Press start: Batemans Bay gets a new games arcade for kids young and old

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Dwayne Houghton and Bianca Caldwell have four kids. It's hard to keep them entertained. So they opened an arcade.

"Two of our kids are teenagers, and there's just nothing for them in the Bay besides fishing and the beaches," said Bianca.

"We don't care if they play no games," said Dwayne.

"They can have a safe space, chill, and if they want to play, then great. But if they just want to charge their phones and relax with free Wi-Fi, be our guest."

Set on the northern side of the Village Centre in Batemans Bay, the Bay Arcade is bustling with old-school cabinets and shiny new ball games.

"Ninety per cent of our machines are interactive, like the basketball game, or where you shoot balls out of a cannon into a tee," Dwayne said.

"And then we've got the nostalgic games for the parents, like Pac-Man, Frogger, Donkey Kong and Mario Brothers."

There's also a Daytona rig, virtual darts, a high-tech pinball machine and an air-hockey table.

"We found a gentleman in Orange who was selling a lot of his arcade machines, and that's what got us started," said Dwayne.

"Since March, we've had these in our house, in the garage, under the carport, and we had to get a storage unit."

Unlike many modern parlours, the Bay Arcade doesn't rely on contactless cards to pay for games, but on traditional tokens to give kids a tactile sense of value.

"When it gets put on the card, kids have no clue how much they're paying. So we were like, No, let's spend a bit of money and get our own custom tokens," said Dwayne.

"There's no cash on these premises, so you can't put a dollar coin in or a five-dollar note; you just put in tokens and get physical tickets out. It's a lot more extra handling, but it just gets the feels back."

When kids collect their tickets, there's a range of prizes for them to collect - speakers and wireless headphones, keyboards and school bags, fishing rods and boogie boards.

"We didn't make them so high that they're out of reach," said Dwayne.

"We might do a $100 prize here or there, but we got everything from 10 tickets up."

To keep things accessible, Dwayne and Bianca have set prices that range from two to four dollars a game.

"We went to TimeZone and spent $150, and we were there for maybe half an hour," said Dwayne.

"We don't want that. We want kids just to have their pocket money and come and play $3 for a basketball game that could last 10 minutes."

"We wanted to just have something affordable for everyone because the cost of living is crazy."

For high-rollers (and grown-up kids), though, the Bay Arcade is available for private bookings, with endless games and BYO booze.

"As long as there's no one under 18, we shut the doors for two hours and you go nuts," said Dwayne.

"I'm a big kid, and that's what inspired me. I love this stuff."