Rather than hit a specific game topic this time around, we're instead going for a "big picture" angle with a look back at an essential yet ephemeral part of being a video game fan back in the ’80s and ’90s: The bygone age of rental stores. There aren't a lot of shops these days where you can go and rent a game, and honestly Gamefly just isn't the same. Especially since so much of the modern game experience involves downloading content and paying for subscriptions and loot boxes! Rental stores worked best when digital distribution was a rarity and games took about 3 seconds to boot to the menu screen. Ah well.
Joining us this week once again is James Eldred, whose work you can find at lostturntable.com!
Retronauts Episode 218: Video rental stores
MP3, 32.8 MB | 1:10:48
Direct download | Retronauts on iTunes | Retronauts on Libsyn
Episode description: Jeremy Parish, Bob Mackey, and James Eldred reminisce about the halcyon days before digital distribution and demo discs... back when we had bike over to the video store so we could rent games we wanted to try out.