Anytime the game is on it should be energized to keep those rods out of the coin mechs. When the power is off it releases and those rods block the mechs ago all coins go to the return. In older games you couldn't tell if the game was on or off. When a game ended the lights would go out. This is a legacy thing from those days. In the "newer" games the lights are on if the game is on so no one would put coins in an off machine.