The self-inflicted price explosion of KLOV

Apart from the cost of some very rare complete machines it seems like on a whole the prices through the community here are lower than elsewhere, and those items come from generally more trustworthy and helpful sellers and they would be components that are in better shape too.

If you want something that doesn't show up frequently and/or you want something immediately then plan to pay more just like anything anywhere else.

Time and place are everything.
 
I too miss the days of $2500 HUO Monster Bash's, $400 Smash TV's and .05 bottles of coke. I mean 12 years ago ops were giving away 6 player x-men and destroying them. Now you could buy a fancy house in the suburbs for the costs of one.

Free market principles. Supply and demand and way more folks in the hobby, with fewer games available.
Ahhhh and the early 2000's I cannot tell you how many SFIIs I parted or sold complete for $150 or less....
I'm certain I personally destroyed 1% of all the SFII's out there... (#joke)
 
i once bought 100 games for $50 each. i used to go to arcade auctions and pay $10-$50 for the "no value" games.
there used to be an arcade auction every 1-2 weeks all summer.
the reason games are more expensive now is because the warehouses filled with "junk" are dried up
and most of the remaining "junk" has been picked over.
 
With respect:
Arcade prices went crazy when a large California Op went TU and sold off their line (through Captain's Auctions where prices officially hit the BAT-$hit crazy level)

Then we had the Steve Salmon scam.

Prices have since come down.

With some exceptions.

If you buy something off KLOV (and research the seller - KEY POINT), you will generally get a better piece than if you buy off eBay.

Generally. We have some people who take advantage of others (case in point, Steve Salmon and others) which means you need to LOOK at their transactions and see how things have gone.

We even had some people who hacked easy to remember passwords, and started trying to sell vaporgames on the forum. Thankfully, guys like @mclemore and @Tombo (and others) were watching and started locking up the forum to stop the frauds.

Right now, it's a BUYER's market more than a sellers from what I'm seeing, and I'll be the first to admit someone may see it differently, but prices are GENERALLY down over what they were a few years ago.

I would ask you to consider this perspective and test my theories, not accept them as fact. They are what I have observed.
 
I dropped out of the hobby for years as well and recently came back.

Maybe part of it could be attributed to flipper culture? Seems like that kind of got supercharged during the pandemic years, with resellers driving up price floors among almost all markets of collectibles.

Thrift stores are cleared out of anything worthwhile, finds and big profits are posted on social media accounts, "picking" has entered the lexicon and culture, and a lot of these amateur brokers are driving up sales in many hobbies, where it was previously mostly the collectors determining those markets.

I'm going off vibes instead of data, but to me it seems to have had an impact on this hobby as well. 🤷
 
People are making some great points and observations here, I love it.

There's also the painful truth that any 'obscure' hobby that has the social media spotlight turned on it gets flooded with new interest.

I don't think it's unreasonable to say that this used to be a hobby that could be enjoyed by people of most financial levels. The games were cheap to come by and if you were willing to learn and scour through schematics you could get one back up and running for a pretty modest sum of money.

The flood of retro popularism has driven demand so high that many people have been priced out of the hobby and that pisses those people off. Pretty understandable when they feel like they were there for noble reasons decades before it became 'cool'. This is just a sad reality of trends becoming popular.

I'm lucky, I've been able to create a personal situation where I can afford that change, but many cannot.
 
To those who are coming back to this hobby welcome back.

Things are not the same. Chasing deals is becoming harder. Your competitors have more money and have better connections and are quicker. It is a real struggle to find a certain arcade machine. You have to be more creative in your searches.

Good luck in your searches out there.
 
Thanks @Alpha-tron !
Yes, the market seems a lot different from back before the sugar rush of the pandemic.

I've completely given up on pinball at this point.
Ain't gonna happen again. 🤷

Have surprisingly lucked out with arcade games though and found everything on my list! Was always good at hunting, and only shipped one of them. Now just have to fix & restore them, and am enjoying that. There's technically room for one more game, but i dunno if I'll fill that spot or not.

Living in a much smaller place now in an urban center has really helped force me to keep a narrow focus. It's a lot of effort to get a game up the cramped "historic" stairs (no Ataris!), there's no garage or workshop, no room to hoard, and I recently sold my truck and am car-free now. I walk, bike, or take the train everywhere, and renting is easier than owning a car here.

I think it's a good thing though, as I have to be really intentional with game choices. No games I won't play. No "just because" games. No big monstrosity cabinets. No impulse buys. I like those constraints and they've been helpful.

I do miss the arcade I had and wish I'd kept a few of those games, but am pretty happy with the new collection and their replacements so far. 🙃

Glad to be back in the hobby! 🕹️😁
 
To those who are coming back to this hobby welcome back.

Things are not the same. Chasing deals is becoming harder. Your competitors have more money and have better connections and are quicker. It is a real struggle to find a certain arcade machine. You have to be more creative in your searches.

Good luck in your searches out there.


This is very true.
Plus for those of us who don't due social media we miss a lot. But we don't get as much grief or scammers either. lol


Plus if you are dropping $25K in 3 months I don't see where a $200 difference in price for something needed to finish a game matters. There is getting stuff done quickly or searching for deals, those two efforts rarely happen together.
 
Example -
Tapper power suitcase working - KLOV $300+ - Found one on eBay for $60
NOS Ikari Warriors Side Art - KLOV good luck anything below $250 - found mine on Offerup for $50

Example:
You paying $900 to ship an empty cab across the country instead of hooking up someone who's local.
 
The prices seem to have cooled off. Pinball is seeing almost all titles go backward in value, first I've seen in 20 years or so.

I think videos are still doable for low prices and for people willing to put in the sweat equity. I see and pass on cheap games all the time, I just don't want or need them, but someone getting started or with less money could fix those up.
 
Value of money and time.

I know collectors who are still waiting to pickup a deal on xyz arcade machines or pinball machines.

Those who cursed to have kids laughs knows there comes a time when the last time the little buggers stop wanting to climb on your shoulders. They last time they view you as all knowing parent. Time ticks by so fast. What the use of restore arcade games if the family view the games as just things that take you away from them.

Arcade projects in fact any project does steal time away from family and personal relationships. A life out of balance is a recipe for losing what important. Journal your time and see where and how you are spending your time.

If that arcade project takes you years to it get done. Was it worth your time? Where could you spent your time better? If those who visit your arcade are gamers. There isnt much fun for them if they are all broke.

My point? Yes your time is valuable but family time is also valuable. Spend your time well.
 
It's been pretty wild coming back to the hobby after taking a 7 year break from being 'active' in restoring, getting pickups etc.

I can certainly say KLOV has been an indispensable resource in helping me gather information, guidance, games and parts, without which I certainly wouldn't have been able to achieve anywhere near as much as I have with the hobby. The thing that has stood out to me the most, returning here is a much more aggressive attitude toward pricing of games and especially parts.

No doubt COVID money printing added to ongoing abnormal inflation in this field the same way it did with so many others, and continues to effect it even years on. But also, perhaps driven by supply-demand factors resulting from more and more people showing interest, it seems that EVERYTHING has rocketed in price 200%,300%, 400% and more on certain items. Also it seems there is a lot more MMAO trending in the for sale section.

Personally I've chosen to no-longer engage in MMAO sales as I don't agree with the format, that's just my opinion and choice of course. But also, I've found myself checking other places FIRST before considering buying from sellers here as it seems that the KLOV premium is becoming a thing too, 'collectors price' for everything.

Example -

Tapper power suitcase working - KLOV $300+ - Found one on eBay for $60
NOS Ikari Warriors Side Art - KLOV good luck anything below $250 - found mine on Offerup for $50

Someone kindly reached out to me the other day when I mentioned I might be looking for a Crazy Taxi sit down. In 2018 you could get working sit down drivers all day long for $150. This seller mentioned they were looking for $2,000.

This isn't so much a dig or swipe at anyone, just an observation that sometimes it seems that communities that become too insular can self-inflate the very things that they need to pursue their hobby.

I imagine this happens in all kinds of communities that trade in any hyper-focused vertical category.
When I sell, I usually sell for cheaper on KLOV myself. Also, Crazy Taxi is an awesome game. The people who want it have money now which means the price goes up. That's happening for a lot of 90's + stuff. Younger generations don't care about the old stuff as much.
 
I've spent about $25,000 on this hobby in the last 3 months, does that count as buying anything recently?

Well, you got the self-inflicted part right.... TL;DR: You can spend your $$ where you choose. But don't come whining later that the hobby is too expensive.

Props to you that you have such disposable income available for a hobby.


Happy-Clap.gif
 
I must be doing something wrong. I always seem to sell for less than I bought a part for. I always invest more time and money in a cabinet then I end up selling it for. I honestly just consider this a hobby and try to help others enjoy the games. If I'm lucky to make a few bucks here and there buying and selling parts when friends need something then so be it.
 
Apart from the cost of some very rare complete machines it seems like on a whole the prices through the community here are lower than elsewhere, and those items come from generally more trustworthy and helpful sellers and they would be components that are in better shape too.

If you want something that doesn't show up frequently and/or you want something immediately then plan to pay more just like anything anywhere else.

Time and place are everything.

I feel like there's a little bit of both going on here, on eBay and places like Facebook marketplace. I think part of the issue some people that have is that these items are no longer considered simply " junk ". This is a particularly difficult realization for those that have been in the hobby for a decade or more. The days of buying things cheap because they were seen as " junk " are over. What's left out there is all a sellers market.

Sometimes like you I too have seen some things cheaper on eBay and other times I've seen them cheaper here on KLOV. This kind of sellers market simply has items priced based on perceived value. At the end of the day it's only worth how much people are willing to pay for it.
 
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