Maybe inexperience and feel obligated to say something, from the little bit of research they've done.

They haven't learned number of plays can be reset. They haven't learned it always comes down to condition. They don't know how to examine a pin and determine it's condition.

LTG : )

I think a lot of the time people are just curious and ask, but don't really care too much. I have yet to have someone make a big deal about plays or try to use it for a discount. I think some people just think it is something you are supposed to ask, like mileage on a car.

EDIT: Yeah, what LTG said lol

Just part of due diligence. Obviously there are eras that it is a moot point as Lloyd said (resets, older era game, restored). On Spike 2 or JJP high play count can affect price.

it's a weird question though because unlike a car, # of plays does not correlate with component failure.

Wow 3000 is basically nothing.

Ignorance mostly.

It does correlate to wear and failure.....a game with 30 plays will be far less likely to be worn out than one with 30,000 plays. Every time a game is played, millions of atoms of wood, steel, and clear coat are dispersed into the atmosphere and down into the cabinet. This is similar to the way every ounce of alcohol you drink - or every Mariah Carey song you hear - kills millions of brain cells.

This - people are idiots and don't realize condition is king. Plays are meaningless on a well maintened game.

It's the same virgins that think a women's body count correlates with tightness. They've just never been with a woman before to know any better.

I personally think a game plays best after it's gotten around 500 plays. Some people just want their game to be as "new" as possible so the number of plays is something they care about. But like you said condition is really the only thing that should matter.

This is a good point. There are people that collect games that don't play them and want them presitine. That's not me but it's definitely a legitimate reason to want low plays if that's what your motivation is.

Just because someone says its HUO, it might not be. The number of plays will help confirm if its HUO or not.

I get asked all the time and for the most part it’s nota big deal to answer. But some try to use it as a haggling tool. I’ve gota few left over Expo games with low play. Had someone ask and i said i thought it had around 300 plays. He wanted that verified. The game has 403 plays. He then asked for more off. He didn’t get the game.

I guess the person that i told the same to and when they got it he messaged thanks and he checked his audits and the game had 150 plays. I guess i should have told him he owes me more money, lol

I can see the difference if a game has 1000’s off plays different but not a hundred

I guess I don't mind when people ask, but I'm really not sure what (if anything) it actually tells anybody. People seem to have translated an audit intended to help the owner balance their books, to some kind of odometer which is indicative of value. There has only been once somebody raised this with me:

Buyer: Wow... 300 plays sure seems high... Would you take another $300 off?

Me: (sarcastic) "No, I cant... The price history for this title treats anything under 500 plays as basically new. I would really only move on my price for a condition issue."

Buyer: "OH, ok..."

[Buys Game at my (fair) asking price]

I miss the days when it was the shooter lane that counted most.

So easy to sand them smooth and put a fresh layer of clear over them.

I had some douche bag tell me 95 plays was a lot. I know who I’ll never respond to again when I’m selling a pin.

Not all number of plays on a game are equal.

Example my IMVE has double of most other games. However IMVE games average 2 minutes and SMVE average over 5 minutes.

Because there's a lot of people who buy NIB for decorative purposes but don't actually play a whole lot of pinball and list their pins for sale with only 112 plays on them.

My god, here’s a stroke of genius business idea: decorative pins that’s don’t actually play at a fraction of the cost.

Before the time of clear coat on the playfield, people thought that it mattered with HUO games so that their special game was in pristine condition. Then once games were clear coated the playfield held up relatively well, so in order to get their dicks hard they would want a picture of the shooter lane; because that is where you can see the real wear and tear. But then a couple years ago the really get their panties in a bunch people would want to count the dimples on the playfield or some shit, I don’t know.

Condition is king.

You may go insane worrying about wear at the atomic level. I’m concerned!

Dude I’ve had so many people flat out lie and say a pin is huo and try to hide damage etc - and just like if I were going to buy a used car I’d rather have the lesser mileage on same type of car.

I get the point you’re trying to make with your post but there are a good enough amount of reasons to ask pointed questions in this hobby - not everyone is honest with descriptions

If you bring your game to a show, it can rack up 400-800 plays all in one weekend.

I never bother to ask "how many plays" a game has. It's meaningless. Condition is king.

Do you not ask how many miles a used car has when looking at it? Why should you care? If it’s a well maintained car it’ll go forever!!!!

Of course plays matter. Anybody who thinks otherwise is lying to themselves.

There are a few threads documenting games on route with 5 digits in the play count:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/stern-star-trek-with-4938-plays-pics/

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/documenting-the-entire-life-of-a-metallica-pro-on-route/

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/documenting-the-entire-life-of-a-medieval-madness-remake/

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/documenting-the-life-of-monster-bash-remake-0-plays-/

The last updates showed that they were still in pretty good shape.

And don’t you think they are sold at a lower price than a game with less than 1000 plays when the time comes? You would pay the same price for a machine with 20k plays as one with 1k?

I love when a person or company tells me a game is huo and sends me pics of the standard audit screen that shows a ridiculous amount of plays on an older game like game of thrones - and then you ask for the earnings audit and the current says next to nothing but lifetime is an insane amount (cause they tried to reset and it doesn’t on earnings)

Obviously a factor of 1,000 is going to matter but at the number of plays HUO games get I would be much more interested in the average ball time along with the plays. I am bad at pinball so my number of plays is way higher than what a good player would have but with a much lower average ball time. Total play time is probably lower, especially considering I like to end the game if I do really badly on the first ball.

Number of plays is only one small piece of the picture. I wouldn't rely on it alone to tell anything about the machine.

Well, there are obviously some signs that these 20K+ play games aren't fresh off the factory line. So no, it probably won't fetch the same amount as a game fresh out of the box.

However, looking at the photos without knowing the play count, could you accurately estimate the play count give or take a few hundred plays?

A well maintained game will look a lot nicer a lot longer than a neglected game that is never cleaned, waxed, or repaired.

I would still maintain the point that condition is what matters the most--not play count.

I recently bought a HUO game and when I got it, it had 10,800 plays on it. For a game made in March of 2020, i figured that is way too high for a HUO. But the cabinet is mint, the playfield is in great condition, only slight wear in the shooter lane. I can't tell a difference between mine and someone with 500 plays on theirs. These newer games hold up better and plays don't wear it as much since it seems most people take better care than ops did in the 90's and 2000's.

I bet my older games had 50,000-100,000+ games on them due to the wear. I'm not concerned about play count anymore due to the fact that condition matters more than some number. Reminds me when i used to buy police cars and Idle hours meant everything. Some didn't care at all since the car was in mint condition. But if the car had 4,000 idle hours vs 400, you could get an extra 10-30% on the selling price.

Pins seem to be the same in sellers and buyers minds. If a pin plays great and is in great shape, that's the main concerns one should have. If someone used crap balls and used it on the boardwalk, 500 plays may look like 100,000 plays, who knows.

I’d mostly agree with this but I’d still like to know the amount of plays before I go check a game. I wouldn’t be afraid of buying a game with a lot of plays.

I don't care about number of plays so much. It's more about how much time Pinsiders have had to whore them up and glue plastic MickeyD's toys under the hood that matters most to me. And how rusty their balls must be.

A great place for the Theseus Ship thought experiment.

Dose a game with 20k plays and a brand new playfield still have 20k plays? What if you replace the boards too?

Two HUO games, same title and model are for sale at same exact price

Game 1 has >3000 plays excellent condition

Game 2 has <300 plays excellent condition

What game are you going to buy?
You have no knowledge of buyer from past experiences

The one that's closer

Both. As long as they are B/W that I like.

Because they're newbies. No way to really know unless it's a newer game made in the last several years. They probably want shooter lane pictures too I'll bet.

Well, maybe neither though. He said they were the same price but he didn't say they were priced reasonably.

When it comes to some low milage B/W, you gotta do what you gotta do. And the more the merrier. I'll be the first to admit they made a lot of turds though that I would never own.

So I guess title really matters most.

There is nothing wrong with asking play count on a HUO game…….…it’s perfectly appropriate. It’s the equivalent of someone asking the mileage on a one owner car. What am I missing???

So many long-term hobbyists who always buy used and old and routed games are the ones saying "condition is king". If you spend most of the time buying newer (1-5 y.o. pins) then asking about plays just makes sense- 10k is different than 1k and it does not always "show" in pure condition. Of course its ok to ask about plays.

That's 10 plays a day for the three years. That's perfectly plausible, particularly if there are kids banging through games quickly (or mashing the start button for 4-player), or a lot of ball one restarts.

Total ball launches would actually be a more accurate metric of use, if games had a lifetime count for that.

That said, any amount of plays under 10k isn't worth worrying about if there's no visible wear. Between 10k and 50k plays is when significant wear begins and when you start needing to worry about things like flipper rebuilds.

That pinball machines aren't cars.

It’s not equivalent at all. A pin is not a car. It’s a far (far) simpler machine whose parts are all easily visible. And whose parts and much simpler and much fewer that typically need repairs. And whose potential repair costs for any undetected issues are much lower. If the playfield is in good shape, there is nothing going on under the playfield that will cost thousands to repair. Nor hundreds. More like a few bucks to maybe $100 or $200 if you need to rebuild flipper, pops, slings, etc. If you know pins and know what you’re looking at, you know very closely what you are getting. If kept in a home, kept clean, balls changed regularly, a pin will stay in good condition almost indefinitely. Rebuild flipper, pops or slings at 50k, 100k plays, it’s good for another 50k. Playfield will stay good forever if kept clean. Esp on modern playfields. When was the last time you saw wear through the clear to the bare wood on a modern game? Maybe if it was trashed to hell on location for 5 years straight. Never in a home setting. # plays might be one fact of many to consider (and not a very important one) but not equivalent at all to car miles.

In the pins i have purchased, I take game count has a metric of use and comparison to others on the market. for me, <500 basically new, 501 to 3000 - lightly used, above 3k, I have more questions about maintenance.

the last pin i bought, the flipper and sling rubbers had never been changed or rotated, surprised they were still on the posts when it arrived, 3500 plays... probably original stern balls, lots of posts loose, roasted coil stop, failing auto-launcher. couldn't tell any of those things from the pictures.

Since I live in the middle of nowhere, i have to ask a lot of questions and collect lots of data, because i'm sending a wire and it's done after that.

Nope, pinball machines aren’t cars and you just did a fantastic job of making my point. A pinball machine is a simpler machine than a car and sadly way more expensive from every comparable measure. Because there are less variables that impact the differences in a HUO pinball game, every variable matters more in determining value. With few exceptions, non of the games are all that rare and as a buyer, if there are 3 Iron Maidens for sale in my area, all for relatively the same price, why would I not want to know all the variables, i.e. condition, plays, mods that could impact value to other potential buyers. I’ve bought and sold over 150+ games in my 13 years in this hobby. Every buyer is welcome to ask as many questions as they want when buying a game from me………..they are a potential customer and I respect their concerns, even if they are not my concerns.

Save yourself an annoyance and just post # of lifetime plays in the ad. Problem solved. Asking price is asking price. If you head that off in advance by just making it part of your routine then you won’t be surprised. Why not just disclose it out front? Everyone on pinside knows it is not a big deal. If a buyer won’t buy b/c of the # of plays then let them walk.

Why do people post lots of photos? To minimize the objections. Same with # of plays… just share it and then forget about it. NOT being proactive and sharing the lifetime plays in an ad (if known) makes it seem like someone is hiding something.

My .02….

It shows they know jack shit about pinball machines.

I bought a gotg le out of a pinball arcade/ museum, with 13,000 plays. Game looked and played perfectly. I no longer ask or care about play count, visual inspection tells more of a story.