I’d like to have spaces a bit like karaoke bars, where you can rent a room with some friends and watch TV or play videogames and order food and drinks. And maybe even karaoke. I hate theaters because the general population is insufferable, but watching a movie with friends is still fun.
Many cinemas let you do that, but it’s naturally hella expensive because they are too big. Wonder if it would be profitable enough.
Maybe both, a karaoke place with a big screen?
I’ve rented out my local theater for birthdays and stuff several times over COVID. It was really nice
That was a thing for both karaoke and video rental when I lived in Korea in the nineties.
The karaoke was more a place to go with a group of friends and the video place was more to go for a private place to grope your girlfriend while you watched the latest Tom Hanks movie. Think going to blockbuster, but then they immediately put the movie on in a private room for you.
Sometimes in the summer, I’d go rent a video room by myself so I could take a nap in a dark air conditioned space.
If I understand correctly, a major player at Netflix actively doesn’t like theaters and sees them as competition to eliminate.
On a completely separate tangent: You remember those occasional attempts at online virtual hangout zones back in the 2000s? They were implemented in anything from Flash to the Source engine, often resembled a physical shopping mall, “Hang out with your friends, customize your avatar, engage with today’s products and brands!” And a lot of them tried to have virtual movie theaters, because of course people wanted to sit in their computer chair in front of their 15 inch CRT and watch a very low resolution “whatever will fit down a 2002 era DSL connection” stream of Shrek 2 in its entirety. And of course it never really happened that often because no one would license them the rights to any decent movies.
One of the cinema companies where I live has started renting out the individual cinema rooms to people, you can bring in you’re console, hook it up to the project9r and play games or watch TV or movies using your own accounts.
Cinema projectors are usable for gaming? I’d expect extremely high latency since it doesn’t usually matter
Nah they work well, here’s a 17 year old video of people playing Wii in a cinema.
Imagine the really big screen to which my projector points and ask me why I wouldn’t care. If you can invest in a really awesome home theatre system, it’s rare that you wanna go somewhere other than home to see something.
It’s hard for a projector to compete with a nice OLED in a dim room.
If I can rent it out for the night so its just me and my buddies it’d be great! Of course it’ll need a completntary extra tall dude who sits in front of me, a crying baby, an old lady with a nasty caugh, and the dude with an obnonxious laugh who seen the movie 6 times and spoils everything.
Don’t forget the vapers.
There are a couple of smaller local theaters where I live that let you rent out one of their cinema halls for the evening and let you and your buddies watch whatever you want. You can also bring consoles to game on. It’s like 60 Euros per hour, definitely affordable for a small group.
That’s…sooooo fuckin cool
Man, every so often when I’m at work, I’ll still daydream about renting out my local theatre, having them use a black question mark rather than the private rental image on their schedule website with a note that it’s a private rental with public access, then playing the Church of the Subgenius’ recruitment video (link for the interested: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=o0x9ymMQUg8). Or, depending on my mood, one of those desert series stoner rock concert videos.
Only thing stopping me is money, and the fact that ARISE is on DVD rather than Blu-ray - I don’t want to do Stang and co dirty like that, it would look like shit.
All the theaters in my area do that but it’s probably way more since it’s a Metropolitan area and they can make a ton just airing regular showings. I would love to host something at one for my buds though, like worlds for the game we play.
Not that far off, tbh. Netflix is planning to open multiple brick-and-mortar places in 2025, just not for watching movies or shows (afaik). https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-12/netflix-to-open-stores-where-fans-can-play-shop-and-eat-in-2025
My mind is blown away
This would be like Amazon opening up a physical book store (which didn’t last long):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_BooksThey had one of them in my neighborhood and it only stocked the most popular books (on amazon) which you already get delivered to you in an hour or two. It seemed pretty pointless.
Netflix actually had that in Sydney, in partnership with a speaker company. It was to push home theater, but you could go watch movies.
I havnt heard of the speaker company since.
What is a speaker company?
A company that makes/sells speaker systems
I get that this is tongue-in-cheek call to remember that movie theaters are a thing, but this isn’t outside the realm of possibility.
If we consider that a lot of mainstream “big screen” movies are digitally distributed, the distinction is actually very small. The only real difference is licensing; individual screening vs group screening. And a big company like Netflix probably has a lot of leverage to competitively negotiate this already since they have established relationships with most media companies.
Let me watch any Netflix content in a movie theater whenever I want and now you got something.
i wonder how much itd cost to own just 1 theater room at my local theater
You can rent them for events or private parties/showings, you know.
I saw someone offering bring your own consoles / land party deal. Not sure how the split screen works with that…
Better than N64 Turok multiplayer split screen on a mini CRT
God, the latency!
Depending on the game…maybe everybody is playing on a tv/monitor in front of them and the cinema display is for spectators.
If you go to an early morning showing on a weekday just before a film is going to leave a small town theatre: there’s a good chance you can get the entire theatre to yourself for the normal admission price.
that happened to me one day after school when i went to see incredibles 2
holy shit
Supposedly rather cheap (like in the $200-300 range), at least for off-peak/matinee. Depends on the theater tho.
mine starts at $99 dollars. not bad!
The movie industry version of Return To Office.
In order to continue using Netflix, you have to watch 3 movies a week in the theater.
Are those 3 trips included in my subscription?
I’m just kidding, I know they aren’t.
What do you think this is - unshittification?
Great in theory ….but what if they made popcorn and coke $17 ?
Each or combined? Because the combined prices are already that high and people still buy it.
Nah, nah, nah, you need to start out with $8 unlimited per trip, then over a series of years raise the price to $17 on account of “inflation” and have smaller bucket tier sponsored by ads on the buckets.
talking ads
Nobody would buy it for that much, surely!
What if we covered it in some sort of oil that doubles as a laxative?
And demand you buy another if they catch you sharing
That’s pretty much what it costs here now
I don’t think that would be very profitable unless they would force people to go by maybe showing content exclusivly in these stores before releasing them online.
Wo even comes up with those wacky ideas? I don’t want to see movies with random people taken off the street.
Why ? you’d get to chill with them, as in netflix & chill
Hmmm,ok but the lights stay off.
