a few posts updated

some edits to prior posts you might have missed:

Added 2 more machines to  http://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2021/01/exploring-japanese-arcades-in-this-tweet.html

Added new Home Run Game info and photos to http://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2021/01/exploring-arcade-in-1971-aka-delinquent.html

Added a link to watch the Supaidaman episode from http://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2020/05/exploring-arcade-in-supaidaman-ep-13.html

New photos and data added to http://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2021/01/transitional-electric-pachinko-machines.html

New machines added to http://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2020/12/niche-mechanisms-001-drop-shelf.html

exploring the 1973 Japanese arcades in this tweet...

I saw this tweet that features two old photos of Japanese arcades that had been colourized via AI.

https://twitter.com/onionsoftware/status/1351516597840580609

Let's spot some games!

"American Game"!
we can identify three machines here, can you?

introducing... サーカス (Circus)

It's here and it's awesome.  I'm so happy to say I finally have a Japanese 10¥ machine in my collection!  Yes, it's Circus aka サーカス from Taiyo Sangyo in 1978.

When I got into Smart Ball (スマートボール) I started also discovering the world of 1970s Japanese 10¥ arcade machines.  These were games that you'd find in candy shops and would dispense tokens that could be exchanged for sweets or prizes.

It seems like lots of them did not survive.  Many were operated outdoors at the front of shops.  Sometimes under an awning, sometimes not.  Just lined up front along with vending machines.  Japan's a relatively small island with lots of coastline, so atmospheric conditions in many parts were probably not conducive to long-term preservation.

But what's really special about this one is that it is "New Old Stock".  It seems like a small number of Circus machines (and a game called Home Run Fever) popped up on Yahoo Japan Auctions.  Here was a chance to own a nearly brand-new 10¥ game from the 1970s, probably the only chance I'll ever have to get one in this condition too.

10¥ arcade machines do come up on occasion, but very rarely, they're often in quite poor condition, and they sell for hefty sums of money.

Enough preamble, let's open it up and take a look!

math: Mills slot machine

Who doesn't love finite mathematics?  so practical, so alluring!  And awesome for gambling analysis!

I found this site that sells slot machine reels and eventually found the reels that are on my Mills Hightop.  It was on a picture that had 8 reels, but I was able to find the specific ones for me.

Here is an edited pic, and as you can see they are out of order but I drew numbers along the bottom

excuse the ordering difference

There are 20 symbols on each reel, and here is the number of occurrences:

and here are the odds of each of those coming up on each reel:

here are the outcome scenarios:

When doing this math it's important to note the NET win.  A single cherry pays two coins, but since you spent 1 coin for the spin, your net win is only 1.

The triplets (oranges / plums / bells) can also be finished by a BAR on the third reel, which adds an additional 5% chance for the winning symbol to appear on the third reel.

Interesting to note how bells are plentiful (7 of them) on the 2nd reel and 3rd reel, but on the first reel there is just a single one.

Oranges and plums only have 2 symbols each on the 2nd reel.

the third reel introduces the Lemon symbol, which is just there to mess up your triples.  (you can still win with a lemon in the third reel, if there are cherries too)

3 bars nets you a 20 coin payout plus the jackpot.  I'm told the jackpot is traditionally loaded with 80 coins, making the full payout 100.

So what is that final # in the bottom right?  That is the Expected Value of your spin.
Play 1 coin, expected to lose 0.1635 coins.  
The machine is expected to pay out 0.8365, or 83.65% of the input value.

This is an important number because the lower it gets, the less "exciting" the machine is for the player.  It just becomes a place to dump your money.  If it's too high, it cuts into the operator's profit.

These days casinos control this expected result digitally.  You can see it easily if you get a pachislo machine, do the reset, and you can change the odds there to be even more generous.  But that's boring.  I find it really interesting on mechanical machines though because they had to have this math in mind during the design.

The reels themselves can be changed!  It's not a matter of just putting on a new sticker though, as the reel has to have the physical holes that align with the symbols.  Here is an example of someone physically altering a reel to reduce the odds and increase the profit.

What happens if the jackpot hopper is empty?  If we reduce the Jackpot payout from 100 to 20 (the internal payout online) then the expected losings go from 0.1635/coin to 0.2035.
The expected payout goes from 83.65% to 79.65%

introducing... a 1948 Mills High-top slot machine

New arrival!   a Mills high-top slot machine from around 1940

If you appreciate purely mechanical devices, you absolutely need to get a mechanical slot machine.  What a wonderous piece of engineering.

exploring the arcade in 東京流れ者 aka Tōkyō nagaremono aka Tokyo Drifter (1966)

 OK, a quick one...

3 different promo posters/covers for 東京流れ者 / Tokyo Drifter (1966)

shall we enter?

exploring the arcade in Android Kaikader (1972)

It's Kaikader time!    Another clip passed my way by James at Pinballspotting.  Jump to 6:54 in the clip for the arcade.  This episode came out July 29, 1972 and is called 呪いオレンジアントの死の挑戦, aka Noroi Orenji Anto no Shino Chōsen, aka The Accursed Orange Ant's Deadly Challenge.

"hey let's go into this awesome arcade!"

Japanese reggae: Boogie Man doing Pachinco Man!

Boogie Man ‎– Pachinco★Man

and oh shit someone did a jungle remix!

https://soundcloud.com/dove6/king-of-the-pachinco-man

but of course since he's a Japanese reggae performer, requisite to post this:

exploring the arcade in ずべ公番長 ざんげの値打もない (1971) aka Delinquent Girl Boss: Worthless to Confess aka Delinquent Girl Boss: Unworthy of Penance

 I was sent this one along by James at Pinballspotting.  I had some ideas of the machines, but had to send my query to the incredible nazox2016 for assistance here.

promotional poster for ずべ公番長 ざんげの値打もない
the 4th of the "Delinquent Girl Boss" movies
released 1971

exploring the arcade in The Women In His Life (1933)

Lots of people have seen this clip from The Women In His Life (1933) bounce around,  as it's heralded as the first movie appearance of a pinball machine, so check it here:

It's on screen for less than a minute, and it's just one machine, so maybe this isn't much of an "Arcade Exploration", but it's still an arcade that needs to be explored.

transitional electric pachinko machines

This page is a work-in-progress in hopes to document the late-70s transitional electric pachinko machines.

With the start of the 1970s, arcade machines took their first baby steps towards solid-state technology that would eventually lead to the videogame revolution.  Pong machines came from numerous manufacturers in the early 70s.  EM arcade machines started including sound board and limited circuits.   Pinball manufacturers slowly started including solid-state circuity:  first for sound effects, and eventually for scoring and game rules.

Pachinko felt the same pressure, and the 70s gave us a fascinating period of incorporating electricity in to machines.  Previously machines would only have electricity for lights:  one for jackpot payout, and one to indicate low balls in the upper tray.

There were a few super quirky innovations, like pachinko machines with tiny TV sets in the center so players could watch while playing, but those were not pervasive.

My favourite era of pachinko ended when electric ball shooters became the norm.  And once Sankyo released Fever in 1980, things changed forever for pachinko, a revolution that would lead to the digipachi (deijipachi / デジパチ) dominance of pachinko we have now.

This page will NOT be including arrangeballs, challengeballs, pachinko baseball, pachinko mahjong, and other early solid-state pachinko variants.  This is just machines that "play + pay" like normal pachinko machines.

I will put them in chronological order as we verify their year.  If we don't know the year, they go to the end.  When possible I will link videos.  Thank you to everyone who has helped with this, and/or has unwittingly had their posts/images used as a resource.