This past weekend, we drove to Dallas for vacation and one of the places we went was the National VideoGame Museum in Frisco. I wanted to go in blindly and knew nothing about it before going. I was pleasantly surprised by how much they have there, and by the majority of hands-on computers and consoles they have, that are in good working condition. Not to mention there’s a nice-sized room at the end, filled with 80’s (and some early-90’s) arcade games, all of which were in great working order and require tokens, complete with 80’s music playing. It was well worth the trip, in my opinion.

If you also would rather not be spoiled by all the following pics, then just stop here, close this browser tab, and go visit the museum. There’s many other things to do in the Dallas area to make it more worth the trip.

Here’s the entrance. You buy tickets for admission inside, along with tokens for the arcade.

—IMAGE— nvm-entrance-01.jpg

My son looks angry, but he was actually very happy and just joking around. Too much work to ask him to smile. 😄

—IMAGE— nvm-entrance-02.jpg

The first thing you see after your admitted. A nice timeline of video-game consoles. See.. he can smile.

—IMAGE— nvm-consoles-01.jpg

To the left was the really old stuff that was before my time.

—IMAGE— nvm-brown-box.jpg

Everyone has heard of Pong though.

—IMAGE— nvm-pong-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-pong-02.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-pong-03.jpg

Neat to see many boxes for older consoles, such as the Magnavox Odyssey.

—IMAGE— nvm-old-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-old-02.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-old-03.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-old-04.jpg

Some nostalgic T-shirts

—IMAGE— nvm-zork.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-misc-01.jpg

Various controllers. Out of the older ones in the top left, I only recognize ColecoVision (very top-left) and Intellivision II (3rd from top-left).

—IMAGE— nvm-controllers-01.jpg

My son playing The Typing of the Dead for Dreamcast.

—IMAGE— nvm-typing-dead-01.jpg

Video of him playing it

Going back to the consoles timeline near the museum entrance. My first console (technically my parent’s) was the Intellivision. Further in the museum, they had an Intellivision hooked up to a TV and you could play two player BurgerTime on a couch, one of my favorite games for the system (and my mom’s favorite game.)

—IMAGE— nvm-consoles-02.jpg

I was kinda surprised not to see a Famicom , nor PC Engine, nor Super Famicom here, but you can see they have the western versions (NES, TurboGrafx 16, SNES). Later on, they do have the keyboard addon for the Famicom on display, and the museum does have other Japanese stuff as you’ll see in later pictures, but it was definitely more western-baised.

—IMAGE— nvm-consoles-03.jpg

Super Nintendo is still one of my favorite consoles. I love the 16-bit era in general.

—IMAGE— nvm-consoles-04.jpg

The original PlayStation is another favorite of mine.

—IMAGE— nvm-consoles-05.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-consoles-06.jpg

Some of my friends had a Commodore 64, but our family had an Apple IIc instead.

—IMAGE— nvm-computers-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-computers-02.jpg

They had several other computers. I just didn’t get photos of them. Including an Apple II with playable Karateka, which my son played a bit. I played it first in middle school typing class. 😄

—IMAGE— nvm-japan-01.jpg

They had a bargin bin of Intellivision games, but I already own some of these. Astrosmash was my first console game. Still like the Dragonfire cover art.

—IMAGE— nvm-bargain-bin-01.jpg

I never knew they attempted to make a computer attachment for the Intellivision. It’s stuff like this that makes the trip to the museum especially interesting.

—IMAGE— nvm-intellivision-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-sega-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-bally-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-atari-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-compumate-01.jpg

Here’s that keyboard for the Famicom I metioned earlier.

—IMAGE— nvm-famicom-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-atari-02.jpg

Dragon’s Lair stuff. They also had a playable (I think?) arcade unit to the right of this. I remember being amazed at the animation quality of the game, but I was never any good at it.

—IMAGE— nvm-dragons-lair-01.jpg

My son played around in Mario Paint for awhile, which is kinda funny, cause I kept telling him he can just do that at home (still got it). To the right of this (not pictured) was a playable Doom level of the museum itself. Impressive for how much detail it has.

—IMAGE— nvm-mario-paint-01.jpg

They had some collections of badges and pins.

—IMAGE— nvm-badges-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-pins-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-pins-02.jpg

Someone at the museum likes Donkey Kong Country. It’s an amazing series, but I was kinda surprised to see it as one of their main sections.

—IMAGE— nvm-dkc-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-dkc-02.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-dkc-03.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-misc-02.jpg

Earthbound, AKA Mother 2 - One of my all-time favorite games. ❤️ Also had ROB with Gyromite.

—IMAGE— nvm-earthbound-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-misc-03.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-misc-04.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-castlevania-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-posters-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-misc-05.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-misc-06.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-posters-02.jpg

Finally, here’s the arcade. Sorry, some of these pictures didn’t come out very well.

—IMAGE— nvm-arcade-01.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-arcade-02.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-arcade-03.jpg

I loved Carnival back when my parents would take me to Chuck E Cheese in the early ’80s. Was surprised to find an actual working unit here.

—IMAGE— nvm-arcade-04.jpg —IMAGE— nvm-arcade-05.jpg

Video of my son playing Blue Shark

My son and I got to play one of my all-time favorite arcade games, Gauntlet, together. This really made my day.

—IMAGE— nvm-arcade-07.jpg

The museum still has more things I didn’t take pictures of. We had a blast though. Even my wife, who isn’t into video games, enjoyed it a lot.