Twilight Zone
Bally, 1993The local arcade owner has a Twilight Zone in storage and a friend and I have been trying to convince him to bring it to the arcade floor. He says the machine is too valuable to put on location and will cost too much to keep running. At $3.2k I might see his point, but what do you guys think?
I must be crazy then, since all my machines on location are worth more than that. My TZ only has the gumball mod, but also a full set of cliffy's and new clock, and a play field that looks brand new.
Plus, it's not earning anything sitting in storage. Basic economics. Sell it, pimp it out, or bring it home.
This machine has absolutely no mods. It's stock, and I think he has it for sale. Still, he makes most of his money off console sales. He really may not be able to put money back into it when something breaks down.
Get him to put protectors on it, and let it ride. As long as it gets waxed once in a while, there's very little that's going to happen to it that would damage it insanely. Maybe if the place caught fire. We had a AFM on the route until a few months ago. It came back looking better than a lot of pins we have. In fact, it's for sale, if anyone's looking for one.
Ok thanks. I thought I read somewhere about the gumball machine breaking from time to time, considering the game has so many toys on it.
I can understand his concern about keeping it running. TZ is not the most reliable machine. My record is 5 days without having to take the glass off (last night the right diverter set screw came loose. Second time that's happened, and it broke the 5-day uptime run. )
Other than high-end restorations, or games that are ultra rare, I think pretty much any pin is routable. Heck, there are CCs and BBBs on route.
"I don't want to put my commercial, coin operated, amusement device on route for the public to play". The dude is smoking something.
Quoted from RobT:If people still put MM on route (and they do) then there is no way a TZ is "too valuable" to put on route.
Good one RobT!
It must be in mint condition if he doesnt want to put it out. probably wants to sell it.
Unfortunately there just aren't enough players in my area to justify the time a labor for another machine. I can agree; his main location is located in one of the top ten most endangered malls in the country, and his second one can only afford to stay open 4 days a week (and this is right next to Target, a game store, AND Chuck E. Cheese's). That's how times have changed for the worse for arcades in general. The place simply doesn't make enough money.
It would also be nice if it wasn't so far away from me. Last time I brought a friend and he bought a classic Gameboy and played some games with me, but it's a drop in the bucket. It literally doesn't do anything to help.
You need to ask him to sell it to you.I had my TZ on my route back in 2000-2002 I made a thousand or two then I put it in my personal collection.The guy may be a collector that is why he might not want to route it. But I think he just does not want to fool with it.Try and buy it.P.S.Don't MOD it to much it is best to keep it original. Not as cheesy.In my opinion . Peace!!
Quoted from RobKnapp:You need to ask him to sell it to you.I had my TZ on my route back in 2000-2002 I made a thousand or two then I put it in my personal collection.The guy may be a collector that is why he might not want to route it. But I think he just does not want to fool with it.Try and buy it.P.S.Don't MOD it to much it is best to keep it original. Not as cheesy.In my opinion . Peace!!
I think it's a lost cause. The owner values it at more than it's worth, and has many other pins on location to satisfy most peoples' needs. I'd love to play TZ, but I just don't see it happening.
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Houston, TX
Saskatoon, SK