Current Events > Anybody have any fond memories of video game demo stations in stores?

(+) Yeah! (+)

When I was young, my favorite thing was playing those demo stations while my parents shopped.

I'll never forget one time when my brother dragged me away to a demo station at Sears, and we tried to play either Tekken 1 or Tekken 2, but the controllers were broken, and so the demo station was stuck in Demo mode. Since we couldn't play, I got bored and wandered back over to my mom, who was buying me Super Mario RPG for my birthday, and my brother had attempted to distract me so I wouldn't see.

Good times.

I still had to wait for my birthday to get SMRPG, and knowing I was getting it made the wait so much more unbearable, but now, so many years later, it's a fond memory.

I remember the neck strain from looking straight up at the TV since they used that uncomfortable angle so people wouldnt stand there and play all day.

As well as the immediate disdain Id have for other random children if I went to the electronics section and saw someone else playing it.

gamer167 posted...

I remember the neck strain from looking straight up at the TV since they used that uncomfortable angle so people wouldnt stand there and play all day.

As well as the immediate disdain Id have for other random children if I went to the electronics section and saw someone else playing it.

Yes, to both!

when mcdonalds had n64s and gamecubes

Yeah I think Sears was the first time I saw an n64 running in person. Then Toys r us had them as well even before they had the electronics area. I do remember playing a lot of Halo at Baggages. Hell a friend of mine beat it there.

Playing Diablo on a Best Buy demo PC was a life changing experience.

Freddie_Mercury posted...

when mcdonalds had n64s and gamecubes

I, admittedly, don't remember this. I may have been a bit older at the time. I mainly remember like, Sears/Kmart/Walmart/etc. having SNES, PS1, and later, Dreamcast displays.

I think I vaguely remember like, Walmart and Best Buy getting N64 demo stations, but that's probably my latest memory of them.

EDIT: I see I have things out of order, since Dreamcast came after N64, but you get my drift.

I'd play the shit out of PS1 demo discs at Sears because my mom worked there and I'd sometimes have to just hang out around there before she got off work. After they switched to a new disc my mom got to bring the old one home so I have a shitton of them somewhere with my PS1 stuff. The demo station screen was kinda high for lil ol MJOLNRVII so my neck would sometimes hurt after a while.

JuanCarlos1 posted...

Yeah I think Sears was the first time I saw an n64 running in person. Then Toys r us had them as well even before they had the electronics area. I do remember playing a lot of Halo at Baggages. Hell a friend of mine beat it there.

Do you mean Babbages? Oh geez, I remember them. We had a Babbages in the mall, before Gamestop bought them.

The last one I remember was Target here had a PS1 station set up with demos of Ridge Racer and Battle Arena Toshinden. It was used so much that the first controller didn't work so you had to play from the player 2 side.

I still remember when the original Gameboy came out Walmart had a few set up so you could play Tetris.

StealThisSheen posted...

Do you mean Babbages? I geez, I remember them. We had a Babbages in the mall, before Gamestop bought them.

Lmao, yea

MJOLNRVII posted...

I'd play the shit out of PS1 demo discs at Sears because my mom worked there and I'd sometimes have to just hang out around there before she got off work. After they switched to a new disc my mom got to bring the old one home so I have a shitton of them somewhere with my PS1 stuff. The demo station screen was kinda high for lil ol MJOLNRVII so my neck would sometimes hurt after a while.

Yeah, the screen was intentionally higher so you didn't stand around all day, but little StealThisSheen didn't care. I'd play the demo station all day if I had to, while my mom shopped for school clothes or whatever. And she'd come to me and be like "Do you like this?" And I'd be like "Yeah, yeah, whatever," because I was too busy trying to beat Bowser, or Robotnik, or Kazuya, or whatever, at the time.

I only had a SNES as a kid and absolutely loved to go to Toys R Us exclusively so I could play the Sonic demo station they had there. Game was insanely fun.

The first time I saw a n64 in person was at a Dunkin Donuts. It was playing Mario 64. My jaw dropped!

Tony hawk demos at Kmart and Walmart. Good times

Back when Fry's was king, seeing Half-Life 2 run on a state of the art gaming rig at the time.

sabin017 posted...

Back when Fry's was king, seeing Half-Life 2 run on a state of the art gaming rig at the time.

Oh man, we had a "Fry's" at the mall I went to as a teenager, though I want to say it was called something else. I can't remember. This is now going to kill me until I remember what the name was. It was... whatever the Northeast called "Fry's," at the time. Like how Rally's and Carl's Jr are the same, and the name depends on where in the country you are.

I remember my local Sam's Club having what I'm pretty sure was a full copy of Melee that I would play the entire time my parents were in the store, they'd just leave me there and I wouldn't move.

Best Buy had the demo of Wind Waker that I played multiple times. And also had Guitar Hero and Rock Band that I would just stay at the whole time

I used to go nuts over the Melee demos at Gamestop and Best Buy

I love how many people are replying to this topic. I mentioned demo stations to some of my coworkers, and they stared at me blankly. This is cathartic.

I remember demo stations at Toys R Us were my first exposure to Super Mario World, Super Mario Kart, Super Mario 64 and Pokemon Stadium.

Yeah, my father would take me to Toys R Us on Saturday mornings so I could play Super Mario World and sometimes Star Fox at the kiosk. There was some other store we went to that I also played Super Mario World, and some other kid was walking by and said the SNES controller "has too many buttons!"

I played Super Mario 64 at Blockbuster, and years later when I worked at that Blockbuster, there was a Pokemon Snap station that would print stickers. Pokemon Snap is what actually got me to buy an N64 and was the first Pokemon game I ever played.

Edit: I also remember playing Killer Instinct on the SNES at Sears whenever I went out to the mall. And the Virtual Boy.

yeah i used to go to toys r us all the time, i played everything on those. only time i ever played a virtual boy was when it was displayed. fondly remember playing comix zone, dkc2, street fighter the movie. not sure why those games specifically.

when the 64 came out they basically remodeled the entire area to set up demo stations for mario64. i remember playing it the first time on that, totally worked, i was sold on it. but i was definitely the kid who went to every electronics area just to see if they had playable demos at that store.

Thanks, CE. You all have fed my nostalgia so much, with this topic.

Those 5 minutes of Dynasty Warrior, while your parents searched Toys r us for a gift for your baby cousin, were pure crack.

I went to Toys R Us twice a week just to play Mario 64. I spent so much time running around the courtyard and Bob-omb Battlefield. I never could beat King Bob-omb though because I kept throwing him off the mountain (which is still weird to me that that's not what you're supposed to do).

I also remember the dude who worked at Babbages would challenge anyone to play Soul Calibur on the Dreamcast kiosk, and I destroyed him. He hopped the counter and went "YOU'RE GOING DOWN KID!", and he did not. Good times.

Hayame_Zero posted...

I went to Toys R Us twice a week just to play Mario 64. I spent so much time running around the courtyard and Bob-omb Battlefield. I never could beat King Bob-omb though because I kept throwing him off the mountain (which is still weird to me that that's not what you're supposed to do).

I also remember the dude who worked at Babbages would challenge anyone to play Soul Calibur on the Dreamcast kiosk, and I destroyed him. He hopped the counter and went "YOU'RE GOING DOWN KID!", and he did not. Good times.

Oh god, I remember Soul Calibur being a hot Dreamcast kiosk game. I didn't buy the game until much later, but I rented the hell out of it specifically because of this. In the kiosk demo, I think you could only be... Nightmare and Mitsurugi?

Earliest one I recall was a demo for SMW

Yea wed go to BJs Wholesale and Id play Super Mario World the whole time they shopped.

Ranting__Nord posted...

Yea wed go to BJs Wholesale and Id play Super Mario World the whole time they shopped.

I had an NES at the time and recall just being blown away by SMW

A friend of mine had it and I spent more time playing the game than hanging out with him, lol

I was playing the metroid prime demo and some jackals came up and hit the reset button to fuck the game up.

My dad saw it happen, came over a drilled them in the mouth several times and we left the store.

I remember the demo for Star Fox 64. I would bug my grandparents to take me to Walmart so I could play it.

Why did demo stations stop being a thing?

they totally sold me on Mario 64, the virtual boy and even the Nintendo switch. They work

The_shibe posted...

Why did demo stations stop being a thing?

they totally sold me on Mario 64, the virtual boy and even the Nintendo switch. They work

They still have them at Target, I see people playing Switch demos all the time

HylianFox posted...

They still have them at Target, I see people playing Switch demos all the time

Yeah, they have a Super Mario Wonder demo at the Target kiosks right now.

I remember the timer on Donkey Kong Country was so short that it was impossible to make it to the first save point before the game would reset itself. But when they swapped the game out for Yoshi's Island, the entire game was available to play because it saved after every level. It makes me wonder how many people it took to get through the entire game and how much time they sank into it. Or maybe it was the same kid who kept coming back to it and beat the game without having to buy it.

Bizarrely, the TV beside the demo still had commercials for NES games. I remember ads for Jurassic Park and Wario's Woods. I can still remember the enthusiastic warning of, "Remember, you're in Wario's Woods!"

I've never been able to find that ad online.