RV'ing in San Francisco - The Metreon

[@vipy4309]

As a kid this place was like a big amusement park, mom would take us every weekend. That target that replaced it is now soulless.

[@THIZzSCO415]

Victor P yea it sucks I remember the city being soo full of life now it’s soo different

[@memesmoke1206]

Fuck this shit. I want a time machine bro.

[@Micolashcage1]

@@THIZzSCO415 I feel the same way. I’m 28 now, just moved out of the city actually

[@adesignersperspective]

i'm sad i didn't move to san francisco til after this closed. i remember seeing it on TechTV back in the day and it looked so cool. and yeah, the metreon now is just a generic mall. san francisco deserves better.

[@ubeezy_538]

I miss seeing the giant Spider-Man balloon 😔

[@OerlikonNoerd]

Ah yes the late 90s/the year 2000 what a time to be alive

[@MildMisanthropeMaybeMassive]

People were so hopeful then. But San Francisco's crime rate was even worse then.

[@sdutango]

and a prime time for PlayStation, now it's just shit...

[@sarahleath3242]

The Where the Wild Things thing was the absolute best. I was so sad when it got taken out

[@diamondsking3790]

that was 15 years ago and still from this day I would still go there even as a adult

[@Enigmatism415]

This is how I'll always remember it. Thank you for uploading!

[@StevenTorrey]

I remember when it was completed, what a thrill it was. It was quite busy. Then the Target Store moved in and provided a food store in the downtown area. Believe it or not, between the Safeway on Market/Church and the Safeway on Jackson Street by the Embarcadero, there were no chain food stores. Now there is Trader Joes, a food Market in the Twitter Building, and a recently opened and closed Whole Foods Market / 7th Street.

[@ijuswannatlk2sampson889]

I’m so lucky I got to experience this. Now it’s just not the same. The beauty and excitement of San Francisco is just not there anymore.

[@audiofella5066]

Man this brings me back that playstation store at 1:36 was epic to me as a 13 year old kid, you could basically test out any game you wanted!!!

[@SolidKnight64]

That Playstation store was a dream for any gamer. The best surprise for any kid or kid at heart. That spot is sorely missed.

[@sdutango]

I miss this place...

[@twenty2082]

THE COMPUTER AT THE END JUST CRACKS ME UP!

[@p0613v]

I used to take bart every weekend and go to CompUSA and Sony store in metreon.

[@TheKorfish]

Pretty sure I saw shanghai noon there.

[@FunRoadsTV]

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[@KuromixMel]

My childhood 😢.... The Metereon today is really boring, it's just food courts and although there is a movie theater and target. I missed the PlayStation store. There was once a Halo Themed Displays/Design upstairs

[@LlamaDrama142]

Ikr? The arcade and the PlayStation center were gems and gave us a reason to go there other than for a movie. Even the park and the bowling alley they had behind metreon. They had so much! Crazy how much things have changed.

[@elmer9980]

i know 😭😭

[@joshuarivera3787]

This was my childhood when I was11 years old

[@Jose-td7dd]

I was born in 2000 and the PlayStation store was always a memory that I’ll never forget growing up in the early 2000s was a time that I’ll never get to experience again 😢😭🥹

[@charlesderosas5577]

The good ole days

[@doomcookies]

Does anyone know what the game being played at 1:02 is?

[@NSAspyvans]

it was all original arcade games based on the comic Airtight Garage no one has any real footage on the games or what hardware they used

[@nell866]

I won a lot of money on them games at the metreon

[@jacobg8707]

I look really young in this video lol

[@ddrusa]

Why did this closed down

[@jacobg8707]

They couldn't make any money. First, it was located on the outside of the downtown tourist SF area, so you had to know about it to even know to want to find it (this is before cell phones and apps and Google maps, mind you). There were also way too many niche shops there that didn't appeal to anyone - Where the Wild Things Are, The Discovery Channel Store, the Microsoft Store, etc. So, it wasn't like the Metreon had much for locals or tourists to want to buy from. Then there was also the high prices of everything - there were never any sales or price matching, and local customers would simply go somewhere else to buy under msrp what Metreon was charging full price for. Lastly, Metreon was 80-90% dependent on tourist money. But there wasn't much you could sell to a tourist that they could use. Playstations were region locked, as was Microsoft. Sony Style sold general electronics (again for full msrp), and no tourist was going to buy a tv and dvd player and drag it home with them. From day one, every employee knew that the only area that made money at the Metreon was the movie theater, and the theater was one of the big reasons why the Metreon ever got crowded when it did. I think the popular stores were always either the theater, Jillian's bar on the weekends, and the Playstation store. But no one was dropping any serious money at those places, and those three stores alone weren't going to keep Metreon open for long. I kinda even remember Sony going to AMC with an offer for them to buy out the entire mall because Sony knew it was a sinkhole that wasn't going anywhere. AMC passed, but kept their contract (to this day) to maintain the theater presence on the third floor. I'm not sure who eventually bought it, but I think there have been multiple owners and the current ones are the same people who own the Westfield Shopping Center right across the street. It was a fun place while it lasted, but there were a lot of uneducated hands making business decisions based on status and presentation rather than longevity and brand loyalty. It's why there was a high turnaround of employees in the first 3 months when it opened who outright quit because of how awful management was treating them and the products that needed to be sold (ask any former Playstation Store employee about getting games in on time, taking pre-orders, and/or being able to get restocks of popular games in a reasonable time, lol)

[@ddrusa]

@@jacobg8707 Yes I been there many times for the arcade fun place it was to. This was my hang out spot for a while when PS1 is taking off

[@MildMisanthropeMaybeMassive]

@Jacob G Hey the Starbucks had pretty good business. According to the staff at Things From Another World, business was actually good but the landlords would either jack up the rent or deny their lease renewal (in a way evicting them) to entice another tenant that could pay higher rents.

[@ddrusa]

@@jacobg8707 I miss going to the arcade there

[@MildMisanthropeMaybeMassive]

@@jacobg8707 The theater (It started as Lowes which was then bought by AMC) and Chronicle Books are as far as I know the only remaining original businesses there. I also remember the arcade Portal 1 getting a lot of business and I remember the games being quite expensive for the late nineties considering they were about a dollar or more for play and I remembered games in the early 90's costing a quarter. It offered games I wasn't able to play anywhere else.

[@uo9zzzyxwvutsrqp0nmkjihgfe43]

Peak san francisco

[@smmackey]

and now look what it turned too 😩😞😒🙁