This hobby before the great CL... share your stories.

vintagegamer

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This hobby before the great CL... share your stories.

I was not involved in this hobby until the CL thing was already up and running, matter of fact my 3rd and 4th games came from a CL score (#1 was from a neighbor in 2005, #2 came from the Bay in 2006.........).

How did you old-schoolers do it? Auctions? OP networks? Newspaper ads?

I know this has been touched on before but it's been a while so let's hear your tales for the new folk.......... :D
 
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My first game - Space Invaders. Newspaper ad.

I searched the internet after that and found 2 different guys that bought and sold games. Ended up buying a lot from them including a Tron, Wizard of Wor, Tapper cocktail, Dig Dug cocktail, Galaxian, Burgertime. One guy had a website.

A fellow klov member and I used to walk the neighborhoods where he lives, peering into open garages for games. You wouldn't believe how many we (mostly him) found and bought. A Robotron; which led to other games the guy had in his basement including a Battlezone UR, and a Frogger cocktail, Twin Cobra, and a few others I've forgotten about.

Mayo Clinic advertiser was another one. Got a Ms. Pac thru that.

Called up a vending place back in '98. Asked them if they had a Gorf. The guy said "yep". I laughed, but he said they had just finally pulled it off route after all those years and it was sitting in the showroom for sale. I went down there at midnight (open 24/7) and put $100 down on it and they delivered 2 days later.
 
On that note, I remember pre-Ebay (which probably also makes me seem old). Ebay rocked the shit out of coin-op collecting when it appeared (and every other hobby). CL's impact was a blip in comparison.

Pre-Ebay online purchases were really, really sketchy. You were sending M.O's to essentially complete strangers, even though you "knew them" on RGVAC and would weight the cost benefits of buying a plane ticket to retrieve your stuff if things went bad (I don't think anyone ever did this though...but I'm sure someone will surprise me with a story). Your only other resource was to do things IRL. Haggle with ops just to get to look through their stash. Try to find local collectors and network like crazy. (and believe it or not) scan the local newspaper ads, which unlike CL only a few people used (since newspaper ads aren't free and everyone is a cheap ass ;P).

When Ebay hit, only a few were utilizing the system at first, but it grew substantially after the first 6-12 months to where EVERYONE was using it. The rating system had weight considering there was only "he said, she said" on RGVAC to back you up when shit went bad. Prices on Ebay, believe it or not pt. II, were pretty fair as well for a little while...but it also raised those prices like crazy for obvious reasons after that first 2 year period.

Since then, some things have gone for the worse, some things for the better. *shrug*
 
On that note, I remember pre-Ebay (which probably also makes me seem old). Ebay rocked the shit out of coin-op collecting when it appeared (and every other hobby). CL's impact was a blip in comparison.

Pre-Ebay online purchases were really, really sketchy. You were sending M.O's to essentially complete strangers, even though you "knew them" on RGVAC and would weight the cost benefits of buying a plane ticket to retrieve your stuff if things went bad (I don't think anyone ever did this though...but I'm sure someone will surprise me with a story). Your only other resource was to do things IRL. Haggle with ops just to get to look through their stash. Try to find local collectors and network like crazy. (and believe it or not) scan the local newspaper ads, which unlike CL only a few people used (since newspaper ads aren't free and everyone is a cheap ass ;P).

When Ebay hit, only a few were utilizing the system at first, but it grew substantially after the first 6-12 months to where EVERYONE was using it. The rating system had weight considering there was only "he said, she said" on RGVAC to back you up when shit went bad. Prices on Ebay, believe it or not pt. II, were pretty fair as well for a little while...but it also raised those prices like crazy for obvious reasons after that first 2 year period.

Since then, some things have gone for the worse, some things for the better. *shrug*

..and when Ebay hit, a Ms Pac cocktail could go for $1500.
 
I was not involved in this hobby until the CL thing was already up and running, matter of fact my 3rd and 4th games came from a CL score (#1 was from a neighbor in 2005, #2 came from the Bay in 2006.........).

How did you old-schoolers do it? Auctions? OP networks? Newspaper ads?

I know this has been touched on before but it's been a while so let's hear your tales for the new folk.......... :D

Auctions and word of mouth. Everyone knew I liked games so I had people pass me leads. Got a $125 Galaxian cocktail and a free converted Moon Patrol that way. Got my first pinball at an auction, Who Dunnit.
 
Called up a vending place back in '98. Asked them if they had a Gorf. The guy said "yep". I laughed, but he said they had just finally pulled it off route after all those years and it was sitting in the showroom for sale. I went down there at midnight (open 24/7) and put $100 down on it and they delivered 2 days later.


Interesting that a vending place would end up with these games- I mean, I know they are both coin-op, but you would think they would still lead separate lives for some reason.
 
Auctions and word of mouth. Everyone knew I liked games so I had people pass me leads.

See, this was totally different for me- the people who I grew up with who liked arcade games kinda let that part of their lives 'die' after the arcades died. Leave it to me to fall in the 1% who didn't :D
 
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Picked up the phone book, looked under vending companies, called a place called Empire Arcades, they sent me to a private seller who had the machine I wanted in a barn.

Back when you used phone books for looking up phone numbers.
 
Picked up the phone book, looked under vending companies, called a place called Empire Arcades, they sent me to a private seller who had the machine I wanted in a barn.

Back when you used phone books for looking up phone numbers.

[VG mumbles to self, trying to pronounce a new word] ff.....fff... Phhhhone. fffpphhhhoone, book. PhoneBook... Sorry, nope, doesn't ring a bell :D

I still never in that time would have made the connection between "vending" (ie soda and snack machines) and "vending" (arcade games). This is a totally new concept to me (no sarchasm this time).
 
Networking was huge in the early days of collecting, I was fortunate to meet a few local collectors in the early 90's at local auctions (which I'd happened upon completely by accident) and we went warehouse raiding together. Eventually we started calling it, "The Kansas City Group", and we're still all together to this day.

I also had pretty good luck with classified "wanted to buy" ads in the local Thrifty Nickel paper. Once an old operator called me and had an entire warehouse of machines, he would only sell me four of them and they were only $25 bucks each. That guy had really cool old stuff- Seeburg jukebox shipping crates from the 40's and 50's, ball bowlers, you name it. A couple of years after that he died and they held an auction. I bought a few things, but wish I'd bought more since so much of it was hard to find elsewhere.

Also plenty of RGVAC deals with money orders before Paypal was in widespread use.
 
I started collecting way back in '94.

My first machine was a Rastan in a converted Berzerk upright that I purchased right off the floor of a local mom & pop arcade.

After that, I mainly looked under the heading "amusement devices" in the phone book (an ancient concept, truly) and called operators to inquire about older games. Many operators would say they sold/trashed/converted everything that wasn't "recent", but others still had older games stockpiled. As is the case now, sometimes prices were favorable, sometimes they were insane.

In addition to buying from ops or off the floor of arcades, I also snagged a Space Invaders, and a Stratovox from sellers who posted ads in the local "Pennysaver" newspaper, and was I given a Pulsar (rare Sega/Gremlin) from a friend of a friend who just wanted it out of his basement.

Kyle :cool:
 
Like others said, I started collecting before Ebay came about. Everything was networking and live auctions. Uncovered a few games in old operator warehouses. Made one 'raid' on a guys old barn and found a few games. Word of mouth.. bought a couple of games from someone I worked with 'who heard I collected arcade games'. When Ebay came out it was crazy. You could sell a crappy working conversion for $300. Dedicated games in nice shape could go for $1000 and up. And people were happy to pay $200 to ship them. Now with Craigslist you can just search for things local to you.
 
Got my first game (GORF) from a newsgroup listing. Frogger came from an auction I got to about 3 hours late. Always try to pick up locally.
 
I love hearing pre-ebay or even internet stories. Ebay was already going strong when I got into owning games, but I collected motorcycles pre-internet.

Newspapers, Cycle Trader, wanted ads on cycle shop bulletin boards, and word of mouth at races. That feels like such a small "world" compared to getting stuff with net access now.
Some of the logistics are no better though... Getting a Robotron or a bike from 300 miles away is pretty much the exact same experience!

Oh yea...
2003: 6 motorcycles, 0 arcade games
2012: 1 motorcycle, 10 arcade games, 2 pins! :)
 
my first cab was a birthday present Defender (yes, i picked it out) from my parents that came from a local operater (MusicVend, now Mountain Coin) in 1991.

after that i was given a cab (very poor condition Pacman converted to a JR) in about 1998, then i picked up a n/w Robotron from a thrift store for $50 about the same time.

after that it was mostly CL, word-of-mouth with other collectors or a very few buys off of eBay.
 
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