Museum of Soviet Arcade Machines
 Entrance of the museum in Moscow. | |
  Location within Moscow | |
| Established | 2007 |
|---|---|
| Location | Moscow |
| Coordinates | 55°46′35″N 37°40′35″E / 55.776255°N 37.676480°E |
| Website |
www |
The Museum of Soviet Arcade Machines (Russian: Музей советских игровых автоматов) is a private interactive historical museum, where is presented a unique collection of playable arcade machines from the Soviet Union. The museum was found by three enthusiasts, they collected arcade machines from the former Soviet Union, removed them with love and care so they can be played. The collection continues to grow constantly. The first Museum of the Soviet Arcade Machines was opened in Moscow in 2007, it had a great success among Moscow citizens and foreign visitors who found there exactly what they loking for: exciting time machines.
The Moscow Museum became so popular that one was not enough and two more museums were founded - in St. Petersburg and in Kazan.
Arcade machines in the Soviet Union
Finally USSR’s Ministry of Culture started to reproduce adapted copies of American and Japanese arcade machines in 1975. This was followed by locally made machines machines like ‘Pepka’ (the Turnip) and ‘Konyok-Gorbunok’ (the Little Humpacked Horses) based on Russian fairy tales of the same names.
22 military factories made machines for the whole Union from the seventies up to the Perestoika. There were more than 100 different types of arcade machines. After the Soviet Union collapsed, the production stopped and the computer era had something new to offer, so these machines were broken, sold for details, forgotten.
History of the Museum
In the 21st century three young people got an idea to create a museum to save the machines for future generations. So forgotten and broken down Soviet-era arcade machines are now being restored for Museum of Soviet Arcade Machines and now it is possible to play and feel the atmosphere of childhood and youth of Soviet nation. Museum was found in 2007 and continues to grow.
Most of the machines are working ones so you can challenge yourself with games like ‘Morskoi Boy’ (Sea Battle), ‘Tankodrom’ (Tank Battle), a shooting game called ‘Sniper’, early video games like ‘Skachki’ (Horde Races) and many others.