Coinlight Arcade

Coinlight Arcade is a neon arcade hall with eight cabinets you walk along and play. Each one is an old arcade idea with a rule of its own: a paddle game where the wall of bricks keeps stepping down, a lane-crossing game with a storm climbing behind you, a formation shooter where freeing a carrier gives you a wingman, a one-tap stacker, a bubble shooter, a snake that pays for eating fast, a space-rocks game whose ore fills a screen-clearing nova, and a territory-capture game that reveals a picture as you claim it.

None of the eight is a licensed classic, and none of them copies one: the names, the rules and the drawings are ours. They are drawn in code behind a curved CRT glass with scanlines and glow, and every sound is made in the browser.

The part to come back for is the Daily Gauntlet. Five cabinets, thirty seconds each, three hearts, and the same five for everyone that day. Each leg starts already under pressure, a par score is worth a thousand points on every machine so the legs add up fairly, and you can send the day's run to a friend to beat. It also lets you try cabinets your level has not opened yet.

Around the cabinets there are medals from bronze to platinum, three-letter high-score tables, three missions a day, and tickets you spend at a prize counter on things you then see in the hall — signs, lamps, a jukebox, glass tints. Nothing on the counter makes a game easier. It plays upright or sideways, in eight languages, and keeps your progress in your browser.