Westworld Electronic Amusement Center (Glenlawn)

Westworld Electronic Amusement Center (Glenlawn)

Years active	Unknown
Number of games	14-20
Located	U. S. A.
Status	Unknown

Background

Gimmie a Break! was an American situation comedy that took place in Glenlawn, California. It was in regards to a police chief named Carl Kanisky (played by Dolph Sweet) raising his three daughters – Katie (Kari Michaelsen), Julie (Lauri Hendler), and Samantha (Lara Jill Miller) – after his wife had died. Assisting the family was their wise-cracking housekeeper Nellie Ruth Harper (Nell Carter). The show ran from 1981-1987.

In the "Julie's First Love" episode, parts of it took place at the Westworld Electronic Amusement Center, a local arcade. Its games ran on quarters.

Known games, video

Astro Destroyer (fictional; see Trivia)
Froggy Hop (fictional)
Gorf
Maniac (fictional)
Pac-Man
Space Invaders
Cockpit game of some sort; possibly Subroc 3-D
Unknown fictional shooter (in Tempest cab)
Unknown fictional tabletop sci-fi shooter

(pinball)

Flight 2000
Star Trek
Supersonic
Others

Trivia

The Westworld Electronic Amusement Center was an actual arcade, with its address being known as 4345 Glencoe Avenue in Marina Del Rey, California. However, due to Gimmie a Break! taking place in the fictional town of Glenlawn, this still would be considered a fictional arcade. Westworld was also featured in the Quincy M. E. episode "Suffer the Little Children" as well.
During one part of the episode, Julie is seated at a tabletop game. An arcade employee, Arnie (Loren Lester), begins talking to her, stating that the game’s name is Astro Destroyer. However, the Scramble logo can be seen. Another fictional game he mentions is Maniac, which is a nod to Berzerk, as Arnie mentioned a character in the game as to being "Blobbo the Beach Ball", who was not coming out like he was supposed to. The game wasn’t the same without Blobbo. The same could be argued with Berzerk without its Evil Otto character (also a ball), as the game wouldn’t be as intense without the added time pressure of players making it out of mazes quick enough without having the indestructible Otto on their tail.
Another fictional game that is shown is Froggy Hop, which its marquee can be seen in several shots. However, this is actually Asteroids by viewing the game’s front and side art. As Arnie explains of players guiding their frogs across four highway lanes, Froggy Hop is obviously Frogger. (There is also a goof in the scene when two teens turn away from the game, one of which proclaimed that his friend played it for 18 hours straight. However, upon the screen being in plain sight, Froggy Hop was obviously not even turned on.)
Another supposedly fictional game (based on a real one) is Tempest, which is obvious by its side art and wide cab (plus the Tempest marquee can be seen during a shot as well). However, as a teen is playing it, there is talk between him and his friend of a "killer satellite" and an "attack missile" being present, neither of which appear in Tempest, along with the sounds not matching the game, plus it is also stated that the player "lost London, New York, Paris and Rome", none of which are in Tempest either. This is probably a nod to Missile Command, where players must defend six cities from missile attacks (although the cities in that game are generic and unnamed).
Near the end of the episode, Julie is seated at an unnamed fictional shooter. After Carl joins her for a game and immediately loses all of his ships, a voice from the machine states "You blew it again, Comet-head!" Carl asks the machine if it would like a "swift kick in the asteroids". No known machine used this phrase in real life.
Sound effects from Asteroids can be heard from one of the tabletop games during the episode.