When Arcade Paradise appeared on consoles and PCs in 2022, it ended up being a novel surprise. A laundromat and arcade management sim with some genuinely appealing original arcade games? It was my jam. Now in 2024 we’ll be seeing Arcade Paradise VR, a new adaptation that ports the game to the Meta Quest headsets, and I appreciate how well Nosebleed Interactive seems to have it settling in on the systems.
For those unfamiliar with the premise, Arcade Paradise and its VR release both follow Ashley. After getting a laundromat to run from an overbearing father, the new manager realizes there are some old arcade cabinets in the back generating a surprising amount of revenue. So the goal becomes managing the laundromat to build up the arcade with (playable) original titles, as well as optimizing the arcade in the back to your liking.
For this VR version, the bulk of the tasks suddenly feeling more realized in VR occur when doing folks’ laundry. You grab the baskets off of the intake shelf. You go to a machine, set the dial for the colors in it, open the machine door, load in the laundry, shut it, and start the wash. While those are being cleaned, you can play arcade games or tidy up by grabbing trash, yanking stray gum wads, cleaning the toilet, and repairing broken machines.
When a load is done, you unload it from the washer, walk to a dryer, open the door, load it in, choose a setting based on the color of the basket, and start that. When that’s done, you take that to the completed shelf. Rinse and repeat, while also gathering money from the laundromat token machine and arcade cabinets, dumping it in the safe, and using that money to buy new cabinets. It all felt very natural when I played in VR, though it seemed like the actual movement was a little too swift and motion-sickness-inducing for me than the teleport option.
The biggest quirks I noticed in the build I ended up playing were typical growing pains of a game in development. For example, during the initial tutorial some of the boxes would… um… appear inside the washing machines. See, if I was facing a certain direction when a notice would come up, the text box would sort of be clipping inside of it. When I’d need to clean the toilet, even if I gripped the handle in such a way that it should have the proper angle for cleaning, it sometimes wouldn’t work as naturally as I’d expect.
Also, I didn’t really get to experience any of the new, VR exclusive games in Arcade Paradise VR. It seems like those cabinets may come later than the expansions I unlocked. However, I did get to see how UFO Assault handles, which involves pressing a button, and… it’s fine? It isn’t as technical as something like the new basketball cabinet, but it works.
Given the nature of the original Arcade Paradise, Arcade Paradise VR really does seem like it could be an ideal kind of game for the Meta Quest. The laundromat management elements lend themselves really well to VR. The arcade cabinets all tend to work well too, since you’re just… standing up at it or playing one of the existing VR cabinets in VR or new ones. What I experienced in the early build makes it seem like could really come together.
Arcade Paradise VR is coming soon to the Meta Quest 2, Meta Quest 3, and Meta Quest Pro. The original Arcade Paradise is available on the PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and PC.
