Arcade game

An arcade game or coin-op is a coin-operated entertainment machine typically installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games or merchandisers.

While exact dates are debated, the golden age of arcade video games is usually defined as a period beginning sometime in the late 1970s and ending sometime in the mid-1980s. Excluding a brief resurgence in the early 1990s, the arcade industry subsequently declined in the Western hemisphere as competing home-based video game consoles increased in capability and decreased in cost.

Arcade action games

The term "arcade game" is also used to refer to an action video game that was designed to play similarly to an arcade game with frantic, addictive gameplay. The focus of arcade action games is on the user's reflexes, and the games usually feature very little puzzle-solving, complex thinking, or strategy skills. Games with complex thinking are called strategy video games or puzzle video games.