Congratulations. My best advice - before you decide to install a McDonalds happy meal toy with an LED in the game that you *think* fits the theme well -- be advised that it does not look as good or cool as you think it will/does.

Otherwise, NVRAM is your friend and an easy upgrade to the game - never worry about batteries again.

The other advice - READ READ READ. After that the only way to learn is by doing. You will figure it out and we have a great community of people here to help. I'm amazed by the information on here. For example I was able to use playfield tear down photos over the weekend that someone else posted 4 years ago to identify what posts were incorrect/missing in my Funhouse. So much information here if you search or ask for it.

Most of the pins in the backbox are held in by connectors... and you would typically rebuild a connector (not solder). You may want to show us a picture of that before you or your friend solders anything.

One skill almost as important as soldering is learning how to strip wire and crimp a connector onto a wire. Many of these games used an IDC connector (where the insertion of the wire caused the insulation to be displaced) and those connectors are now coming undone.

Thank you that photo was very helpful and I can see now you are not talking about a connector but the display pins themselves. That is indeed a solder fix if it is not securely connected to the PCB.

Or do you mean it is breaking off from the display portion itself - if so it also looks like you can solder that.

One advantage of sticking to the same system/build era is that the parts are "somewhat" universal and you learn one system at a time. One disadvantage is that you don't get experience with the diversity and "feel" of different games and their quality etc. Modern Stern games fell vastly different than old Williams games or even newer games from CGC or Jersey Jack. Some people hate that some people love it. There is no right answer just opinions.

I like the DE and Sega stuff as my first DMD game was Twister and I miss it. Personally I'd like to own a Southpark and a DE Jurassic Park one day.

The fun part about this hobby is if you buy a game at a reasonable price you usually won't lose much (if any) money when you resell it (IF you decide to resell it). I've been thinking about a Stern Stranger Things which I have never played and I'm starting to see them sell for $5k. I figure even if I hate the game I should be able to resell it for $4,700 to $5,000 making it a "cheap rental" at worst case.

That being said the disadvantage of this hobby is moving these games around. Heavy stuff!

So did you pick out the second one yet?

We all know you did.