Well I've only played a rather beat up example a couple of years ago and I'd have to say I felt it was a bit of a dog.
If you like the show maybe that'd help. But I found it plain to look at and rather boring.

1200 dollars? - euros? Seems very pricey. If you're on a budget why not try something like a The Shadow, Dracula, Doctor Who, Judge Dredd,or even Jurassic Park - Pin tastes vary enormously but any of these "sleepers" is way better value than X-Files.

Ah, the X-Files [plinks away a tear of nostalgia] ...
Having owned an X-Files game for several years I can give you all the info you need

I have always been a big fan of the series and this definately helps appreciate the machine. The theming is done very well on the game. It also helps that the backglass is absolutely marvelous. The playfield has some nice toys and features and all in all I would highly recommend the game to any big X-Files fan. That alien baby from Erlenmeyer Flask on your playfield is reason alone to feature this pin dead center in your living room (if you're a real fan)

But what about the pinball fan? Comparing to several other titles in this price range, the game is allright, but often highly overpriced. To be honest, there are better games to be played for that kind of money. Remember: this IS a Sega game in the range of Twister and the likes. You often either love or hate them.

The X-Files, like many other SEGA's lacks severely in sound quality, you can barely hear what the quotes are trying to tell you.. The music is pretty nice and creative, but also of so-so quality. The game rules are OK, not to difficult to understand, plenty of multiball (both file cabinet and truth multiball) and game flow is pretty decent. The modes are fun, and once again some of the show's best episodes are in the game. I love the trivia mode where you are challenged for your knowledge of the series. Getting to the end game (completing all modes) proved to be pretty rough for me so I always had enough of a challenge to try it again and again. I have enjoyed this game a lot, but after a couple of years I had to let it go. [plinks away another tear for nostalgia]

My advice: If your not a huge X-Files fan, don't bother. Otherwise: Play it! And decide for yourself. Always remember: don't let other people dictate the games in your gameroom! My X-Files was always mocked about by others, but I kept it for many years because I liked it!

PS: IF buying one, play close attention that the area directly in front of the file cabinet is undamaged. Often this area is pretty beat up and operators would place a metal plate over that playfield area (and removing the magnet under the playfield that's supposed to keep the ball from trashing the file cabinet). This eventually lead to the destruction of said file cabinet toy and these are hard to find (and expensive!).

Finally, about the price: I sold mine about 2 years ago for 750 euros. It was in good shape, except for the file cabinet which needed replacing. It took a while to sell it, even for such a low price... Hmm...

Hmm I have actually never upgraded the speakers in any of my Pins. But I heard that having a Pinball Pro (that's the name of a popular pinball sound upgrading kit if I'm correct) in a game gives the sound a serious quality boost, especially in the subwoofer parts.

In the X-Files it would never hurt I guess, but the sound quality problem is more related to bad sampling (8 bit?) than it is to the speakers being poor.. So I'm not sure if it would fix that.

Hmm come to think of that, the left speaker in those Sega's especially was of very poor quality. The modern Sega's had different speakers for left and right. One resembling the rather nice speakers used in Bally/Williams games, the other a clock radio speaker kind of thing.

1250 USD is a bit on the steep side, although it could be worth that price if the game has a perfect file cabinet area, with working magnet and all.

Re: "Often this area is pretty beat up and operators would place a metal plate over that playfield area"

This was actually an official service kit from SEGA. The magnet functionality should still be in place though!

You're right, I should have mentioned that - it was indeed an official repair kit issued by Sega. But as for the magnet, I always though it would not work with the metal plate installed and that is is missing on all XF's with a metal plate installed. Thanks for correcting me on that one!

I've recently acquired a Sega X-Files pinball machine. I'm looking for a bit of advise. When I turn the machine on, the initial splash screen comes on with the name of the game and the sound plays fine, then the display goes black. The music still plays but I can't even run the test modes as the messages don't get displayed. I was wondering where I should start looking inside as possible causes for the display to stop.

Get it, because if you don't, the truth will be out there.

sometimes it helps to start a new thread with a descriptive title, but we'll see what we can do...

I've got a DE, not a Sega, but I think they are close...

the splash screen - is that the one that says the version # of the ROM's, etc? Or is it a dot matrix fancy title screen?

I'm assuming it's the former. As a little background, there are 2 CPU's controlling the dot matrix. One on the board in the backbox, and one on the DM controller itself. When you turn it on, the DM controller "boots", shows the screen with version #'s, etc.......then it waits for the main CPU to start sending it information.

IF this is what you are seeing, it kind of says "my DMD is booting fine, my power is good, but I'm not getting any signal from the main CPU".

First thing to check? The ribbon cable. Turn your power off. Should be a long computer ribbon cable coming from the mpu to the DMD controller board. Pin 1 on the boards should be marked. Pin 1 on the cable is the one with the red stripe. Disconnect both ends of the cable, carefully align pin 1 on the board with pin 1 on the cable. Push the connectors firmly down on the pins on the mpu and the DMD controller.

75% of the time, this will fix your problem, at least temporarily. If it doesn't, check back and we'll go from there.

$1200 sounds like a decent price. The sites I use to price say the average price is $1000 so $200 higher isn't too far off. X-Files is one of the first machines I plan to buy and if I found one for $1200 in good shape I'd definitely go for it. But not until I tried to talk them down a few more bucks.

Compared to the $2795-3700+ amounts I've
seen on EBay $1200 is a reasonable price as long
as it's not in really bad shape.

If you really want it I would say go for it because I
haven't seen one priced that low for awhile.

Xfiles is whitestar where as Sega stopped using DE's system 11 clone after batman (apollo 13)

Xfiles probably has only one speaker in the head. I just picked up a cheap twister yesterday and am looking into putting the hardware back on the mpu to play the audio out of two speakers. It should really help the sound quite a bit.

I have a friend who loves X-files. When I played it I found it fast, flowing and not as bad as it is sometimes portrayed. If you fancy it and it is cheap give it a go-you can always sell and get your money back. It's quite an atmospheric game if your into sci-fi.

couldn't figure out what the heck you guys were talking about until I realized you are replying to a 2 year old posts.

To AKDaddo - this is why I recommended you should start a new thread! The old threads are nice for research, but you deserve a nice shiney new thread to address your problem.

I was at my daughters doctor's checkup and was bored while waiting for the doc,
and I didn't realize I was responding to a 2year old post, from my iphone. Text is super small
on iphone showing age of thread, which I wasn't looking at. sorry

Son of a....
And to make matters worse, it looks like he never got that X-Files machine