I don't think that really holds water. You could say that about any game system. Even system 11 can sometimes mystify people.
Just about anything can be serviceable if you put in the time & effort. Heck, I wrote up documentation for two game systems that were either completely non-existent or significantly lacking in key areas. Very rarely is a game completely dead and unrecoverable. Games that didn't boot are what a large number of my bargain price games were. Not everyone has the skills and/or patience for that, though.
Sure, that can be true. There is certainly a lack of one-click buy options. It can be a scavenger hunt, but that comes with the hobby. There's only a small number of parts that have taken me ages to find or come up with substitutes for. There's only a few games that scare me off when they're missing a well-known unobtainable part (the submarine on bally atlantis comes to mind).
Quoted from dung:That lack of knowledge extends to the games themselves. Both by the fact that many do not know they exist and for the rest what the rules are. Heck, I don't have a manual for football and don't know what all does what on it yet.
There are thousands of titles beyond the top 200 that people aren't aware about. Many of them rare, so they don't often see the light of day. The best bet for selling an unusual or rarely seen game is to do a short gameplay video of it along with good photos. Out of the hundreds of games I'm at least passingly familiar with, I still find new ones all the time that I've never seen or played before. I've been hoping I might be able to get my hands on a few Taito games at some point. Most people have never even heard of those titles before, but there are some neat ones in the lineup.
Yes, I agree--that can be a turn off to people. Sometimes that makes a game interesting (baby pacman or ice cold beer, for example), sometimes not (hyperball, for example). Sometimes a game strays too far into the world of novelty amusements and pinball purists just don't like it.