Fruit Machine Chat

given that paragon seems to have a dynamic frontscreen (cf. itbox's releases which are static), i had assumed that it reflects the punters' tastes in a given venue.
is this too simplistic?

can anyone shed light on this? also, is the subsequent order on the back pages indicative of throughput? i realise the duplicated titles throw this out but there must be some procedure whereby the cabinet chooses what goes where.
ta.

Istenem wrote:given that paragon seems to have a dynamic frontscreen (cf. itbox's releases which are static), i had assumed that it reflects the punters' tastes in a given venue.
is this too simplistic?

can anyone shed light on this? also, is the subsequent order on the back pages indicative of throughput? i realise the duplicated titles throw this out but there must be some procedure whereby the cabinet chooses what goes where.
ta.

The Games Warehouse team suggested to us on our visit that the order of things does to some extent reflect tastes at that venue, yes. We didn't really go into much more detail than that.

question for Grecian.
why do some gw paragons only have a front screen?
any view would be appreciated!

cool wrote:question for Grecian.
why do some gw paragons only have a front screen?
any view would be appreciated!

A good question, and I must admit I can't remember whether we put this to Games Warehouse or not (maybe Nil Satis can remember). I guess it might be that some pubs are a bit tight and want to pay less for fewer games options? I tend to see this most at out-of-the-way pubs so that could be the answer? I think we were told that the worst Paragon menu of all time (i.e. things like the snooker game, the treasure island game etc.) occurs when a pub has used up all its credits and hasn't bothered buying any more!

I remember thinking on the way back that this was one question we forgot to ask! My best guess is that, as grecian says, the single screen menu is for pubs who are too tight to pay for a larger set of games (although that doesn't explain or excuse the new Wetherspoon's pub in Banbury having that version!). It all seems a bit pointless as no thought seems to have gone into the nine games displayed.

After a little more digging, I can answer the two questions that have been raised here:

Front screen game selection

This is indeed dynamic and it is determined by which games are played the most on each cabinet

Single screen with 9 games

This is an option that machine owners, who in the case of the Paragons are normally independent operators rather than landlords or pub chains, can choose to select, apparently in the belief that reducing the number of games increases their takings (which seems wrong to me unless they are very clever in which games they choose).

xyz

dmac wrote: * why their updates are so few and far between,

I didn't ask them this, but suspect it must be because Paragons aren't networked, and indeed aren't even owned by Games Warehouse (but rather by independent operators as Nil Satis has said), so an update is a matter of sending CDs out to independent operators for them to upload at each venue i.e. it's a much bigger deal than might be the case for, say, ItBox, who can presumably flick a switch and update their linked up cabinets instantly.

dmac wrote: * why decent games like Millionaire and Nuts get taken off but dross remains

I did ask them this, at least in respect of Celebrity WWTBAM, and was told it hadn't been getting enough punter play, which seems a shame to say the least. The same argument was advanced for the proposed ditching of Are You Smarter..., which again is a shame, as both were good games. Perhaps they are too hard for punters.

I put a £10 note in a paragon on saturday and it put the whole £10 into credits. Is this standard practice now?? I expected maybe £5 into credits at the most. But all of it???

Excellent gif, gambogaz!

Heh!! cheers, gave me a good chuckle when I stumbled across it yesterday.

He's in the Sun today with a Pink flower behind his lug hole

Just wanted to say the reason why you see paragons with only 9 games on the screen is because the dongle has ran out of credits and this way gw hope the opperator re-news the dongle to allow the better games to be run.

The paragon is on a pay per play system for us so every game you play removes a credit from the dongle, once ran out we have to purchase a new one to get the better games back, if we dont we can only run them with the 9 poorest taking games.

Hope this helps peeps.

thanks for the informative replies gents.

someone had to ask the obvious follow-up question and it might as well be me:

why do some paragon cabinets have 18 games (without pretending that both backscreens are unique)?

starleisure wrote:Just wanted to say the reason why you see paragons with only 9 games on the screen is because the dongle has ran out of credits and this way gw hope the opperator re-news the dongle to allow the better games to be run.

The paragon is on a pay per play system for us so every game you play removes a credit from the dongle, once ran out we have to purchase a new one to get the better games back, if we dont we can only run them with the 9 poorest taking games.

Hope this helps peeps.

I own a few machines myself, when the dongle runs out the whole machine stops working until you replace it with a new 'i button'. Well with TT's anyway.