Toronto Thumbs

COMMUNITY PROFILE
A & C Video Games

A guy in a leather jacket and a mop of dark hair enters A & C Video Games while I’m there. His girlfriend in tow, he marvels at a red periscope-like device on the counter. His girlfriend is confused. “It’s a Virtual Boy,” he tells her. He plays a bit of Mario Tennis, but has to soon stop to rub his eyes. He tells his girlfriend that he played one as a kid during a video game expo at Ontario Place.

It’s a scene that unfolds often at A & C Video Games. A customer comes in for one thing, but quickly finds something else, pulled by the riptide of nostalgia. Despite the store’s size, it’s packed. There are stacks of original Nintendo cartridges slotted into shelves, a wall of Japanese imports behind the counter, DS games arranged alphabetically in a display case, bulky Neo·Geo games just slightly out of reach above, a heap of neglected PC games on the floor, and over all this there’s a computer airing old video game commercials while cranking out iconic 8-bit tracks. It’s a lot to take in.

Chang Toy started A & C as a convenience store in 1998. As competition in the area increased, Chang, with the help of his younger brother Gar, started thinking of ways to change the business. “It’s not fun selling drinks and chips,” Gar recalls. After failed attempts to incorporate soccer jerseys and Yu-Gi-Oh! cards, the brothers tried to find a niche.

“We were looking around the city, seeing what the city needs, and we noticed no store really specialized in old school games.” So in 2003, the brothers decided to start A & C Video Games.

It wasn’t an easy journey. “When we started with games, we literally had like, five N64 games and five PS1 games, in a display with some card games mixed in.” Chang lets out a chuckle. “Most people probably had more games at home than we had at the store.” The store’s transformation was gradual. Chip racks, cigarette displays, and refrigerators were replaced by joysticks, Super Scopes, and Famicoms. A man enters the store at one point and asks for a pack of smokes, and is surprised that the store no longer sells them. Looking at the store now, it’s hard to believe it was ever anything else.

“It took a good three to four years to build up a selection like ours,” Gar explains. The store’s dense piles were acquired by buying off anybody willing to part with their games. Likewise, word of mouth about the place spread. With no major advertising, people either stumble upon the store or, more often, hear about the place through friends. The store does as much as it can to foster this following. “We want to build a community,” Chang says.

Gar likens the store to arcades. “Arcades were also social places, where [you’d] get to meet people, meet all your friends, and play games together. [It was] definitely a great time.” At a time when the arcade is an endangered species, the brothers are trying to bring back their sense of community with gaming tournaments where games are set up for casual free play, and prizes are to be won. But it’s not so much about the competition as an excuse to bring the community together.

Like everything else at the store, it was a slow building process. “We started with 30 or 40 people who attended our first tournament. Then it jumped to 60 to 70. Then 70 to 80 [for] our third tournament. Then our last tournament was the one we did in July; it went up to 150.” They’re even planning to do bigger tournaments in the future.

But to the brothers, A & C is more than just a game store, and more than a community. For those who grew up gaming, whether you’re an avid player like Gar, or have a family and sneak in a little gaming once in a while like Chang, old games are tethered to old memories. “We have stuff that people are looking for that reminds them of their childhood.” People come into the store all the time and, like the guy in the leather jacket, find more than just old games. “We used to spend eight to 10 hours, the whole day [gaming]. Those are days when you don’t have to go to work,” Chang laments. “Everybody’s pretty busy.” There are hundreds of games in A & C that act as portals to an easier time, and the brothers take pleasure in helping people find refuge from the pressures of daily life.

“I enjoy coming in everyday.” Gar says. “It doesn’t feel like work at all for me.” It’s this love that keeps people coming back to A & C. “We were thinking of what we like to do, and video games were pretty much the number one thing,” Their passion shows.

Posted in Blast From the Past, Features, Interviews |