Hello, I'm a first time buyer but I've reading this forum for few months before I decided to buy one. I was referred to Rob at Rockland pinball.I told him I'm a new buyer looking for first game and He told me that he had a nice shadow for sale and told me only thing wrong was it had some scuffs on the backbox and cabinet but playfield was in excellent condition but few plastics were broken. Price was $3200 so I assumed that it was a real nice example. I told him I didn't really mind few scuffs on cabinet as long as playfield was in excellent condition.

The machine arrived yesterday and the machine is players grade at best. The cabinet has chunks missing at different spots and has about 20 holes on the right side of the cabinet. Came with 3 leg levelers and the backbox has wires just soldered on to the board without connectors. Most of the fuses were fastblow. The playfield has tiny hole that looks like somebody try to drill from underneath and went to far. It also has some planking right next to it.

I was extremely pissed off but i thought maybe if I played few games I would feel better about the machine. Guess what? I can't even play the damn machine. The screen is all jumbled up and I can't make out anything. I pressed the start button after installing the balls and it kicked out all the balls at once and the battlefield flipper went off by itself about 20times before everything shut off and came back on by itself. So it's just sitting with fucked screen and no way to play it. And I'm not tech savy so don't want to touch it to make it even worse. But for what i paid for the title, my friends tell me I should have very nice Shadow or at least a working fucking machine.

I don't know what I can do since this is my first purchase hence asking for advice before I decide on what to do or how to go on about doing it. Any advice would be sincerely appreciated.

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Thanks everyone for your advice and support. Does anyone know what he goes by on pinside? I tried reseating all the cables but still no go. I wouldn't even be mad if he told me the machine was players grade but obviously I wouldn't have bought them.

My friend also told me about that $2800 shadow they had listed and thought it was messed up that he charged $3200 to a newbie for the same machine. I'm hoping that isn't the case.

I only paid the deposit with paypal but he told me the rest had to be paid by cashiers check or bank wire.
I'll follow you guys' advice and contact him.
I have no reason to lie or make up some story. I wish the machine i got was a nice shadow like he said more than anything.
Here are the pictures he sent me.

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I didn't assume anything. He told it was in nice condition and I believed it cuz the price reflected it. Would you consider this machine a nice condition?

Sorry for the late reply. I was busy all day being a best man to my brother's wedding.
No, I paid $3600 for the whole machine. $3200 was the price of the machine not including shipping. How do i go on about returning the machine?

Maybe to the pros, all the damages are easily visible but to a newbie, those are little harder to just point out and I didn't get any pictures of the right side which has about 20 holes drilled into it.

I was asking Rob. My mistake. I thought he would be reading this thread.

I will never buy a game without inspecting it first

No just bunch of random holes like a blind man was trying to screw on something.