Ask kyleb about old-school video games (or coin-ops)

[kyleb]

To be completely honest, this sounds really familiar. I think I saw one of these machines at a local Hills store in the Midwest when I was growing up. However, I can't say I know specifically what edition it was (or if it was even Street Fighter at all).

[kyleb]

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ASimilarly, is it EVER possible to get SO good at an arcade game that it can be +EV with those little prize tickets? Are there professional skee-ball players out there?
-Sam

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I didn't see this, you must have edited it before I could get it! :P

Anyway, yes, this is definitely possible. My friend has a positive ROI at the Cyclone ticket machine game, and has proven it to me on several occasions.

[SamIAm]

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My friend has a positive ROI at the Cyclone ticket machine game, and has proven it to me on several occasions.

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Very cool. Do you mean one of these?:


How does he get the best return for his tickets? What's the best value/ticket on the gift wall? (Please say bouncy balls. Please say bouncy balls.)
-Sam

[Paul B.]

I'm guessing you've run into some slugs in your time. What did you do with them? Do you know how they are made? Did you ever try putting a stop to them?

What tools would one need to trick coin-op machines into thinking that quarters were being inserted?

Who is your avatar?

[SamIAm]

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I'm guessing you've run into some slugs in your time. What did you do with them?

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Go to the vending machines and buy lunch?
-Sam

[kyleb]

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My friend has a positive ROI at the Cyclone ticket machine game, and has proven it to me on several occasions.

[/ QUOTE ]
Very cool. Do you mean one of these?:


How does he get the best return for his tickets? What's the best value/ticket on the gift wall? (Please say bouncy balls. Please say bouncy balls.)
-Sam

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Yes, one of those indeed. He is uncanny - I would say he can hit the jackpot 30%+ of the time. With practice, he hits it around 40%. It's sick.

You have to wait for the jackpot to get to a high enough point before whoring it repeatedly, otherwise it's not worth it. Luckily the Dave and Busters place in Cleveland has multiple Cyclone machines!

The best return on his tickets is not bouncy balls, unfortunately. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] It is indeed XBox games that can be resold easily.

[kyleb]

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I'm guessing you've run into some slugs in your time. What did you do with them? Do you know how they are made? Did you ever try putting a stop to them?

What tools would one need to trick coin-op machines into thinking that quarters were being inserted?

Who is your avatar?

[/ QUOTE ]

Slugs were not too common in my arcade, actually. However, when I was younger and worked for a Namco arcade, people would buy tons of tokens from Ebay and bring them in to our arcade - they were called "walk-ins," and you really can't stop them.

It's fairly easy to defraud the older machines - in fact, the string and quarter trick works on a surprisingly large amount of them still. As for the newer machines, it requires a lot more work than is worth it, trust me.

My avatar is none other than Jodie Sweetin.

[RunDownHouse]

Holy [censored], never would have thought it was Jodie Sweetin. She's all grownsed up!

I went on a sick hot run on Cyclone once and thought I could destroy it, but never was able to repeat. Is your friend some freak, or is actually exploitable in some way?

[Dire]

Any interesting stories of the arcade business? Maybe somebody becoming frustrated with a game and attempting to damage your hardware?

[Dire]

What sort of return is there on most coin-ops? How long does it take for a machine to hit the green? How often does the change need to be replaced? How secure are the coin holders against theft?