Long before digital gaming consoles like XBox, PlayStation and Nintendo, people went out to bars and pinball arcades to get their fix of Tetris, Pac-Man, Donkey Kong or Double Dragon.

Local musician Paul Granger is hoping they’ll do it again. In what could be called a gamers’ version of turning back the clock, Granger, 40, and his partners Mark McHale, 34, and Kevin Berger, 39, are about to open a new fully licensed pleasuredome called The House of Targ with 18 vintage pinball games and a dozen classic arcade games along with fine Ukrainian dining, (as long as you’re in the mood for perogies), a bar and live music.

The House of Targ -- HOT for short -- opens on Thursday at 5 p.m. with mayor Jim Watson, MP Paul Dewar and Coun. David Chernuschenko cutting the ribbon and music by Toronto band Pup.

The combination of pinball arcade, family-friendly restaurant and music club is not such an odd idea according to Granger, who witnessed the game’s popularity first-hand at the rehearsal and party space he operates on Main St.

Four years ago, a friend gave him an old TARG video game. The game, which lends its name to the new club, became so distractingly popular that Granger and McHale kept adding more machines, most of them salvaged from private collections, until it became clear that they needed a bigger space.

So in January, Granger and McHale and their third partner Berger rented the old Bayou Blues bar at 1077 Bank St., which had been empty for since 2009, gutted the 4,000 sq. ft. space and, with a lot of help from enthusiastic fans and tradespeople, turned it into an empty space that functions as an arcade by day, a family restaurant serving perogie dinners everyday from 5-9 p.m., and a 19+ concert venue at night.

And because it has the look and feel of a campus pub in the 1970s, it’s an environment boomers feel comfortable in. Even the DJ’s music library is vinyl.

Many of the games are popular classics. Tron, Centipede, Mortal Combat, Super Dodgeball and 1942. There are a few vintage pinball games dating back to the 1970s, but most are movie-themed electronic extravaganzas from the 1990s like Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Dr. Who, Nightmare on Elm St., Roller Games, Last Action Hero and Six Million Dollar Man, most costing 25 cents a game.

“I love the sociability of a place like this in Ottawa South,” said Berger. “With what’s happening in Lansdowne Park, the neighbourhood is changing, and the community here is excited about the changes.”