What happens when it works. The lamp cuts. The cabinet thunks. The tube degausses. And then a game that does not exist plays itself for ten seconds, under its own marquee, from its own invented publisher. A different one every machine.

What's in it

• Eight faults, three tests, and a note that is always technically true
• A repair shop economy where a lucky guess can beat a careful sweep
• Ten seconds of an invented 1983 arcade game on every machine you fix
• Sixteen colours and pixel type, and nothing drawn outside them
• Three things hidden in it that nothing ever mentions
• English and Korean. Plays offline, no account, no energy bar.

Controls (PC)

• Mouse: click a test to run it, click a fault, pick a part.
• Esc: back

The itch.io version

• No ads. No in-app purchases. The full game, once.
• "Take an advance" is a free button here. It only shows up when the cheapest way through a machine is more than the shop has.
• The mobile version's other video offers (sell a machine as-is, call the old guy, the parts bin) are not in this version: free on every machine they would be a skip, a free clue and a free part.
• A tall window (540x960) that fits a 1080p screen and can be resized.

Credits

Room tiles from the Gaming Room Interiors pack; the machines are drawn in code. Fonts: Silkscreen, Galmuri11 (SIL OFL). Made with Godot.

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