Fruit Machine Chat

in the past week or so this is how many of my pictures of the Queen have been swallowed by machines without giving credit.

surely it is not beyond the wit of man to design a coinslot which works more than 90% of the time?

ind:e coinslot & paragon 2 note acceptors are (imo) the worst.
at least the shit box has this mechanism sorted. notwithstanding the labyrinthine payout chute.

I would never risk putting a note into a quiz machine.

My current main gripe is that on several Itboxes nearby, the coin mech doesn't work at all, so it at least spits the money out, but you can't play any games. One of them has been this way for 2 months at least, and one of them, which was working earlier in the week, is now not working, and the barmaid said the engineer had just been round to "fix" it

In fairness, this bug usually gets fixed quicker than all others, since it is obviously the worst from the owner's point of view. Other bugs tend to last a lot longer. Machines with badly calibrated screens tend to stay that way indefinitely.

I entirely agree. I've been noticing increasing issues of late with (a) machines simply not accepting coins; (b) machines accepting coins but not registering them in the machine; (c) machines accepting coins but paying out only a proportion or even none of the monies won - quite where the rest goes I don't know. And that's in addition to the problems of machines with dodgy touch screens. I accept that I am in small part partially responsible (as I suspect are many players) - if a machine is broken it's pretty rare that I'll report it (generally only if I'm out of pocket by over £5 as a result). I guess if players reported all faults then bars would have to get them rectified; having said that it's surely not beyond the wit of a bar owner to check their own machines every so often is it? Although of course you'd only find out about (c) above when you'd finished playing.

In the currently tough machining environment badly-kept machines only make things worse.

grecian wrote: if a machine is broken it's pretty rare that I'll report it (generally only if I'm out of pocket by over £5 as a result).

ditto.
it is easier to abandon a quid than speak to a surly barman then an unhelpful manager but maybe i should make a point to report dodgy machines.

skewed touchscreens argh
having said that i hardly ever report this as there are always some games which are playable but this can only be counterproductive. anybody who would play a given game will do so once, realise it is pointless and leave it.

so we really should report it even if we do come over as pedantic wankers.

The coinslot and payout mechanisms of SWPs seemed more reliable 20 years ago than now.

The payout on old machines was like the Battle of Stalingrad. You could hear it in the next street.

I think this is some sort of manufacturers ploy these days.

I know of 2 AWPs that for no reason at all take a pound coin but give no credit at times. Where it goes/registers i haven't a clue.

Have to say i've never been troubled by a SWP payout/non acceptance. Maybe i don't play enough

Agreed to 100%. There are two separate problems here:

(1) the mechanical reliability of the coinslots

I often think while trying and failing to get some perfectly legitimate £1 coins accepted by a coinslot that I can't think of another common mechanical object that is less reliable. It's not even a general issue with coinslots as vending machines selling cans etc. rarely if ever present the same problems

(2) the payout mechanism

Clearly there are known faults in the design of the payout chutes of various machines, with the two commonest cabinets I see (ItBoxes and the oval Gamesnets) both liable to get a quid or two stuck in the chutes. However this isn't so bad as you can usually get them out once you know it's happening. Much worse is a bug on the oval Gamesnets where you try to collect say £20 and after only £2 has been paid out a red screen comes up with the time and date of the fault and the amount of credit remaining, even when there is no way that the machine has just £2 in it - you've usually put more than that in yourself.

In terms of reporting errors, I try to do so after the latter sort of problem but it's a pretty futile task - the last time I got the 'Red Screen of Death' was at a pub in Preston (after an Everton game) and while the guy was very apologetic I got the usual routine of 'It's not our machine, we can't reimburse you until the engineer has been out, ...'. They have indeed called subsequently to say that the error has been confirmed and that my £18 is available to collect but that it is in cash and they can't post it so I can't get it until next time I am in Preston. You can see why for anywhere other than your local pubs this becomes a pretty soul-destroying process.

As for the note acceptor, they can actually come in handy if the coinslot on an Itbox is broken if (a) there is a game that you are confident is worth playing (unlikely I know on the ItBox ) or (b) you simply want change from a £20 note. You have to play £1's worth of credits but can collect the remainder after that. There is of course a risk that the sorts of problems mentioned here mean you lose the note but I can't say that personally I've ever experienced or witnessed that happening with a note acceptor.

Incidentally I used the note acceptor 'trick' at Yates's in Leicester Square while killing time on Saturday evening, but more notable (if you pardon the pun) was that I was asked for ID on entry! Now I'm no longer a spring chicken and this was London not New York, so I asked the bouncer what the ID was for and he said that they needed to scan the ID of everyone coming for some (unspecified) reason. I didn't have anything suitable but he let me in, saying 'Don't forget next time', but what the **** was that all about? I do have certain standards and could happily avoid going in that place again for the rest of my life but has anyone encountered the same thing happening elsewhere?

I knew of a publican who had a money making scheme. He rigged a condom machine to accept money but as there were never actually any condoms in the machine in the first place they lost their money. It took a brave man to report the loss to the bar staff so he was coining it. With regards to quiz machines gamesnets have become by far the worst machines to not payout. The last time we got the silent countdown on numerous occasions was when they were attempting to prevent fraudsters by experimenting with new software. I have informed gamestec that the content of their machines tends to be better than ITBOX , and that their approach is better (good games where people actually win are not removed quickly ) but that their machines are not reliable. Since then (6 wks ago ) nothing has changed. Interestingly the company denies that the usual pub spiel is correct. The decision to refund is the pub companies policy not GAMESTEC so that it should be possible to get the money immediately without the machine being checked. Its rubbish anyway that the machine isnt the pub companies as they normally get 50% of the profit from it. Why then are pub managers so paranoid about people skimming the machines? Why do pubs expect the player to return to the pub , havent they heard of cheques?

Interesting further comments.

Unlike Cool I've always found mechanical errors to be more of an issue on ItBoxes than GamesNets, thereby following the modern trend that IBs are inferior in all respects to GNs. There are two placings for the IB prize chute - one in the middle and one on the right hand side of the machine, and one is far more problematic (I can't remember which). Those with long fingers can often jemmy them in to the slot to get a few coins back though.

I do find it peculiar how unreliable these machines are; whilst companies are not, I am sure, producing unreliable machines on purpose, it would also be true to say that they have little incentive to keep machines in 100% condition when these errors invariably go against the punter. Even for highly skilled players such as ourselves (!!!!), the margins are so tight on machines that a small error can be the difference between making it worth playing and not worth playing.

Nil Satis - do you have a trusted mate in the NW who could collect the cash on your behalf and send you a cheque?

i have been told that the major reason Rileys have just dumped Leisure Link is because they are sick of malfunctions and non-payouts. They are replacing the machines with not Gamesnets but are negotiating with local suppliers, so perhaps the 2 major machine companies will get the message.

grecian wrote:Nil Satis - do you have a trusted mate in the NW who could collect the cash on your behalf and send you a cheque?

Don't worry - I'll be up in the North West this weekend and assuming the cash is still there I will be able to collect it then. Making the further assumption that the machine fault has been fixed, I fully intend to take some further cash out of it just to show them who's boss!

I always put a 50p in first - well 40p plus the 10p they leave in - just to make sure that the screen and the mechanism are working properly. I've never complained about a broken machine either, particularly not the ones I've broken. (The Spoons in Slough - that was me!)

[the artist formerly known as DMAC]