A shop that only sells yo-yos... and cool t-shirts! But there would be no Hot Topics and no emos!
By the way Tom, I've always wondered if people came to the office to buy merchandise or just meet you guys. I don't mean the website extremists and mods, just regulars and such.

I would just settle for something geared toward the younger adult age group; some clubs, high class bars, or even just a one fucking Hooters. You would think they would have some things like that since there is a major military instillation near by and a population of 90,000, but nope.

I really miss my old college town where they were more liberal and open to ideas instead of this closed minded town. They really enjoyed more of the arts, especially music and actually host three free music festivals each year. I would think something like that would help my hometown suck less.

Maybe get some audio gear to make it so you could have bands play gigs at yo hip place and be all g and stuff?

Live music attracts hip and cool people broseph.

But in all seriousness if you do finish something pretty epic I'll be sure to visit.

Lol, honestly Tom, I'm 22 and I have no childhood relationship with the majority of the stuff you NG Admins always talk about (Transformers, Street fighter, etc). Arcades aren't something most people can relate to in younger generations (or even newly adulted generations). For example, I didn't even know what Metal Slug was until I heard about it here.

Not to call you old or anything (:3) but if you want something for kids I doubt an SNK or Treasure art museum would be very relevant. Then again, if the room changed over frequently and you had some stuff on display from older eras of gaming, I'm sure people would appreciate it.

Personally, I'm thinking something where people can gather and do nerdy things like tabletop/trading card/LAN games would probably fit the best. It could be a lounge/community center hangout where people are bound to meet a few NG celebs on any given day, maybe look at some art, bring their laptops and get tips on their stuff, etc.

At 4/15/10 12:11 AM, TomFulp wrote: We saw those girls walking around Akihabara when we were in Tokyo but didn't actually try it. Feels kinda creepy to me though. There was a ninja restaurant where everyone dressed as ninjas and did ninja magic to make food appear and that sounded fun.

THAT WOULD BE AWESSOOOOMMEEE, if they opened one of those in, stl. i'd life in it

I'm simply going to say a place for LAN parties simply because I've always wanted to go to one yet have no place to go here (Simply because I live near farms, yay)

It'd be easy to hold competitions to get more people wanting to be involved. Mixing it up with an old school arcade vibe would be pretty cool. Having some stations already set up for old school tournaments mixed with people bringing in their own computers for newer game tournaments would be awesome.

definitely a comic book museum, you dont see it very often and i believe i am entitled to read the old classics like the steve ditko spiderman and old batmans without paying a fortune. although i do have many in my city (toronto) i think a public gallery is a must, a place where its not too expensive to show ones art and its open to anyone with some decent work.

For the music thing, why not have a room with head sets hooked up too a computer generated list and have a system, where every headset could play a different song, then the people visiting could browse through the list and listen too their fav song without having too disturb others, you could do that in like a restaurant or lounge type area, of course then the music would have too be like, a complimentary service or something like that

That honestly sounds really rad, i would love too visit that, if i wasn't all the way here in Canada (Canadian pride! we won hockey gold!) lol, anyway what i would enjoy, and this is just me, is a massive arcade, i enjoy those alot, especially the multiplayer arcade games when someone can walk up and just jump right into the mess with ya, of course i always dreamt of VR games (virtual reality) but i'm getting ahead of myself, i'm a gamer, but call me a party gamer, I enjoy playing with my friends and family, so an arcade with the idea made for that would be cool, that would make my lil corner of this world better

a liquor store

That's some very visionary shit Tom.

If you know a bookie taking bets on whether or not you succeed, tell me his name. My money is on yes.

you blessed cracker you with your good ideas

Holy god damn shit you're fixin' to evolve NG in a way no one expected....

*high fuckin' five man*

If you're lookin' for gaming booths I can get you them locked and loaded (hell even custom programmed to accept flash) for next to cost. If the economy picks up I can get them for free.

You should go with the lazar tag idea. I, personally, have waited for someone with money and power to think of this also.

I really think what would make [any] town nice would be the simple open-mindedness of allowing graffiti on prominent structure surfaces. But maybe more like commissions to the artists for relevant and permanent artwork. The more town you have, the more art you have. The garbage artists can still take the overpasses. The rockin' ones get Main Street, y'heard?

Manholes should be used with more efficiency. I think the sewers would make an excellent second-story for any town. You could put shops down there and stuff. I mean, we've already got the ladders going down there, let's just make it available to everyone, y'know?

That's all for now. Nice thought-invoking post.

At 4/15/10 12:03 AM, TomFulp wrote: I always wanted to have a laser tag place where you could choose your gun, or even toggle your gun settings in-game. For example:

1) Shotgun - wide beam, less range, fast shot
2) Laser - Strong focused beam, sustained shot
3) Spread shot - multiple angled beams, fast shot
4) Machine Gun - Bust of four quick shots followed by delay

Stuff like that...

Funny you should say that Tom.
Where I live, there's no family fun type places at least in a 2 hour radius. So my dad opened a mini golf/ laser tag/ batting cage place, and the general attitude and morale of my town has gone up extremely.

At 4/15/10 12:03 AM, TomFulp wrote: I always wanted to have a laser tag place where you could choose your gun, or even toggle your gun settings in-game. For example:

1) Shotgun - wide beam, less range, fast shot
2) Laser - Strong focused beam, sustained shot
3) Spread shot - multiple angled beams, fast shot
4) Machine Gun - Bust of four quick shots followed by delay

Stuff like that...

Honestly, something about the laser makes me think that's a bit overpowered. Several other things I can say about the little idea, but is smart lol.

The problem with society and businesses today is that they rather be safe and go with the times (smart choice if the goal is to only make money), but there's really no-one whose wanting to mix things up in fear that they will go out of business which would cripple their financial "foundation" whether or not the business failing was because of a error or rather horrible luck.

One day, maybe, but for a radical idea to work, it'd take a hell of a lot of brainstorming because billions of people in this world there is a pretty good chance that at least one is smarter and more creative than anyone in here. Takes a right amount of ingenuity and creativity to be the few few people (like you and newgrounds for example).

It would be nice if there was NG division in Seattle?

Well...Down Town Honolulu has opened a 3-D animation studio.

But I think that because Hawaii is so close to Japan, a dubbing station would be easy and profitable as there are many eager voice actors/actresses out there.

It might also serve one day as a translator studio for Manga works as they are imported from Japan, China, Korea, and maybe even the Philippines.

Hawaii is a mixing pot of races and languages so finding a translator is CAKE.

Hawaii could one day be the stepping stone to bringing all forms of Asian Media, Pop Culture, Toys and Games to be converted for Mainland audiences of the USA.

At 4/15/10 01:34 AM, Shauna wrote:

At 4/14/10 11:41 PM, TomFulp wrote:

A yoga studio with an adjacent smoothie or tea shop. I like following up exercise with what at least feels like a healthy treat and while I imagine this sort of combo exists in plenty of hip neighborhoods, I don't seem to come across it.

Wow Tom. Just wow.

Not a good wow...you're just being downright silly.

Laser tag is silly if you want to make money off of it and you're not placing it inside of a huge mall.

A "smoothie, yoga, tea shop, exercise/martial arts shop coupled with a video arcade that's connected to the internet (not just immediately for gaming but for the oleds he was describing and the ports he inferred) is a scenario that our culture is heading to. This lil cracker has his head on straight.

Don't hate man.
If you don't agree, the least you can do as a free loader is quietly refrain from cock blocking...

I for one want to buy stock more than ever...

If you ever need someone to sell shit, remember how well I did back at Wizard Con.

Just whoring myself out is all.

good tom !!!

You know what could be a good idea? Along with that casual listening type are you mentioned, why not set up a venue where bands could play? This venue could have a wide array of indie band to well known bands. Also to get more people to go to it, no genre restrictions: Indie band tickets would be cheaper, and it's open for all ages, regardless of content.
Just a suggestion.

Pfft! Dream on, Tom, Philly is going to remain pretty shotty for a while--until all of these wonderful renovations you're dreaming up come true.

Back in high school, we had a Lan cafe where we would play Battlefield 1942 and Starcraft after school. When it got shut down and closed forever, we found a similar location a city away, and there we would play Battlefield 2 while enjoying their concession stand they had up-front; they had Xbox's hooked up to a bunch of TV's for system-link Halo matches, and it was the spot to be.

Now that we're more adult, I've had this crazy idea to combine Lan parties with alcohol for the adult video gamer community; a Lan Bar, possibly multi-leveled where you could take shots while playing a Lan game with your friends, or have your beer and play some Xbox or what-have you...hosting tournaments, a special dining area where you could take a break from gaming and grab some chow. I always thought it could somehow work if one could acquire the proper licenses to start up such an establishment.

I vote Tom Fulp for new mayor of Philadelphia ^^

Some nice ideas there. The last two seem like great fun to me, although chances are that people will get bored with it in a couple of years. But if you're living in a big town it might work.

Let's see, "ideas that would make my town more awesome". Well the town I live in is pretty small, so I'm already glad we have a supermarket and a bank around here. What I'm really missing though is good hang-out places for people of my age. Whenever they make something new they only focus on teenagers, while for my age-group there's only one lame cafe which is mostly occupied by older men anyway. Recently they built some apartments for younger people, so it would be a good time to open up some places for them if you ask me. Things like internetcafes or sportscafes would be nice, or a cafe with a stage so that we can get some local bands playing there. A cinema would also be great, considering there's no cinema here within a range of 20 kilometers.

At 4/14/10 11:56 PM, TomFulp wrote:

At 4/14/10 11:55 PM, Dante-Son-Of-Sparda wrote: when is the NG chat coming Tom its been freaking years man.

We're gonna premier the chat with the launch of Pico 2 so everyone can chat about how awesome it is.

Physco said that the chat was coming out next weekend..

This is going to be an awesome weekend..

i'd definitely say a web-alliance shop. Not like those ebay ones, but a shop where you could actually buy the stuff right there. Like, maybe a shop that sells stuff from lots of different websites, like webcomics, or deviantart, and most importantly, good ol' newgrounds. But combined into one.

OH! and these shops should be international, so people won't be left out if they can't buy online. Like me. I live in australia, and so many 'limited time only' items just pass by, and i can't do shit.

It'd definitely be worth it. I'd say that that's an invesment worth building.

My town is full of old people, and there isn't any decent shops at all. This means I have to get a train to Preston if I want to get new stuff. The Chinese restaurant is awesome though. And I guess the Sainsburys is pretty good, but that's it.

At 4/14/10 11:41 PM, TomFulp wrote: When I was in college I would go to 611 Records and listen to vinyl on the turntable listening stations. When I stopped collecting vinyl I did the same thing at CD shops. Now everyone downloads their music so there isn't much draw to a CD store. Is there some sort of potential social space for music fans that is less extreme than a concert but more public than browsing on-line?

Independent record stores?
Coincidentially; International Record Store Day was introduced exactly for the reasons you state above.
Thats April 17th

You wanna make a castle ?

You do yoga and drink smoothies? Dear god Newgrounds is run by a hippie

Hamburg is pretty modern , at least in the center.
But what could be a big improvement.. For example more "normal" police with uniform and that hat ... there are just these "mercs" with MPs in black when you see security, I feel like in some dark future rpg when walking through the city sometimes.
And I want more traffic lights with countdown timers. Somewhat useful. And glowing street marks everywhere.
But less airplanes.
More green like trees and stuff would be cool too. Im studying biolgy and green makes my eye happy. Almost everything would grow in the city because of the almost artificial climate.
And more big displays like sawn in pictures of Tokio and Japan.
Even though they keep building modern lokking things in the city they never include displays.
In my eyes its pure irony that the small food stores at the electro trainstations switched from common ad signs etc. to huge LED TVs that show product slideshows. Or bluescreens sometimes.