Quoted from SilverUnicorn:Ivan and his crew were making sure games did not leave before 6, and rightfully so. It says so right on the papers you put your name and contact info on that games can NOT be removed until 6, or a $40 fee is imposed. Problem is, people would buy a game, turn it off, and claim it was "broken". While there were still many games available at the 6:00 time, there were several which were off (some for a good while before that). I am sure these were not all "broken" as claimed, but I guess people want to protect their purchace. If that's the case, pay the $40 and take your game home. I'd rather see an open space than a game which was off.
Sure things aren't perfect, but Ivan and his team (he has a huge team) do a great job in getting a quality show to us.
Chris
As someone who has bought a game off the Freeplay floor two years in a row now, during show hours & didn't want to wait around till after 6 to break them down as I had a 3 hour drive home ahead of me I'll give some insight...
Both years I paid the $40 early removal fee.... I feel that also is another way to help support show somewhat financially even if I'm removing a game early. It makes me feel somewhat not like a complete schmuck.... If it helps keep the event happening every year, I'm cool with it.
Last year, I recall Pinfest staff both at the table & at the doorway being very uptight about me buying a game, on Saturday no less. They had one of their guys go to the machine with a pinball lift, watched owner tear it down, then they moved it over to the large garage door, the security was a pain in butt with us going in & out the door & hovering around the garage door while we loaded the game, they kept asking us to hurry up like we were causing the worlds biggest problem. They needed it off their dolly ASAP etc..... Wasn't overly cool, but whatever I was getting the game I wanted & not having to wait around till after 6 to save $40.
This year.... completely different... Guys at the table could have cared less that we were taking a game off the floor, one guy just found owners name on the registry list, marked it gone. I paid my $40.... Actually had to ask who to pay because they were so laid back about whole procedure, they just didn't seem to care, & were like "oh yeah, I guess you can just give me the $". The guy who took my $ signed the back of the card that was on the machine with owners info & said to "show the signed card to staff on way out the door" So went back, tore machine down, I really appreciated the people playing the two games on either side of me not caring that I was tearing a machine down in between them & glaring at me that I was interrupting their games. Neither stopped playing or gave me an extra inch to get to backbox etc but a lot of people in this day & age are just rude, so what are you going to do... If I was playing a game & someone started tearing a machine down or even just needed to work on it next to me, I'd just drain my ball & let them do their work & find another game to play, especially if I was on their right side where they need to be to get into the backbox on an old Bally & pull the glass, unhook connectors, & unbolt the head......but that's just me I guess.
I took backbox out door on one trip, then came back in & the ex owner & I loaded cab & took out door second time. There was no one around who was even paying any attention the entire time to what we were doing. Which is perfectly fine by me, but just found it strange I had such a different experience 2 years in a row. The security guard who worked that garage door both days looked like he wanted to be there as much as man on the moon, I never saw him get off his chair. Quite a change from the Crazy wristband Nazi lady last year who jumped up & chased down my 10 year old daughter & made her pull up the sleeve on her sweatshirt to show her wristband AFTER we had just been in & out that door about 4 times in 10 minutes & mulling around that area for another 20 while loading that game.... I know there were a lot of posts about her last year & rightfully so....
I tore it down & loaded it around 5 PM, I had few other things to do before leaving for the night, so I could have left it on the floor & on for a while, & actually did to allow a group of 4 to finish playing it on a 4 player game because I guess it had been selected for tournament play.... But I wanted to get it loaded before meeting NicoVolta to load 2 more machines in the parking lot... It's a lot of work to tear down a machine, move it out of building & across parking lot & load it, wrap it, strap it all by yourself, so I just wanted to get that box checked off.
One game on Saturday that I had paid some attention to, was the Bally BlackJack.... I think it was in the 1st row, closest to the back wall by the tournament.....I played it early Friday & felt it was priced very well for the machine, I had never played one, BG was nice, PF was nice & it was like $750 on Friday AM. If I was in the market, that would have been a good one to get, that was a nice machine for the $. I was walking around around 11AM maybe closer to Noon Sat & saw it had a Sold sign on it & it was turned off. It's gotta come down to the new owner, whether they want to let their machine sit there for rest of day & be played... risking a problem occurring.... Some people are going to be willing to do that & some not.
Anyhow.... just some observations, from someone who has actually bought machines off the floor during show hours before.
Julian, PA
