Raja's Arcade

Raja's Arcade is an arcade located in the Liberty Gardens abandoned mall of the Boston quarantine zone. It appears in issue two of The Last of Us: American DreamsDruckmann, Neil. Naughty Dog. The Last of Us: American Dreams #2. Dark Horse Comics. May 29, 2013. and the downloadable content Left Behind.
== Background ==
Raja's Arcade billed itself as "The Funnest Place". It contained many popular video games and likely drew in large crowds of kids. In the aftermath of the Cordyceps brain infection, the arcade is among the many abandoned venues in the mall left to the ravages of time.
Inside the arcade, Ellie is amazed to find the fighting game "Triple Phoenix", which she has read about at some point in the past. Riley dismisses it as a children's game, and tells Ellie about "The Turning", a "hardcore one-on-one fighter".
Ellie tells Riley how lucky kids were before the infection, and as they leave she looks back and imagines the arcade in its heyday, vibrant and full of enthusiastic customers. She helplessly utters "it's coming for you", before leaving the ruined, body-filled arcade behind.
Three weeks before Ellie meets Joel, the two girls return to the arcade. Although the power is on, Ellie is left disappointed that she still isn't able to play "The Turning" due to it being broken. Riley however describes the fight for Ellie to imaginatively play it. Afterwards, Ellie needs to head back but Riley wanted to continue exploring. When Ellie asks why she is brought to the mall, Riley reluctantly reveals that she is to leave Boston the day after to join a Firefly group in a different city. After another argument, Riley leaves the arcade to investigate the source of the music, with Ellie following behind.
== Known Arcade Games ==
*Triple Phoenix - a three-player brawler based on a cartoon centered around mutated pigeons. Ellie describes it as "super popular".
*The Turning - a two-player brawler described as a "one-on-one" fighter with over a hundred combos and "insane" boss fights. "The Turning" features a playable character named Angel Knives; the character's finishing move entails punching a hole in her enemy's chest and beheading them with a single kick.
*Savage Starlight - a video game adaptation of the popular comic book series.
*Jak X: Combat Racing - a vehicular combat cart racer developed by Naughty Dog that exists in reality. In Left Behind, Ellie can sit down on the seat and pretend to play it, then dismiss the whole concept of shooting race cars as stupid. An option to interact with this will occur when you get near it, Ellie will sit in the seat, point out her tools at hand, pretend to drive, then get off, commenting about it being stupid, you can earn a trophy for this called "Nobody's Perfect".
*Metal Racing - nothing is much known other than it is a racing game.
*Dance Dance - a game that involves the player to physically dance to the corresponding movements.
*Fighter Instinct X - a game that involves a one-on-one battle between two fighters. Nothing more is known. Possibly a reference to the fighting game franchise "Killer Instict."
*Iron Shell - a presumed shooting game. Nothing more is known.
*Tetsumasshu Tournament - a presumed one-on-one fighting game. Possibly a reference to Namco's "Tekken" which is a fighting game.
*Gobble Boy - Nothing is known about this game. Possibly a reference to Namco's "Pacman" because Pacman makes a gobble noise when eating yellow dots.
== Gallery ==
Raja's Arcade.png|How Ellie imagines the arcade looked before the infection.
TriplePhoenixPoster.jpg|A poster for Triple Phoenix.
TheTurningLogo.png|The Turning logo.
TetsumasshuLogo.png|Tetsumasshu Tournament logo.
MetalRacingLogo.png|Metal Racing logo.
FighterInstinctXLogo.png|Fighter Instinct logo.
IronShellLogo.png|Iron Shell logo.
== Trivia ==
*In The Last of Us, Ellie and Joel come across The Turning inside the remains of Anthony's Pizza & Subs in Lincoln. Ellie tells Joel about Angel Knives and her finishing move. Joel admits that he was never a big fan of video games.Naughty Dog. The Last of Us. (Sony Computer Entertainment). PlayStation 3. 14 June 2013
*The name Raja is a reference to Naughty Dog's Uncharted franchise, which features characters named Eddy RajaNaughty Dog. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. (Sony Computer Entertainment). PlayStation 3. 13 October 2009 and Rika Raja.Druckmann, Neil. Naughty Dog. Uncharted: Eye of Indra. (SCE Worldwide Studios). PlayStation 3. (2009). Street signs in the game Uncharted 2: Among Thieves also allude to a Nepalese club called "Club Raja".
*Interacting with the Jak X: Combat Racing machine grants the Trophy Nobody's Perfect. Many Naughty Dog developers have admitted to being ashamed of making that game in the past.
*Naughty Dog created a viral webpage for Raja's Arcade.
*Some of the games in the arcade are most likely references to actual arcade games namely: Fighter Instinct being a reference to the fighting game Killer Instinct, Tetsumasshu Tournament being a reference to the fighting game Tekken, in which characters compete in a tournament called the King of Iron Fist Tournament and Gobble Boy being a reference to Pac-Man; likely called Gobble Boy because of the noise that Pac-Man makes when he eats the yellow orbs. Dance Dance is also a reference to Dance Dance Revolution
== References ==
Category:Locations