Cyber Zone

This place has recently been vacated.
:(((

I feel really bad for the owners of this place, I really do because they are really nice people. They always gave me a refund if the machine wasn’t working correctly and were very nice, hence why I am giving a 2 star and not one.
I used to come here a lot in middle school to play the hell out of Street Fighter Alpha 3. Today, I won’t even think about coming here. Nearly all the machines are broken piece of junks that hardly works. I also don’t know Street Fighter 3^rd Strike is running on 30 fps… so ghetto. Also, the price is ridiculous. Nothing is a quarter here. All of them are 50 cents or a dollar, and more than half of the games are over a decade old. All their games are outdated and they never update any games, maybe except for Initial D. Also, almost no one comes here but middle-​high school girls who wants to take a picture at the booth that costs I think $ 10 dollars. So if you want some game competitions, this arcade has none.
If you want to have fun in an arcade, don’t come here. There’s just nothing to play, nothing works right, no one’s here, and it’s expensive.

My boyfriend and I went here one weekend afternoon as we’ve been wanting to check it out for a while.
We walk in and off the bat I thought «OK…very asian» as the first thing you see are the rows of photobooths (pretty awesome) and the DDR machines. We look for a place to exchange $ for tokens… the machine is broken.
I go up to the window and the owner is sitting there in his little room/​booth half naked, shaving his face with an electric razor. Must have had a rough night, as it was past noon on a Sunday.
He motions for us to wait a second and proceeds to get dressed… but only after he goes to get tokens out of a machine… what the what, what?!
He was nice enough to give us 2 extra tokens, but long story short, lets just say I still have a bunch of tokens left… anyone? anyone? like SERIOUSLY.
OH. and when we were riding the video motorcycles, the owner went around spraying the photobooths with air freshener… yeah, pretty ghetto if you ask me.
Great place if you’re like, under 18.

Ok listen. hahah!
The only reason why im giving more stars than this place is worth because.
The tokens are cheap.
plus
Initial D, DDR, Pump it Up (Zero)
Pump it up is a pretty hard Arcade game to find here in LA.
Except for Dave and Busters but the pads there suck because drunk ass people mash the pads like crazy there. although this is an old version I really like how sensitive the pads are. Its easy to play plus it’s a super great workout!
Same for DDR.
Initial D is pretty good here. Its updated. I’m just not sure if its 3 or 4 but its still good.
Photo booths are adorable. I don’t go in those because I don’t really need it. Lol
This place just needs Tekken 6 and Street Fighter and a bathroom then it can actually sell itself in the market.

Okay this place is not the best place but it’s the only place that I know that has the japanese photo booths. They have lots of those. The pictures always come out hella pretty and cute. You decorate it afterwards. It used to be $ 5, but now is $ 10. There are $ 15, $ 12 and $ 20 machines I think. I remember taking these photos in Japan and their the same ones. although much cheaper overseas ($ 4ish).
Also puzzle fighter is my game. They have that game at the Japanese MArket plaza in little tokyo/​downtown la. I’m pretty damn good at it! No, I think I’m the best ;)

Is there some sort of thing hipness with shitty arcades? I mean, this isn’t even a GOOD shitty arcade. There’s a difference between that dark lit grimy arcade that has all of the classics and then there’s this place.
I guess it has Dance Dance Revolution… which I don’t remember if it’s still in style to dance like a fool in public to really bad techno remixes of popular Asian music.
Then you factor in that the majority of the games here are completely busted. I mean, they’re just not working in the slightest bit. There’s no room to walk around because of the huge machines in the middle. I didn’t even know what they were. Photo booths? Who knows.
They had some old fighting games and that’s about it. Really, the whole feel just gave me a bad vibe and I like grimy arcades. This one just blew all around.
There’s far better arcades. Hell, just going to the near by bowling alley will get you a better arcade playing itch out of your way.

Crappy videogames but the Japanese photobooths are hilarious after a long night of drinking.

I went here recently while waiting for my friend’s Korean passport to develop. This place totally went downhill. Most of the machines are broken and torn up. A lot of the TV’s have problems and the machines have issues eating the quarters. Of course there are no new games coming out though so you really can’t blame them.

OMG I haven’t been here since high school and I went last week to take those Japanese photobooth pictures, and they were WAY overpriced and the quality was horrible. The employees don’t even cut them for you! UGH Cue is so much better. Also, we stayed there for 10 minutes and the stupid valet parking guys made us pay $ 2 for nothing. The lot was EMPTY. Why do you need valet parking at 3 p.m.?! Never going back. Maybe only for Wacko next door.

The people who work there are kinda lazy and you have to go to them so that you can use the machines now… you don’t feed the money in. The machines are filled with ktown teens’ names or profanity scribbled in Sharpies and what not.
This used to be my go-​to place for japanese sticker photos but then I discovered Cue! Studios in San Gabriel. So if you don’t mind the extra drive go there. It’s an entire room (bigger than Cyberzone, I think) filled with different kinds of booths and for almost half the price. (Cyberzone = $ 12 vs. Cue = $ 6-​$ 10)

its been there forever. It’s an arcade half filled with photobooths. The japanese photobooths. its way overpriced and its in japanese so u have to guess what it says and the employees are too lazy to help you with it and i doubt they even understand what it says. but any i love their airplane fighter game, drum game, and photobooths but its way too overpriced):

Bring dollar bills. You can play some fun stuff here. It was not busy at all. I like the game where you turn into animal people hybrid characters and beat the crap out of each other. For 50 cents. It’s a fun place when you might come across some boring times sitting around your place. Get out. Play games.

This dated arcade has a plethora of run-​down looking stand-​up machines to choose from, as well as some of the more new-​fangled «(blank)(blank) Revolution» titles, racing games, and some ultra-​modern shooters too. It’s got a great, old-​school vibe.
For me, the rub is the older games. The more banged-​up and held-​together-​with-​tape the module, the more likely it’s where I’ll be. Especially if the game has no instructions whatsoever, and is in an entirely different language that I have never received instruction in. And it sounds like it’s yelling at you and shaming you for even attempting to play it in the first place. I love a game where it takes a good couple of bucks to figure out the objective, and then another couple to get any good at it. This place has got that aesthetic in spades.
Extra points go for the guy who runs the joint. As we were approaching a new game (older game, new to us), tentatively fingering our tokens and determining whether or not to take the plunge, he just strolled right up, pop in a few tokens of his own and insisted we try it ourselves. How cool is that? What arcade lets you sample the merchandise for free? He then ran off and was playing other games while patrons coin-​pumped their way into a flashing-​light and blasting-​sound euphoria. You know how some people don’t trust bartenders who don’t drink? It’s a rare thing to see an arcade owner who’s in it for the fun of it like everyone else.
For the avid arcade junkie, this is a must-​visit.

One of the only true arcades left in Los Angeles. It reminds me of the old school arcade rooms in Korea from back in the days of my childhood. The place is a bit dark and grimy in atmosphere, but shoot you’re not there to interior decorate… the games are great ! Good mix of old school and new ones such as the Pump/​DDR machines.
My only gripe is the change machine is freaking anal so unless you got the crispest new bill in your wallet… you’ve got to go to the guy. But other than that… a fun place to blow some time before you shoot off to the next destination. You’ll find me at the «Initial D» game driving my ass off under the influence. LOL! Cheers.

This place is a blast. I can’t believe I ran across this place and was able to find Puzzle Fighter. I used to play that game in college for hours with my suite-​mates.

This is gold for any koreatown date. First, you start with the standby: failing at Dance Dance Revolution. Play it tandem style so you suck WITH your date. (It’s more bonding that way) Make sure to use the machine on the right when you come in, not the one on the left. That one is just hard. Put it on the lowest beats per minute song you can find. It’s actually not that hard then.
Next move on to the drum drum revolution. Pick beginner. It’s also pretty easy. You get four songs for one play so trade out so you can encourage/​make fun of your date. You get to preview the songs so pick a clip that’s melodic. It’s all Korean stuff except, for some unfathomable reason, «I fought the law and the law won»
That’s a good song to pick by the way.
Now move on to the PUNCH game. It’s a weather beaten game in the middle of the arcade with a lot of duct tape on it. There’s a photo option. Use that one. In theory it lets you take a pic of yourself to be the guy who gets punched. After that it’s simple — the arm with the target will rise. You punch as hard as you can. And it tells you how hard you hit.
Finally, the key to koreatown arcade: the photo booth.
The photobooth in the center is the one to pick. You go in and take several pics for 8 dollars. Pricey? Maybe. But worth it. Some will be knee level shots, some shoulder height. Do the craziest poses you can think of. Then, about six shots in, go for the kiss. That’s right. KISS.
Now your first kiss is officially a picture. Fun.
When the flashing stops, go to the other side behind the curtain. If there’s an older korean woman (an ajumma) there, get her to help you. She loves explaining how it works. It’s all in Korean but she can talk you through it.
Basically you pick the best shots from the ones you took, then you mess around with the pics by adding graphics and backgrounds. When you’re all done, pick the layout you want, then print.
10 minutes later? The ultimate koreatown souvenir.

three stars just because of the young AND old asian dudes in suits and ties playing shoot ‘em up games and DrumMania to take the edge off a long day’s work at this koreatown arcade. it’s just fun to watch them.
the games are kinda pricey, but i’ll pay four tokens any day for a round of DrumMania (think Dance Dance Revolution except with drums and drumsticks!). plus, there’s these cute mini wooden karaōke booths in the back of the arcade. i popped in three tokens before realizing all the songs were in korean! oops. so we just made up our own lyrics.