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ATARI’ Visioneering presents a new family of profit playmates.
new DIG DUG™ and KANGA- ROO™ the best they can be— two of this year’s hottest fan- tasy hits!
Dig in for Knockout profits. Talk to your ATARI distributor now or contact us for referral at ATARI Inc., 790 Sycamore Dr., P.O. Box 906, Milpitas CA 95035. Also ask him about the free eye-catching promotional
materials available
for DIG DUG and KANGAROO—To
help your profits | be the best they
cane ATARI
Dig Dug™ Pooka™ Fygar™ Mother and Baby Kangaroo, the monkeys and our own en- gineering and manufacturing teams are all playing your game. To win!
ATARI Visioneering has cre- ated another new dimension of excitement—games that come alive with wild and crazy video playmates. Magi- cal little people who leap from the screen to enchant players of every age and skill.
The engineering, marketing and manufacturing expertise that has made ATARI unique in the world is also making
ys a
sy
© A Warner Communications Company
Atari, the first decade. »< The creation of an industry.
Dig Dug is designed and engineered by Namco, LTD. Manufactured under license by Atari, Inc © 1982 Atari Inc. All rights reserved. Kangaroo is manufactured under license from Sun Electronics Corporation.
=e e ® ee ® 2 e242 2228
Publisher and Editor: Ralph C. Lally Il
Editorial Director: David Pierson Managing Editor: Laura R. Braddock Associate Editor:
Mike Shaw
Administrative Assistant: Valerie Cognevich Art Director: Katey Schwark Circulation Manager: Renee’ C. Pierson Typographer: Jo Ann Anthony Graphics: Jeanne Woods Technical Writers: Randy Fromm Frank Seninsky Correspondents: Roger C. Sharpe Mary Claire Blakeman Charles C. Ross Mike Bucki Paul Thiele Bill Kurtz Dick Welu Tony Bado Michael Mendelsohn Bill Brohaugh Classified Advertising: Valerie Cognevich Advertising Manager: David Pierson lustrator: Bob Giuffria European Representative: Esmay Leslie
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982. Volume 8, No. 15. Copyright 1982 by Skybird Publishing Company. Play Meter (ISSN 0162-1343) is published twice monthly on the 1st and 15th of the month. Publishing offices: 508 Live Oak St., Metairie, La. 70005; Mailing address: P.O. Box 24170, New Orleans 70184, U.S.A.; phone: 504/838-8025. For subscriptions: 504/837-7987. Subscription rates: U.S. and Canada—$50; foreign: $150, air mail only. Advertising rates are available on request. No part of this magazine may be reproduced without expressed permission. The editors are not responsible for unsolicited manuscripts. Second- class postage paid at Metairie, La. 70002 and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send Form 3579 to PLAY METER, P.O. Box 24170, New Orleans, La. 70184.
European Office: PLAY METER Promotions, ““‘Harescombe’”’ Watford Road, Northwood Middx. England, Northwood 29244.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
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Volume 8, Number 15/August 1, 1982
PLAY METER
The Twice Monthly Publication for the Coin Operated Entertainment Industry
FEATURES
BPA Circulation Audit applied for
37
Educating Technicians Mike Shaw gives you an update on schools that teach amusement games service people how to deal with their equipment.
49
New Direction Cinematronics recently did something unusual—the manufacturing firm released not one, but two games at the same time. Why the philosophy change?
51
On the Battlefield The copyright wars continue in England and Japan. Roger Pearson takes an in-depth look at the fight in England, and Mike Shaw gives an update on the skirmish in Japan.
i ,
Coinman Interview Service problems, gray area machines, and speed-up kits are some topics Frank Seninsky covers as this issue’s Coinman. As president of Alpha-Omega Amusements Inc., Seninsky talks from experience.
76
Successful Soldering Randy Fromm tells you just about everything you need to know about soldering including types of equipment to use and soldering techniques.
DEPARTMENTS
4 Up Front
Letters to the Editor
10 Puzzle Answer
12 Equipment Poll
15 News
71 Our ’Cades 72 Frank’s Cranks
84 Technical Topics
89 New Products
92 Aijids to the Trade
94 Classified
110 Call the Operator
UP FRONT
A veteran operator lamented the fact that at one time in this industry all you needed to fix a broken machine was a screwdriver and a pair of plyers. That may be a bit of an understatement, but, to a large degree, he was right. In the “old days,” things were almost that simple. Today, a service technician’s repertoire of remedies runs the gambit from logic probe to oscilloscope. The computer age has revolu-
tionized this industry creating a whole new world of
service problems and a need for skilled technicians to solve them.
When digital technology first made its impact on this industry, there was a great deal of concern over the serviceman’s ability to make the leap from elec- tromechanical to digital dexterity. This was an important concern and proved to be a determining factor in the growth rate of the industry. Looking back, | think it can safely be said that the transition from an old technology to a new technology at the operator level was not only very successful but also took less time to accomplish than most had antici- pated. And the ones to thank for all this are the servicemen themselves. In fact, the service technicians of today are the unsung heroes of the computer revolution that took this industry by storm not so many years ago. Had it not been for them, the indus- try would never have come so far so fast.
While others may tend to overlook the vital role service plays in this industry, we have always main- tained that service is a cornerstone of every smooth and efficient operation. That’s why Play Meter makes
every effort to provide our readers with as much technical information as possible. A game may be the season’s best, but if it doesn’t work, it’s no better than the worst. In this business, downtime is lost revenue. | hate to think of the millions of dollars this industry loses every year because of downtime. If we can help operators beef up their service programs and decrease their downtime, perhaps we can get some, if not all, of those lost millions into their pockets.
This, our annual “Service Issue,” is dedicated to all the technicians throughout the entire industry. Technology itself is as volatile as the industry it revolutionized. And you can be sure that the tech- nology of the future will be quite different from today’s. When that day comes, you can rest assured that our technicians will be ready and willing to meet the challenge of another revolution. Thanks to their dedication and determination, the industry has been able to handle its growing pains and has come a long way over a short period of time.
To a great extent, the future of this industry rests in the hands of today’s technicians; and because of them, the future may not be as far off as we think.
Ce
Ralph C. Lally I Editor and Publisher
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
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We’re Playing Your Song.
From the electronic wizards at MARANTZ comes the MARANTZ Ragtime Piano, an exciting, profitable addition to coin-operated entertainment. It’s a self-playing piano with a patented computer mechanism that uses cassette tapes to control the piano keys and pedals, producing a vivid, “live” performance. Gone are the limited selections, brief playing time and mechanical problems of old-time piano roll players.
That’s Entertainment!
The Ragtime Piano means music and style that will never go out of date. It eliminates the trouble and expense of replacing worn piano rolls or changing records on a juke box. The Ragtime Piano’s fine traditional styling fits any decor, and with the push of a
eliminates the problems of keeping up with top ten hits. Easy to Service Modular electronics make the Ragtime Piano easy to maintain and unlike other automatic pianos, tuning and service is a snap. And with MARANTZ, technical expertise is never further than your phone.
COMING A unique video accessory that lets your
SOON!
hidden button, it’ll even play Happy Birthday! Plexiglass panels allow customers to watch the mechanism and keys in action, and that’s adding solid entertainment value.
Easy to Place
The Ragtime Piano is a welcome replacement for a juke box in many clubs, restaurants and lounges, and will open doors that reject juke boxes. It can even perform as an ordinary piano; in fact, if a club already has a piano, you can install our MARANTZ mechanism and convert it easily into a profitable, coin-operated piano. And it
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
guests sing along with the Ragtime Piano
High Return
The Ragtime Piano promises maximum return on your investment at a substantially lower price than you'd pay for an old-fashioned player piano. If you recognize the music of profits, give us a call toll free at 1-800-438-7023. Distributorships available. As always, MARANTZ is playing your song: the Jingle of Silver.
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Marantz Piano Co. ¢ Morganton, N.C. 28655 ¢ (704) 437-7135
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LEADERS SERVING OPERATORS IN THE INDUSTRY FOR NEW & USED EQUIPMENT.
FULL LINE DISTRIBUTORS: SALES e SERVICE e PARTS
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Helps in all areas of game selection, room decor and management & technical training.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
Letters to the editor...
Always the individual
How original! I counted 172 members in the law firm of Jenner & Block—the PR firm retained by AMOA. How prestigious!
To solve our ASCAP problem, the fact sheet asks of us, “Who do you know in Congress?”—exactly what we’ve been saying and doing all along. We didn’t need a 172-member law firm to tell us that. As they say, the more things change, the more they remain the same.
It was always the individual. The last time the ACAP measure was tabled, it was largely due to the efforts of Fred Collins and Garland B. Garrett. The time before, it was Bill Cannon, and if you read the cover of Billboard in 1963, it was principally myself. So it remains, that you yourself are still your own best goodwill ambassador— no matter who you hire.
Millie McCarthy
President
New York State Coin Machine Association Inc.
Hurleyville, New York
Home versions
After paying $3,400 for my new Turbo and $2,650 for my Donkey Kong, I’m standing in one of my locations reading a game magazine on the shelf offering not only Turbo and Donkey Kong on home video game versions, but Zaxxon, Venture, Spectar, Phoenix, and a game that’s just been released, Tron, not to mention scores more.
What’s going on? Can’t these manufac- turers wait till I finish paying for these games at least, before they release them for home versions?
I’d like to know how the operators of 1982 are coping with increased game prices, as well as higher equipment output from the major manufacturers as well as the smaller manufacturers, and don't
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
forget the bootleggers, along with high interest rates, location bonuses, more com- petition from other operators, and gener- ally lower collections.
Many operators blame the industry problem on the manufacturers, and home games are just part of it. The trade-in market on good used equipment no longer exists as we knew it. Games are almost worthless after a year. That’s if you were lucky.
Operators today can’t afford to buy any- thing but what they think will be a hit, and understandably so. Manufacturers, through their higher output of equipment, have taken an open market and have come close to saturation in just two years. Where
if equipment were released with better timing, the market would be there longer and used equipment would have value.
The major manufacturers have an obli- gation, to the future of this industry, and not the home market. It was our money that made these manufacturers flourish, and operators should not be “sold out” for the home market.
For just as companies are made, they can be put under. Operators cannot continue to buy equipment for $3,000 each, and turn it over in six months and stay in business.
The manufacturers have done many good things for the advancement of the industry as well. Innovations made make
Audio Visual Amusements
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For further information, call Pete Entringer (collect)
N.A.T.O. Defense
is now on display at
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Distributing Co. For 31 years The Dependable Supplier to the Coin Machine Industry, with Quality Parts and Supplies at the Lowest Possible Prices. For. . .
e VIDEO ...¢ INTEGRATED CIRCUITS ... e PHONOGRAPH e AMUSEMENT GAMES ... e SOCCER & POOL TABLES e ELECTRONIC SUPPLIES . ..e VENDING MACHINES
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today’s game better money-makers than ever before, but rising costs are higher than rising collections.
Everyone must work together as one to make this industry better for operators, manufacturers, and distributors, and the time to do it is now. Because if we don't, a few issues from now, some of you may no longer be in the business at all.
Jack Guarnieri Brooklyn, New York
Blue sky artists
Our company would like to compliment you on the article you wrote inthe January issue of Play Meter magazine. Regarding marketing technics of Leisure Time, Quorum, Potomic Games, and other similar type operations. We found it very informative.
Our employees have spent days passing out articles, like yours, at these expos. We too feel obligated to the public by inform- ing them of the irreputability and mis- representation of profits.
Another successful method which retards the production of these “Blue Sky Artists” is placing ads in local newspapers. I have enclosed a copy of Business Oppor- tunities from the January 24th issue of the Rocky Mountain News. Our response has been gratifying.
I hope that other operators and distrib- utors will take the time to invest in ads which discourage business practices such as these.
We again compliment you on your well written article.
Tim Prize
President
Vending Alternatives, Inc. Wheat Ridge, Colorado
Ed. Note: Here is the ad from the Rocky Mountain News:
SCAM II
The cost of a phone call may Save you thousands. Before you get caught inthe VIDEO SCAM with a fast talking non-professional working out of his home, car, hotel, or arcade. Call with questions you have, the answers are free.
Something on your mind you want to vent? Got a gripe? Full of praise? Have a question? If you have comments on the coin operated entertainment industry, write to Play Meter. Our “Letters to the Editor” columns are dedicated to you, the operator/reader.
All letters must be signed; if requested, only initials will be used or the name withheld from print. Please include return address (although, for the sake of your privacy, addresses will not be printed.) All letters subject to standard editing. Be concise.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
PP-400
Designed for one purpose.
To duplicate...inexpensively.
The Kurz-Kasch PP-400 simplifies duplication. Just insert a master ROM, PROM, or EROM, a blank EPROM, flip the power switch to “on” and push the Program button. Operation is that simple.
Very little technical background is needed to use this unit efficiently and easily. There is no editing, interfacing, programming or verification neces- sary. It will duplicate the majority of 24 or 28 pin ROMS, PROMS, or EPROMs into most 24 or 28 pin EPROMSs via personality modules. The dupli- cation of multi-power devices such as the 2708 and TMS27XxX series is no problem with the PP- 400. It is fully self-contained, with all regulated power supplies.
Because the PP-400 comes from Kurz-Kasch, its capabilities, performance, and low cost will come as no surprise.
Get full details. Call Kurz-Kasch, Inc. (513) 299-0990.
QT
Electronics Division
PUZZLE ANSWERS
The pin heard ‘round the world
(Play Meter, July 15, p. 44)
Recently, a speech was made by someone who was to become a major pinball spokesperson. That speech was literally heard ‘round the world. To learn exactly what was said in that speech, complete the names of the following coin-op games, then use the numbers below your answers to insert the appropriate letters into the spaces below to find out the contents of the speech and the people who translated the speech into English
for us.
Answers
|. Gottlieb’s | 1 Mm © Line pingame 32 43 36 2
Nm
Stern’s Sting | 4 JY pingame 24 7 33
3. Midway’s Wizard of W © © video 42 4 40
4. Bally’s Nip- eit pingame
46 2]
5. Williams’s Black © " ' pingame 34 17 41
6. Game-A-Tron’s Space B YU 8 2 € FT video
18 35 3 223727
7. Gottlieb’s M a | 5 God of War pingame 1 26 & 49
VIDEO ARGADE OWNERS:
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CREATIVE COMPETITION IS THE ANSWER!
Let The Video Visions Company provide you with a high quality, custom-made TV com- mercial for a fraction of comparative commercial costs. Our professional
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arcade and save you up to $1000
on standard production costs!
Public recognition gives your
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needed in todays market:
Call us for more details
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and revenue today!
10
8. Midway's 2 ™ & & @ Race video 16 48 10 25 11
9. Stern’s Big G 4 M € pingame 30 20 13 29
10. An object important on the backglass of Gottlieb’s
Pink Panther: G ¢€ m 6 19 28
11. Bally's H © t Doggin’ pingame 38 31 12
12. Midway’s Bleue ghark video
13. Gottlieb’s R © y a | Plush pingame
The Speech
Me Gorgar, Beat me 1 2 3435678 SNOT 3:14 You beat Gorgar
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Me g 0 you Me hurt
28 29 303132 33.34 35 3637 =. 338 39 40 41
42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49
VIDEO VISIONS 9310 Earhart Rd.
Ann Arbor, MI. 48105 (313) 761-7954
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
Get a great return from a low invest- ment with Dynamo’s new Pro-Bilt
Table, the best deal yet for the coin-operated industry.
Reflecting the design improvements suggested by operators and players, Dynamo’s new low-cost, low-maintenance table excites players and returns the goal of investors — a profit.
Dynamo built this table for the opera- tors. It’s durable. It’s secure. And it returns a profit at the drop of a ball.
With over 12 years experience in producing high quality foosball tables, Dynamo joins the top foosball players in an exciting new national promotion.
Call Dynamo today to find out how you can get in on this great return of
foosball.
Dynamo Corporation
1805 South Great Southwest Parkway Grand Prairie, Texas 75051 214-641-4286 1-800-527-6054 Telex 732432
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The following are rankings of the top videos and top pinballs making above average weekly gross collections nationwide. The dollar amounts appearing are the average weekly grosses as reported to Play Meter magazine throughits regular national operator survey. Amounts are heavily weighted by averages reported from arcade locations; street locations are generally lower. Games with less than adequate responses (less than fifty percent) but with above average collections are so noted. Games not appearing on the poll either (1) did not generate over a ten percent response rate to provide an adequate representative sampling or (2) did not register weekly gross collections above the national average.
TOP VIDEOS TOP PINBALLS
Fourteen of 23 videos (61%) with a response rate Six of 11 pinballs (55%) with a response rate over ten percent have above average earnings. over ten percent have above average earnings.
Aug. 1 July 15 July 1 Aug. 1 July 15 July 1 National video average $184 $179 National pinball average $114 $128 $113
. Zaxxon/Gremlin $253 $265 * 1. Caveman/Gottlieb $194 $190 . Robotron/Williams $237 $231 * 2. Devil’s Dare/Gottlieb $132 $150 Ms. Pac-Man/Midway .... $243 $235 3. Mr. & Mrs. Pac-Man/Bally. $129 $161 $161 Dig Dug/Atari $243 $250 4. Centaur/Bally $120 _ — Turbo/Gremlin , $231 $230 5. Haunted House/Gottlieb .. $120 $128 $125 Donkey Kong/Nintendo .. $215 $226
. Stargate/Williams $204 $197
. Galaga/Midway $210 $186 ©
. Pac-Man/Midway $193 $194
WCONAAAWNHH
* Conditionally Rated— Weekly average based on less than 50% response rate
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_ Provisionally Rated Pinballs and Videos
(Above average earning games, with a response rate between 10—25%)
VIDEOS PINBALLS
Provisional Ratings Aug.1 July15 July 1 Provisional Ratings Aug.1 July15 July 1 Looping/Venture Line $217 $217 Orbitor 1/Stern $134 $139 $180 Frenzy/Stern a zal
$250 — The Pit/Centuri $196 $206 Alpine Ski/Taito $211 $220
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Operator/ readers who would like to join the ever-growing numbers of readers participating currently in the survey, write: Play Meter, Equipment Poll, P. ©. Box 24170, New Orleans 70184.
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By Mike Shaw
ZAXXON SOARS ON TV e GRAY IS OK IN PA ¢ DRAW POKER LOSES IN NEW YORK ¢ MIDWAY SUES ELCON STATEWIDE TAX SOUGHT e KANSAS CITY OPERATORS UNITE © OPS TRY TO EVOKE STATUTES @ NEW YORK, NEW YORK e S&H DENIES SALE TALKS e ARCADE ARTHRITIS ¢ VALLEY CUES UP e NINTENDO TO BUILD IN SEATTLE «© BUSCH POOL LEAGUE WINNERS e ADMA MEETING PRODUCES CHANGES ° TUNI IMPROVES WARRANTY ¢ VIDEOS ON THE RISE ¢ DOCTOR RATES RAGE e YOUTH RESEARCHER BACKS VIDEOS
ZAXXON SOARS ON TV
Sega’s Zaxxon was featured in 30- second television commercials beginning June 22 for two weeks in the Los Angeles area.
Calling the commercials a “revol- utionary marketing experiment,” Sega Chairman Dave Rosen said the TV spots were probably the first coin-operated video game commercials based on a specific model.
The commercials featured Zaxxon’s game play and its number one ranking based on recent Play Meter and Re Play surveys. “...this will not be an ordinary commercial, but rather one that is somewhat spectacular in that it includes computer graphics,” Rosen said in a letter to industry personnel in the Los Angeles/San Diego area announcing the Zaxxon TV commercial.
“We at Sega are very excited regarding this commercial, and we hope Sega’s Zaxxon TV commercial marks the beginning of an on-going program which will, among other factors, enhance the image of the industry of which we are members,” he continued.
GRAY IS OK IN PA
“Gray area” games are not so gray in Pennsylvania. There, courts have ruled that an Electro-Sport video Draw Poker game is not per se a gambling device under Pennsylvania law.
Initially, law officials seized the game from a bar in suburban Pittsburg. Officers did so assuming that the game was a violation of state law against gambling devices. But when the game’s owner
Sega/Gremlin’s TV announcements highlighted Zaxxon's new screen display with detail, color, and 3-dimensional realism. Here a player craft approaches an energized laser barrier.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
obstacles.
begged the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County to return his Draw Poker game, Judge Robert E. Dower did so based on his determination that the game is not a gambling device under Pennsylvania law.
Kemal Mericli, an assistant district attorney, said the court judged that the machine required an amount of skill that would classify it as a non-gambling device.
“It requires the amount of skill required for poker,” Mericli reported on the court’s ruling.
Mericli and the district attorney’s office made an effort to get the lower court decision reversed in the state’s Superior Court, but to no avail.
“The position of the district attorney is that the game is a gambling device because there is no significant amount of skill required to play the game and because of the mechanical adjustments to the machine.”
A “dip switch,” a “knock off” meter, and certain coin adjustments are indications to the district attorney’s office that the game
Players score points by maneuvering the fighter plane and firing on enemy missiles, gun emplacements, and other player
15
is used for gambling and that payouts are issued to successful players.
“The amount of skill required to play the game,” said Mericli, “is comparable to the kinds of things kindergarten children do when they circle pictures on the back of their readers.”
The Superior Court’s decision to uphold the lower court’s ruling has been appealed to the state’s Supreme Court, but there has been no information released as yet as to whether or not that court will consider the appeal. bd
DRAW POKER LOSES IN NEW YORK
Electronic Draw Poker games have been banned from Niagara County, New York. In a lower level court decision for the western district of the state of New York, the Sircoma (now International Games Technology) Draw Poker game was declared an illegal gambling device, and its destruction was ordered.
Five of the Sircoma games were declared contraband and destroyed.
In referring to the decision, First Assis- tant District Attorney Stephen Shierling said that his office acted to keep the games out of Niagara County for fear that they were backed by organized crime.
The decision against the Draw Poker
machines was the result of consideration of New York state law, other states’ analog- ous laws, and federal laws, Shierling said.
“The publicity was as effective as the ruling,” Shierling reported. He said that when attorneys for Sircoma, who owned and were leasing the offending pieces, became aware of the publicity surrounding the destruction of the games, they decided not to attempt an appeal to the decision of Niagara County Judge Charles J. Hannigan.
Shierling opined that Sircoma had placed
‘the machines to test legal authorities’
reaction to them in hopes that the games could be installed throughout the state in connection with the state lottery system. Although owners of the taverns where the five machines were seized were not pro- secuted, the district attorney’s office issued directives to law enforcement agencies throughout the county to “seize any such machines and arrest persons who maintain them.” e
MIDWAY SUES ELCON
Midway Manufacturing has succeeded in enjoining Elcon Industries from using Pac- Man and other Midway printed circuit boards in its cabinets.
Niagara County District Attorney Peter Broderick wields a sledge hammer to destroy one of five video poker games declared illegal and ordered destroyed in
Niagara Falls.
The city’s police superintendent, Anthony Fera, admires
Broderick’s handiwork and waits his turn with the sledge.
16
In a decision rendered by the U.S. Dis- trict Court in Detroit, Elconand its parent, Micropin, were ordered to stop marketing games that utilize Pac-Man or Galaxian boards.
They were also ordered to stop selling Piranha videos. Piranha is a Universal USA game that the company produces under a separate agreement with Midway. It, too, is considered a derivative of Pac- Man by Midway.
A distraught Andre Dubel of Elcon told Play Meter that he stopped selling Pac- Man and Galaxian games several months ago when Midway announced its intention to prosecute people marketing unlicensed versions of its games. He said he was warned against selling games that con- tained Midway boards at the Operator’s Amusement Expo in March 1981 in New Orleans and again at a later related industry show in Chicago.
“We built ‘knock-offs’ like Galaxian and Pac Man,” admitted Dubel, “like hundreds of others were doing, but we stopped about a year ago.”
The injunction is in force while Midway and Elcon try to hammer out a deal that would compensate Midway for games sold by Elcon. That deal, according to Dubel, currently is set at $500 per Pac-Man and Galaxian sold and $200 per Piranha. Dubel said these figures would apply to about 80 Pac-Man and Galaxian games and about 50 Piranha games.
Dubel said that Williams Electronics has asked Elcon to pay $700 for each May- Day it has sold. May-Day reportedly infringes on Defender. Additionally, Elcon has sold several Crazy Kong games and some have been seized from their owners by Nintendo of America as infringements of Donkey Kong. e
STATEWIDE TAX SOUGHT
Rep. Carl Boyes of Erie has introduced legislation into the Pennsylvania House of Representatives that would eliminate the power of localities to tax amusement operators. House Bill 2206 would empower the state to set a fee, and then channel the monies back to local com- munities.
The newly formed Pennsylvania Amuse- ment and Music Machine Association supports the measure which would replace the frenzied and unequal ways amusement operators are currently taxed throughout the state.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
The city of Etna, Pennsylvania, recently passed an ordinance to license arcade (five games or more) operators at $5,000 per year. This fee will be inaddition to existing fees of $250 per video.
‘‘Amusement taxes and licensing permits, laws, and proposals vary from $25 per machine to a 10 percent tax on gross receipts,” said Herb Lottier of the asso- ciation. “Under the current bill, the state wants $100 per machine, but our goal is to reduce that figure.”
The legislature’s $100 figure was devised from Rep. Boyes’s estimate of 75,000 machines in use in the state, but Lottier thinks there is probably about 200,000 coin-operated amusement pieces in Pennsylvania. The association’s initial effort is to make an accurate count of
WE HAVE COME FOR YOUR TAX PAYMENT OR YOU.
machines, and lessen the tax burden per piece.
The bill is popular in its essence, reported Lottier. Indeed, the main argu- ment seems to be over content.
“Some kind of bill is necessary,” asserted Lotter:
But not everyone agrees. Under the pro- posed bill, communities who have taxes or fees in place would be reimbursed by the state for those amounts. But communities that did not have fees imposed before Jan. 1, 1982 might be left high and dry. At least, they would have no claim to a specific amount of the state collection.
In Castle Shannon, a suburban Pitts- burg borough, Mayor James Milcarek has voiced his opposition against the bill.
“] think it’s a futile effort by the vending companies to get people like me off their backs,” he said as he labeled an ordinance to raise a video/ pinball fee from $100 per year to $200 per year “fastastic.”
Under HB 2206, 25 percent of taxes collected from the amusement industry would go to support programs for Penn- sylvania’s handicapped citizens.
“As a result of that provision,” said Lottier, “we have additional support from other lobbying groups.”
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
The bill will be discussed throughout the state in a set of local hearings chaired by the bill’s author. Passage of some form of HB 2206 is expected early in 1983. e
KANSAS CITY OPERATORS UNITE
The threat of a $100 tax on videos has created a major headache for operators in Kansas City, Missouri, and has forced them to band together to fight the debili- tating legislation.
The proposed fee would be an increase of $85 over the current $15 fee locations pay. Though locations pay the fees, opera- tors split the costs as they do the revenues from the games. Additionally, the county assesses a $5 charge per game.
Tom Bengimina of B&G Amusement and Vending has taken charge of the new Kansas City Area Operators Association. The organization’s first meeting was attended by 25 of the 30 operators in the city. These operators then showed up in force at a city council meeting to explain their plight and offer alternative measures.
“They’re making a pile of money,” John M. Urie, city finance director, said of the operators’ businesses. “We ought to be able to get some of it.”
Councilman Emanuel Cleaver, pro- posed that the increased tax revenue could help assuage a hard-pressed city budget and estimated the number of machines on location in the city to be about 20,000.
Bengimina said the Cleaver estimate is absurd.
“He did not poll any operators or any distributors to get his figures,” Bengimina said. He contends there are about 6,000 games on location throughout the city.
“I wish we had never bought the first video game,” Bengimina said. He said that all the publicity surrounding Pac-Man and other videos has led city officials to believe that profits are excessive for operators. Politicians don’t take into account “the machines you buy every month that don’t make enough to pay their freight, or the fact that distributors don’t take trade-ins anymore,” Bengimina said.
The Kansas City Area Operators Asso-
Roger Sharpe’s column, Critic’s Corner, will be back in the next issue of Play Meter. He’s covering the Con- sumer Electronic Show in Chicago for Play Meter.
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ciation’s efforts are meeting with success, Bengimina said. The council is leaning toward a lower fee, he said, admitting that some increase would be acceptable to operators, since $15 has been the annual rate since the city first licensed coin-ops.
“We must give the devil his due,” Bengimina said.
The operators believe a fee of $25 to $30 would be appropriate and feel the city will agree and the county will then raise its charge from $5 to $10. e
OPS TRY TO EVOKE STATUTES
Community officials throughout the U.S. have mulled over the problem of how to provide something to do for local youths. While American society provides a multi- tude of entertainment availabilities for adults, very little has been done for school- age youths.
Until the evolution of the neighborhood arcade, that is.
And now that community Officials’ questions have been answered by the amusement operators of America, many authorities are not so sure they wanted an answer at all.
Such is the position of Mayor Nicholas Corbiscello of Fort Lee, New Jersey. He and his council mates have imposed a moratorium on games in his borough. He fears the effect an arcade might have on “children and traffic.”
But a former country health official and his company, Cosmic Vending, are chal- lenging the mayor’s moratorium. Richard Censullo and his partners, who wish to open a “coin-op electronic game family fun center” in Fort Lee, are also challenging the town’s ordinance that allows but two games per establishment.
Cosmic will argue that the moratorium is a violation of federal anti-trust legis- lation, and that the city has no right to impose such a moratorium. A Cosmic victory could have national implications if federal law is evoked.
However, Cosmic Vending will have to fight an uphill battle. Its suit is filed in Bergen County Superior Court, and on June 7 there, Judge Harvey Smith ruled that Steven Steinberg was not entitled to licenses for 40 video games in a proposed arcade in Cliffside Park because a borough ordinance limits licenses to three per establishment. e
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
NEW YORK, NEW YORK
A New York City Supreme Court justice ruled that the city can use zoning laws to close 27 video game parlors. Consecutively, Justice Thomas Galligan ruled that the city could not use the laws to shut down peep shows because they are protected by the U.S. Constitution.
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The judge issued an opinion that films, whether in theaters or in coin-op booths, are clearly covered by the First Amend- ment but video games are not.
The decision came June 15 as the culmination of a yearlong suit brought by the city against operators of 50 sex shows and video game parlors. The city sought a halt to operations in certain neighbor- hoods, contending the businesses violated zoning laws and caused traffic, parking, and crowd problems.
“This is a great town,” said Sheldon Camhy, attorney for two video game arcades. “The children will be free to look at dirty pictures but not to play Pac-Man.
S&H DENIES SALE TALKS
S&H Distributing President Mrs. J. W. Hughes denies any attempt at a purchase arrangement for her company by Morgan’s Restaurants.
“I never talked with anyone from
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Morgan’s Restaurants,” Mrs. Hughes said in response to a Play Meter July | news story.
Although an executive of the company originally confirmed Morgan’s buy-out attempts, Hughes flatly denied any such meetings or conversations ever took place. She said that at the time the Morgan’s buy- out story was reported, another company was making overtures to S&H. But the offers never came to fruition, and she re- emphasized, were not from Morgan's. ®
ARCADE ARTHRITIS
Emory University School of Medicine rheumatologists have released a study contending that millions of habitual video game players may come down with “arcade arthritis.”
The study, conducted by the Atlanta school’s rheumatologists and released at a recent meeting of the Pan-American Con- of Rheumatology, said that 65
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percent of players polled in the survey had temporary arthritic conditions or other noticeable physical complaints.
“The rapid repetition of motion in handling the controls is causing the injuries, said Dr. Gary Mayerson, chief investigator of the study and a senior fellow in rheumatology and immunology at Emory.
Two temporary arthritic conditions were noted in the study, arthralgia and ten- donitis. Arthralgia results in neuralgic pain in the fingers, wrists, palms, and arms. ‘Tendonitis brings about an acute inflam- mation and redness in affected areas. The study of 142 arcade patrons also discovered blisters and callouses on the hands of players.
Myerson stressed that the symptoms were only temporary, usually disappearing within 24 hours after playing. it was
reported by the Los Angeles Times. However, he noted, his findings are only preliminary, and he plans to continue extensive study to determine if any permanent arthritic problems might be caused by playing the games.
Myerson is reportedly a video game enthusiast himself and offered that manu- facturers could help reduce arthritic pro- blems and related minor injuries by using softer plastic and by designing hand con- trols with a more natural wrist position.e
VALLEY CUES UP
A new service to provide cue buyers with fast response to orders has been inaugu- rated by The Valley Company, Bay City, Michigan, with cue manufacturing facili- ties in Shakopee, Minnesota. By dialing 1-800-248-CUES toll free, the buyer can order any of the Valley one- and two-piece cues. That order will usually be shipped within 48 hours.
“When a cue buyer needs his order, he
heeds it fast,” said Valley’s president,
Charles P. Milhem. “We've always prided ourselves on both the quality of our pro- ducts and the service we provide,” he continued, “and this new hot line is one more way that says Valley cares about our customers.”
An inside sales person has been assigned to expedite orders coming in on the 1-800- 248-CUES line. Customers are instructed to ask for Melody who will process the
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NINTENDO TO BUILD IN SEATTLE
Nintendo of America has purchased a parcel of land in Redmond, Washington, where it hopes to get the assistance of the City Council to build its new manufac- turing facility.
Nintendo will pay $4.3 million for 13.4
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BUSCH POOL Be
NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP
The members of the 1982 Busch Pool League National Championship’s winning team happily display their first place prize, a check for $10,000. The six-member Jimmy's Bar team of Sandusky, Ohio, was one of 16 teams that competed at the 1982 Busch Pool League National Championships held recently in St. Louis, Missouri. Team members are Dave Mougey, Tony Mougey, Doug Bourque, captain, Dave Ives, Bill Wilder, and Del Williams.
Michael Palmer, marketing manager for the Busch Brand, Anheuser-Busch Inc., presents Doug Bourque, the captain of the 1982 Busch Pool League National Championship’s winning team with the first place prize check for $10,000. Bourque is the captain of the Jimmy’s Bar team.
acres of land on the southwest corner of the intersection of Northeast S5Ist Street and Highway 520, east of 148th Avenue North- east in the Seattle suburb.
A $2.5 million building—four are planned—will include 65,000 square feet for assembly and distribution of videos. Later expansion will allow the American arm of Japan’s major manufacturer to produce home video games and computers for nationwide. distribution.
A key element in financing the new plant is a city bond package valued at $7 million. According to Nintendo’s Ron Judy, all indications are that the bond issue will be approved by the Redmond City Council.
“The intent of the council is to spur new development,” Judy said.
The bonds will be issued as municipal offerings and therefore will pay tax exempt interest to investors.
Nintendo likes the Seattle area because of quality labor available, easy access to materials in the Northwest, closeness to Japan, and the good facilities of the Port of Seattle.
The new plant will manufacture some game components, but all assembly and cabinetry work for games sold in America will be performed there. e
BUSCH POOL LEAGUE WINNERS
Dynamo Corp. announced that the Jimmy’s Bar team of Sandusky, Ohio, was the winning team of the 1982 Busch Pool League National Championships held recently in St. Louis Missouri.
The national amateur 8-ball league, offering $33,000 in guaranteed cash and prizes, is co-sponsored by Dynamo and Anheuser-Busch Inc.
The Jimmy’s bar team won the finals over the Northside Tavern Club team from Tampa, Florida, 3-1. For its efforts, the Jimmy’s Bar Team was awarded the first place prize of $10,000.
For achieving second place, the North- side Tavern Club team received $5,000.
The Ballbusters team, St. Petersburg, Florida, and the Long Branch team, St. Louis, Missouri, placed in the semi-finals; each team received $2,500. Fifth- through eighth-place teams each received $1,250 and ninth- through 16th-place teams each received $1,000.
“We are very pleased with the enthusi- astic response to and the turn-out for the Busch Pool League tournaments,” said
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Mark Struhs, vice president of sales and marketing for Dynamo Corp. “We are particularly pleased that the Busch Pool League is dedicated to amateur pool players since this allows these players to polish their skills and compete for mone- tary prizes and prestige in a national championship.”
Sanctioned by the American Pool- players Association (APA), the Busch Pool League is a grass roots amateur team league that features weekly divisional play on coin-operated tables in taverns. Local winners advance to regional tournament competition, with the top teams there advancing to the national championships.
Dynamo’s Big D coin-operated pool table was selected by Anheuser-Busch and the APA as the official league and tourna- ment table for the Busch Pool League.
The game played in the league is a unique handicap version of 8-ball. The handicapping system allows players of different skill levels to compete equally in match play. As a result, Superstar players like Dave and Tony Mougey of the Jimmy’s Bar team had to win several more games than their opponents to win a match.
Sixteen teams competed in the national championship. The Southeast Region and the Northeast Region were represented by four teams each with the Midwest Region being represented by eight teams due toa larger number of players from the region participating in the league. e
ADMA MEETING PRODUCES CHANGES
The Amusement Device Manufacturers Association (ADMA) held its annual meeting in Chicago June 7 and introduced its new executive director.
Glenn E. Braswell comes to the associa- tion after 12 years with the United States Brewers Association. His credentials
The telephone number and address for Video Games Ireland Ltd. and its sister company, Amusement Machine Distributors Ltd., was not in the Directory. The companies’ telephone number is Dublin 694888, unit 404. The address for Video Games Ireland is 77 Benburb St., Dublin 7, Ireland. Amusement Machine Distributors is located at 6 Callender St., Belfast BT] suxXrrt~—~s~—SsCS
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
include a law degree from Emory Law
School, Atlanta, Georgia. He is admitted to practice in all local and federal courts in Washington, D.C., as well as the U.S. Supreme Court.
ADMA also announced a name change to the Amusement Game Manufacturers Association (AGMA). The name change is effective immediately. But it was noticed specifically on July 1 when the association’s
headquarters were moved to the Washing- ton, D.C., metropolitan area.
The relocation of its national office was noted by AGMA as an indication of the new emphasis to be asserted on legislative and regulatory problems facing manufac- turers and the industry at large.
AGMA announced an increased level of activity in public affairs starting with participation in the National Conference of State Legislatures, the National Asso- ciation of Counties Convention, and, later in the fall, the Congress of Cities. These three events are viewed by AGMA as pro- viding the industry an opportunity to present its views to governmental decision makers from all levels of administration and from all parts of the U.S.
Following the general program, the members filled two vacancies to the Board of Directors by electing Glenn K. Seidenfeld
Jr. of Bally Manufacturing Corp. and Richrd Simon of U.S. Billiards each to a term of three years. Following the annual meeting, the new Board of Directors met and elected officers for 1982-83: Joe Robbins, president; Duane Blough, vice president; and Richrd Simon, secretary/ treasurer. e
TUNI IMPROVES WARRANTY
Tuni Electro Service, ina move designed to build operator trust in its Convertible Video System (CVS), is offering what it contends is the industry’s first full one-year warranty on its games.
Tuni’s CVS library of convertible games will carry 12 months of protection for parts, printed circuit boards, and television monitors. If “defects in workmanship” or “material” are present in any of its CVS games, Tuni will “repair, replace, or credit
StarxTech Journal is the technical monthly designed for the distributor and operator of coin-operated electronic amusement machines.
Your first issue sends you on your way to building areference library tailored to your needs as a technician/mechanic.
You get troubleshooting tips and techniques, equipment modifications, and general service news on videos, electronic pins, and phonographs. Information that saves you time, money, and trouble in the shop orin the field. You'll use what you read in every issue.
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25
THE CALENDAR
September 10—11 Wisconsin Amusement and Music Operators, Paper Valley Hotel and Convention Center, Appleton
September 10—12 Joint North and South Carolina Associations meeting, Radisson Plaza Hotel, Charlotte
September 24—25 West Virginia Music & Vending
Association convention, Ramada Inn, South Charleston, West Virginia
October 7—10 NAMA convention and exhibit, The Rivergate, New Orleans
October 14—17 ENADA (exhibition of coin-op amusement machines), Congress Building (EUR), Rome, Italy
October 15—16 Amusement and Music Operators of Virginia, annual convention and
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November 18—20 AMOA Exposition, Hyatt Regency Downtown, Chicago
November 18—20 [AAPA annual convention (Parks Show), Bartle Hall, Kansas City
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January 10—13 ATE 39th Amusement Trades Exhibition, Olympia, London, England
March 16—17 Nihon Amusement-Machine Operator’s Association, second amusement expo, Shinjuku N.S. Building, near Keio Plaza Hotel, Shinjuku, Tokyo.
March 25—27 Amusement Operators Expo ’83, Hyatt Regency O’Hare, Chicago
purchaser’s account for such products which are returned to Tuni during the warranty period.”
The full-year warranty will be retroactive to cover every applicable CVS game the company has sold.
“We are not aware of any other legiti- mate video game manufacturer offering a full-year warranty,” indicated Tuni’s marketing director, Alan Rosbrook. “We want this industry to know we are building a quality product that will compete with any game manufacturer, large or small.”
VIDEOS ON THE RISE
Warner Communications Chairman Steven J. Ross told the company’s annual meeting that the popularity of video games is on the rise.
Far from following recent published reports that the video market has reached saturation, the chairman of Atari’s parent firm reportedly indicated that he believed more than 44 million homes worldwide will eventually have a player within.
Ross said that 15 million homes were expected to house players by the end of this year. e
DOCTOR RATES
RAGE
University of Nebraska Medical Center studies show video games can help deter- mine stress factors in patients.
Dr. Robert S. Eliot, chairman of the center’s department of preventive and stress medicine—and a much quoted figure relevant to the relationship of stress and video games—said the games are useful in deciding whether patients need medical assistance or counseling for stress.
He said his department has used video games for several years as part of its system for determining susceptibility to stress pro- blems. Tests provide up to 136,000 pieces of data that relate to body chemistry and physical responses.
“Video games can be a form of relaxa- tion for many people,” he said. “But we use video games as a diagnostic tool because they offer one way of testing how an indi- vidual deals with pressure.
“They duplicate part of the mental tasks
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PLAY METER, August 1, 1982 Ze
that people face in daily life. We can deter- mine that if they overreact in terms of bodily response to video games, they will do so in the real world.”
Eliot has labeled those who respond vehemently to videos as “hot reactors.” He said blood pressures can soar from 130/80 to 220/130 in a few minutes.
“They have no idea they are paying that kind of physiological price,” he warned. @
YOUTH RESEARCHER BACKS VIDEOS
A former high school principal has addressed the Boston video game morato- rium (Play Meter, July 15, p. 19) ina letter to the city’s mayor, Kevin H. White.
Dr. B. David Brooks sent the mayor findings of a research project that answers many questions asked by parents and other concerned citizens about video games and their effects on youth.
Brooks finds that “the evidence seems clear. A well lit, well-supervised video arcade poses no more a threat to American youth than their congregating at athletic
events, pizza parlors, school dances, amusement parks, or soda fountains...My experience is that they (youth) are better off spending their quarters cna video game in a public arcade than ona “joint’ ina not so public place. If it comes down to drugs, guns, gangs, or games, I'll take the games!”
Brooks is a specialist in the prevention of juvenile crime and has found common points shared by troubled youths.
“I find several threads that run through the many stories of violence and crime so common among children today,” wrote Brooks.
Young people share a prevading feeling of boredom, offered Brooks. Troubled youths often complain of having nothing to do.
“They can’t go to parks because parks are ‘controlled’ by other youth. School facilities and recreation facilities are often closed when most needed—evenings and weekends—and a two-hour movie runs anywhere from $3 to $6.
“They see the video arcade as an exciting, enjoyable, and safe place to spend their leisure hours. In addition, they report— and my research verifies—that teenagers can play a video game fora fairly long time on 25 or 50 cents.”
Brooks indicted that teens told him they have merely switched targets for the money they spend. They have receded from pur- chasing records and tapes and have
decreased attendance at movies. Brooks said teenagers’ changing tastes are evident
when noting the downturn in revenues in these industries.
Brooks said that children who commit crimes share a need for excitement that drives them to criminal activity. Following years of seeing bizzare acts of violence on TV, “they find life’s real experience dull.
“They tell me,” Brooks continued, “the video games offer them a thrill, in addition to the chance to compete with themselves. As I observe the children of the 80s, I find this to be a very positive sign. I am begin- ning to see some examples that the chal- lenge of competing against oneself and finding success may have carry-over to other aspects of these children’s lives.
“Tam greatly concerned about the plight of youth today,” Brooks wrote. “They are surrounded by actual, not vicarious vio- lence on TV and in films.
“They are not being taught basic values so necessary for survival of our American way of life, and they are entering the age of electronics and change at a pace never before known to man.
“I do not work for the electronic video game industry, nor do I own their stock. But I do have stock in the future of America, and that future is dependent on our youth. I encourage you and your staff to look very carefully at the positive aspects of video game amusement centers and their use by our nation’s children. The small minority, albeit vocal, who oppose video games do not have factual, researched information.” ®
The AVMDA (Amusement and Vending Machine Distributors Association) recently
held a board meeting to discuss an
industry public relations program to supplement its Community Relations Manual. The AVMDA Board of Directors includes:
(seated left to right) Ira Bettelman, Jerome Gordon, Rubin Franco, and Jon Brady. Kress, Norman Goldstein, Allen Fagel, E. G. Doris, Albert Rodstein, Dean McMur
28
Standing (left to right) are Alexander die, and Stephen Lieberman.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
We spare our readers unimportant advertisers. We spare our advertisers unimportant readers.
PLAY MEFER
P.O. Box 24170, New Orleans, La. 70184
SNAPSHOTS
Stern engineers Paul Ziehm, John White, and Lou Rudolph demonstrate some of the visual features of the Video Music Center to an interested visitor at the National
Restaurant Association Show in Chicago, May 22—26.
David Stroud (pictured) has resigned as vice president, marketing, for Cinema- tronics Inc., expressing his wishes to pursue other interests within the coin machine industry.
Steven Blattspieler, Cinematronics’ national sales manager, will assume Stroud’s corporate responsibilities.
Status Games has moved into a new facility in West Hartford, Connecticut, that has enabled the company to triple its daily output.
Status Games, manufacturer of video games and video gambling machines, has increased production capability from 40 pieces a day to 140.
“The 20,000 square foot facility is expandable,” offered Status President Irv Jeffries. “We also can now offer an attrac- tive showroom and provide spacious research and development areas.”
Status produces Planet Patrol, Force One, and Blockade Runner, and is gearing up for its newest video, Highway Patrol.
30
J. Vernon Lloyd has been appointed general counsel and corporate attorney for Taito America Corp.
Lloyd will coordinate all legal work for the company, handling all phases of com- mercial and corporate law, contracts. trademarks, and coordination of all out- side counsel.
Lloyd, a graduate of Yale Law School. was previously a general attorney in the legal division of Montgomery Ward. He is chairman of the Chicago Bar Association’s Committee on the Unauthorized Practice of Law.
ree es —_—s it a _ as ont gy ; “8 a
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PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
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Whether or not an elephant can play Defender is another question, but the new American Video Athletic Association believes that players should join together to help develop their competitive skills.
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“Video Athletes are good kids who deserve a little recognition,” the associa- tion proclaimed. “We think it’s time to acknowledge them.”
Betson Pacific Distributing Company has a new headquarters at 2444 West Pico Blvd. in Los Angeles that opened June I.
The new 20,000-square foot building is just one mile west of the company’s previous location.
“With ramp and dock high indoor loading capacity, a 10,000-square foot parking area, expanded parts and service areas as well as a significantly larger showroom, the new Betson Pacific head- quarters is designed to make it more convenient for our customers to buy and service their equipment,” Pete Betti, president of Betson, noted.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
epee or Sa
Jack’s Amusement Company of El Dorado, Arkansas, has opened a distri- buting branch office in Lubbock, Texas.
Brad King, sales manager for the 25- year-old distributorship said: “Our studies showed a real need for equipment and service in the west Texas region. The operators are anxious to deal face to face as opposed to over the telephone.”
Pictured are Mel Harp (left), a 25-year veteran of the coin-op business who will manage the branch, and John Hawley, formerly of Sega/Gremlin who will head the service department.
Sunday, June 6, game operators enjoyed refreshments and industry conversation while touring Automated Consultant Systems’s new showroom, offices, and warehouse now located at 2523 Data Drive in Louisville, Kentucky.
General Manger E. W. Brewer (right) is shown here with Joe Furjanic, regional sales manager for Universal.
31
PUZZLES:
Brohaugh
An “Upright” Fellow
Fill in the names of the appropriate games in the space below, 15. Midway’s successful entry into the “cute” game market. then check the center row of vertical boxes to see who our —— nomination for the most upright fellow in the industry is. 16. The human fly would love this game by Nichibutsu. 17. Name this Stern video, and we will be close to
CLUES (2 words)
18. Cinematronics takes us back to World War II in
. (2 words)
1. Centuri’s driving game is in the maze city of
2. The U.S. has its Space Shuttle, and Taito has its
(2 words). SOLUTION 3. E.G. Marshall in the old TV show, or the popular Williams video.
The “Upright”
4. The only name to appear on both video and pingame. Fellow
(2 words) 5. Centuri’s space video named after star cluster.
6. Atari’s recent video that revived some of the elements of Pong, but with a medieval theme.
TTT os
[eee TORE 7 st | | | ET TT 8. Taito’s video makes you wonder what happened to colonies Let | | | | | | | ty Ty | through 6. (2 words) ‘7{ | | | | | | fT [TT] ist | | | TT fot | | TT rT [10 Soo eee — tut | | | Te pT Ty
7. Universal’s video that stars, not Mickey, but (2 words) | 4
9. Centuri’s has landed.
10. Gremlin/Sega first came out with Astro Fighter, and then
with the similar-sounding . (2 words)
. Gottlieb’s first video. (3 words)
12 Lett Hy tf ft ET pia) ot ist | | TT J | fel | | TT Tey fT fect
12. This Cinematronics game brought new meaning to the mrp h , “Castles in the air.” (2 d phrase astles in the air.” (2 words) ia) t ca
13. This new Atari video is 100 feet long.
14. You can do it to eggs, and to Stern’s video. (Answers will appear in August 15 issue.)
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
ee
Deep in the sea garden, there was a happy group of aqua- tic creatures. One day a school of fierce Devil Fish’ broke out of prison and occupied the sea garden.
The angry King of the Sea appointed the brave Sea Dog to conquer the Devil Fish™.
Sea Dog would cleverly take advantage of the narrow pas- sages by fattening them up with bait, then when immobile, would attach and kill them. Can Sea Dog save the aquat- ic creatures? Please give this game a try!
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ROBOTRON has begun...
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STATUS REPORT:
The revolt of the Robots is powerful. They are staging an all-out attack to re-program the remaining few hundred humans into their own image or wipe any trace of humanity from the face of the earth.
But take heart! Reports from the field advise the challenge of the Robots is being met! All over the world, people are taking to the controls and engaging in battle. They are fighting off the
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In the ultimate conflict between man and machine, Williams has made you
the winner!
: or the service back-up that keeps you
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Educating technicians: a 1982 update
n the June 1979 issue of Play Meter, there was an article titled, “What’s Available as far as Educating Your Technicians.” It was a summary of the schools that teach amusement games service people how to deal with solid-state electronics and accompanying equipment.
Now, three years later, here’s an update on these schools and what they are doing for their students.
Although there are a number of fine technical or vocational schools nationwide that offer thorough approaches to under- standing digital circuitry, some schools are geared specifically to the industry, and these are the ones examined here.
AMOA schools
“Just change the boards.”
That kind of service approach is what led Don Miller and the Amusement and Music Operators Association (AMOA) to sponsor a traveling classroom designed to help service technicians understand the intricacies of digital equipment.
Miller starts with the basics of digital electronics and progresses to proper shopping procedures, troubleshooting techniques, and preventive maintenance. Reading and understanding schematics is stressed. Using the schematics—to which Miller adamantly refers to as the keys to fixing any machine—the sequence of Operation is covered to determine how the machines operate. All circuits are followed and explained. The final three days of each 10-day session are spent troubleshooting problems in popular machines.
AMOA Mechanics School tuition is currently $250 per session. Classes are generally arranged by request of state associations, said AMOA’s Executive Director Leo Droste.
Nevada Gaming School
The Nevada Gaming School, now in its 10th year, educates video game technicians as well as slot machine mechanics. The school was Bally’s officially certified training center until June 6 when it was purchased by a Bally competitor. Although you will not find Bally’s official stamp of approval on Nevada Gaming
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
By Mike Shaw
School any longer, the courses and the quality of instruction are unchanged.
The institution features an extensive 24- week course on video game repair. Elec- tronic video game instruction features training in the use of various pieces of test equipment—probes, oscilloscopes, signa- ture analyzers, etc.—and educates students on high value soldering techniques.
Circuit board repair is taught to the component level, and the course also includes instruction on troubleshooting and TV monitor repair.
This amusement technicians’ course features 600 hours of instruction at a rate of $5.50 per hour. However, students with competent knowledge in some areas of electronics can alleviate hours and save tuition money.
Additionally, since the school is accred- ited by the Accrediting Commision of the National Association of Trade and Tech- nical Schools, students can qualify for government loans and grants. Despite
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government cutbacks in those areas, there are still plenty of government financing alternatives available, according to Stan Brateen, director of the school.
“About 40 percent of our students use government financing to attend,” said Brateen. Enrollment currently at the Nevada game school reads at about 260 students in Las Vegas and about 80 at Brateen’s Reno, Nevada, branch.
The set-up enables a student to design his schedule around the information he needs and the amount of time he desires to spend at the school each day. Classes start anew each Monday.
Electronic Institute of Brooklyn
One of the newest entries in the amuse- ment machine education field is Joe Sturtz Electronic Institute of Brooklyn.
Sturtz, who left Sylvania as its chief service instructor, presents a study program designed for workers who cannot take time away from their jobs to attend classes.
37
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2115 Commerce Dr. @ Cayce, SC 29033
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The Repair Center for the Games Industry
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The Electronic Institute addresses its program to prospective technicians who have little or no electronics background. It includes instruction on meters, basic elec- tronics, power supplies, monitors, basic logic, and pinball and video board repair.
Locally, Sturtz offers a five-week course of evening classes that meet three times weekly. There are a total of 60 hours of instruction, and new classes begin each seven or eight weeks.
Sturtz has also made the course avail- able to students who cannot arrange a five- week stay in Braoklyn to learn the tricks of the trade. The same 60 hours of instruction offered at the Institute is available on video tape for home study.
The home course provides the same hands-on training a student would receive at the Institute. Sturtz even ships a mal- functioning TV monitor for the home student to repair, and, at another time during the course, he sends a faulty logic board for the aspiring technician to solve.
There is a toll-free number for students to call to get special assistance when needed, and Sturtz even offers a money- back guarantee to home students up to the end of the first lesson. The guarantee enables a prospective technician to find out for himself, at no risk, whether or not he can handle the program.
Sturtz charges $800 for the course— whether the student attends in person or takes the home study course—and he insists that graduating students can handle 90 percent of the problems they encounter in the field. The $800 ticket includes tools and materials valued at $110.
Randy Fromm’s Arcade School
Randy Fromm’s Arcade School in San Diego has been helping entry level service people learn the ropes of solid-state elec- tronics for slightly less than three years now.
Although the school’s home is in San Diego, it has also been operating on the road. Dennis Sable instructs in San Diego, Fromm sets up shop several times a month In major cities, and, until recently, Nathan Bush was offering regular monthly sessions in Dallas.
The course lasts six days and teaches entry level “mechanics” (as Bush refers to his entering students) to deal with the majority of problems they will encounter in their service calls.
“We bring them up to the point where they can fix 90 percent plus of the problems they’ll see. You can’t educate a computer technician in six days, but they'll be able to handle most of everything else they'll encounter and even be able to handle some simple computer related problems.”
Bush stressed that students need not invest heavily in tools or equipment prior to the course.
“The most sophisticated piece of equip- ment they need is a voltmeter,” he said.
In addition to regular offerings in the San Diego area, Fromm’s school will find its way to Minneapolis, Salt Lake City,
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40
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Is now on display at
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“THE PROTECTOR”
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Chicago, and Atlanta before the end of the year.
“And he might come to Dallas, since I’m retiring,” joked Bush who is leaving the classroom to return to his route and ser- vicing businesses.
Randy Fromm’s six-day program currently costs $400. A schedule for Fromm’s traveling school is available by calling 714/286-0172.
Kurz-Kasch
The Kurz-Kasch Center for Technical Development calls its education a lesson in “advanced topics in electronic circuit design,” but the company’s general manager, Jim Sneed, said the course approaches digital electronics from a “basics” point of view.
The course is designed for the technician who already has some background in elec- tronics. It is intended to teach electronics theory.
The I.C. Logic Design program is for technicians who are beginning to design, test, or repair equipment using ICs. The course is based on working with standard IC logic devices as they are offered by manufacturers.
One of the best things about the Kurz- Kasch course is that it’s free to subscribers of Play Meter. Although a Kurz-Kasch education was previously only available as a $400 correspondence course, it is now only featured in issues of Play Meter magazine.
Cal’s Coin College
After 12 years of educating amusement technicians, Cal’s Coin College has refined its program to a single approach—a two- week package of intensive practical application for aspiring video technicians.
The oldest of amusement tech schools, Cal’s Coin College conducts its lesson totally on the basis of working with machines.
“We teach no theory, and mathematics is a no-no,” said the school’s founder and teacher, Cal Clifford.
The course is built for entry level students and teaches schematics and systems that emanate from manufacturers’ documents on the games. Lessons include training on all types of TV monitors.
Clifford limits his enrollment to six people per class so he can assist each student in a thorough look at the machines and see them through their efforts to troubleshoot problems that commonly occur.
The Cal’s Coin College course costs $700.
The courses mentioned here all provide a basic electronics education for amuse- ment technicians. Remember, “just change the boards” is a bad service approach. A solid education in digital circuitry basics and an in-house system that provides for circulation of pertinent, recent service information will produce good service people and a great service reputation for any operator. | e
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
STRATEGIES
for making sure you get to read your own copy of PLAY METER
Strategem No. § in a series: Office bribery...
GIDFFRIA~
Bribe the secretary with dinner and dancing so you're sure of getting the copy when it comes. OPeece You can fill in the coupon below for easy, direct delivery of Play Meter to your home, twice monthly.* Send check for only $50 for 24 issues!
TILE
COMPANY
8101S) ee ——“ rll
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Send to: Play Meter magazine, P.O. Box 24170, New Orleans LA 70184
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
Comparing prices
Use a personal computer to save time, money
By David H. Ahl
ouble-digit inflation. Shrinking profit margins. Higher prices on just about everything except
avocados.
Because of these factors, people and Organizations are doing more and more comparison shopping. Whether it’s com- paring supermarket ads in the newspaper or bids on a job, we all need to compare prices quickly and easily.
To compare prices on a few items is no particular problem; one need only jot them down on a slip of paper. On larger lists, it becomes more difficult. And when dis- counts and shipping charges enter the picture, the task becomes nearly impos- sible.
Example: You are an arcade operator trying to maximize your profit. This means
(File: VIDEO)
A
Vendor
having a good choice of the latest games balanced by a cross-section of older gaines that still attract the quarters. You get Play Meter and look at the pages of classified listings of new and reconditioned games in the back. You attend the Amusement Operators Expo and pick up the circulars from the distributors. And, of course, your own distributor is always telling you he has a great deal on a like-new game that was just returned from a bum location.
You like to pick up a reconditioned game from time to time, but the ads and circulars just aren’t designed for compari- son shopping. One ad lists games in order of decreasing price, another by ascending price, another by manufacturer, another puts the biggest movers at the top and many seem to be ina totally random order.
Vendor Vendor B C D
This example will be used to show how the VisiCalc computer program ona small personal computer can be used quickly and easily to come to your rescue.
Alphabetical order The first step is to put the list of items into some sensible order. While ascending or descending price has some attraction, it really isn’t useful because a game might fall into several spots on the list because of different pricing from different vendors. In this case, I chose alphabetical order because it made the most sense to me. Rather than trying to assemble the names of all the arcade games and then alphabetizing, I decided to start entering information into the computer, putting each new piece where it belonged. I took
Vendor E F
Min Price
Alpine Skier 2495 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 2495 Amidar 2395 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 2395 Armor Attack 1E9 1400 1E9 1249 1E9 1E9 1249 Asteroids 1695 1550 1395 1E9 1E9 1E9 1395 Asteroids Deluxe 1695 1450 1495 1495 1E9 1E9 1450 Astro Blaster 1895 1700 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 1700 Astro Fighter 1E9 1200 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 1200 Astro Invader TES 995 1E9 1095 1E9 1E9 995 Avalanche 1E9 1E9 1EQ 1E9 295 1E9 295 Barrier 695 500 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 500 Figure 1
Portion of a price list with 1E9 filled in where no price is available. This allows selecting the minimum value in the Ist column.
(File: VIDEO)
Min Price
Vendor Vendor Vendor Vendor Vendor Vendor A B 6 D E F
Alpine Skier 2495.00 1E9 1E9 TES 1E9 1E9 2495.00 Amidar 2395.00 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 2395.00 Armor Attack 1E9 1400.00 1E9 1249.00 1E9 1E9 1249.00 Asteroids 1695.00 1550.00 1395.00 1E9 1E9 1E9 1395.00 Asteroids Deluxe 1695.00 1450.00 1495.00 1495.00 1E9 1E9 1450.00 Astro Blaster 1695300 1700.00 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 1700.00 Astro Fighter 1E9 1200.00 1E9 1E9 1E9 1EOo ‘F209:-00 Astro Invader 1E9 995.00 1E9 1095.00 1E9 1E9 995.00 Avalanche 1E9 1E9 1E9 1E9 295.00 1E9 295.00 Barrier 695.00 500. 06 1E9 1E9 1EQ 1E9 500.00 Figure 2
Formating real prices into dollars and cents makes the list more readable.
42 PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
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PLAY METER, August 1, 1982 , 43
the longest list of games from a single vendor, started five lines down from the top, and entered the name of the game in the first two VisiCalc columns (eighteen characters total) and the price in the third column (C).
If a game fell above or between those already entered, I simply opened up a row by typing /IR (insert row) and entered the new listing.
I then took the second largest vendor list and put these prices in the fourth column (D), opening up rows for new information as necessary. Ditto for the third and fourth vendor. But then trouble arose.
My computer (TRS-80 Model III) per- mits only six columns of VisiCalc data on the screen and adding additional vendors meant I could no longer. see the game names in Columns A and B. So I simply typed /TV with the cursor on Column B which sets the first two columns perma- nently on the screen.
With the title columns protected in this way, to insert a new game, it was necessary to use the “go to location” function (>A28 for example) to enter the title area.
The best price?
Just doing these few steps alone was enormously valuable. I had previously been impressed with Vendor B because of his $1,395 price on Asteroids, $300 less than my local distributor was asking, and also his $1,195 price on Galaxian, way less than anyone else. I had begun to think he had the best prices on everything and why
look farther. But then my simple list revealed that his $1,595 price on Battle-X wasn’t so good after all, and $1,995 on Gorf was more than anyone else was asking.
Since I now had all the data, it seemed sensible to let the computer look for the best price on each game. | attempted to do this by typing @MIN(C4...H4) as the entry in 14. This function selects the minimum value from the list C4, D4, E4, etc. and enters it in 14. Surprise! The minimum was 0 because several entries in the list were blank.
This, of course, was not what I intended so I tried entering the special VisiCalc @NA function in the blanks (meaning, value not available). Now for the minimum I got NA. So I tried entering alphabetic characters. Still, no go.
Longer values When averaging a list, VisiCalc looks at only the non-blank values. Not so for selecting the minimum or maximum values. Hence, the only solution was to fill in the chart with values larger than would ever be found (say, 10000) which, unfortu- nately, makes it less readable. Alterna- tively, one could use a value of 1E9 (meaning | times 10 to-the ninth power). Since the expanded form of the number will not fit in a standard width VisiCalc column, the exponential notation is retained. If you wish to use this method, you should fill in the VisiCalc worksheet with 10000 or IE9 before entering any other
data by simply using the replicate command. This saves having to enter each value individually. A portion of the work- sheet with 1E9 filled in is shown in Figure 1.
To make this modifted worksheet more readable, I elected to format the real price entries as dollars and cents while leaving the 1E9 alone. This is done by typing /F$ before each dollars-and-cents entry. Typing it in as, say, $1,995.00 will not do since VisiCalc will drop the zeroes after the decimal point. This output is shown in Figure 2.
To use these data to make a shopping list which shows only the lowest price on each item, one can move the last column, in this case column I, to the position immedi- ately next to the title columns using the /M command.
Since two of the vendors were on the West Coast and I was on the East Coast, I wanted to modify their prices to reflect an extra $100 per game for shipping. This was done by using a spare column (J) and giving the command +C5+100 in position J5 followed by a /R (replicate) in J6...J109 using relative values. I then replaced the original column with this modified column using the move (/M) and delete column (/ DC) commands.
All told, this entire initial comparison shopping procedure took about two hours. To update the list each month (or when- ever the occasion arises) takes no more than fifteen minutes. The potential savings are hundreds or possibly thousands of dol- lars, a more-than-satisfactory return on my investment of time and computer resources.
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Cinematronics’s President Fred Fukumoto
Philosophy change:
Doubling up, deleting slack time
hen someone does something
out of the ordinary once, people
tend to talk. But when someone does something different twice, people tend to ask questions.
Consider Cinematronics. The manufac- turing firm released Solar Quest \st Octo- ber. Then something unusual happened: Cinematronics four months later released not one, but two licensed games— Naughty Boy and Jack the Giantkiller. The com- pany produced more than one game at the same time.
People are asking questions. Has Cinematronics stopped developing pro- duct? Is it going to start manufacturing licensed-only games? Why was there a four-month lapse between Solar Quest and the Naughty Boy/ Jack the Giantkiller dual release?
“We always designed and programmed our own product,” explained Tom Stroud, Cinematronics’s executive vice president. “But one of the problems was the slack time when we didn’t have product.”
To make effective use of its time,
The majority of the company’s 85,000 square feet is devoted
to producing games.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
Cinematronics decided to manufacture some licensed equipment. And Stroud gave many reasons for the new strategy.
For starters, he said it takes four months from concept to putting out an in-house product on the market compared to 30 to 60 days to ready a licensed product for testing.
Licensed product also gives Cinema- tronics some degree of flexibility. “We look for changes, and we dictate changes,” Stroud pointed out. “We don’t want a product just to have something to build. We have the capability to go any way based on each product.”
Quick reaction
Another reason the manufacturing company decided to go with some licensed product is that Stroud said Cinematronics now has the ability to react to the market— it has evened out the risk of a game failing. If one game does not succeed, another one will soon be marketed to take its place since more than one game is always being produced.
iv
Licensed product does have its advantages, but Stroud lamented that all of Cinematronics’s product is not in-house. “Tike any company, we want to develop in- house, but the reality of the situation is to get a relationship with other companies. It’s nice to smooth out the valleys.”
Accepting licensed product also means some of the company’s philosophy has changed. Stroud said that in the past, Cinematronics wanted to be totally self- sufficient. But the slack time between in- house equipment developments was a loud vote in favor of licensed product.
Licensed equipment, however, is not a panacea to all development problems. There are more risks with licensed games, Stroud said. “But usually when we license a game, the electronics are proven and tested —we look for the performance in the field.”
Cinematronics tests licensed equipment in convenience stores, bars, and arcades, and based on that information, it either makes a commitment or does not accept the product. In fact, the majority of the
Ten to 12 percent of Cinematronics’s profit goes back into game design.
49
Tom Stroud (right) and Bob Posten in the prototype shop.
licensed goods are not chosen in the con- ceptual stage or after the testing period.
But with all the talk about licensed pro- duct, Stroud pointed out that Cinema- tronics has not given up developing in- house equipment. “When we do hit a slack time, we can concentrate on developing games,” he said. In fact, Stroud estimated that 10 to 12 percent of Cinematronics’s profit goes back into game design.
Democratizing design
In addition to pumping profit into game design, the company has also “democra- tized” the design of its games. “We’re broadening the base of people that we can draw from,” Stroud said. “Within the next five years, anyone who likes games and has creative bent could create games.”
Stroud goes back to 1977-78 to defend
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Cinematronics’s interest in design. That year, the company had one game designer; then in late 1978, the second and third designers were added. Today, Cinema- tronics has nine game designers that work in teams of two and also with other companies.
“It’s the responsibility of the manufac- turers to provide new games,” he said. “We’re open to ideas.”
And the majority of Cinematronics’s 85,000 square feet is devoted to producing games. One reason is that cabinet and art work come from outside sources. “This formula is a little bit unique and has been successful for Cinematronics,” Stroud said. “We’re in the coin-machine business, not in the graphic design or wood busi- ness.”
Not only is more space used for design- ing games, but there is more room for
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everyone since Cinematronics’s employee roster has grown from 12 employees in
1975 to 270 people today. Twenty-seven people have recently been hired, and Stroud said the company is making a large commitment to quality control. “This is one of the best commitments we feel we can make to our customers.”
Some results have already come out of the company’s desire to create—a new hardware and software system has been developed. Game software is basically player-oriented, and system software is operator-oriented and geared to account- ing and testing functions.
Next frontier
The home market is another frontier. “We're looking into it (the home market) for possible expansion,” Stroud said. Cinematronics is working on a system for 3-D graphics that may have an application in the computer graphics field and home television.
But Stroud added that “video in some form is here to stay.” He believes the industry is going to hit a saturation point, but, on the other hand, technology is moving in quantum leaps. With technology growth, Stroud said he sees players getting more serious about the games—serious enough to possibly start player organiza- tions one day.
Stroud wants everyone asking questions about Cinematronics to know the answers. No, Cinematronics has not stopped devel- oping product. No, it is not going to manu- facture licensed-only games. And the four- month laspe between Solar Quest and Naughty Boy and Jack the Giantkiller was a slack time when no new product was being introduced.
Licensed product is not a complete answer for Cinematronics; development and licensed product are a two-pronged attack against slack time. e
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PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
Copyright battles
are fought in England
By Roger Pearson
he video game copyright war 1s
heating up in the United Kingdom.
There still remains to be a defini- tive ruling by a High Court judge in Britain on whether under UK law any aspect of video games is protected by copyright.
Nevertheless, even in the absence of such a decision, legal action already taken in the courts on the other side of the Atlantic and involving market leaders such as Atari, Sega, Williams Electronics, Alca, and Taito, has now established a useful first line of legal defense for those claiming their games are being ripped off.
A pattern has been emerging as a variety of companies have beaten a trail to the steps of London’s law courts. And it’s a pattern that indicates that effective pro- tection is now obtainable in the UK pending a definitive decision on the actual copyright issue.
The British High Court judges have been careful not to hint one way or the other where, if at all, they think copyright may lie in video games. Several are now on record, however, saying they would welcome a test case to decide the issue.
However, some other judicial comments and actions taken in the British courts must be of immense interest to those in the video industry who could come up against piracy in Britain.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
One of the most telling comments to fall from a judge’s lips came at a hearing of an action brought by Atari against a British amusement arcade operator.
Protection, although on a temporary basis at present, is now
available through the
UK courts.
Atari claimed that a Millepeidi machine the operator was using, which was made by Scando of Italy, was a copy of its Centipede.
They took action in the English High Court, without warning the operator, to obtain a court order banning him from
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using the machine. The order was made, but the operator later gave the court an undertaking along the same lines as the order. And he claimed that as he had been prepared to give an undertaking, the earlier court action against him had been unnecessary.
He said that for this reason Atari should be debarred from claiming legal costs.
The judge, Justice Dillon, would have none of this, however. He said there was an “arguable point” on whether there was copyright in the attract mode or program of a video game.
And: “It seems to me there is so much piracy in the video and electronic fields current at the moment that the plaintiffs (Atari) were fully entitled to do what very many other manufacturers and distributors are doing at the moment,” he said.
“That is to apply to the courts for immediate injunctive relief against anyone who is apparently using infringing material io be removed so as to come up more con- veniently elsewhere without the plaintiffs knowing.”
In other words, the judge made it plain he believes that swift action, and, perhaps more to the point, action without any prior warning against those believed to be engaged in piracy, is justifiable.
For those fighting to protect the copy-
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right they believe the English law gives them in their machines, this comment is one on the plus side.
However, in the latest round of a legal battle between Sega and Alca, it was made clear that the courts are not prepared to make it too easy for companies to track down those using machines alleged to be copies.
Three of Britain’s top judges in the Appeal Court unanimously refused to uphold an earlier ruling by a High Court judge that Alca should reveal the identity of customers and locations where machines have been sited. Sega wanted this informa- tion to launch further proceedings against those customers, primarily breweries, the court had been told.
Lord Justice Lawton said in this case that it was easy to see why Alca was reluc- tant to reveal this information. If pro- ceedings were taken against its customers, they believed their business would be done “a great deal of damage.” They would suffer “a great deal of ill will.”
And, he said Sega had a safeguard. This particular aspect of the action involved interim court orders. If at the end of the day Sega proved its claim of copyright piracy, it would then be in a position to demand from Alca the names and addresses of customers.
Another of the judges sitting at this hearing, Lord Justice Templeman, said that if Alca had been ordered to reveal the names and addresses sought at this state of the proceedings, it could result in “pure harassment” of its customers.
However, in another action also
involving Sega, this time against a smaller English firm, it has been made plain that the copyright war is going to be fought fiercely in the UK courts against all who can be traced using allegedly pirate machines.
Gordon Day, Sega’s solicitor, left no doubt about this in a written statement that was put before the court. In this, he said Sega was taking “all available steps” including legal proceedings both inthe UK and elsewhere in “a systematic effort worldwide” to contain and eliminate the widespread infringement of copyright in its video games.
He said that Sega had instituted pro- ceedings in Britain over the past three months against five companies, and court orders had already been granted on a temporary basis in some of these actions.
In that particular hearing, the judge, Justice Whitford, made it plain he is well aware of the copyright problems over video games. He said he thought the legal questions raised were “fascinating” and that it would be “very interesting” to hear full argument of them.
“I have been hoping for it for some time,” he added. In this, of course, he was echoing the sentiments of many in the amusement industry on both sides of the Atlantic. The air needs clearing here.
In the absence of this “interesting and fascinating” legal argument and a defini- tive ruling, however, it does look as if positive steps are being taken in the UK to combat piracy. Protection, although ona temporary basis at present, is now avail- able through the UK courts.
..and in Japan
By Mike Shaw
Sega Enterprises has been notified by the Japanese Agency for Cultural Affairs that it intends to treat videos as copyright items, reported the Japanese amusement press.
In light of that announcement, the Japanese Amusement Machine Manufac- turers Association (JAMMA) conferred to discuss ways to eliminate copying and appoint a copyright protection committee.
The committee, composed of 40 persons from I7 major Japanese manufacturers, was chaired by Hayao Nakayama who called the Japanese video game copying efforts “shameful not merely domestically but also internationally.”
“Although it is becoming commonly accepted that, at least in Japan, copying is harmful to the trade, the fact is that 80 percent of the domestic video game market remains invaded by copied products,” he said.
“Thinking that copyright of video games can be protected under the current law as something like filmed items,” Nakayama reported on the committee’s findings, “we
have discussed the possible way for securing more powerful legal protection... Though there is no court decision that openly authorizes copyrights for video games, such an affirmative decision, | believe, will be made in the near future.”
Sega succeeded last year in obtaining a “registration of transfer” from the Agency for Cultural Affairs. That registration recognizes that a copyright has been obtained outside Japan, but a “registration of the first publication of works” that is produced in Japan is seen by JAMMAasa much stronger type of copyright pro- tection.
In anticipation that such copyright- ability is near, Sega proposed the organi- zation of a committee within the associa- tion that would help the government agency handle applications for registration smoothly.
Additionally, the Japanese press reported that Data East, Konami, Namco, Sega, and Taito have taken action against copiers in Japan. e
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
Pinpointing, dealing with the problem employee
By Joseph Arkin, M.B.A.
HB ach employee is part and parcel of a team and as such is expected to contribute to the overall objectives of the business organization. The employee who, for one reason or another, fails to satisfy his supervisors can become quite a problem and challenge.
The employment interview is perhaps the opportune time to be selective, weeding out those who show (1) an employment record with frequent changes of jobs without valid reasons for the shifts, (2) a tendency to lie about their previous posi- tions—if you are interviewing a man for a supervisory position, you want to be sure that he had indeed held prior positions of leadership, and (3) poor work records as disclosed by checking references.
Despite all of these criteria, mistakes are bound to be made, and persons will be hired who are apt to be troublesome.
The initial period of employment can be considered as a trial period, one wherein management decisions are made as to whether or not an employee is satisfactory.
This critical period is one wherein the employee is trained, assigned to specific duties, and allowed to become part of the work force. At this point, it is necessary for supervisors to evaluate the employee in terms of adherence to the training program, aptitude, attitude, and performance.
Now is the time to find out if the employee displays indifference, apathy, inability to follow orders, an attitude of belligerence, or is seemingly unfit for the assigned tasks. If correctable, now is when supervisors should take a hand in trying to correct the situation, or if deemed so deep- rooted that correction seems impossible, it is best to terminate the employment.
Some people are slower learners than others, some take longer to acquire manual skills and need understanding and patience
of their superiors during the time that they are trying to prove themselves.
The employee should be kept informed of his progress so that he will be let down gently if the decision is made not to con- tinue his services. |
What are some of the factors that can lead to the situation where a trained worker does not make the grade? Knowing about what can cause a worker to do less than an adequate job is of paramount importance.
Robert N. McMurry, president of the McMurry Company, writing for the Small Business Administration, lists seven pri- mary reasons for a problem employee.
Lack of skill
Sometimes a person is a problem because he lacks skill in his job and com- petence on it. His skill may have been sufficient when you hired him, but it didn’t increase as the job grew. Not being able to perform the job as well as he’d like—or as well as he thinks you can expect him to— can do several things to an employee. It might, for example, make him indifferent to fellow workers.
Misplacement
Often an employee becomes a problem because he’s in the wrong job. Perhaps he’s selling and failing miserably because he lacks self-reliance (the capacity to accept rejection without anxiety). He begins to feel that people don’t like him, and this causes him to act in a hostile way toward them.
Lack of job structure
Without job structure (detailed and clear instructions in what they are to do), most employees become confused. When an employee wonders in his own mind why
he doesn’t know his job, he might decide that, “It’s my fault. I didn’t pay enough attention when he was explaining it.” Or more likely, he will blame his employer— “That so and so never says what he wants and then jumps on me when I do it wrong.” Either conclusion damages his morale and tends to lower morale throughout the business.
Incompatibility
Some people are problems because of incompatibility between them and their employers. “I just can’t get along with him,” a worker says about his supervisors. And the supervisor says, “No matter how hard I try to understand him, he rubs me the wrong way.” What causes friction between two persons—both of whom are conscientiously trying to cooperate? Some people call it “personality clash.” Actually, it is more complicated than this label implies. The important point is: Beware of such incompatibility, and realize that there isn’t much you can do to change it.
Inadequate supervision
Many employees become problems because of inadequate supervision. In some cases, they don’t know what to do, and the supervisor doesn’t seem to care when or how they do it. People begin to deteriorate when they aren’t kept busy at constructive tasks. They lose interest, become indifferent, and sometimes resentful. Closely related to this situation is inconsistent or capricious supervision. One day management is strict...the next day lax.
Emotionally immature employees
Other employees are problems because they are not emotionally mature. They never completely grow up, and sometimes
2 a
The employee who, for one reason or another, fails to satisfy his supervisors can become quite a problem and challenge.
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
53
they think and act like children. To a cer- tain extent, everyone suffers with this situation. The difference between an emotionally immature person and one who is normal is: The normal person has fewer emotional disturbances, and he is often able to control them.
Physiological deterioration or poor health
The human body changes constantly. Deterioration sets in early with some per- sons, later with others, but eventually with everyone. Sometimes it’s sudden as when an apparently healthy person suffers a heart attack. Or it may be gradual as when an employee loses his hearing over several years. Often, the most difficult problems created by such poor health conditions are the anxiety and psychological damages that often go with changing physical con- ditions. For example, nature may repair an employee’s damaged heart so that he’s almost as good as new, but he may never overcome his anxiety. His constant fear of another attack may turn him into a pro- blem employee.
Proper supervision is the key to elimi- nation of much of the troubles. When supervision is of high order, there will be little to contend with in the way of problem employees or problem cases. Therefore, it would seem that a good first step to a good working staff is the selection, training, and development of good supervisory per- sonnel.
Supervisors have to do more than
merely instruct, train, oversee, or chastise. They have to develop teamwork so that each employee respects their authority, is free to ask questions without fear of belittlement, contributes ideas to save time and money, develops a sense of respon- sibility and loyalty, and receives acclaim for work well done.
The word communication is bandied about so much that it has almost lost any
.Management must accept the fact that people are not perfect, and that mistakes are going to be made.
a ED
real meaning. Yet, a rampart must exist in which management establishes a system of handling employee relationships.
In this area you can appraise an employee and compare his performance to that which is required of his job, and you should keep him informed of his work per- formance. Where the employee is deficient, a plan should be established to correct the shortcomings or increased training to fully utilize his skills.
Oft times an employee will pass all of his initial tests and some personal problem may turn him into an_ unsatisfactory employee. This is when your supervisors have to know their stuff. They must be able to recognize signs, be able to offer sympa- thetic assistance, be able to tactfully suggest seeing a physician, and have the sincere desire to help the employee correct the weakness. |
Proper discipline is what is required and oft times neglected in the mistaken notion that more can be gotten out of any group by “being friends.” Yet, most people want order within the framework of freedom of a sort. They want to know what is expected of them, what results have been obtained, and that the company is successful— partially because of their efforts.
In conclusion, management must accept the fact that people are not perfect, and that mistakes are going to be made. To help overcome this fact, management must make every effort to motivate employees to be creative and imaginative, to be capable of self discipline, to volunteer extra effort, to make personal sacrifices for the good of the team, to be instilled with some sense of loyalty, and to want to do an honest day’s work for an honest day’s wages.
Perfection will never be achieved no matter how desirable a goal. But, wanting to reach the goal of perfection can lead to more orderly procedures which will make for a better and happier place in which to work. e
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Irving Blackman
Paying and collecting employee benefits
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Success Corp. employes Joe Exec. Joe will receive an agreed salary plus 200 shares of Public Co. Success buys the shares of Public and transfers ownership to Joe. However, if Joe terminates his employment with Success before 1990, the shares are forfeited (ownership is returned to Success). In 1981 Joe receives $10,000 in dividends on the Public stock.
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PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
Now the tax results of this scenario. The $10,000 in dividends is considered income to Success. Why? The tax rule is that stock subject to a substantial risk of forfeiture, even though transferred to an employee as compensation, is treated as the property of the employer for tax purposes. This status continues until the employee’s rights become fully vested. (Code Section 83) Success is entitled to deduct 85 percent of the dividends received. (Code Section 243)
OK, let’s put the law and the numbers together. Success, in effect, received the $10,000 and paid it out to Joe. That’s good for a $10,000 compensation deduction. The 85 percent dividend credit produces another $8,500 deduction. Total deduction for Success is $18,500. Joe pays tax on only $10,000.
Ww IN HAND Al TAX SHELTER
TH
Like I said, you will love this idea.
But how should Joe collect his benefits? Sooner or later, every participant (or his beneficiary) of a qualified plan (stock ownership, profit sharing, pension, or ESOP) will be entitled to receive his benefits. Is there a tax cost? Is this cost significant? Can anything be done to reduce the cost? The answers to the ques- tions are Yes, Yes, Yes.
Unfortunately, the rules that govern the taxability of distributions from a qualified plan are a complex maze. You must seek professional help to maximize your after- tax benefits. Why? Because there are a number of choices on how benefits can be paid out of a plan. That’s good. But what may be the best choice for one participant/ taxpayer may be the worst for another
“Well, buster, where’s the fire?...”
55
ee
participant/taxpayer. The right choice is related to your age, your income needs, and the size of your estate.
Basically you have three choices: (1) take a lump sum distribution and pay an immediate tax; (2) roll over the lump sum into a tax-free IRA (Individual Retirement Account); or (3) have the trustee of the plan pay your benefits in installments. You must always keep in mind that your benefits are subject to two taxes—the income tax and the estate tax.
The estate tax can be avoided entirely or in part. The income tax can, at best, be deferred or subjected to lower tax brackets down the road. All the options and possi- bilities could fill a small book.
Generally, the estate tax can be avoided by taking all or any balance in the plan or in an IRA (that received a lump sum from the plan) in installments. This is choice (3) above.
The income tax consequences are listed below:
Choice (1) - Pay an immediate tax, but it is based on a special favorable ten-year averaging computation.
Choice (2) - The transfer to the IRA is tax free. Between the ages of 59!4 and 70!4 you can withdraw-whatever amount you want, taxable at no more than the fifty percent maximum tax. Undrawn funds
continue to accumulate tax free. At age 704, you must begin to draw the balance.
Choice (3) - Installments received from the trustee are taxed up to the fifty percent maximum.
I suggest you cut this item out. Keep it with your qualified plan papers. When the time comes, take it to a qualified profes- sional. He can make precise computations with your facts. You will also learn there
are more rules and exceptions than mentioned in this item. You will be astounded at how large the tax savings will be with the right choices.
An entertainment deduction test
I never met a taxpayer who does not like to deduct entertainment expenses. A recent case (Donald Sap et al v. Comm.,
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TC Memo 1981-167) serves as a graphic reminder that even legitimate entertain- ment expense might not be deductible. How is such a result possible? In a word, substantiation; more precisely, a lack of proper substantiation.
Here’s the story. Mr. Sap deducted lunches, dinners, and other entertainment expenses on his tax return. He offered only cancelled checks as evidence of these expenses. Thumbs down ruled the court. In order to properly substantiate an entertainment deduction you must have a record of (1) amount, (2) time (date), (3) place, (4) business purpose, and (5) busi- ness relationship (who entertained). Checks alone, the court held, do not indicate who was entertained.
Now the story really gets interesting. Mr. Sap also deducted travel expenses to attend trade shows in California and Florida. Only cancelled checks payable to the travel agency and the hotel were used to support the deductions. Thumbs up held the court: the checks “are direct evidence of the amount, time, place, and date of the expenditure.” The court knows the law. Only the first four items listed above are required to support a travel deduction. Item (4)—business purpose—was the trade shows Mr. Sap attended and was satisfied by the checks. e
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PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
COINMAN INTERVIEW
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Frank Seninsky
Media hype, overbuying, and the future of the arcade business are some topics Frank Seninsky covers as this issue’s Coinman. He is known for speaking his mind. Consider his Play Meter column, Frank’s Cranks. He has told manufacturers about problems facing operators—and he has been successful. Manufacturers have adopted some of Frank’s tips.
In his interview, Frank talks about service, (“...the more people that come in, the harder it is to service their machines. ”’), gray area games, (“Gray area games have nothing to do with
this industry.”), and speed-up kits (“...they do help dead wood come alive again.”’).
He’s president of Alpha-Omega Amusements Inc., a com- pany that supplies and services coin-operated games to more than 71 college game rooms, (He’s considered a college game room expert.) 35 New Jersey Shore arcades, and 100 street arcades and locations.
He attended Stevens Institute of Technology and got a bachelor’s degree in engineering and went to Stevens and New Jersey Institute of Technology for graduate school.
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PLAY METER: Why did you want to write a column? SENINSKY: I wauted to get to the position where I could go to the manufacturers and converse with them. I felt that I could be one of the first in the industry to go to the manufacturers and educate them on the operators’ problems and pass on any hints that I picked up in the field.
I figured since I would love to read something like this, others would too. And, besides, it would save operators hours of wasted time. I wanted to combine ideas with tips into one column.
PLAY METER: What was the initial response to Frank’s Cranks?
SENINSKY: The reaction from the manufacturers (I thought they would be negative.) was very receptive! Most of these people were on a first-name basis, and they wanted to know what the problems are. They try like hell to get it pushed through upper management to get these things done right. Most
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
of the time you have to bring these things out into the open— make more of a big deal out of it than it really is to get it into the spotlight. I feel that I accomplished that.
PLAY METER: What direct changes have you seen imple- mented since the creation of this article?
SENINSKY: One of the biggest changes that has come about is the standardization of a very good coin door with an overrun to the cashbox. That was one of the major accomplishments— separating the cash from the other components of the games. The manufacturers now have moved in that direction.
PLAY METER: What was the response from the operators? SENINSKY: I got very complimentary letters saying “keep it
%9
up.
PLAY METER: Do you think that the operators that you heard from were just blowing off steam?
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SENINSKY: Maybe in the beginning. Now they’re just using me as a sounding board, where in the past the sounding board that they had was the distributor. You can say what you want to the distributor and get him to pass it on to the manufacturer, but no one really believed it was getting back to them.
PLAY METER: Did you have any problems with the manu-
facturers?
SENINSKY: I can’t think of any. Some would call and say that they thought I was being a little hard on them in this one category. But I did point out the good points also. It’s a very realistic approach. I felt that the manufacturers understood that I was dealing with the good and the bad and trying to overcome the bad and make it a better industry. Basically it’s the design engineers that I spent a lot of time with. These people are very concerned; they want to make the very best product. It’s just that they have their hands tied a lot, or they have to use up all the old parts before they can design a new part.
PLAY METER: Does the responsiveness carry over to all phases of manufacturing today—even to the physical product itself? SENINSKY: Not all of it. It is a major factor. They (manu- facturers) are more aware of it now. They are putting out good machines and adding little things that are making it better.
One argument now is do they need an electrical coin counter (meter) on every single video game? My answer is yes. If they would get it, they could get the internal bookkeeping perfect. The design engineers believe this.
The manufacturers say they don’t want to do this, which means that they are working very hard on the other approach to make sure that they don’t have to.
PLAY METER: What about manufacturers’ warranties? Play Meter gets letters sometimes about them not being realistic. SENINSKY: I believe that no one in the industry would say there is a manufacturers’ warranty. As I understand it, if the game is sold to a distributor, for all the time it takes to get from the distributor, to get crated, and to be shipped out, the warranty would be expired.
Realistically they have a distributor’s warranty. The manu- facturer may give the distributor some money for doing some amount of warranty work, but the way we see it on the street, if you're getting any amount of warranty work done, it’s being done by the distributor.
PLAY METER: What is the solution? Service seems to be one of the major stumbling blocks left today. Most people would say that the quality of the work is better today than a few years ago. What can be done about the warranties?
SENINSKY: I’m not sure I have an answer because I don’t like what I see. I see too many people coming into this industry with no background whatsoever, with no chance in hell in fixing anything that they buy, and they are just rebuying the games from whoever that they bought them from.
This could put a burden on the distributors that they could never handle at all or handle at a good efficiency rate. This means the more people that come in, the harder it is to service their machines.
PLAY METER: Is the operator doing all the work that he should be doing? Is he doing less? SENINSKY: For the amount of people in the business, they’re not doing anything. Then you have your people in the business that are almost self-sufficient—they handle 100 percent of all their board and monitor work themselves.
A company like ours very rarely has to go to a distributor except to get parts for the machines.
PLAY METER: The thing that you're most interested in is the new people that are coming into the industry. Are you opti- mistic about the continued well-being of the people coming into the business today?
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
a
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
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SENINSKY: No. Someone once told me that only the strong will survive. Business is in a boom period. The manufacturers are really geared up to produce at a very high level. The distrib- utors are buying at very high levels. There’s more credit now than there’s ever been.
Before, people would not overbuy, but now I’ve noticed that they are overbuying without realizing it and that may continue for a while longer. But then saturation hits, and you have to sit back, and, in other words, digest what you just ate. I see that coming within the next year. A lot of people are going to go under.
PLAY METER: What are some indicators that people should be looking for, especially new operators?
SENINSKY: All the media hype. There are two different hypes going here—the regular media hype that comes up with the numbers that could be made everywhere, then you have your manufacturers now that are hyping all these products.
It seems that each manufacturer is really hyping every product that comes out. If the game can’t make it on its own. there is no sense in hyping it. But that seems to be what the manufacturers do. They put out a lot of publicity on these games.
PLAY METER: Do you think the attention that Pac-Man is getting worldwide is good or bad?
SENINSKY: It did put our industry on the front page, but | think it cannot continue. Pac-Man was a good game to start off with. I knew right away that this was a game that people would enjoy playing, but once it got the hype, it got blown out of proportion and out of reality.
If there is any problem with the municipality, it is all blamed on the video games. It is so blown out of proportion that anyone wanting to make money is going to look at this industry. They think it’s the “get rich quick” industry, but they’re all going to find out that it’s not true.
Most of the good locations have been taken up already. The new guy comes in and doesn’t think nothing of spending $10,000 of his hard-earned money on games then putting them out and hoping that a $300 a week in a few weeks Ill have my money back. But it doesn’t work that way. And people learn this real fast.
PLAY METER: From your own experience and for the record, how long can an operator expect to make top money with a game and how does it level off? SENINSKY: I went to a Gottlieb luncheon in Chicago at the AOE. The manufacturers brought together a cross-section of Operators across the country. There was about 30 of us there. We debated that for about a half hour. Depending on the part of country you were in, which again is related to the standard of living out there, the big cities were trying to get their money back out of the machines in six months and that went as highas 12 months. I almost discount the first three weeks when a new game comes out for testing. It will de good money because people will spend a few dollars on it to learn how to play it. Then at the end of the three weeks, you’ll know if the game is good enough. |
Most games start to drop rapidly; an exceptionally good game would naturally make more money in the beginning while everyone learns. Then it will level out in about four months and pretty much stay that way. Maybe a game like Pac-Man would finish out the year. Pac-Man is very popular, but it doesn’t make as much money now because people are very good at it.
One thing that people do not take into account when they talk about making their money back ona game, they’re looking at it as an income figure instead of deducting all their expenses from that. All the money that they make in the first year, they can apply, if they’re lucky, 20 percent of that to the purchase price of the game.
You're a very healthy company if you have 20 percent gross profit. I’m in the 10 percent category. One industry survey (AMOA) reported that the big companies are receiving 7.5
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
percent profit, where if they took all their profits and put them into a bank, they could make twice as much. Maybe that’s how we're all waking up. We’re working like hell, and we don’t know what the bottom line is.
PLAY METER: We hearalot of things about operators in dire straits. Unwise operators will look up one day and see that these machines are not going to be making $300-$400 a week. What does the operator need to do? Is it just luck guessing right on the games or is it principles of operation that the operator should be going by? You talk about overbuying. How does the operator know that he’s overbought? What should he be looking for? SENINSKY: Well, I don’t know how anyone else does his projections, but you only have so much money to buy with. Of course there are a million reasons why you shouldn’t stick with those formulas, like location, demand, and competition. You have those fighting on one side, and on the other side, you’re fighting for financial stability. You have to stay as close to financial stability as you can; you have to stick to your formula. Sometimes it may mean losing some accounts in the course of it, but in the long run, you're better off.
That’s why I used that figure before, that 10 percent. For example, one year (I always shoot for 10 percent gross profit.) I ended up with 8.6 percent, and that means that I was foolish. I overbought. Just imagine, if I can make mistakes like that getting all the prototypes six months before anyone else does and really testing them all and knowing what to buy and gauging it all out in a formula, and I can make mistakes. Just imagine the guy who does it off the hip, who just guesses. New people always guess. They just go in and give away whatever they have to, and they make some money in the beginning, and maybe if they’re lucky, they'll get to pay for part of their first machines. But as soon as the next round comes in, they’re not in.
PLAY METER: We got a comment from somebody who
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didn’t want to put anything in writing. He was upset about our editorial stand in regard to gray area machines, talking in terms that video games today need gray area to make a profit. He said you cannot make a profit with video games. Is it really all that bleak?
SENINSKY: It’s definitely not all that bleak, and I would never even consider putting the two together. Gray area games have nothing to do with this industry.
PLAY METER: The reason I was asking the question was that this is the second occasion now that we've gotten someone who operates both types of equipment that says that he needs this type of equipment because video amusement games will not generate the necessary revenue on their own.
SENINSKY: That’s an overstatement. There’s no way that can be true. I think basically he’s in an illegal area. Maybe he’s trying to rationalize that what he’s doing is justified.
PLAY METER: What about the speed-up kits? Are they necessary? Does an operator need them to turn a profit? SENINSKY: We haven’t had to update any games or use speed-up kits yet. I know enough that people who do (use speed- up kits) don’t have to work as hard maybe as a company as ours to move out the used equipment and havea very fast turnover to survive. We work very hard at it. We don’t know if we’re making any more money by not using it.
But I have to look at it from everyone’s point of view. The manufacturers, I don’t think, havea right to get a copyright ona game now if they don’t want to sell speed-up kits or do anything for these operators that are stuck with these old games. Some- one else is going to doit. Just like everything else in this country, it just has to be done. Someone’s going to have to use these kits because they have been proven that they do help dead wood come alive again.
And if it remains a gray area, the operators are going to use them and they’re going to be using them in a great quantity.
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PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
PLAY METER: Is it essential? SENINSKY: It should be part of the business.
PLAY METER: Is it going to be harder for the operator to operate profitably without, would you say?
SENINSKY: Oh, sure. There’s no way you can pay for equipment now if it’s going to have only a three- to four-month life. You are going to have to use every bit of your imagination and brain power that you were given to survive out there.
Speed-up kits are going to bea reality. I think copy games are wrong. I would take that stand for the manufacturer’s copy- rights. He should be able to copyright it, and he should fight for that. If they win it, granted, they should make the money on the games that they invented. But to fight the speed-up kit also and to keep the operators from using them, to me, is absurd.
There are some examples of how we used to make money 10 years ago. When I first came into the business, I spent a good part of my days becoming very proficient on pinball machines so I could just about play them in my sleep. We took many of the early pinball machines and rewired them to completely change the whole games to make them more thrilling.
This is probably one of the areas that you would call speed-up kits. I mean that’s really what we did. We did everything we could to get more use out of the games, and no one ever said anything about it because it was our equipment and we did what we wanted to.
And we’re in pretty much the same position now. Once you buy a piece of equipment, you’re stuck with it. If you want to change it to make it better, I think you should have the right to do so.
But if you want to change them and sell them, that’s where I listen to the laws and learn from them. For example, if I owned a Chevy and I wanted to put a Cadillac engine in it or use Cadillac parts on it, who would say that I can’t do that? The problem would come when you wanted to sell your Chevy, and you wanted more for it from an unsuspecting public. But as long as you’re up front about it, this is my Chevy with a Cadillac engine, I don’t think there are any laws in the country that prohibit that. Speed-up kits is not a good name for them—| would call them modification kits.
PLAY METER: What do you see for the future of the arcade
business? Are we going to see a lot of people going out of
business because the business is leveling off? As far as arcades, do you see them worse, better, or the same?
SENINSKY: I don’t see too many of them surviving. It just all came at once in just the past year or two.
Just take any industry where everything is cyclic. It’s good, it’s bad, then it levels off, then it gets good again. We’re probably on the increase of the cycle right now, almost at the top or we may have come to the top now. We’re there. There’s not going to be too much more equipment put up. There may be more people coming into the business. There will be more games sold. So you'll have your manufacturers’ curve and you'll have operators’ curve too.
We’re going to go through a period of eight to 12 months of nothing happening. People are just going to be meeting their financial obligations. Street collections are going down. Most of these street arcades, I’ve seen, they’re carrying $60-$70 averages per machine for new equipment. It’s just a matter of time until people realize that you just can’t go into these things and make money.
They also create major problems for the municipalities. These people are running these places with absentee manage- ment or they’re not doing it very professionally. They just want in, and they figure they can make $500 a week, and here I am and I don’t know what I’m doing.
And that just creates problems for the industry and has brought it more into the limelight. This is what I believe the public is protesting. I don’t see much hope for these street arcades. The ones that are going to make it are the ones that are going into it very professionally or are backed by the big conglomerates. I couldn’t even say now if all these are profitable
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
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or not. But when a company comes and puts a million dollars into a restaurant and entertainment center, these are the thing that people are going to go for. The street arcades are going to die if they’re not dead already or legislated out of business.
PLAY METER: Are we going to see an end to the small entre- preneurial operation in place of these giant conglomerates? SENINSKY: Within 10 years, I would think it would come to that just through laws of economic feasibility. We almost have 30 people a week calling up and asking me how to get into the arcade business. And I tell these people that first of all, before you even open your mouth, you got to do $2,000 a week regardless of rent. And there’s not many places you can do that—that’s big bucks just to open up store. So they’re going to disappear would be my guess.
PLAY METER: One of the factors affecting this you said would be governmental regulations. What are we doing wrong as far as working with municipalities at this point? Or is it something within our control?
SENINSKY: Well, the state organizations are getting more into it. The people in the industry have to educate the people that write the laws. All these towns are really doing what they want.
I wrote a column that had a lot of the background on what’s wrong with the coin operators (See Play Meter, April 1, p. 41). The problem that I wrote about was misinformed and uneducated people who are trying to regulate this business.
But to add to that, we really have no standards of who should be in the industry. In the future I can see that you'll have your Aladdin’s Castle and each one of your manufacturers will have their sort of side chain—big arcades and game rooms that are run professionally.
PLAY METER: Is the AMOA. specifically getting into the speed-up kit controversy?
SENINSKY: I haven’t heard if they will or not, but I think that will show you which direction it is going in.
The only way the operator can fight is to keep his established community to the best operators. Naturally operators are going to have to form together, and form strong associations in the regions that they operate and maybe write standards such as who is going to be in this industry—people that have money to buy equipment or professionals.
But the good operators will survive. They will beat out these chain stores for the small locations. I don’t think they can do it for the big ones. But for the small ones, they'll be able to supply service in about five minutes if they really want to get on it. It’s not bleak for everyone. It’s just when you think about it, it’s these big giants coming in too, and it’s kind of hard to combat.
Now everyone wants the new equipment, and they won’t stay with you if you don’t give them the new equipment. The problem is that there is always someone around to give it to them. There never was before, but now there is. So you’re overbuying to stay in business. But attrition is going to bleed this out in about a year.
PLAY METER: So after this year we'll be back to a normal standard?
SENINSKY: We'll never be back at a normal standard again. When the market dries up, people won’t realize that this is not the pot at the end of the rainbow. It used to be that people in the industry educated their locations. Now all the locations are educated.
Phil Sternberg with Eastern Music just made this statement the other day that stuck in my head that the amusement game industry is run bya group of 10-year-olds. And what that means is that a 10-year-old kid goes into a pizzeria and says, “I want Super Donkey Kong,” and the man at the pizzeria calls the operator, tells him what he wants, the operator call up the distributor, and orders the piece of equipment. So the decision was made bya 10-year-old. That’s how it works and that’s how it will always work. e
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
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As the Player begins his flight into Adventure-Land, his airplane is quickly surrounded wy hot air balloons. WATCH OUT! These seemingly innocent colorful objects mean destruction.
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Immediately the Players flying skills are tested. The hot air balloons challenge and engage the Player ina fierce doatight The ayer must loop his plane to avoid ca destroy the swirling balloons.
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As the Player continues his journey into Adventure -Land he encounters the Maze Tunnel. Now the Player must guide and loop his airplane through the labyrinth with precision movements.
looping is manufactured under license from Video Games GMbH
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Both firms will take all necessary legal actions to protect it’s proprietary rights against all copiers and sellers of such infringing games. Anyone who violates ‘our exclusive copyrights by importing, producing, and/or selling/purchasing such copies will be subject to criminal prosecution.
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Manufacturing Corporation
Stocking
your arcade
rnie’s Arcade has 30 video games, taking in a total of $4,500 each week. If Arnie had 60 machines in
his arcade, how much would he make?
If you’re a mathematician, you'd pro- bably say $9,000. But if you’re an arcade operator, you would—or should—say a lot less than $9,000.
Filling every nook and cranny of your arcade with games may seem like a good use of otherwise empty space, but it won't bring in many extra quarters.
Bruce Cherubin, director of games for the Malibu Grand Prix arcades, said he starts with a floor space measurement of the game room when deciding how many machines to operate.
“Usually about 30 to 35 square feet per game is adequate,” he said. “If you put in more games, you get toa point where youll delude a good game room.”
Cherubin said he finds it better to start with slightly fewer machines than might be needed and later increase the number of pieces, if necessary, rather than overstock the arcade.
Yearly average
“A lot depends on the per-game volume,” he said. “We try to make an average of $125 per game per week (per year). If we’re making more, then we would put in more games.”
Steve Bodenstein, an arcade consultant with Professional Amusement Associates, said he doesn’t use a formula but looks at how much business the arcade will do, which varies from location to location.
“Different criteria apply to different locations,” he said. “The number of games you have should be determined by how much traffic you get.”
Like Cherubin, Bodenstein said he looks at how much money the games make annually when deciding how many machines to put in an arcade, remembering that April and May are typically bad months for arcades while December and January are the most profitable.
“It’s like the automobile industry in Detroit,” he said. “They don’t build to capacity but for year-average sales. In an arcade, you don’t plan for peak demand, but for the average crowd.”
Bodenstein said he considers 20 games “minimal” for a location to call itself an arcade and more than 40 games “super- fluous” unless there’s enough volume to justify it.
Is more better?
“You can only cram so many games into a room before they become unplay- able,” he said.
Of course, any formula can only give you a very rough estimate of how many games you'll need. Most upright videos, and even pinballs, don’t require too much space.
But if you have coin-operated pool tables, sit-in videos, air hockey, foosball, skee ball, or even kiddie rides in your arcade, your games-per-square-foot formula will change.
How you arrange your machines is important, too. Cherubin said he banks his multiple games, placing them practically against each other, which allows room for a couple of extra games in the arcade. (See this column in Play Meter, July 15, p. 50) for some of the pros and cons of banking your games. When setting up your arcade, remember that more isn’t necessarily better. e
———————K7_EE=SS
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
BALLY ADVANCE, INC.
(Formerly Advance Automatic Sales Co., Inc.)
540 Forbes Blvd.
South San Francisco, Ca. 94080 (415) 864-0400
Telex: 176-128
740-I Moowaa Street
Honolulu, Hawaii 96817 (808) 845-3305
9745 Bufiness Park Drive, Suite C Sacramento, California 95827 (916) 362-3294
BALLY MIDWEST INC.
(Formerly Empire Distributing, Inc)
2828 North Paulina Street Chicago, Illinois 60657 (312) 871-7600
Telex: 254026
1343 Sadlier Circle (South Drive) Indianapolis, Indiana 46239 (317) 352-0466
11998 Merriman Road Livonia, Michigan 48150 (313) 525-8700
Telex: 230212
3423 Lousma Drive, S.E. Wyoming, Michigan 49508 (616) 243-3644
Bellevue Plaza
1241 Bellevue Plaza
Green Bay, Wisconsin 54302 (414) 468-5200
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BALLY NORTHEAST DISTRIBUTING, INC.
1400 P Providence Hwy.
PO. Box 604
Norwood, Massachusetts 02062 (617) 762-9300
Telex: 924489
P.O. Box 23
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Telex: 937455
7A
BALLY MIDWAY’S COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT POLICY
FAIR WARNING! (Part IT)
WILLFUL COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT IS A FEDERAL CRIME! (Now strengthened by Tougher Criminal Penalties)
On May 24, 1982 PRESIDENT REAGAN signed into law provisions amending the Criminal Copyright Infringement Provisions of Federal Law which toughen criminal penalties for those found guilty of pirating and counterfeiting copyrighted audio visual works. The amendments provided in part:
“PIRACY AND COUNTERFEITING AMENDMENTS ACT OF 1982
Section 506 (a) CRIMINAL INFRINGEMENT - ‘Any person who infringes a copyright willfully and for the purposes of commercial advantage or private financial gain shall be punished as provided in section 2319 of Title 18.’
Section 2319 - CRIMINAL INFRINGEMENT OF A COPYRIGHT...
‘(b) Any person who commits an offense under subsection (a) of this section —
‘(1) Shall be fined not more than $250,000 or imprisoned for not more than FIVE YEARS,
or both if the offense...
‘(c) is. asecond or subsequent offense...where a prior offense involved...a motion picture or other
audiovisual work.”
The new law additionally provides for a fine of $25,000 and IMPRISONMENT UP TO A YEAR for the reproduction or distribution of pirated audiovisual works for less than sixty-five (65) copies but more than seven (7) copies during any 180-day period. Knowingly trafficking in counterfeit labels affixed or designed to be affixed to a copy of an audiovisual work may result in fines up to $250,000 or IMPRISONMENT UP TO FIVE (5) YEARS OR BOTH.
The penalties for trafficking in counterfeit or infringing games by some manufacturers, distributors, and operators is clearly of greater concern than ever. These companies undermine the creativity which is essential to the life of this industry.
Because of the additional serious nature and attention given to the problem of criminal copyright infringement and trafficking of counterfeit labels, Bally Midway now gives notice that it intends to seek criminal prosecutions to the new limits of the law against any such companies in cases of willfull infringe- ment of its copyrights in GALAXIAN™, PAC-MAN™, RALLY-X™, GORF”, WIZARD OF WOR", OMEGA RACE”, GALAGA”, KICK-MAN™, BOSCON IAN", MS PAC-MAN”, ROBBY ROTO", SOLAR FOX”, and all other video games manufactured and released by Bally Midway as well aa UNAUTHORIZED ENHANCEMENT or SPEED UP-KITS. Bally Midway will additionally seek to enforce its private rights by civil actions against infringers for injunctions, damages and profits. Bally Midway further places the business community on notice that it intends to enforce its copyrights and trademark rights against those infringing or trafficking in counterfeit labels on merchandising products other than video games. The new Piracy and Counterfeiting Amendments Act of 1982 will supplement and strengthen every available legal action that Bally Midway will take to protect its proprietary rights in its original and highly successful video games.
sally
MIDWAY MFG. CO. Franklin Park, Illinois 60434 [i] LEE LP EL LET IE EDEL LEELA AN DEA LEE LEBIAES NOD ALIEN ENDL SIPS AES PEDERI EAE LYNE EREE ALLRED REGED R AAC LERA
© 1982 BALLY MIDWAY MFG. CO. All Rights Reserved.
Daily Vehicle
Institute extremely strong penalties for private use of company vehicles.
Establish procedures to cut down on the number of half-loaded trucks that leave daily.
When vehicles are available to all drivers, employees’ feelings of responsibility are reduced.
By Ernest W. Fair
71A
oday’s high costs of maintaining and repairing trucks and vehicles justify cost-saving steps.
Add the increasingly costly replacement factor, as well as growing fuel bills, and the need for the steps listed below becomes urgent in the coin machine business.
e Place strong emphasis upon use and handling of company vehicles by employ- ees. Improved driving habits can eliminate misuse and reduce high operating costs.
e Institute extremely strong penalties for private use of company vehicles by employees at any time. This should include carrying guests in the truck cab when on business rounds.
e When costs rise sharply, arrange for maintenance and service checks twice as frequently as in the past. Look for the minor service and repair needs on hoses, belts, and electrical wiring.
Make sure there is nothing slack about checkups. Pick a responsible employee, and give that individual ample time to doa good job. Make sure he has plenty of back- ground in every aspect of vehicle operation.
Saving maintenance checkups until several problems accumulate can turn a $25 bill into a $100 bill. And probably four or five more problems will develop just because the original ones were not handled immediately.
e Maintain constant attention to better truck routing. When done on a systematic basis, it is surprising how much of a daily reduction in mileage there 1s.
e Establish procedures to cut down on the number of half-loaded trucks that leave daily. Most of these trips can be saved by better scheduling and working closer with accounts covering deliveries.
e Never let up in efforts to sell employ- ees on defensive driving as part of their working chores. This is something the average person can easily forget. Its value in holding down truck costs is high.
e Take a long, hard look at the quality of oil, gasoline and diesel fuel, lubricants, etc., that are used for preventive main- tenance. Fuel is much the same from every source. With lubricants, there can be big differences, however.
e Institute careful checks upon over- loading. This invariably produces strains and stresses not engineered into the truck’s capabilities.
Sometimes company truck drivers can
Attention Pays Off
be blamed for this, but more often, over- loads originate elsewhere. A driver should be given the authority to refuse to move his truck when it is overloaded.
Too often, employees gauge loading limits with a visible check upon springs, tires, and other body details—it is a helpful procedure. But often overlooked are effects that overloading has on the motor, transmission, and rear-end parts when the vehicle is put into motion. The load that body springs can handle is often the one subjecting drive-train parts to costly strains.
e When possible, limit vehicle use during adverse weather conditions and over punishing terrain. Many times, trucks are used during circumstances where a little more careful planning could avoid unnecessary wear and tear.
e When not in use, even the most rugged truck should be given protection from adverse weather conditions. Extremely cold temperatures can do a lot of damage to every part of the vehicle though damage to painted surfaces is greatest.
Mechanical protection against weather also has high importance. Extremes of heat and cold can do many dollars worth of damage to even the newest truck.
e Another step is to assign each vehicle to a specific driver. When vehicles are available to all drivers, employees’ feelings of responsibility are reduced.
An assigned driver invariably familiar- izes himself with the characteristics of a specific vehicle and will probably spot developing problems earlier.
e Try to keep company vehicles neat and trim on the inside and outside. This not only contributes to a longer vehicle life, but psychologically demonstrates to employees that the firm is concerned about equipment appearance.
It has been proven that the employee who drives a neat and attractive truck is going to take better care of it than one who totally neglects his truck.
e Consider a recognition program for drivers’ good records—not only for safe driving but also for maintaining low repair costs on the vehicles.
Everybody in the business has to develop concern for keeping truck use costs down...from the man who drives that truck to the operator behind the desk in the office. °
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
FRANK'S CRANKS
By Frank Seninsky
Fix your own circuit boards
logic comparator is an inexpen- sive device that can save you a great deal of time in locating bad
chips or IC’s.
The method used to repair boards by many in this industry is to first call a service technician on the game manufacturer’s toll-free number, wait a half hour on hold, and if you can accurately explain the symptoms correctly, you will, in most cases, be directed to a certain section of a logic board, monitor, or power supply if the problem is complex.
You then proceed to change each suspect IC (which takes a lot of time and patience)
SUGTR4AP™
LOGIC COMPARATOR
POWER
COMP, @
RESET
until after many hours or days you finally find the bad chip or chips, and “presto,” you tell your boss the board is fixed, but you spent $139 in parts for the nine sus- pected bad IC’s.
For those of you who can easily trouble- shoot with* schematics, oscilloscopes, signature analyzers, and logic probes, my hat is off to all 10 of you. Sure it is true that you must first understand “gate truth tables” to read schematics accurately, but how can a beginner get started and not waste time? One answer may be a logic comparator such as the Bugtrap Logic Comparator.
A beginner can work on boards with a Bugtrap Logic Comparator.
Piggy-backed together
A logic comparator compares a “known good” intergrated circuit (IC) with a duplicate suspect IC that is on a powered- up board (usually in a game). The two ICs’ inputs are “piggy-backed” together, and the outputs are separated and compared. With identical inputs, the outputs should match perfectly. This is all done while the suspect IC is in operation.
Any output pin of the suspect IC that does not match with the corresponding output pin on the reference IC will cause a LED on the comparator (there are 16) to latch or lock on. The corresponding LED will also stay on if the comparator encoun- ters small errors or intermittent miscom- pares that often cannot be picked up onan oscilloscope.
The Bugtrap comes in a hand-held unit made of a high-impact thermoplastic material. The 16 switches have contacts that are made of nickel and overlaid witha very thin gold covering. A 16 wire ribbon cable connécts the test clip to the com- parator. The test clip will easily fit onto any 16 pin IC, and each of the IC pins can be easily tested with a logic probe or multi- meter lead when the clip is connected.
A set of the 10 most commonly used IC’s comes with the comparator along with a reference manual listing all the comparator switch settings for each IC output in the 7400 series.
Bugtrap limitations As with any troubleshooting aid, the Bugtrap has its limitations. This unit can be used to test 8, 14, and 16 pin TTL (trensistor-transistor logic) and DTL (diode-transistor logic) 7400 series circuits. The 7400 series includes simple IC’s such as AND, NAND, OR, NOR gates and buffers and those more complicated: triggers, decoders, expanders, flip-flops, latches, adders, counters, shift registers, and multiplexers. These cover just about all the possible 7400 IC’s that are used on today’s game logic boards. The IC’s are numerically
72
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
—————————————————
EXAMPLE I
listed in the manufacturer’s logic com- parator reference manual that also lists
each IC’s standard switch settings for the ae oe IDENT IFICATION Dm(74).S161N output pin comparisons. Before starting to work with a com- parator, you must at least know some 910791 . ’ 1 OM74LS02N basics about IC’s. ba 74L00 ad TANG
Identifying IC’s
There are four basic types of IC’s. How many units an IC is to drive, and the speed that they must be driven determines what type will be used. In most cases, if you have to use a faster IC than the one you replaced, the game will work. The four types of IC’s are:
74H161 and 74L802
EXAMPLE II
“Te OIN ECHAN/ISMS nc.
817 Industrial Drive, Elmhurst, Il]. 60126 - 1184
H_ High Speed L Low Power S Schottkey LS Low Power Schottkey
The IC part number is usually embossed on the IC surrounded by a mess of other numbers and letters. This mystique (con- fusion) is to make those who work with IC’s feel important when they rattle off a string of numbers and letters and impress the rest of us dummies. Don’t let this confuse you.
The two numbers before the type letter(s), usually LS, refer to the series, in our case 74. Any letters or numbers before the 74 can be disregarded. The last two or three numbers after the type letter(s) is the part number of the IC. Any numbers or letters after that can be disregarded. In Example 1, the IC’s are easily identified.
To add to the confusion, sometimes a 54 is used in place of the 74 to denote an IC that is made to military specifications but is the same as its corresponding 74 series IC. The military does this so its special IC’s can be kept secret, and no one will under- stand its codes.
Manufacturing Coin Mechs, Domestic And Foreign, for
the Coin Operated Amusement Machine Industry Know where pin number one Is
There are basically four different ways e
that manufacturers mark IC’s to show where pin number oneis. In Example II, all the IC’s have some mark or notch to show which is the top end of the chip. Pin num- ber now is then always in the top left corner.
+5 volts DC is needed
If the power light on the comparator does not go on when the test clip is cor- rectly connected to a powered-up suspect IC, there is a strong possibility that the suspect IC isn’t getting +5 VDC. Every 7400 series IC requires a 5 volts DC input and a grounded output to be driven. The comparator and the reference IC also run off this 5 volt input. You will have to check the +5 VDC input pin and output ground pin with a multimeter to be sure.
Clearing an IC In order to get an accurate comparison
a
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on the complicated flip-flops, latches, counters, registers, and multivibrators, you will have to clear or reset the IC under test, so it will start from the beginning and perform its total function.
If a miscompare is shown in an IC that isn’t required to be cleared, (inverters, buffers, and gates) there is a good chance that the IC is bad. Every IC that must be cleared has a designated input pin or pins that must be pulsed to either a Logic | (high, +5 volts) or a Logic 0 (low, ground). The manufacturer recommends that you use a logic pulser to clear the IC’s.
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Founded in 1980, Randy Fromm’s Arcade Schools are the most respected and often recommended training pro- grams in the coin amusement industry. As a technical writer, Randy Fromm’s comprehensive articles appear regu- larly in the industry trade journals. Now he has condensed his ten years of experience into a proven Arcade School program that has allowed hun- dreds of Arcade School graduates learn the easiest, fastest, and most accurate ways to repair coin operated video games.
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If you’re careful, the easiest way to do the same thing is to take a jumper wire and clip one end to the +5 VDC test point on the board and use the other end as a Logic I, and clip a wire to the ground test point on the board and use the other end of the wire as a Logic 0.
Just touch the end of whatever wire you require to the designated input clear pin or pins of the suspect IC. The table lists these pins precisely and also shows how to clear dual pack IC’s. A dual pack IC has two separate clears: one for each half of the IC package.
Attend the Arcade School nearest you in: Atlanta, GA Baltimore, MD Chicago, IL Dallas, TX Minneapolis, MN New Orleans, LA Phoenix, AZ Salt Lake City, UT San Francisco, CA Toronto, Ontario Whichita, KS
Call or write for FREE information package
Randy Fromm’s Arcade School 6123 El Cajon Blvd. San Diego, CA 92115 (714) 286-0172
* It should be noted that if the clear instructions are enclosed by two vertical lines, then the input pins (which are next to each other) must be pulsed at the same time. If the clear instructions are separated by a horizontal line, then clear inputs can be pulsed separately, but both must be pulsed to compare the IC.
Additional notes If the output of a suspect IC is con- nected to an input circuit of another IC, (a pull-up resistor/capacitor circuit or a clock circuit located close to the crystal) a miscompare can result. A miscompare may also result if the suspect IC has an output that connects to another compo- nent that has a shorted input. This drags down the suspect IC’s output to ground. It’s a simple matter to lift the output pin or pins of the suspect IC that show mis- compare or cut the trace from the output to the possible shorted input. This is still easier than replacing the whole IC. If you now show a compare, you should look at the next IC that might have a shorted input.
Beginner shortcuts Some shortcuts for the beginner to be aware of:
I. Ms. Pac-Man piggy-back board— There is a bad run of 74LS74 flip-flops that causes the game to reset in the middle of play. This chip failure has been the cause most of the time.
2. Centipede—When the ball track won't move the man in either direction and both optic couplers are known good, then take a look at the 74LS157 on the logic board. It has been known to fail.
3. Defender—If your game just rests in the middle of play, look at the 74LS374 on the CPU board after checking that all connections are tight.
4. Star Castle—If you can’t get your monitor to work and it tests good, look at the 74LS377 IC on the CPU board.
5. Gottlieb—If you are missing digits on a display and the display is good, look at the 7408 on the CPU board. If the whole display circuit is bad, check the 7448.
The Bugtrap Logic Comparator will
help get you into checking IC’s and
collecting known good reference samples. Then, when you hear the guys rattling off the names of the stuff they work on, you can rattle off some of these names too. It’s a nice tool to have.
By the way, I dropped it twice (as a test?), and it didn’t break or scratch. It is made by Bugtrap Instrumentation, 1173 Tasman Dr., Sunnyvale, California 94086. Telephone: 408/734-1118. It costs $265.
Over the summer, Ill be putting together a list of symptoms and bad IC’s that would cause these symptoms. It should be a valuable list to have. e
a
PLAY METER, August 1, 1982
® Reduce the collector’s work. With no time wasted counting quarters, he can cut collection time by 40%.
® Gain more than just a count. The receipts show the machine’s serial number, the date and time of the col- lection—as well as the amount of money in the cash-
box.
SPEED UP ™ COLLECTION TIME BY 40%
The ITS system includes the installation of an electronic totalizer in each machine which transmits collection data through a beam of light to the ITS microprinter.
With this, collections are as simple as
Step One
“Interrogate” the machine. ITS Microprinter can print two receipts.
, Ge “J
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| Hen pa
Step Two
eEnlarge the possible ways of doing business. For — Empty the cashbox and put one receipt in
example, by keeping the cash and mailing a check, you have additional short-term capital for 2-3 weeks; or, by giving the keys to trusted locations, your collector can interrogate the machine and have the location give him a check on the spot.
Gain the confidence of location owners, especially those large chains that demand total accountability. Prospective new accounts will be impressed with your
professional sales presentation.
Also available: The TT-7 with 14-character Alpha-numeric reprogrammable identification code.
Call or write us for details. You owe it to your business to find out more.
INTERNATIONAL TOTALIZING SYSTEMS, INC.
1244 Chesnut Street Newton Upper Falls, Mass. 02164 (617) 332-4400
Step Three
Hand the second receipt to the location owner. Your collector takes all the cash.
Please send me more information on your ITS cash accountability system.
Name Company City____—————CT— State ____ Zipp | operate O under 250 machines
O 250-500 machines 0 500-1,000 machines 0 over 1,000 machines
Wise
Figure 1-A
Soldering tips
and techniques
lectronic game repair is a lot like
the work of a police detective.
When acrime occurs, the detective looks for the person that committed the crime. When a game