Zone X (Eastpoint)

Zone X at Eastpoint has maimai, which almost nothing else in the far east does, and there is rarely a queue for it. The cabinets are kept in good order and a dead button tends to be fixed within days rather than left, which is the part that matters if you play rhythm games seriously.

Away from the rhythm machines the floor runs to claw machines stocked with soft toys and a handful of redemption games feeding a prize counter. It is a neighbourhood-sized arcade, so the cabinet count is modest rather than sprawling, and the rhythm corner is what it does properly.

For anyone in Simei, Tampines or Pasir Ris that combination is the whole appeal: you get on a machine when you want one instead of queueing behind three people at a town arcade, and you are back on the platform two minutes after you finish. Credit runs on a stored-value card rather than loose coins, so pick one up at the counter before you start. One thing to know before you set off — it trades on its own signage as Cowboy Utopia by Zone X, so that is the door to look for, in the basement of the mall in Simei directly beneath the station.