Every year I acquire a few amusement devices. However, not all of them make it to my blog.
Either from lack of time or interest. Not every game gets to be written about.
Here are the 2021 games that didn't get a proper convoluted semi-technical write up.
Taiyo Circus:
Purchased off Yahoo Japan Auctions. Released in 1978. This is a great example of a Dagashiya (Japanese traditional Mom & Pop candy store) game. It's a super difficult skill game so it's ideal as a keeper. I highly recommend this game. The aesthetics and gameplay are awesome. A bunch of these popped up on YJA... some lightly used some new (out of the box) and some new in box (NIB). I'd love to know the story of these games. How they appeared in quantity on YJA. Prices are slowly creeping up, so if you are considering one of these better get one sooner than later. Watch out for games with rot or corrosion.
NSM Rider Seven:
Another YJA impulse buy. I've always wanted a NSM Rotamint and I love the esthetics of Dagashiya games. This game combines both. It's a late 60's NSM game that's been converted with a high quality art package, a 10 Yen coin chute and a Nickel sized token chute. The game required a reset coil for the payout unit that had to be sourced from Germany (Thanks Cait). Despite ticking all the boxes I sorta lost interest in this game.
Midway S.A.M.I.:
A legendary offering by Midway in 1970. I think it's one of the best electromechanical arcade games ever produced. Despite not being more complicated than a Sea Raider. The end result is stunning. I've always wanted one of these for my collection. I bought two (one for parts). One day I might take the time to document the production differences between both, one being early production, the other late production. These arcades games, gameplay wise, have a pattern so once you memorize it the game becomes a bit boring. These are super cool nonetheless.
Games Inc. Super Wild Cat:
Another Flasher Console. I don't need another one (I already have a Little Buckaroo and and Mountain Climber project) but this one has a story and some sentimental significance for the seller. These were well built games. One day I'll take the time to write about the innards. In its heyday it was operated in New Brunswick.
Maruto 1961 Single shot pachinko machine:
This game came in very late in the year. I've wanted a single shot pachinko machine for awhile. The opportunity to buy this one came up. It required a bit of soldering work to get it going.
Once I got inside the game, I discovered that the tokens that were sloshing about were also jammed everywhere inside the cabinet. They even got inside the monitor frame! Before even thinking of powering up the machine, I had to fish out all those tokens.
I took the board unit and inspected it for hidden tokens.
Once I finished fishing out all those tokens, I had a big pile. It's the first time I acquire this type of game and it came with an adequate amount of tokens. Over 200 tokens!
Payout unit and power module
The monitor has a bit of burn in but it's not too bad considering the age and previous heavy use.
I gave the cabinet a light vacuuming, checked all the connections and fuses, double checked I had all the tokens out and plugged it in my variable transformer adjusted at 100V. It turned on like it should and went into attract mode.
I made a short video of the attract mode and uploaded it to Youtube as a reference since no one had before.
I coined up the game, shot some balls and pressed some buttons. None of the tile buttons were registering. It was at that point I realised I had no clue what I was doing. I can't read japanese and I don't know how to play mahjong!
The balls that came with the machine were absolutely gross, which is a surprise considering they don't even get handled by the player. I changed the balls for clean smooth unmarked balls. The machine uses only 18 balls.
The 14 balls on the right side are released simultaneously at the start of the game to make the pile. The 4 balls on the left are doled out one at a time once you discard tile. The played balls return immediately to the accumulator trail after passing through one of the tile ball microswitches.
The ball trails were very dirty... to the point balls would stay stuck. They required a bit of cleaning and polishing.
Two push on / push off buttons inside the door top right. Top one is to recall the last game played and the bottom one is for bookkeeping details (coins in - coins out = net total sice machine was last turned on).
The mysterious "tile button" not working:
Turns out that was the major problem with the game. None of the tile buttons worked. All the tile buttons, that are used to discard or to lock a group of 4 tiles were unresponsive.
I took the tile button sub assembly apart and discovered that the conductive rubber pads inside the buttons were contaminated by some type of oil, making the rubber non conductive. I tried cleaning the rubber pads with various solutions to no avail. I tried lightly sanding the rubber, but that didn't work either. I looked it up and apparently that's a common problem with some vintage computer keyboards. There's no solution for contaminated rubbers other than changing them out for good ones. Since that's not an option in my case, my only option was bodgery.
I weighed my bodgery options and opted for aluminium foil. Tiny folded strips of aluminium foil... for all 27 buttons. I actually felt dirty doing this type of bodgery. This is below my usual repair standards. But it's simple, cheap and reversible. Otherwise I'm stuck with a unplayable game.
If in the near future a button fails again, the subsequent fix will be easy. I will have to make do with this "repair" until I can find a good button sub assembly (good luck with that).
I know I can buy conductive rubber material from various suppliers and cut tiny pieces but that wouldn't work with my situation since the rubber pad have a kind of nipple in the center that acts as a spring for the button plunger. That and the way the material is secured in the pusher.
I reassembled the assembly, tested it and it works great. For how many cycles? Who knows! But the machine will get light use anyway.
The non registering tile ball microswitches:
I took out the microswitch subassembly. Each switch can easily be taken out for service. I had two bad switches. I had to take the microswitches apart for cleaning and adjustment.
That sums up the work on the Satomi Sparrow Ball TV JanQ
General impressions:
I like this game. The look is dated, but in a good way. The cell art is a mix between greco-roman kitch and a trucker's girl silhouette. The green CRT's warm glow reminds me of my childhood. The game has an imposing amount of buttons but it's pretty simple once you know how to play the game.
Playing impressions:
Since fixing the game, I learned the basics of japanese mahjong. I enjoy playing the game. It's like playing an arrangeball, but with more control. First shoot 14 balls. Then discard a tile to shoot a ball, repeat. You build your hand, modifying your strategy as the balls land try to get a winning combination within 10 shots. Each game is pretty long, over a minute, for one token. That's good entertainment value for the money. There's a few scoring subtleties specific to the TV JanQ (not mahjong in general) that still elude me but I don't mind.
It started with a fascination about a type of game I didn't even know the name of... Sparrow Ball, basically it's a mix between pachinko, (maybe more like and arrangeball) and the game of japanese mahjong.
For the history of Sparrow Ball here is a Japanese Wikipedia article. Just translate to english and enjoy.
The short short history:
First game in 1958... first TV game in 1979.
Sparrow Ball parlours phased out in 2007 and completely gone by 2013.
One day, while perusing Yahoo Japan Auctions, a Satomi TV JanQ sparrow ball popped up for sale. I had to buy it.
The Google translated YJA auction description mentioned the "tile button" and sound not working, but overall the game worked.
Shouldn't be too hard to get it working I thought.
There was even a video of the actual game in action. The screen brightness is obviously adjusted too high and a few tiles didn't register. No Biggie.
Buying a machine off YJA is always a gamble. The pictures are usually bad. The description, minimalistic and the details... foggy.
Furthermore, you have to use a Proxy bidding service. Once you win the machine, you're committed, all the way.
You pay for the bidding service, reception, re-packaging (if necessary) and expedition (not cheap).
To that you add duty and customs brokerage fees plus any other fees the intermediate parties decide you have to pay.
Basically, once you win the auction, you strap your wallet to a rocket and blast off! So it better be worth it.
The Satomi TV Jan-Q arrived 6 days later in a gigantic 49 kg box. As the delivery guy carried the box from his truck to my doorstep I could hear the tokens and balls sloshing around inside the cabinet. Finally I could see what I bought.
As mentioned in the previous post, I acquired a Nishijin Circuit Racer.
Soon after, a friend mentioned that I could buy replacement stickers for it. But when I compared my machine with the sticker set, mine were slightly different. The car sticker in the "cloud" is different and my the feature artwork doesn't have the fork in the road around the "4" and "G", nor does it have the second "S" at the start. Fortunately, my stickers are still in decent condition.
And contrary to other descriptions of circuit racer that are found online, the left and right yellow trophy holes start the feature, not the center hole. Center hole opens only the bottom centre tulip on mine.
The funny thing is that when the tire feature is open, you can't see the S, 4 and G lights. Should have used a low profile tire instead ;-)
You can see the S, 4 and G lights only if you look from the side.
Circuit racer is known to be a game from early 1975, so the expiry date stickers would indicate some months in 1976 (S51). But my expiry sticker indicates 50-12 (December 1975), meaning it was released some time in December 1974. Does this mean I have an early production game?
Pachinko Palace imported some rare gem!
Here is a very informative article about pachinko machine expiration dates. I used the article as a reference for my tiny bit of research.
By chance, I picked up a rare Nishijin Circuit Racer pachinko machine. It's one of the few models of that era that utilizes an electromechanical feature. Most pachinko machines from that era are purely mechanical devices except for a couple of lights and leaf switches.
When I first got the machine it was dirty, the back was falling off and the tire feature coil was continuously energized with no power going to the lamps. The cleaning and falling back were an easy fix not worth documenting. The stepper unit required partial dismantling to access the wiper and disc for cleaning.
The feature unit is very nice with a sealed relay, a tiny wiper and disc, a step up coil, a reset coil and a delay circuit for the reset coil. The board also has 4 diodes as a bridge rectifier.
Here's how the unit works.
Under normal conditions, when the feature is not engaged. The stepper unit wiper is in zero position and the sealed relay is energized breaking the circuit to the tire solenoid.
When a ball triggers the feature micro switch it momentarily energizes the step up coil, shifting the wiper one position. The small sealed relay drops out and it's switch makes the circuit for the tire solenoid.
Additional balls in the feature steps up the unit via the micro switch until it reaches last step.
The stepper unit reset coil is energized by the last step on the stepper unit or by the left or right pit stop micro switches.
Wiper winds back to zero position, small relay is energized by zero position and tire feature solenoid drops out.
Stepper disc steps:
0 - Energizes sealed relay
1 - S light
2 - 2 light
3 - 3 light
4 - 4 light
5 - G light
6 - Energizes stepper reset coil
Enjoy some reference pictures of the stepper unit. Details are few for this game!
