Nostalgia Meets The Future At This Gaming Heaven
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Last Updated 22 July 2016
Gamers prepare for heaven; Science Museum's summer exhibition is filled with video games from the retro to the modern day, so you can get a dose of nostalgia and an adrenaline rush all in the same room — and what a room it is.
Starting from Pong and working its way through to virtual reality, 40 years of gaming is contained within a large space that's designed to resemble an arcade. The lights are low, there is music being pumped in and fizzy drinks and pizza slices are at the ready — we had lots of flashbacks to our teenage years.
The scale is impressive and all the classics are here — including Super Mario Brothers, Sonic the Hedgehog, Street Fighter II and Lemmings. There's also an impressive 16 player Halo set-up and a whole bank of computers where visitors can play Minecraft.
It's nostalgic for us as we grew up with a lot of these games; seeing consoles like the Sega Mega Drive and Nintendo N64 brings back memories of popping round a friend's house and playing video games all day.
The future of gaming is represented with a virtual reality rollercoaster where visitors are seated in a moving D-box seat, so the movements reflect everything we saw on screen. It's a tonne of fun, but also remarkably unsettling.
The only downside is that 'noobs' will find it overwhelming, hard to penetrate and may not get as much enjoyment out of it. We were quite into our games and even we were exhausted after an hour and a half.
Gamers will absolutely love it. It's a hot and noisy event and most people will find the standard 90 minute tickets more than enough, though all day passes are available for the extreme gamer. It's likely to be very popular and it's only on for a couple of weeks so advance booking is recommended.
Power Up is on at Science Museum until 7 August. Tickets are £8 for adults for a 90 minute session. There will also be cheaper tickets on the Science Museum Lates and there are adults only nights too.
