New Year, New Changes At R-CADE

It's a brand New Year and we are so excited to see what shenanigans we get up to in 2024. We will be updating you lovely lot with our events, meetups and promotions over the coming months, but in the meantime we have a few changes to update you on:

Loyalty points

Our website has finally updated and we can now offer loyalty points, hooray! Loyalty points are earned for every arcade session you book via our website. These points can then be exchanged for money off future arcade passes and special event tickets. Here's how it works:

First, and most importantly, you must be a member of the R-CADE website. When you previously booked an arcade session you will have put a name and email address into our system. You can then use your email to log in and view your loyalty points. If you haven't booked with us before, or want to use a new email address, you can create an account via our website too. Every time you book an arcade pass, a Lates pass or a special event, you will be rewarded with points that automatically add to your profile. IMPORTANT: Please note that you earn 100 points for every session or special event you book, not how many passes you book in that session. Loyalty points can only be earned by booking via our website. If you visit our venue and we book you in, points do not get added to your profile. Loyalty points cannot be moved or refunded if you reschedule or cancel a booking. How to redeem: You can log in anytime to view your points, but to use them is very simple. Just visit and book the passes as normal, but when you get to the payments page there will be an added option below the 'pay with Paypal / credit card' etc options that says 'use loyalty points'. This option will only appear if you are logged into your profile when booking. You can then add as many points as you like which will reduce your payment balance, it's as easy as that! The loyalty point scheme has been running for a little while, so many of you will already have a few points saved up! Go get booked in and have a free arcade pass on us. Check your points HERE.

Gift Cards

We have been offering digital gift cards for over a year now, but we now have a whole page on our website explaining this added bonus to you all. Check it out HERE.

You can now purchase digital gift cards to send to your favourite gamer, or purchase one yourself and print off one of our vouchers to put in a lovely greetings card. You can now also customize how much you want to add to your gift card too. Please note that digital gift cards can only be redeemed for arcade passes via our website, they cannot be used to purchase items in our cafe.

Weekly boardgame night

Introducing our weekly 'Board As F**k' boardgame night! Every Friday from 7pm we will be meeting up and playing a different tabletop game from our catalogue of over 200 games in our cafe. You can check our boardgame list HERE.

We will also be hosting a bi-monthly 'Learn & Play' game night where one of our staff members will take you through one of our epic boardgames! You can purchase tickets for our Learn & Play events via Eventbrite. This event will be hosted in our cafe every Friday from 7pm. This won't be a ticketed event (apart from the Learn & Play events), you can just turn up and play on the night. As always, our venue is strictly over 18's after 7pm. Our cafe is still open to everyone without the need to book, all we ask is that you buy a tasty snack and drink from our cafe.

Our over 18's events are also BYOB, with a corkage fee for drinks brought in. Our arcade is open during our boardgame nights too, you can always book our over 18's Lates arcade passes via our website HERE.

Updated t&c's

We have now updated our t&c's for our all ages arcade passes, over 18's Lates passes and special events. We mainly wanted to clarify one or two things regarding age restrictions that a few customers have questioned us about over the past year. To confirm, when purchasing passes for any family friendly sessions or events in our arcade area: Gamers age 0-4: pass not required for child, but parent must purchase a pass and stay with child in the arcade during the game session. One Adult pass must be bought.

Gamers age 5-7: child pass required for child and supervising adult. Adult must stay with child in the arcade during the game session. Two passes must be bought.

Gamers age 8-11: child can enter the arcade alone, supervising adult can stay in cafe but cannot leave the venue during game session. One pass must be bought for child with a second pass if supervising adult wishes to also play in the arcade.

Gamers age 12+ : adult supervision not required. Gamer can play in the arcade alone. One pass must be purchased for per person in the arcade. We have also introduced an addition to our reschedule policy. Our policy has always been that we can only reschedule or cancel arcade passes up to one hour before the event begins with option for a full refund. If you miss your booking or are late, you forfeit your passes and must purchase new ones.

We have now introduced our 50% fee policy. If, for any reason you are late for your session or miss your session, or want to reschedule within the hour before your booked session begins, we can now offer a 50% fee to do so. This means that to reschedule a missed or late session, you will only be charged 50% of the total fee for the passes you want to move.

You can view t&c's for all of our events and passes on each booking page. You can always keep up to date with any changes, upcoming events and special offers by signing up to our mailing list HERE

Meet The Team: Laura

October introduced a lot of things. The darkness comes earlier, and the rain falls hard. But R-CADE Glasgow remains a warm and welcoming place - even more so with the addition of our newest staff member: Laura!

“I’m very excited! It’s great to be working with my friends - it’s just such a positive, lovely environment to work in,” says the newest member of the R-CADE Team.

Some will recognise Laura as one half of our board game partners Roll Wi It, who have run TTRPG and DND events in R-CADE for the last five years. As part of Roll Wi It, Laura is adept at hosting large events and presenting to a group as she leads intrepid travellers on dangerous quests in fantasy realms. Her knowledge of the card arts has already been an asset during Laura’s first couple of months at 121 Saltmarket.

“It’s really fun seeing people look at all the games and then I’m like “Aw this game’s amazing. If you like this game you’ll like this game” and recommending games to people is really fun.”

On top of her board game expertise, Laura’s addition to R-CADE brings in an employee with advanced cafe experience, as we look forward into the future of what our little store can be. Although, just because she hasn’t got experience with the arcade side of the business doesn’t mean she loves video games any less.

“My favourite video game ever is either Sonic Heroes or Jet Set Radio Future. It might be rose tinted glasses, cause it’s been a long time since I’ve played either, so they might be garbage…”

“They’re just two games that we had on the original Xbox that I remember playing significantly. Jet Set Radio Future, I don’t ever remember physically going out to buy it or having a box for it - I think it was maybe just some weird demo disc that we had… Core memory. A great game.”

Despite our focus on the retro side of gaming, as a staff we stay abreast of what’s current in the video game landscape. For Laura that means diving into possibly the biggest game of 2023.

“Baldur’s Gate 3 is pretty much the only other video game [other than Overwatch] that I currently play - but I don’t play it that often because I don’t own it. I’m not stealing it off [her boyfriend], I only get to play it when I’m at his. It’s basically DND, but in video game form - and I love DND.”

If you’re in Glasgow and haven’t met the newest member of the R-CADE Team yet, make sure you come down to 121 Saltmarket before the year is over to introduce yourself! (Or just to play some video games, or even have a party!)

Spooky Games!

It's the most wonderful time of the year! It's Christmas for goths and cosplayers - Halloween! In celebration of spooky month, we here at R-CADE are hosting some special Halloween events for all ages AND an Atmosfear Party, for one of the best VHS board games of all time. But is it also the best scary game of all time? Lets look at five spooky games that are available to play in R-CADE as we celebrate all hallows eve.

Atmosfear

A board game like no other, players challenge the Gatekeeper and their worst fears as they race around collecting six different keystones. As the game progresses, you are routinely stopped by the Gatekeeper, who appears on screen as part of the accompanying VHS (later replaced with a DVD, and eventually an app).

A 30th anniversary edition was Kickstarted in late 2022, raising over AU$450,000 to produce a deluxe version featuring an updated backstory for the Gatekeeper and including the Baron Samedi expansion (also on display in R-CADE!).

Haunted House (Atari 2600, Suitable for All)

What's scarier than playing as a set of disembodied eyes? Well that which lives in the haunted house of course!

Avoid bats, spiders and ghosts as you run around in the dark, seeking to repair an urn and escape. When it launched in 1982, the game was considered difficult to play, lacking intuitiveness - but that didn't stop the Haunted House franchise from living on long into the future, with releases in 2010, 2014 and 2023.

Shadow of the Beast (Megadrive, Suitable for All)

Originally produced for the Amiga, Shadow of the Beast was later ported to the Sega Megadrive/Genesis, where you can play it in R-CADE.

Corrupted and transformed by magic into a monsterous beast, protagonist Aarbron seeks revenge on his master Maletoth after witnessing a man's execution - his father! (Drama)

Ultimately you face a monster of arms and feet, unable to finally reach Maletoth. While revenge is a long way off in Shadow of the Beast, the sequels, Shadow of the Beast II & III continue Aarbron's quest for his own humanity. Play the first 2/3 of the saga in R-CADE today!

Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness (Nintendo 64, Ages 15 and up)

A 3D platformer in a world of myth and magic, Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness combines hoping from spot to spot with early elements of survival horror. Even if it's described as "a cage fight".

During fights, enemy vampires can latch onto the player character and change their status to "Vamp", removing the players primary weapons and healing equipment until you use a specific item. It makes things much harder, so vampires really do suck.

Luigi's Mansion (Gamecube, Suitable for All)

Arguably the most popular spin off Mario series to not focus on the titular plumber, Luigi Mario carries himself well as a fearful paranormal investigator. Originally for the GameCube in 2001 (guess what we've got!) the Luigi's Mansion series is back for a modern fanbase on the Switch.

Releasing alongside the Gamecube, from day one players could take control of Luigi as he moves from room to room in a suspicious mansion he's somehow won. With Mario missing, it's up to the younger brother and his borrowed ghost hunting equipment to save the day!

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Want the chance to play all of these games? Make sure you book passes for one of our family friendly sessions - OR get your game on with the big kids by booking an R-CADE Lates session.