Where to buy old arcade games?

[Entity]

My friend wants one of these - and I'm trying to help him find one. Any suggestions other than fleabay?

Rob

 

[austin316]

.......

 

[Fritoz]

Google is the obvious answer, but I wouldn't expect prices to be any better than you see at ebay. Rather, keep an eye on your local paper classifieds. I see folks trying to sell old video and pinball games from time to time with pretty decent prices. Many of them are just looking to get rid of 'em.

 

[amnesiac]

Look in the yellow pages under Amusement devices. There are usually companies which specialize in used arcade games, and can probalby hunt them down for you.

Depending on the condition, you're probably looking at $250-600 for an older game like Tetris.
*edit* Damn, I'm good. I pegged the price range exactly as the auction stated and I didn't even see it.

 

[kranky]

Gotta find one locally because the shipping probably ain't cheap. I noticed in the auction you linked that he doesn't say what it will cost, he only says "an extra $40.00 or $50.00 to ship it to your house". Most people will skim over that and miss the all-important word extra. And how much is the basic shipping - $100, $300? Or what? He doesn't say! It's based on distance/weight (and insurance, I'll bet) and the machine is in MO.

 

[Imported]

A friend of mine is building a Street Fighter II machine..

 

[ObiDon]

I don't know if they still do it...but when I worked for Tilt, they would put all their games on sale around Christmas. All the machines would have price tags on them with the prices. The older games would go for $250ish and up depending on the game.

When Super Street Fighter II had just come out, we had converted an old game into SSFII and that week someone came in and wanted to buy it. It went for $3995 and since I was the manager I got a pretty nice commission for that one. I also sold several other games that year.

I don't remember if there were any Tetris machines in the company at that time. They probably were all converted into something more profitable. It might be worth it to stop by and check it out though.

The same company also owns The Gold Mine and possibly the Red Barron shops in case there's any of those in your area. Also, sometimes the small independent shops will put their games up for sale.

I think it would be pretty cool to have a coin-op Moonwalker machine. I ended up converting mine and I don't remember what it became.

 

[HiveMaster]

Look in the yellow pages under Amusement devices. There are usually companies which specialize in used arcade games, and can probalby hunt them down for you.

I cannot stress enough the importance of this: IF you want to buy from one of these "dealers," INSIST on getting the names and phone numbers of clients! You MUST find out if the person selling you this game is NOT going to rip you off after the sale. I worked as a technician in the 1990's and almost every used Arcade Game salesman I did stuff for was a fscking crook.