One of the great things about the video game collecting hobby is the wide range of subsets that you can get involved in. Gaming magazines, action figures, hardware variants and store displays are just a few things you can spin off into collecting to compliment your collection.

Today I'll be taking a look at a really cool and overlooked subset -- arcade game marquees.

What's an arcade marquee?

The days of neighborhood arcades filled with dedicated Pac-Man, Donkey Kong, Double Dragon and Street Fighter II machines is long gone. These wonderful machines are now either in someone's home, in a trendy 'barcade' or gathering dust in a warehouse somewhere. Arcades were an iconic fixture of 80's and 90's pop culture and really need to be preserved so future generations can experience dedicated, full-size arcade games. But that's a topic for another day.

As machines are broken down for their parts, one of the elements of virtually any arcade game is the marquee. The marquee is the glass, plexiglass or plastic piece of artwork at the top of the machine. They were designed to be backlit, so with simple florescent lighting behind them, they blazed up to brightly and proudly display the game's title and artwork and draw in interested gamers to suck the quarters from their pockets.

Early games used glass for the marque art, which eventually changed to sturdier plexiglass and in the 90's they were largely made of cheap plastic. The artwork varies from gorgeous to bland, with a wonderful array of designs that are instantly recognizable and nostalgic for anyone who grew up during this era.

Today there's far fewer complete machines than parts, so collecting marquees is relatively simple but they can be hard to find. If you have access to vending or amusement distributors or arcade reconditioning businesses, you might be able to browse their inventory and find some cool pieces. Otherwise, eBay and online collector/trading groups will be your best bet.

Marquees are generally all the same rectangular shape, though the height and width can vary as there were some machines that didn't really fit the mold. But keep that in mind if you have a specific space in mind or are going to build frames or lightboxes for them. They're not all the same.

What do you do with them?

Marquees are simply display pieces, bits of retro arcade art you can add to your home, game room or office to add some fun, nostalgic flair. Though if you want to take it up a notch, lightboxes can be purchased or built to give this artwork the deluxe treatment. The components for building a lightbox are cheap and simple to assemble, so nearly anyone with the desire to do so can make their own.

I have a small collection of marquees that I eventually want to build lightboxes for, but at the moment they're simply mounted on the wall of my game room. They look great just as wall art, but I'm looking forward to when I can get these properly mounted in a lightbox to bring out the bright, vivid artwork.

Thanks for reading. As always, upvotes, resteems and comments are appreciated!