The story behind the 18 classic games

Dave at Watts Train Station shot me an email to see if I’d be interested to add to my collection. I was interested, and I am always on the lookout for something new – contact me if you have games for sale.

Watts is an interesting piece of Zionsville history in itself – in existence beginning in the 1960′s, Watts is a mecca of Christmas and train collectibles in Indianapolis.

The owner, Dave, is a prolific Asteroids gamer – having won entrance to the Atari World Championship in 1981. In the 90′s Dave was exposed to the arcade auctions at the Faigrounds here in Indianapolis. Dave recounted to me his astonishment that all of these great classic games could be purchased for $100 or less. Over the course of several years Dave amassed a collection of 18 games that he setup in Watts for customers to play.

Which games were at Watts / in the trailer?

What a great list of games, that arcade in Watts must have been amazing – I’d give anything to see photos. I was pumped at the prospect of adding some or all of these games permanently to the collection.

• Tac Scan (Upright)
• Asteroids (Cocktail)
• Asteroids (DeluxeUpright)
• Red Baron (Upright)
• Frogger (Upright)
• Discs of Tron (Upright)
• Tron (Upright)
• Omega Race (Upright)
• Omega Race (Cockpit)
• Space Duel Upright)
• Black Widow (Upright)
• Gravitar (Upright)
• Space Fury (Upright)
• Star Wars (Upright)
• Frontline (Upright)
• Two Tigers Upright)
• Sea Wolf (Upright)
• Star Castle (Upright)

With the list in hand Dave and I made arrangements via phone. I asked him – “When we get in the trailer and I go to haul these games out, will they fall apart?”

Dave said no, no way.

Arriving for Pickup

Time changes a lot of things, and as focus at Watts changed, the games were shuttered. For nearly 20 years, the games sat outside, in a trailer on the property. I had visions of a really nice trailer in a temperature controlled environment. Here is a glimpse where the games sat:

And the first look into the trailer containing the classics:

The trailer had leaks previously that had been fixed. Dave didn’t know, and couldn’t have known without getting in back that the welding job had rusted out, and that the games had been exposed to many years of contained moisture.

So sad. So many classic games, and the condition unknown but did not appear good.

Collection expansion turned into removal mission

Dave was gracious, and sincerely surprised that the games were not in the condition he expected. We worked out a fair agreement with this unfortunate discovery, and kept loading up the Penske.

Thirty minutes passed, here is a view into the trailer. The game on the end – the Star Wars! Possibly the most disappointing game of all, was sitting right under the leak, the bottom of the cabinet stuck to the trailer when we tried to remove it.

There is a special place in my heart for these games, especially some of the classic like Discs of Tron, Tac Scan, etc. Knowing I was in for an unknown, but certainly TON of work – I still helped haul them off the property. At the least, I was happy to try to get the valuable parts into other collectors hands – sacrifice one for another.

Photos of the games

Reality started to hit. We had moved in just two months earlier, and I was out of space for storage for the games. Some of the games worsened on the ride home, 90% of them would need to be parted out.

I had a ‘sidewalk’ sale here in Indianapolis – I didn’t sell any games but I did get to meet a lot of my neighbors

Here is a latter shot of my driveway as I worked through parting out each game.

Here are some shots of the games. Check out the Frontline in particular, I’ve never seen anything like that. Tac Scan and Star Wars were a close second. The Space Duel ended up falling over and shattering the 6100

Needless to say, I got a lot of use out of my protective equipment.

Of the entire list, the following are the only games that I was able to save and ended up finding new homes:

• Asteroids Cocktail
• Black Widow
• Omega Race Cockpit
• Sea Wolf

Another arcade ‘adventure’ closed

Parting out that many games was a ton of hard work in hot weather. I’d do it again now, given I have space in the garage, but at the time I did think I was crazy.

If you have a small lot of arcade equipment – They could be arcade games, but pinball, jukeboxes, etc. that you need cleaned out from your property or warehouse please contact me. I’d be happy to work something out, and have traveled well outside of Indiana to work a deal.

18 Arcade Games in a trailer in Zionsville is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

My fortune – Zaccaria Quasar

In February 2012, a friend in Louisville contacted me and said “I think I have something you want”. He sent me a photo, I could hardly believe my eyes.

Partially because the game had been converted to a Ms. Pac-man – ouch!

We worked out a deal, which then led me to spend the next year tracking down parts. My quest for Quasar parts and information took me all over the globe, special thanks going out to the following individuals:

• Brent G. (KY) – Quasar Cabinet
• Edward L. & Chris (KY+TN) – Full Quasar Boardset (Including sound board)
• Paul S. (UK) – Second sound board
• Thorsten T. (DE) – NOS Marquee
• Steve S. (GA) – Boardset
• Paul S. (WA) – Photos of the wiring

And one negative shout-out to this joker on eBay:

• Vinny (eBay Profile – wfavinnyvideo2gx1) – Vinny explicitly lied in his eBay auction, and sold me a Quasar marquee for a large sum that had been ‘keyed’ on the front, then he disputed my claim. DO NOT buy from this guy, liar liar liar.

In July of 2012, we moved – and everything has felt unsettled since then. Quasar took a back seat, and sat comfortably but untouched in my basement.

Quasar on East Coast

Fast forward to March 2013. A gentleman out east contacted me about a complete Quasar he had for sale. His family had owned the game for nearly 20 years, and just recently stopped working. While my “Ms. Pac” Quasar was now complete, the wiring for the boardset had been hacked and was going to take some work to restore.

I was fortunate, and I was able to make a fair offer to the gentleman out east to purchase his Quasar. The distance was prohibitive – The perfect time to actually give uShip a shot for the first time. Seen some wacky wacky stuff on Shipping Wars, tried to discount that as fakality TV.

My first experience on uShip was solid, about what I expected but went smoothly and my new Quasar arrived last week! Here it is, briefly wiped down and with my NOS marquee installed:

Closing Notes – Zaccaria Games

Hunting down parts for a Quasar over the last year hasn’t been cheap. Plus, paying for and shipping the Quasar some 500+ miles to Indianapolis also was costly. That said, I was happy to pay to add it to my collection and would like to continue to expand.

If you have any Zaccaria games, please contact me. I would be willing to ship from anywhere in the US if you have a cabinet you are looking to sell. These following Zaccaria games are the ones I’d like to look at buying next:

• Puck-Man
• Scramble
• Astro Wars
• Scorpion
• Super Cobra
• Crazy Kong
• Frogger

Here is a photo of a Scramble via the UKVAC forums…

Please contact me if you have one or many of these Zaccaria cabinets for sale.

I’ve become a black hole for Zaccaria arcade games is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

I love buying games in Chicago

The Chicago area may only be second to California for collection arcade games. Not because the average game in metro Chicago is better than anywhere else, but given the gaming history of the city the possibilities of finding something unique are much higher.

The unique Taito I got this week was a Space Chaser. Snagged out of Bensenville, IL – it is possible this game was imported to the Taito location in Elk Grove Village and traveled less than 10 miles total from that location. Here are some photos.

The story, briefly – Space Chaser is a game I’ve had passively on my want list. Then, by chance another collector mentioned that a Space Chaser was up for sale in Bensenville on Craigslist, listed with a title ‘old arcade game’. The seller and I had problems getting connected. They supplied a contact number, but it didn’t work. My persistence to get the game led me to investigate the number and I figured out that a number was ‘fat fingered’.

I made an nice offer, the seller accepted and we got a time setup. As for the history on the game itself – current owner had the game in his possession about 10 years. It was originally being operated in a bar in the area. Surprisingly enough, the Space Chaser still works! But it does have remnants that it was operated, some graffiti on the kickplate and some sticker on the left side of the cab.

The belgium warehouse

I referenced this in the opening paragraph – read the original warehouse raid post to check out an awesome, weird blend of cabinets you won’t see too often – Taito, Zaccaria and local cabs. Here is a photo showing a lineup of Space Chasers – some had been converted to other games including Phoenix and Puckman.

Other Taito cabinet designs

I mentioned that Taito had some amazing cabinets, to satisfy curiosity, here is an expanded flyer with pages of examples. Granted, some of the cabinet color schemes will inspire a double take. I wouldn’t mind owning a couple of the games including Space Wars, ZunZun Block or Interceptor.

Got any old Taito arcade games? Drop me a line or leave a comment below. I’d be interested to talk about buying it.

One of the coolest classic Japanese imports from Taito is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

A unique piece – Baby Pac-man

I’ve always loved the design of Baby Pac-man and seriously considered picking up one for my collection. My excitement piqued when I noticed that this was no ordinary Baby Pac-man.

Todd over in PA is really the expert on mini machines and has one of these Baby Pac-mans. Todd has mentioned in several posts online when he picked his up in the late 90′s, he learned that 4-5 total of these were built. Todd has one in PA, there was a reference to a collector having one in CA – I think 3 of the original 4 or 5 have been found. Limited quantities means very little about value. Priceless to Todd, but that doesn’t mean most of his minis have any real value to anyone else.

Not sure if this was the true original size that coined the ‘Baby’ monkier, but Bally did scrap the idea and go to the larger yellow standup version.

After 5 months of follow up, Chris Moore and I got something scheduled to pick up the Baby Pac-man out of Mt. Prospect. Many years had passed since the game was originally purchased, but the seller bought the game in the 80′s, and he thinks it was directly from an individual that worked at the Bally / Midway plant. We made a nice offer to the seller for the Jr. Pac-man and the Baby and he immediately accepted. This is the second pickup in the past twelve months from information in the Chicago area about games from the Bally / Midway plant.

Take a look at the differences in particular on the playfield artwork. On the regular Baby Pac-man, the eyes on the Pac-man’s were large, solid black ovals – trademark Pac-man. The eyeballs on this mini prototype were closer to a Mr. & Mrs. Pac-man Pinball machines – illustrated. Completely different screened artwork.

Mini Prototype Detail – Playfield

Original Detail – Playfield

Here are some additional photos. The tags would indicate that this machine may be using parts of a Pac (cabaret) harness.

If you know any additional story about the Baby Pac-man prototypes, drop me a note or leave a comment below.

Oh baby! A rare find in Chicagoland is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

Rife with mismanagement, shady dealings and lost profits, the championship event is widely considered to be a colossal failure – not ET Atari 2600 bad, more like Pac-man bad.

But why did this event flop so hard? Atari was part of Warner Communications – a tremendous distribution asset. They had Lee Peppard, who would appear to have had some cursory success in event promotion. They had a number of things working in their favor, including the brand recognition and consumer base.

There is at least one key area where Lee Peppard / Atari obviously failed…

Reasons why the Atari World Championships failed

This past September, I got to talk to a player that was involved with the World Championship event in Chicago. Dave Watts lives locally here in Indianapolis. Now in Zionsville, Dave used to play a little bit of Asteroids and Asteroids Deluxe. Dave said that he would call into Twin Galaxies when he achieved a new million point score, but his arch nemesis would always be one game ahead of him (Scott Safran? Leo Daniels?).

Regardless, Dave was probably the best Asteroids player in the Indianapolis area.

A Carmel IN arcade participated in the World Championship promotion, tracking Dave’s score where he eventually won an ‘Atari Qualifier’ (hotel, bus ticket and entry). And…he got this neat letter, and possibly this tshirt (given that it is different then the widely known $50K Atari Championship shirt, which he gave to me when I purchased his trailer full of games in September.

The way Dave tells the story, is insightful into how well the promotion was run.

Dave attended the event in Chicago, excited to go head to head with other top notch players in Asteroids. He did have any idea that he would be playing on Centipede, a game he neither liked nor had developed any gameplay skills.

If Lee Peppard had planned his return on promotional efforts around revenues from entry fees, is Dave’s memory accurate that he got an expense paid trip?

Additionally, Why were the amount of entrants so low per kit?

This kit may have been for five entrants, from a tournament local to region, but if the goal was to move towards a forecasted amount of 3,000 entrants, why not make the barriers to entry even lower?

This post will pose a number of questions, of which I don’t have factual answers. Anyone familiar with the event, a former Atari employee, or arcade owner or operator have any insight – please contact me with some more detail. Here are my top three suggestions that should have been considered.

1. Recognized, preferred gaming locations
Pick qualifying locations in major markets. This is how a tournament should work. Drive serious players / parents to those locations. Drive up demand.

Deepen the partnerships with those locations by spending some of that $100K in advertising (that may have taken place in the regional Chicago market) and leverage the distribution capabilities of Warner Communication. Granted, $100K wouldn’t go very far, but let’s dream big. 3,000 players nation wide? That seems like a tiny portion of the overall audience. Maybe it was a pilot program, to scale it out to other markets. Who knows.

2. Give more money to more players
The 80/20 rule. If you want volume of attendees, then structure the tournament to appeal to the 80% of the average players. Survey data to answer the simplest questions from your preferred locations – how long does it take to achieve a score, how many players are at a score tier, and how much much money it takes to hit that tier.

Ensure the players spend the money at the locations. Inspire them to practice to reach a tier within their reach – with the promise of taking part in something ‘bigger than themselves’…and the money is nice too. Require the locations to have a couple of dedicated machines to the tournament (for tracking)

3. Diversify revenue model
Would a preferred location buy additional air time in a regional market through Warner to build their location? With the lower barrier to potential success, require players pay to enter the tournament and profit share with locations. Drive operator purchase of machines through clear communication of the tournament machines, and then include advertising of where pre-selected operators have machines placed on site.

Atari’s Legacy

I’ve consumed my fair share of information on Atari over the years. The company made some smart moves, and had some huge blunders in an industry that was blossoming. It may be trite to reflect on that period and make a summary that a lack of strong, visionary leadership was the cause for their mistakes.

From what little I’ve read about the tournament online, it just seems like it was not well planned. It feels like Atari, on a whim, threw $40K at Lee Peppard and just assumed that promotional success carried over from Fooseball to video games.

There is no mention that a liaison, who knew the behaviors of the consumer or the needs of the location manager, was involved in any capacity.

Atari should have made good money from a Championship event. The brand / platform was there. There may have never been a need for Twin Galaxies.

What a huge opportunity for Atari to be on the forefront to develop the interactive, social component of gaming – Connecting a national audience pre-internet, that is just expected in gaming today.

Such a sad, missed opportunity.

Again – would love to hear from the former arcade location in Carmel IN that was an official partner in this Atari World Championship event from 1981. If you were the location operator, or remember the location name or any information please contact me.

Atari could have revolutionized social gaming in 1981 is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

NOS DECO Artwork

As of this week, I now own two different sets of….hideous NOS DECO artwork Seriously, I am a fanclub of one, what a lucky guy I am.

I posted about this artwork quite awhile ago, asking back in 2009 if there were any witnesses providing that this DECO sideart existed.

Then, in April of 2010 I got “lucky” and picked up the first set on eBay – what I am calling Peter Pepper’s trippy sorbet. Its 6+ colors implying motion in a figure 8 pattern, harkening back to some classic Atari games, but….not nearly as cool.

This would have gone nicely one of the two fully functional multi-deco’s that I know exist – Jon Exidy.

This week, after several months of pestering, Mike S. finally gave in and sold me the other set of DECO sideart that was shown in the flyers. Thanks Mike!

Here is a photo of that – more of a design, the orange and yellow palette fits with the control panel / bezel color scheme, but is completely different in design.

I have a personal preference to full cabinet artwork, deliberate design to match the cabinet shape and profile. What if this artwork covered the whole cabinet, and the DECO lettering was the full width on the diagonal? Using Exidy’s cabinet, something like this:

Either way, just a thought. Something for future DECO fans to consider.

Would anyone consider either of these pieces for constructing a multi-deco cabinet? Or make something new?

Artwork options for designing your multi-deco is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

10 arcades, 4 pinballs, artwork & boards

Collecting arcade games will indirectly lead you to many different ancillary opportunities. Picking up games throughout Indiana has really introduced me to a state that was largely unfamiliar (born and raised in MI). Unfortunately, as much planning as I do to make arrangements to pick up huge hulking arcade games, I never seem to make the time to do much else.

Monticello is partially known for Indiana Beach. I’ve seen it advertised a million times, and after loading up over 14 games I could have used a quick shoot down a water slide. But like many of these circumstances, and especially this one, it was not meant to be.

A sudden passing in the family

I got a note that there was a passing in a family, a father in law who used to run an arcade route had recently passed away and left a garage full of arcade games. On a Wed. evening Travis and I headed up to meet the gentleman with an easy to remember name – Jeff, and find out what would be the best next steps.

When we got to know Jeff, we really understood how great of a guy this former operator was in his community. Jeff talked about opening up his garage perpetually for a small local community gathering area, stocked with drinks and food. The op would always be helping those around him, fixing cars, mowing others lawns, whatever was needed, he was there even into his later years. Well revered and respected the passing had come suddenly and the family was sorting out what to do with his possessions.

Here is what we saw when we arrived (Thanks Travis for the photos).

Plus there were about 4 jukeboxes, a dart machine, and parts scattered all over the place – boards, monitors, some artwork, all of the typically stuff you’d see if you had an arcade route.

The son in law, Jeff, let us know that the father used to have his route up in the Gary IN area, and moved down to Monticello – inferred retirement. Unfortunately, we could only look in at the games from the perimeter, and given the story, assumed most of them had been taken off route because they no longer worked. We could see some games popping out, but it was a significant risk to purchase as we really could see condition of anything, or if the few games we saw popping out were original or converted to something else.

Travis and I spoke for a brief moment and made a really nice offer for what we knew was there. We really wanted to honor the passing, and knew that we could restore some of these games to their original condition. At the very least, those arcade cabinets that were too far gone, we could source new owners and let them see some use again.

Fortunately, it was a good deal for Jeff and he accepted.

The sizeable arcade pickup would be on Sunday

Like most arcade plans and dealing with logistics and weather, if I had planned a trip to Indiana Beach, I probably would have had to cancel. I had a vehicle lined up with Chris, but then he had to have a major repair and was out of commission.

Then Sunday rolled around, and it was pouring rain in Indy. The timing was important for Jeff, as he was in town for a short period of time, and was trying to get many loose ends wrapped before he left.

The weather ‘should’ break for about 4-5 hours, just long enough for us to do the pickup and head back. So we made the 2 hour trip up in pouring rain, with a hope and a prayer.

Not every cabinet made the trip

We took my van, to supplement Travis, he truck, and an open bed trailer. This was the largest load I’ve ever purchased, beating out the 10 or so games I picked up in my very first arcade experience in Nashville in 2006.

As we dug into the garage, it was apparent we wouldn’t have enough space. There were actually 16 cabinets. Loading up, it was apparent that two of the cabinets would not be salvageable – a generic that looked like it had been a gambling machine and the Endura Racer you see in photo 2 above. We also had to trash several monitor that had severe screen burn.

Everything got packed in, including two pinballs in my van! (who knew) and two pinballs in the back of the truck. For a ton more photos, visit my Monticello arcade game album on Google+. Here is a full list of the games:

• Ms. Pac-man
• Captain America & Avengers
• Stargate Conversion – Street Fighter II
• Sega Turbo
• POW – Prisoner of War
• Taito Conversion – X-Men
• Dig Dig Conversion – Time Killers
• Centipede Conversion – Street Fighter II
• Fire! Pinball
• Special Force Pinball
• Cyclone Pinball
• Firepower II Pinball
• Capcom Bowling
• Q*Bert Conversion – Arkanoid
• Generic Cab (trashed)
• Endura Racer (parted and trashed)

Plus we had other arcade parts:

• 4 boxes of miscellaneous stuff
• 6 monitors
• 30-40 pcbs

Monticello arcade purchase postlude

We were fortunate, the rain held off completely for the ride home. No problems at all, well, mostly. Bizarrely enough, we didn’t strap down the Ms. Pac-man enough as the glass bezel was gone when we arrived. Just gone, not broken, no remnants, nothing – it must have just completely lifted and blown off. Fortunately it didn’t hit anyone.

The gentleman might have operated his route in his local market, because nearly half of the machines worked when we got home. It’s not unreasonable to see him placing some games in Logansport, Peru, Lafayette and even Kokomo.

My plans longterm? Well, I was really excited about a couple of things.

First – To add a mid 80′s pin to my gameroom, so I have chosen to focus my efforts on the Cyclone. My mom has really been wanting for me to add a pinball, I think this will be a perfect edition for the gameroom in our new place. I thought at first it was missing the main board, but I believe I’ve found 2 in the loose pcbs.

Also, a huge thing for me being a Mr. Do! fanatic – NOS back bezel / plexi artwork for original Universal cabinets. Three of them actually. Check out this photo.

Really unique find, so pumped to add this to my collection of arcade artwork.

If there is something we picked up that is of particular interest to you, would love to get a machine into the hands of a collector who has been looking for a piece. Drop me a line. I also heard a number of arcade / jukebox collectors contacted Jeff from the Chicago area. There was one vintage Juke (my photos didn’t turn out) that was particularly beautiful – thought about taking it myself. If you ended up picking up the Jukeboxes out of Monticello, drop me a note. I’d love to tie up that thread.

Thanks again to Jeff. We are really pumped to restore, or get the games into the hands of someone who will restore these games back to their original state. The best way to honor the past.

Former operators have the best NOS artwork is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

Two unloved arcade games, left in a closet

It seems that I wasn’t the only one that was on the fence about owning a Food Fight. I got an email from a couple who moved into a home in Mason OH, and they were greeted with two arcade games, left in the house by the previous owner. One of them happened to be a Food Fight, serial number UR00480. I have wacked out dreams like this after a night of Blue Moon, a supreme pizza and Cinnamon Toast Crunch – Where I walk into my new house and there are arcade games bursting from every room and every closet. Check out the photos.

The Food Fight was missing the knob off of the joystick, but other than that appeared to be complete and working. The other game was a non-working Q*Bert, with no sideart and a Willis cpanel overlay.

A real possibility of picking up two fun games near Indianapolis

Two fun games, neither of which were in my possession at the time. The couple was looking to sell both games and approached me first to see if I was interested. Some research online turned up a wide range of prices for a Food Fight, including the typical ‘retailers’ looking to gouge home owners in that $2,000-$4,000 range. The Q*Bert would have been an easy restoration, and I knew I could track down a knob so I decided to make an offer to purchase both.

There were several phone calls an emails that spanned nearly 5 months, but in the end the sellers decided to try listing the games on eBay.

I wish every offer I made panned out – but then again, I’d have to build a bigger house to hold what is now an 18 game collection. I monitored the auctions, my offer was higher than the final prices for the two games.

Doing the math – 119 miles to Mason OH vs. 800 miles to Folkston GA. Sigh.

But hey, now I own a Food Fight. Plus, I got to see some things on the trip to Folkston. Including this cab fail around Atlanta GA. Enjoy.

If you ended up purchasing this Q*Bert and / or the Food Fight out of Cincinnati, drop a line, give an update on how they are working today.

The Food Fight that got away is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

A visual history of 2 HUO games from Bally / Midway

For the last two weeks I’ve been hard on myself. How do I tell such a neat story in a different way, that is more engaging than the typical play by play with all the sorted details. Inspired by the flash in the pan ‘what my friends think I do’ meme, I thought I’d tell the story how I envisioned it happening back in the 1980′s. Don’t like fun? Just jump down to unveiling which HUO titles were found.

One day, a blue collar worker at Bally / Midway…

…decided, “I build these games, but I bet I’d be the golly gee coolest guy on the block if I owned a couple – IN MY HOME”.

Freddie (As we’ll refer to him now) walked into the front office and announced:

Freddie: Bill, I want to buy me some of those entertainment boxes.

Bill: What an excellent decision, and sound investment. These will be around forever, just you watch. And you can use your awesome employee benefit to get them at 10% over cost.

Freddie: Swell!

Freddie headed back out to the Bally / Midway plant floor. Celebratory high fives all around:

Freddie felt real neat, he had two arcade games, life was grand.

With the two games strapped in back, he pulled up his perfect truck into his perfect neighborhood. He was home.

Freddie pictured how life would be now that he had these grand, colorful arcade cases in his house:

But sadly the neighbors in the yellow, green, pink and blue houses didn’t view it in quite the romatic light. They thought – There is something not quite right with Freddie…

Soon, Freddie was all alone, frowny face.

25 years later, forgotten and unloved, it was time to sell the two arcade games. But would anyone want them?

Two arcade games I couldn’t pass up

All kidding aside, the history behind these games made this a truly neat story. It is not often that you find two arcade games that had rolled off the line from Bally / Midway and had never seen another owner. I was so thrilled the son contacted me about making the purchase. Once I saw the initial photos I wanted to make sure I made a fair and generous offer (for two games I had not seen in person) to honor his initial reach out.

The offer was accepted – Excitement – for you see the two HUO arcade games were a…

Root Beer Tapper

…and a Zwackery

The Zwackery (Chris tells me) was formerly a Bank Panic in some form. If you are interested to see a few more photos, and a constantly expanding library of photos of the Zwackery and Root Beer Tapper – view the album on Coinopspace.

Astounding to find two great arcade games that have never seen the light of day outside of this one former Bally / Midway employee.

Special Thanks

Again go out to both Chris Moore and Tom. Tom, if you read this, the above story is just fun – certainly don’t intend it to be mean spirited in anyway. Thank you for selling us the games. Chris – Thank you again for swooping in and being my local go to guy to pick up these games. Thank you to both of you for hauling them outside at risk of bad backs and splintered hands.

What are your memories from 1986?

In 1986 I was 7, and I lived in a tiny town. I played a lot of baseball, and collected baseball cards. But I never sat foot in a full arcade. I’d be interested to hear the first time you played these games, and what you may have been doing around 1986 when these games were being hauled up to Green Oaks, IL.

Additionally, if you are interested to know more about the Root Beer Tapper or Zwackery story, please leave me a comment below or contact me privately.

The secret time capsule of Bally Midway is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog

Arcade Warehouse – Southern Georgia

Collecting arcade games can be a solitary hobby. The following month at a friend’s wedding reception, someone asked what was going on with me. Of course, I shared the email I had gotten just a few days prior, talking about the list of the games in the warehouse. The conversation went:

Them: What is new?
Me: (Hesitation) Well, someone down south contacted me about some arcade games they have for sale. I may end up taking a roadtrip in a month or so.
Them: Oh yeah?
…. (Silence, not a lot of interest. The conversational follow up….)
Them: What will you get?
Me: There are too many to remember
Them: Why, how many are there?
Me: 47
Them: (Silence – Eyes widen, a couple of blinks)
Them: Oh. (My wife rolls her eyes)

I don’t expect anyone outside of this hobby to understand. It wouldn’t be the first or last time I will take a long roadtrip to buy large quantities of arcade / pinball machines. Before I forget, if you are looking to sell some games, give me a hollar and let’s work something out.

The list – Mostly classic arcade games

Why tell when I can show. Here are a couple of photos that the son graciously took for me to help with our negotiations. The full list of games is after the photos.

• Ms. Pacman x4
• Ms. Pacman (Cocktail)
• Galaga
• Star Gate
• Space Duel
• Centipede
• Cloak and Dagger
• Safari
• Kangaroo
• Berzerk
• Asteroids
• Tac Scan
• Missile Command
• Donkey Kong Jr.
• Donkey Kong x3
• Shoot the Bull
• My Hero
• Vanguard
• Qix
• Tempest (Cabaret)
• Food Fight
• Joust
• Popeye x2
• Frogger x2
• Zaxxon
• Phoenix
• Pinball Action (Gorf Conv.)
• Jr. Pac-man (Super Pacman)
• Jr. Pac-man (Factory Dedicated)
• Galaga (Cocktail)
• Moon Patrol
• Motorcycle (Chicago Coin)
• Midnight Maruaders
• Operation Wolf x2
• Black Knight x2
• Dolly Parton
• Fire
• Strikes and Spares
• High Speed
• Future Spa
• Vector
• El Toro
• Solar Fire

I worked quickly out of respect for the owners since they were so gracious to supply plenty of photos. I figured out what I could reasonably offer, sight unseen with some assumptions (beyond the photos) and we continued negotiations.

Asking for help

Given the interest of time, the distance was not an ideal factor. So I called in a friend to help, an expert that has done this a ton of times in that area – Steve Smith in Folkston GA.

Steve headed over to get introduced to the owners in early October. By the end of that first visit he had worked out a deal and loaded up a trailer of games. It wasn’t the full lot of 47, we couldn’t come to a reasonable agreement on that. Some of the games Steve hauled back, and he’ll correct me in the comments of anything I’m missing:

• Safari
• Vector
• Future Spa
• Kangaroo
• Tac Scan
• Tempest (Cabaret)
• Food Fight

The Gremlin Safari was a pretty unique piece. Here is a photo of that cabinet.

I got a single game

The whole deal started out at 47, but I only ended up with one game out of what Steve hauled back. 47 would have been an amazing story, but a true challenge in logistics. Things worked out just fine. Steve ended up making a second trip and picked up a few more games, but by that time many other games had been sold, some of them auctions on eBay. The hope was that he was going to be able to pick me up that factory Jr. Pac-man, but that had been sold. Please, if you bought the Jr. Pac, drop me a line or leave a comment below.

But back to the story. I won’t leave you hanging in suspense on which game I picked up.

Food Fight!

Pretty stellar condition. The top is crisp, there is no swelling, very few scratches, the control panel has no cracking, the game just feels like it was in a capsule.

Steve got to talking with the owners and they said that the brother had been an operator at Fort Stewart. The Food Fight was in excellent condition, and the Kangaroo was nearly perfect as well. We can only guess that when the games broke down, the operator brought them back and started using them for parts. My Food Fight is missing the lighting fixture from behind the marquee, as well as the power brick. I also don’t have the marquee, but that must have gotten lost in the shuffle.

Meeting other regional collectors

This operator warehouse and collection of 47 games spurred plans for Chris and I to pickup that Food Fight and bring it back. Steve was interested to make a trade with Chris that he couldn’t refuse, his working Tron for a working Black Hole. Only problem, that changed our plans from a one way flight, to one hell of a drive.

Over the span of 4 days we drove over 1600 miles. We made a number of stops along the way. We stopped in Louisville, KY to meet Ed Lutz and see his tremendous collection. I had a geek out moment as I got to see a Dark Planet in person. Ed had a number of items of interest for me personally, like a Bazooka, and a DECO mini.

We also got to briefly meet some of the other local collectors like Antz and Jason Bradley. Antz was extremely hospitable, I’d highly recommend Zanzabar in Louisville if you are looking for an arcade or pinball fix.

Great food, solid collection of working games, and pinball tournaments. Not to mention one of the select NIB Robotron mini’s that came out of the John Jukes warehouse. Look him up.

On the way out of town we experienced one other interested site. From a distance we also got to witness a house being used only for arcade game storage, with 6 freestanding structures on the lot packed with games.

Very little luck on our return

We tried to coordinate with a number of other arcade collectors on the way down, but didn’t have as much luck as we would have liked. We did get to stop into GameGalaxy in Nashville, but did not get to hook up with Jason.

We also stopped and picked up a Rip Off cabinet for another collector in Chicago from Tony. Tony has an awesome list of games, but alas, we also could not time it right to make an introduction. Next time, there is always next time.

It was a tremendous trip, and extremely therapeutic, but Chris and I have agreed to never drive that distance again.

Share your bulk arcade buy stories

I’m curious to hear, or rehash, the stories of bulk arcade buys that you’ve had. In particular, if you have ever made a deal for games sight unseen, how many games did you buy and what did you keep? Or share anything else you like.

Georgia Roadtrip – An operator’s time capsule is a post from: Rotheblog - Arcade Game Blog