Coin-Op Game Room — Restaurant in San Diego

Nostalgist, you know who you are. Profile and prefer things from my childhood, but also want the best of the what we've earned today like beer and alcohol.

Seems like every major city is getting these throwback arcade module classic/bar combo's. Ground Kontrol in Portland, Insert Coins in Las Vegas and now Coin Op.

What better place to have a barcade than the hipster haven North Park. I know it's new, but honestly not for long.

We love our craft beer especially if it's from one of our local breweries, but charging $6 for a pint is grocery store prices. Ding. Vodka tonic, same.

Loud, it's loud and not in the normal arcade noises, acoustically it's loud and the patrons get into the games, not for the sensitive and considering I went when it was not packed this will be an issue moving forward. Games are a little close together, a la garage style. As packed as it gets don't expect the rules to the same as when you we a kid and you put your quarter to hold your place. It's fun to harken back to a time long ago, but don't become that little bratty 10 year old you were back then. It's actually normal for the women to be ignored while the guys play video games, but while most of these guys are just a little sick of playing COD at home they come out here and get a beer and fail even more miserably than at standard bars. It's not safe for you guys anywhere. Great place to people watch, er hipster watch.

I counted 20+ consoles, a dozen beers, a dozen specialty cocktails and a pretty basic menu. Cocktails aren't quite on the level of other bars, but this is more a dive bar than cocktail place anyhow.

This place needs drink holders, and everywhere, and bad, apparently they are coming. They also need hand sanitizer.

Service is actually pretty good, they are very proud of their basic Americana menu and they do soups, kabobs, sandwiches, etc. Pork Sliders were better than the chicken satay (dry and needed a more refined sauce), and the popcorn (mole was a little stale and needed more bite). Sliders had soft bread, tender pork and were well constructed, not just mini pulled pork sandwiches. Proportions are always the issue with sliders.

Street Fighter, Mortal Combat, Centipede and others. So many game references like "flawless victory", "perfect" etc. I had so many good laughs, but not that many games played, though they are cheap I didn't play many games. Don't come looking for DDR and this is not D&B. Could be bigger, décor is coming along, but the biggest downfalls are their prices on drinks, amenities and cleanlisness. Could use more staff to help clean up and for sure a nightly disinfection is in order. Come get your 70's-80's on, it's a great place to reminisce, remind you how old you really are and how you've moved on. The concept alone should keep this place around, but as cool as this would have been back then, it's still missing some...

As a "date night" destination with Mrs. Keyes, "Coin-Op Game Room" in North Park was decent. My wife and I had a lot of fun over a few hours here, playing a variety of video games from Ms. Pac-Man to shoot 'em ups, to throwing basketballs around, to playing pong, and so forth. As usual, when we go out, I lose to her at everything, and I'm not even trying to lose. But such is a metaphor for being the husband in a healthy, modern marriage, right?

The food was terrible, and sometimes barfworthy. Well - maybe I exaggerate slightly, since I barely managed to hold it all down somehow, and the "Carnitas Tater Tots" (which should actually be called 'pulled pork' tater tots since they're not prepared in the style of carnitas practiced anywhere else in SoCal or Mexico) aren't bad even if over-optimistically described.

The Spicy Chicken Sandwich (bacon, cheddar, iceberg lettuce, sriracha aioli, wheat bun), on the other hand, was built around the proposition of getting away with serving disgusting, dry, stringy, dehydrated chicken to paying customers. Also, because I don't read closely when I'm out in a place like this surrounded by blinking lights, cathode ray glow, and other stimuli, I was expecting a fried chicken patty - and this is instead a straight-up grilled piece of particle board without any batter or breading. Nice job deep-frying wood, you jerks.

The potato chips served with the chicken sandwich were also quite awful: they were fried in rancid oil and were cooked such that they were unappealingly 'chewy.' Chewy chips are the result of over-crowding the fryer, which is an awful mistake to be making as a professional cook, since it usually also means that you're not fully reaching the desired temperature to cook whatever you're frying, potentially resulting in meat (chicken wings, fried fish, etc.) coming out of the oil still at unsafe temperatures.

This place is known for employing decent bartenders, and their cocktails were OK, I think. The fact that I can't remember them so well means I probably had more than I should have.

With such a mixed bag, it is difficult for a single numeric rating to reflect my experience at this so-called "eatertainment" venue, which yielded 5 star fun, but...

When I moved to north park eight years ago this place was jumping. They had semi monthly street fighter 2 tournaments, and a wild crew would come in and have fun playing video games and drink..

I still like the coin up, but they don't keep their games working the way they used to. I went in tonight July 3rd 2023, and street fighter II was unplugged and broken. The game next to it was broken too. A 3rd game, mortal Kombat 2 -the buttons were all stuck and the screen was fading, Like an old tv about to go bad.

I know people come in and act like they have never played a game with a joy stick and shake it until they break it, But you're a video game bar - half the appeal is to play games that work.

The amount of slot machines has gone up. I'm assuming that's because maybe they're lower maintenance? What I consistently see is: nobody's ever playing them.

There's more carnival type games these days, ike shooting hoops. That's always fun, and pretty popular.

The kitchen was closed when I came in - I'm hoping that's because of the time even though it was only 9 pm. I was there about a month ago, the food was pretty good - bite sized grub that came out quick.

Tonight they closed the back patio at ten o'clock. Not sure why - there were plenty of people out there.

At one point, the Coin-Op NP used to rotate games. They used to ask on social media which games would be the most popular and then rotate them in. I think that's gone now.

I think freeplay - last Sunday of the month still happens, but if games are broken, I'll skip it.

I loved this place. Every once in a while, you'll see the street fighter 2 High score with the initials: FRO". That's me. I used to come all the time.. But...