Which arcade games do I have to get rid of

[pinback]

Two people have now voted for Asteroids. Which means two people are in line for a butt violation with a serrated instrument.

You fuckers.

[ICJ]

I would get rid of the Ms. Pac-Man just because I remember enjoying the Turbo version more (maybe that sentiment will make the purists scoff).

I have mine set to turbo mode for both Pac and Ms. Pac. I can't *stand* normal-speed Pacs.

[Tdarcos]

04. Apparently TDarcos is developing a system in which machines are dismantled and you put stamps on each part and send them across country along with a piece of paper that says "good luck reassembling this!"

I had the general impression you were going to cannibalize some of these machines for parts (like keeping the entire cabinet but replacing the game board inside), and thus would have perfectly good parts left over (but not whole machines), which is why I suggested it.

Let's say you have a game for your house but don't want to have to use coins. You might simply put a button on the outside to short the counter - if the machine can't be programmed to allow the start button to operate without coins - and thus you can ship someone a perfectly good coin mechanism if they had a machine with one that was busted, and they want the 'whole' arcade experience, or they use it as a way to expropriate their kids allowances!

If you're going to have a whole machine or essentially whole, then, of course, shipping it via the method you mentioned ($400 to ship the whole device) would be a much better solution.

[js]

Oh, of course.

[Tdarcos]

Two people have now voted for Asteroids. Which means two people are in line for a butt violation with a serrated instrument.

You fuckers.

"Buy Fucker's brand condoms. Ask for them by name. Just walk right into your nearest drugstore and say 'Give me a pack of them Fuckers!' And don't let them give you a pack of cigarettes by mistake, although after using our product you may want to take a smoke."

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I had the general impression you were going to cannibalize some of these machines for parts (like keeping the entire cabinet but replacing the game board inside), and thus would have perfectly good parts left over (but not whole machines), which is why I suggested it.

Oh - yeah, there's stuff that Flack and I take for granted in the hobby. By "get rid of" I just mean "sell," really. I'd pop it onto craigslist or ask any of my local friends who like arcade games if they'd be interested in it.

People DO "part out" games in the manner you describe. And sometimes a game is worth more in parts than it is as a whole. I've got mixed feelings about parting out games. On one hand, a parted-out game can help many others live. The flip side is that I hate to see a completely working game be sectioned off. (What is more common, when a game is parted out, is that it doesn't work in the first place.)

Sometimes people ship. When I decided I wanted to get Marble Madness, I took a look around at the KLOV forum and found a guy who was offering one for sale. He lives in South Carolina. I asked him if he'd be willing to ship it, and he said that would be fine if I set the shipping up.

A few phone calls later I got a hold of a company called Precision Freight. (They have some relationship to NAVL. The person who handled all the arcade shipments, who read the KLOV forum now works at Precision.) So for $404 they took Marble Madness from the gentleman's house in South Carolina and are bringing it to my place this week. Personally, buying a game that will be shipped only makes sense if the price is so low on the game itself that the shipping still makes the deal worthwhile, or if the game is rare.

(Marble Madness is rare in Colorado. I've never seen one offered for sale. I wouldn't necessarily call it a rare arcade game overall, though. Uncommon, I guess. KLOV will have some designation for it, but it's misleading, as MM is so valued by the same kind of collectors that would volunteer such info.)