The "What Are You Doing This Moment" Thread

[Slammed]

They weren't allowed to it was all under agreement. The machines were all rented and the venues got a percentage of the hopper, they weren't allowed to open any machine. Every machine had trip wires and hair thin tell tales that the techs had to check before and during emptying and if any were not in place the venue forfeited their cut because they'd tampered with the machine.

 

[jimmy101]

Ah, yeah that makes heaps of sense.

 

[CiG]

they costed just 25 cents a game back then for you guys too right?

Just going by memory I'm pretty sure some games were 20 cents, most of the best games were 50 cents though. Then they started jacking the price up, I think the last time I went to an arcade was when I went to see a movie and the arcade was adjoined and it was like a 2 dollar coin to play Time Crisis with the guns. That was maybe 8 years ago at this point.

 

[Sophii]

What console do you play on?

PS4 actually.

MK11 and Diablo 3 have been my main plays here lately.

 

[Sophii]

I wish Microsoft didnt fuckiny destroy Killer Instinct. That is my favorite retro fighter.

 

[Onder]

Just arrived at work. What a weird commute. The bus was nearly empty, the streets are nearly empty, is this is a working day? It's like that Amrucan comic book movie where some dude erases one half of population and it cleans up the city quite nicely.

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

Out here the arcades where where most of the poor kids who couldn't afford consoles hung out at. They also had a machine or two almost everywhere in the early to mid 90's.

PS4 actually.

MK11 and Diablo 3 have been my main plays here lately.

nice. I have Diablo 3 on the PS3, another one of those games i stopped playing because something popped up and i just never got back into. I plan on picking up MK once i'm done playing through the Borderlands games again so maybe we can get some games in.

I wish Microsoft didnt fuckiny destroy Killer Instinct. That is my favorite retro fighter.

the original KI was the shit. They had a machine right outside my middle school in some little snack shop and we used to always be on it.

Just going by memory I'm pretty sure some games were 20 cents, most of the best games were 50 cents though. Then they started jacking the price up, I think the last time I went to an arcade was when I went to see a movie and the arcade was adjoined and it was like a 2 dollar coin to play Time Crisis with the guns. That was maybe 8 years ago at this point.

yea the cunts jacked up the prices out here too. The fake "arcades" they have nowadays have machines that charge like a dollar or someshit

 

[CiG]

yea the cunts jacked up the prices out here too. The fake "arcades" they have nowadays have machines that charge like a dollar or someshit

Out here the arcades where where most of the poor kids who couldn't afford consoles hung out at. They also had a machine or two almost everywhere in the early to mid 90's.

Stingy fuckers man. Yeah that's true about arcades being a place for poor kids to hang out, I was usually one of the poor kids just spectating, and ever since then I've always just enjoyed watching others play vidya games. I watch my younger brother play all the time.

I've been thinking about buying a machine of my own lately, just for the fun of it.

 

[Slammed]

A pinball is not worth it these days. They are nearly all propriety parts that only come from the manufacturer, the only techs who really know how to fix them are the techs from the manufacturer and anything from the service call to parts are fucken expensive. My brother in law has a $6500 dust collector in his possession these days because the parts and labour to fix a 5 year old machine are nearly $2500.

For cabinet games there is a couple of mobs in Sydney who really do a good job of full size cabs with licensed software but the hand crafted work and the license doesn't come that cheap. For the average mug the Aldi cabinet that came down to $250 last year are hard to beat, 2 games, the screen, an emulation board, all the controllers and about 2 hours work. But then if one isn't worried about paying licenses for 30 year old games they are all available for download, as is the emulator and you can make your own cab (without the cab graphics) running a standard PC, decent monitor, even go as fas as getting the car seat for racing games and you'd easily come out of it for $500 with a thousand games.

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

I've been thinking about buying a machine of my own lately, just for the fun of it.

Arcade 1UP has released a few "mini" cabinets (Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat II, Final Fight, Rampage, Pac-Man, Gallaga, etc). Havent played on one but ive heard a lot of good things, especially about the new MKII cabinet they put out a few weeks ago.

 

[CiG]

That sounds interesting, will have to look into them. SF2 and MK2 would be about all I'd need for essentials, anything extra would simply be a bonus.

 

[Slammed]

I think from memory the Aldi ones last year, which were basically just imported as complete cabs from overseas, were Gauntlet and Street Fighter in one and Galaga and something else in another and there has been quite a few hit the second hand market since. There was quite a few people complaining that they are 'kid size' and need to be sat on something like a milk crate for adult use, also that two player is cramped and that the controllers were not the best quality but most of those complaints came from people who paid full price of $499. Those who waited for the stores to discount them and waited for the first buyers to iron out the kinks got a bargain win they came down under $300. Otherwise you're looking at about $2000 for a full size cab made locally with all the right graphics and licensing.

 

[Satanstoenail]

A pinball is not worth it these days. They are nearly all propriety parts that only come from the manufacturer, the only techs who really know how to fix them are the techs from the manufacturer and anything from the service call to parts are fucken expensive. My brother in law has a $6500 dust collector in his possession these days because the parts and labour to fix a 5 year old machine are nearly $2500.

I’ve had a few customers with home machines that didn’t have these problems. One of them said he’d done a bit of maintenance work on it himself. I refuse to give up the dream of one day owning my own.

For cabinet games there is a couple of mobs in Sydney who really do a good job of full size cabs with licensed software but the hand crafted work and the license doesn't come that cheap. For the average mug the Aldi cabinet that came down to $250 last year are hard to beat, 2 games, the screen, an emulation board, all the controllers and about 2 hours work. But then if one isn't worried about paying licenses for 30 year old games they are all available for download, as is the emulator and you can make your own cab (without the cab graphics) running a standard PC, decent monitor, even go as fas as getting the car seat for racing games and you'd easily come out of it for $500 with a thousand games.

Do you know if Daytona machines are high maintenance? Owning one is one of my other dreams.

 

[Slammed]

I’ve had a few customers with home machines that didn’t have these problems. One of them said he’d done a bit of maintenance work on it himself. I refuse to give up the dream of one day owning my own.

Nothing is high maintenance if you have the skills but just like all the home mechanics who think car maintenance only extends to changing oil and rotating the tyres, or the home PC tech who thinks the only way to fix things is to replace parts, pinball/games machines require a knowledge to do anything beyond the most basic thing. With many of the cheaper video games running emulators on older x86 systems (or similar) much of the maintenance is nothing more than replacing bits until you find the faulty part. Of course knowing the faulty part or what makes it faulty is handy but not essential if you operate on the same principal 90% of computer techs do. The big difference with legacy machines and definitely pinballs is the propriety parts and how hard they are to get, even if one is knowledgeable enough to diagnose them. As to how long a machine will last without maintenance is on a par with how long will a new car last without a mechanic.

Do you know if Daytona machines are high maintenance? Owning one is one of my other dreams.

It's the age old question of how long is a piece of string. I know guys who have the original Sega Mega rally, one guy has never had a fault another had has nothing but problems. I've read of guys who replaced old parts on some machines with new parts and couldn't get them to work properly. Sega Mega Rally games are often picked up cheap with cabs that are in less than great condition, but Daytona's really hold their value in good nick. I've seen second hand Daytona's go for more than $8K. But I haven't seen a home based one in person since the early 00's.

 

[Bloopy]

I have Pinball Arcade on Steam and loved the shit out of it. Tales of the Arabian Nights is probably my favourite table on there. Need to try it in real life sometime.

 

[Slammed]

I've got Visual Pinball and Future Pinball on my desktop. Both have their own advantages and disadvantages but the number of people out there making ROM's for them is amazing and the number of 'authentic' tables that can be downloaded for nothing makes the game almost endless. Some of the ROM's don't always work perfectly but because they are freeware they are all editable so you can make improvements if you want to.

 

[Bloopy]

Yeah, Visual Pinball is impressive. The feel didn't seem quite as nice, but great for all those tables that aren't on Pinball Arcade.

I got as far as making this for a laugh. Seeing if it was possible to have a 'moon' switch that appears to change gravity:

 

[Slammed]

I don't use steam so a few years ago when I was going through all the old pinball machines on PC to see if they still worked (ones like Tristan and Epic Pinball) I came across Visual and Future and decided to give them some time. There is some shitty tables out there but when you can play classics from Bally, Stern and Midway etc it does add a new interest. I remember downloading all sorts of shit from the Lethal Weapon, to Addams Family, to Tommy. Of course it wasn't the same as the arcade but it also wasn't as expensive

 

[Funerary_Doom]

It's Mother's Day and I want to be a lazy bum, but my mother's older sister is here from Jamaica and is staying an entire month. So I think I'll take them out to eat. It's really rainy outside today though, and I just want to eat chips, listen to music, and watch The Act. Work is winding down and this week is all testing, pretty much, so I don't need to lesson plan until later on this week. Woot.

 

[CiG]

Is there any chance HP Lovecraft was Omni?

Interestingly, I was trying to find a post by him just now about a band I can't remember the name of, and I can't tag his name in this comment or in the search function.

@MetalAges any reason why his account cannot be tagged?