[HN Gopher] Environmental Discs of Tron Roadside Pickup
___________________________________________________________________
Environmental Discs of Tron Roadside Pickup
Author : jsnell
Score : 264 points
Date : 2023-07-28 07:48 UTC (15 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (arcadeblogger.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (arcadeblogger.com)
| MisterTea wrote:
| Arcade trash is amazing. One day driving around my neighborhood
| in a box truck I spotted a arcade cabinet at the curb. As I'm
| getting close I see the side and its Terminator 2! I stop the
| truck, see a guy in the back yard, flag him down and ask "Is this
| trash and does it work?" he says "Yeah it works but the guns
| don't vibrate anymore and I need the room in my garage" So into
| the back of the truck it went. I was lucky to A. find it and B.
| also happen to be driving a truck.
|
| Guns were easily fixed. The vibrator is a solenoid with a rubber
| tipped plunger mounted to an L shaped bracket made from stamped
| sheet metal. The plunger strikes the short length of the L and
| the bend takes the stress. Over the years the constant slapping
| broke the plate at the bend. I welded the plates back on adding
| two gusset strips on each side to brace them and the guns were
| back to vibrating. Still have it but hasn't been powered on in
| ages.
| butterisgood wrote:
| Unbelievable find! I have fond memories of being a kid playing
| this and being horrible at it.
| dghughes wrote:
| Dragged it home on dollies? This has a very strong feeling of
| George Costanza Frogger episode from Seinfeld.
|
| I worked fro my uncle who rented games to arcades. Discs of Tron
| always had problems with the 3D joystick. You need it for the
| Discs game the levels go up and down.
|
| I can hear the music now...!
| flapjaxy wrote:
| I always wonder, for rare games like this, do folks copy the
| firmware/ROM to preserve the software for others?
| blincoln wrote:
| It depends on the person who owns it and the expense/level of
| effort required.
|
| Some game collectors are motivated by the idea of owning
| something that no one else has. For decades, there were no
| preserved, shares versions of Marble Madness 2 available for
| that reason, but looks like that finally changed last year.[1]
| Akka Arrh was a similar case.
|
| If a collector is interested in preserving and sharing, there's
| still the expense/effort factor. For an arcade game, they need
| to buy (or find someone with) specialized equipment, and may
| need to desolder chips from the board. I.e. there's a non-zero
| chance of destroying a one-off artifact, even when performed by
| people with experience.
|
| The production ROMs for Discs of Tron have been preserved for
| quite awhile.[2]
|
| However, if this was a test machine, it would be neat for
| someone with the necessary gear to dump it and see if the code
| is different.
|
| [1] https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2022/05/after-30-years-the-
| wo...
|
| [2] e.g.
| http://adb.arcadeitalia.net/dettaglio_mame.php?game_name=dot...
| ainiriand wrote:
| Sometimes I think I live in different planets to some people...
| xwdv wrote:
| It's such perfect condition I have to wonder if they bought a
| cabinet then made up a faked story about finding it out on the
| curb outside as trash for clicks.
| roolgo wrote:
| Yeah, i had this feeling too.
| trentnix wrote:
| I've been following Tim Lapentino for many years and immensely
| enjoy his Art of Atari book and love for all things retro
| nerdity. I'd be really disappointed if this was faked. But I
| admit, it is astonishingly remarkable that the guy who curated
| a Tron exhibit would also be the one to find a minty DoT
| environmental, an arcade grail, abandoned on the curb.
| Tade0 wrote:
| Well, it was his relative who found it so I guess his whole
| extended family and social circle know that he's into this.
|
| I occasionally get guitar questions because people know that
| I put the time into researching what's what and can at least
| tell them "yeah, this is crap - don't buy it".
| bovermyer wrote:
| Bitter, cynical, and jaded is no way to go through life, son.
| deely3 wrote:
| Because... ?
| RajT88 wrote:
| Considering things that people have done for attention in
| recent years:
|
| - Crashing a plane
|
| - Pretending to have been kidnapped
|
| - Eating laundry detergent
|
| ...To name a few... It's not crazy to always suspect people
| are pretending just to get attention on the internet.
| xwdv wrote:
| Neither is blinding accepting everything at face value.
| bovermyer wrote:
| There can be a middle ground, y'know.
| xwdv wrote:
| Let me know when you find it...
| ryantgtg wrote:
| I had a similar, though less impressive, find last year. I was
| going to the park with my daughter and spotted a pinball machine
| dumped near the entrance (in a couple pieces). I did a triple
| take and then immediately called a friend to help me. It was a
| Bally Midway Spy Hunter. Much of it was in decent condition,
| though it clearly had been outside for about a week.
|
| The issue was the previous owner had literally torn the backbox
| off of the cabinet, and had snipped the two bundles of wires
| connecting the two (at least 50 color coded wires). So it
| required woodwork to mount the backbox back on, and rewiring.
|
| It sat it my garage for a few months before I accepted that I
| wasn't making progress and I gave it to a friend.
|
| Anyway, yeah, people dump this stuff! My hobby dev project is a
| pinball one, so it felt very serendipitous to find one sitting on
| the side of the road.
| Luc wrote:
| I saw this a few days ago on an arcade collector's forum (not
| based in the US), and the majority reaction was disbelief. People
| seemed to think it was a hoax. That thing is museum quality.
|
| I wonder if it's due to those suburban garages, allowing people
| to pile up stuff for decades. That and having more cash to buy
| goodies than most of the rest of the world, of course.
| koz1000 wrote:
| The more likely reason is that it was a test machine, as shown
| by the paperwork in the cabinet and the low play count. It was
| put on location for a few weeks to gather earnings data and
| then probably pulled back to the factory. A lot of those
| test/proto machines were then scrapped or sold at a very low
| price to someone on the design/production team if they had the
| means to take it home.
|
| Back in this era it was very rare for an arcade cabinet to be
| sold directly to the home. Aside from being very expensive, you
| had to buy from a distributor much like a car dealer. Most
| local distributors hated dealing with home owners (too many
| questions, couldn't fix it themselves, delivery was a bitch,
| etc).
|
| Given this was found in a Chicago suburb I'm going to take a
| wild guess and say it was a Bally/Midway employee that kept it
| in their garage or basement for a few decades and then decided
| it just took up too much room. Or it was handed off to a friend
| or neighbor over the years but either way it really hasn't left
| the city and never saw hard use in an arcade. Galloping Ghost
| has taken great advantage of this situation and obtained many
| pieces that are more rare then _Discs of Tron_.
|
| The reason I know this is because I have a few engineering
| sample games in my basement as well.
| toyg wrote:
| Lady doesn't want to talk about it -> the owner was some man
| who is not in her life anymore.
| johnvanommen wrote:
| Might have just come with the house. I've purchased houses
| where the former owners didn't bother to move out anything
| big and clunky.
| ShadowBanThis01 wrote:
| Yep. I have a century-old pool table (coincidentally also
| made in Chicago) that was left in the house I lived in as
| a little kid. It is extremely rare. Thinking of taking it
| to Antiques Roadshow.
| bagels wrote:
| Test machine theory is also supported by the fact that they
| are in Chicago, where Midway is/was based.
| koz1000 wrote:
| That's right. Bally/Midway left the city for the suburbs
| during the boom years, with offices in Rosemont and
| factories in Franklin Park and Bensenville.
|
| The Franklin Park factory is actually still in use. It now
| makes equipment for Life Fitness, which has a historical
| tie back to Bally.
|
| Here's the factory back in 1982:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62s_BIYg5Gs
|
| And today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UUpzCJaNrQ
| ryandrake wrote:
| Incredible is really the perfect word to describe this: Both
| the "extraordinary" definition and the "impossible to believe"
| definition.
|
| It's too bad the two top-level comments doubting this story
| have been downvoted into oblivion and dunked on for being
| cynical. We might not like that line of conversation, but I
| think it's a legitimate POV that adds to the discussion. This
| find just seems so...incredible. In what actual universe do you
| see these kinds of things just left out on the curb?? The only
| things I see on the curbs in my neighborhood are old junky
| furniture and kids' toys.
|
| I subscribe to estate sale newsletters to find treasures like
| this, and have never seen something like this even for sale,
| let alone free by the side of the road. What an amazing read!
| Damogran6 wrote:
| It may be an intentional misdirection...The guy may have had
| a contact that was easy to deduce, and neither of them wanted
| the attention it would bring...so it 'fell off the back of a
| truck.'
| mayormcmatt wrote:
| My uncle had a 1968 Dodge Charger in his garage, covered, that
| hadn't been taken out since then. At that time it was working,
| but the hoses and seals had deteriorated since (though the
| paint job was perfect) and he wanted it to be his retirement
| project to get it running again. Parkinson's set in and he
| wasn't able to follow through on that, unfortunately, and he
| ended up selling it for a considerable amount of cash.
|
| You never know what's in peoples' garages.
| tibbon wrote:
| Large objects can be so hard to deal with that they are often
| discarded, regardless of theoretical price or value.
| Motorcycles, Hammond organs, etc.
|
| So often it might be worth quite a bit it someone in another
| location, but especially after someone dies, there often isn't
| the energy to deal with it. So on the street it goes.
|
| You can find some people asking $6000 for a Hammond B3, but
| then someone can't give away a D-152 outside of an urban area
| because folks don't know what it is on a search. It _better_
| than a B3, essentially the deluxe model. But they weight nearly
| 500lbs and people don't know how to turn them on to test even
| (it is a 2 step process)
| banannaise wrote:
| Freight costs and logistics are the killer. The freight cost
| often approaches or exceeds the theoretical resale value of
| the item, and the logistical details are difficult to figure
| out if you haven't done this before, which the overwhelming
| majority of people haven't.
| sidewndr46 wrote:
| Same thing with aquariums. If you want a 150 gallon you have
| to pay. If you want a 2000 gallon and are willing to go pick
| it up and move it, it's usually free.
| 83 wrote:
| I run into this with tools at auctions. Want a small
| milling machine you can move into your garage on your own?
| $2k. Want a giant one from the 60s that takes a crane to
| move in? $400
| IceCreamJonsey wrote:
| Exact thing happened to me when I first started collecting
| arcade games. I was ready to sell a Xenophobe cabinet,
| which is a massive, awkward monstrosity. Took a huge "loss"
| on it but at the time needed it out of my house and only
| cared that a potential seller could help get it up the
| stairs. :)
| sidewndr46 wrote:
| Ha, I knew someone who formerly worked for IGT. Said when
| he relocated he had a complete gambling machine
| (massively obsolete) in his living room. Including the
| 300 lbs something steel plate that is used to weigh it
| down. Put it on craigslist for free and said it was gone
| that evening, scrappers showed up and moved it out for
| him.
| tibbon wrote:
| I've found church organs that were probably 100k+ for free
| before as well. You just need a giant place to put them...
| mtalantikite wrote:
| Absolutely. When I was in college (early 2000s) I found
| someone selling a Hammond A-100 in great condition for $400.
| It was her grandmother's who had recently passed, so they
| were trying to clear out the house. She had a really nice
| Wurlitzer baby grand piano for a similar price, but my
| college apartment definitely couldn't fit that thing.
| Roark66 wrote:
| Indeed. I used to own a vintage IBM AS400 server system and a
| separate disc enclosure. Each component was roughly the size
| of two mini fridges one atop the other. It weighted over 130
| kg each. Add a "smart" crt terminal and a carrier bag full of
| cables.
|
| Unfortunately I had to relocate for work and I couldn't take
| it with me. I tried to sell it, then I advertised to give it
| away. Eventually I had to take it to local "it recycling"
| facility rum by the council where they had me pay a fee for
| "disposal of a business grade it system" (fair enough). I
| wish I could've kept it.
| detourdog wrote:
| I got a fully complete Nixdorf 820 with the dust covers for
| free. As far as I can tell I might be the only person
| outside of the Nixdorf Museum with one.
|
| I don't I could sell it if I wanted to. The drives alone
| seem to powered by washing machine motors.
|
| This group usually tries to rescue things.
| https://vcfed.org
| acomjean wrote:
| We went toRhode Island computer museum pre-pandemic, was
| fun (smallish) retro museum. We were offered a tour of
| the warehouse. A short drive later, a warehouse full of
| old machines. Impressive lot. It was a lot of fun. They
| rent them out for movies apparently. They have one old
| car. One of the founders told us he switched to computers
| because they were smaller..(ha)
|
| It's impossiblely hard to keep all the machines working,
| but they're still fun to look up.
|
| https://www.ricomputermuseum.org/collections-gallery
| detourdog wrote:
| Yes, they have a good reputation for a truly unique show.
| This museum is maintained by one person and his partner.
|
| The large Scale systems museum. New Kensington, PA.
|
| https://www.largescalesystemsmuseum.org
| kombookcha wrote:
| For classic cars and other large pieces of vintage machinery,
| "barn finds" have been a common source of weirdly well
| preserved specimens for many years - especially in dry
| climates. Now that we live in a world where many elderly people
| have had suburban garages for many decades, that probably will
| be a major source of interesting finds like this.
|
| All other things being equal, having the space to keep a large
| object you're not using is gonna be a big predictor for how
| many specimens end up in a safe storage situation for long
| enough to become antique.
| blamazon wrote:
| Chicago does have an incredible density of suburban garages,
| perhaps at a scale which is unique in America. Row after row,
| column after column, copy-pasted outwards on a massive grid.
| iamben wrote:
| What's the monetary value of a find like this? It always boggles
| my mind when people jump straight to "bin it" rather than "I'll
| see if anyone wants to buy it". I guess sometimes you just need
| the headspace!
| joshstrange wrote:
| > It always boggles my mind when people jump straight to "bin
| it" rather than "I'll see if anyone wants to buy it".
|
| I think people underestimate the time and effort that goes into
| doing that. It's not as simple as "I'll see if anyone wants to
| buy it", now it's a project you have to manage. Not only do you
| have to deal with people contacting you about it but then you
| have to find a time/price/location that works for everyone and
| you get to deal with the long tail of "Is this still for
| sale?".
|
| I mean for something like this I would absolutely put out
| feelers since I know there are people who would pay for it but
| in general I just donate stuff after posting in my friends chat
| to see if anyone wants it. It's just not worth the hassle, for
| myself it needs to be well over $100 before I try to sell it.
| Maybe that's "privilege", maybe that's "lazy", I don't know.
| bsder wrote:
| > It always boggles my mind when people jump straight to "bin
| it" rather than "I'll see if anyone wants to buy it".
|
| Except ... ever tried to sell something worth $500+?
|
| Good grief, the number of idiots. And it goes both ways.
|
| Look, I know what I'm selling. I know what it sells for on
| FleaBay. Any offer below 50% of that and I'm going to tell you
| to pound sand (most of the time it's not even 10%--I mean,
| really?). I will _throw it in the garbage_ rather than enable
| these kinds of morons. By the same token, if you give me about
| 65-75% of FleaBay, _IT 'S YOURS_.
|
| And, vice versa. Dude, I can see what the last 10 of these went
| for on FleaBay, and you're trying to get quadruple that. Get
| stuffed.
| Brendinooo wrote:
| Yeah, you really do. I'd imagine who isn't in the space might
| think "well the graphics are so outdated and the thing is so
| heavy, who would want to deal with it?"
|
| And we don't know what else was on the curb that was taken by
| the trash people; sometimes you get to a point where you decide
| that cleaning out fast is worth more than hoarding until you're
| able to sell everything.
| cduzz wrote:
| It may also be along the line of "Stan said he'd get that
| thing working, then he didn't, then he died of cancer leaving
| me with a bunch of unresolved crap to deal with, and I really
| miss him and I really hate him and I really miss him." or
| some similarly complex issue.
| thombat wrote:
| Absolutely this: for many people settling the estate of a
| close family member is such an exhausting chaos of emotion
| that the question becomes: should I take it all to the
| dump, or maybe just take myself there?
| kemayo wrote:
| My spouse has been going to estate sales recently, and
| it's an _incredibly_ macabre scene. You walk into a house
| whose owner recently died, everything looking still
| basically lived in, and price tags have been put up on
| their entire life.
| rob74 wrote:
| TBF this is more of a "have to find the right buyer" product.
| Some arcade aficionados would give an arm or a leg to get one,
| but most of us don't have the interest, the space or the know-
| how needed to get it running (I guess the odds of finding one
| in working condition, like this one, are not that good).
| cduzz wrote:
| You pay for things when you buy them and when you keep them and
| when you pass them on to their next owner.
|
| Often these transaction costs are both in time and in money,
| and people all value their time and money in different ways.
|
| Disposing of this thing, which likely has a huge amount of
| emotional weight already embodied in it, via a specialist web
| site and interacting with a gazillion flakes is likely an
| exhausting prospect.
| lelandfe wrote:
| Here's one for $8k:
| https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/240731233987834/
| rob74 wrote:
| Listed 2 years ago, apparently still unsold. Which proves the
| point I was making in my sibling comment :)
| tsunamifury wrote:
| Looks like this comment may have sold it
| trentnix wrote:
| I'm working order? Maybe as much as 10-12k. The emergence of
| barcodes has inflated the price of games like this.
|
| A DoT environmental is widely considered an arcade grail and is
| rare. It's extremely sought after and the logistics of the size
| of the cabinet resulted in lots of them being trashed over the
| year or chopped up.
| xnx wrote:
| Confused until I realized "barcodes" was probably an
| autocorrect of "barcodes".
| DarknessFalls wrote:
| Autocorrect got you too. Barcades.
| thombat wrote:
| Now I don't know whether that's a sly joke, or I'm too dumb
| to spot the difference, or simply if autocorrect bested you
| in that joust?
| xnx wrote:
| Argh. I undid the first auto-correct from "barcafes" and it
| still got me!
| tesin wrote:
| Haha I'm sure you mean "barcades", but that was amusing.
| moepstar wrote:
| Confused that you wrote barcodes again (autocorrect? hah!)
| - i guess it was meant to read "barcades"?
| banannaise wrote:
| I really wonder if the market will soon be (or already is)
| flooded with similar cabinets but in bad condition. Barcades
| put a lot of stress on the machines -- high playtime, by
| adults with more strength than children, who are drinking, on
| machines that are often decades beyond their designed service
| life. And they don't have high enough maintenance budgets to
| keep them in good condition, or often in working condition at
| all.
|
| Or perhaps they just get thrown out when the barcade replaces
| the machines or goes out of business.
| jglamine wrote:
| I just played this for the first time earlier this week! For
| anyone who lives in NYC, they have one at the Barcade on 24th st
| and 7th ave.
| markstos wrote:
| As someone who just bought 900 Pokemon cards at an unadvertised
| estate sale at a roadside Michigan blueberry stand, I can relate.
| We had just stopped by for blueberries.
|
| I happen to see a couple unlabeled sheets of paper tacked up in a
| corner with grainy scans of cards.
|
| I asked the old farmer if she has some for sale and she pulls out
| this massive binder of cards with many first edition and holo
| cards in very good condition... they were from her sister's
| estate and she didn't have time or interest to deal with them.
| aio2 wrote:
| I feel bad for her sister.
| Reubachi wrote:
| I hope you offered the proper/perceived value for them, and not
| the "cardboard" price
| markstos wrote:
| I'd say it was a fair price. I have work to do to reach ROI,
| but after some hours of spreadsheet building, I project a
| reasonable upside on the investment.
| projektfu wrote:
| I don't know, if someone wants to dump a whole lot on you,
| you should just take their asking price. They're not asking
| you to do a valuation. They won't feel the "loss". However,
| if you go through and tell them what every card is "worth",
| and buy a couple that you can afford, they will then feel bad
| if they ever part with them for less than their notional
| value.
| User23 wrote:
| My conscience wouldn't let me do that. Don't get me wrong
| I'd be willing to accept a steep discount for the hassle of
| potentially grading and listing every card, the time it
| takes to sell, and the expectation that some won't move in
| a timely fashion, but I'm not gonna give someone $20 for
| $10,000 worth of merchandise just because they're ignorant.
| elliottcarlson wrote:
| No where near as cool; but ages ago when I worked at Tumblr, and
| when we were expanding the office, they were going to throw out
| the MAME arcade cabinet - since I lived about 15 minutes walk
| away, I put it on a dolly with a coworker and we pushed that
| thing through Manhattan to my apartment building. Got some great
| looks from people as we tried to navigate it up and down curbs.
| Still have it over 8 years later sitting here in my home office.
| allenu wrote:
| I have a similar story. I was working at Microsoft and part of
| the internal arcade alias. One day, somebody on there mentioned
| a team was moving buildings and had some arcade cabinets in
| their storage room that they had to get rid of, one of them
| being a Street Fighter II: CE cab. SF2 was my favorite arcade
| game as a kid, so I needed it. I asked how much and they said
| free.
|
| I got excited and quickly rounded up some coworkers, one with a
| truck, to go down to their building and "rescue" it. It ended
| up in my office and needed a few repairs. Over time, I learned
| how to do minor repairs here and there and even did a monitor
| tube swap (found an old CRT TV at Goodwill that became the
| donor).
|
| The thing is huge, so became a nuisance when I moved teams a
| few times. I got good at putting it on a dolly and transporting
| it myself from office to office. I left Microsoft years ago,
| but kept the machine and it's now sitting in my home office.
| acomjean wrote:
| I was on one of those calls where you get a question you
| weren't expecting..
|
| Jorge: do you think a foosball table will fit in you Honda
| (element)?
|
| Me: I'll take the back seats out and be right over.
|
| He was given the table when the office moved and only had
| room to move one of the tables. And it does fit.. barely.
| millerm wrote:
| Wow. Just wow. I am utterly envious.
| baz00 wrote:
| I'm not surprised at seeing this. Most of my electronics
| "purchases" in the 80s to 00s were perfectly good discarded
| things just thrown out on the street because they were
| inconvenient or someone bought something shinier. I even got a 2
| year old Intel Mac Mini once and used it as a desktop for nearly
| 3 years!
|
| An arcade machine, regardless of how rare it was, would be
| something I walked straight past though! Too big and heavy. I
| suspect that's why this turned up on the street.
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| > An arcade machine, regardless of how rare it was, would be
| something I walked straight past though! Too big and heavy.
|
| Yeah but there's nothing like standing up in front of an actual
| arcade cab, one joystick in each hand, and playing Robotron
| 2084! (one joystick to move in one of eight directions and the
| other joystick to fire in one of eight directions).
|
| About ten years ago a friend of mine was moving to a smaller
| house and had no room for his vintage arcade cab... So he
| offered it to me. I immediately took it (my fancy car wasn't
| big enough to carry it so I went and borrowed my parents' car).
|
| This cab has already been moved to three (EU) countries (!).
|
| It's fully working, I've got a few PCBs (both originals and
| bootleg PCBs) and I've got a Raspberry Pi with a Pi2JAMMA
| adapter, driving the CRT screen...
|
| It's a joy to see my little daughter play on the games I used
| to play as a kid (like Elevator Action, Buster Bros/Pang!, Bomb
| Jack, etc.).
|
| It's an amazing relic from really glorious times.
|
| P.S: it used to be in my office room first, then in the living
| room (which was epic) and now in its new house it's in the
| laundry room next to the washing machine : )
| Damogran6 wrote:
| We had a similar situation...broken Defender cabinet...free
|
| A power supply and 3 RAM chips and my kids got to experience
| unlimited Defender...having 24x7 access to that cabinet like
| that, you picked up really interesting insights into the
| code...and the realization that, no matter how much I played,
| I was never really going to get good at it.
| furyg3 wrote:
| My friends and I were into computers before this, but four of
| us got into systems administration and network architecture
| _primarily_ from dumpster diving around the SF bay area in high
| school. Sun Microsystems and SGI workstations, Cisco networking
| equipment, IBM and DEC servers... we got good getting
| enterprise and /or obscure technology working and talking to
| each other which gave us a more generalist or fundamental
| knowledge of systems and troubleshooting.
|
| And it was so much fun...
| op00to wrote:
| I dumpster dived the IBM offices in North Jersey in the 90s.
| They would trash brand new in the box model Ms, plus huge
| piles of more esoteric keyboards, equipments, manuals, etc.
| RajT88 wrote:
| There used to be awesome retro tech to be had at thrift shops,
| before they figured out there was a collector's market for it.
|
| The great finds are far more rare now.
| [deleted]
| roolgo wrote:
| Wow! I've never seen one of those before. What a crazy find.
| shove wrote:
| * ex-arcade bar owner here, weeping *
| msie wrote:
| Astounding find!!!
| BashiBazouk wrote:
| That is a really nice find. I played this one extensively back in
| the day and it's one of the better games of the era but beyond
| that it's one of those games that really needs the custom
| controls. I got it set up on MAME but never found a control
| mapping that was pleasurable to play.
| acomjean wrote:
| Custom controls make a huge difference. I remember playing the
| Atari "Assualt" tank game in college.
|
| It was fun. 2 joysticks, one for each tread (forward and back).
| You could roll the tank using the joysitcks left right
| together, or turn the tank up by pulling the joysticks apart.
| The fire button was on the joysticks. Sounds weird but was
| pretty intuitive. I tried it emulated, even with 2 analog
| sticks it wasn't the same.
|
| Tempest has the spinning nob. Centipede had the trackball. That
| sitdown helicopter game with the elevation control at your
| right hip. Or intellivision with that wierd 16 direction disc
| and the keypad. They don't work as well without. analog sticks
| help some (robotron for example).
|
| There is also the chance that memory of those games has given
| them a more rosy glow. For example I can't imagine grinding up
| ulitma3 levels today.. But I did so fairly happily in my youth.
| ryandrake wrote:
| I feel the controls are an inseparable part of each game.
| Even if the original cabinet used generic buttons, the
| precise positions of those buttons are still important.
| That's why I never really got into MAME cabinets. Wiring up
| some game ROM to a "least common denominator" (or greatest
| common multiple) stick/button/ball layout is just
| unsatisfying and does not adequately replicate the experience
| of the original cabinet.
|
| That, and emulation is just not perfect, and you can often
| "feel" when you're playing through an emulator and not the OG
| electronics.
| RichardCA wrote:
| I got it to work in an acceptable way with an 8BitDo Pro 2. I
| control the movement of "Tron" via the right stick and the
| aiming cursor with the left D-pad.
|
| The main thing I notice on the environmental version is the
| Sark voice acting, I still wonder if they actually got David
| Warner to do it. :)
| gabereiser wrote:
| Dude just happens to find a fully working and in great condition
| arcade cabinet deluxe from 1983 in 2023? Jesus! What a find! I'm
| a huge fan of old arcade games and even built a few mame cabinets
| myself - this is extraordinary. There aren't very many of those
| games left let alone working in great condition. Many have lost
| their CGA monitors or fried their boards.
| Simon_O_Rourke wrote:
| I wonder what the ballpark resale price is for it, the author
| mentioned it could sell for big bucks, but it'd be interesting
| to see how much.
| ZiiS wrote:
| At $2k it would sell today. The condition looks great could
| easily go for more then double that to the right buyer
| (Environmentals are prized but obviously limit who has room
| for them).
| gabereiser wrote:
| $2k would be a bidding war. This is worth way more than
| that! I definitely know some collectors that would part
| with $50k to have this.
| ZiiS wrote:
| I think the price is silly but
| https://www.ebay.com/itm/275969869915
| gabereiser wrote:
| And that's for one needing some TLC. The top of the
| cabinet is coming apart. The speakers are missing. The
| floorboard is missing. The display has ghosting. The
| colors are fresh and crisp but it's hardly "slightly
| used" as the one in the OP is. Still. I'm just lost for
| words he got this off the street.
| nsxwolf wrote:
| This is a crazy rare version of an already rare arcade
| cabinet. I've seen exactly one of these in my entire
| life. The price may not be that silly if it is in good
| condition.
| epiccoleman wrote:
| As someone who just recently spent a wistful afternoon
| looking at listings on Pinside, this price barely even
| seems crazy. It's a bit different since pinball tables
| have all the mechanical bits and bobs, but still.
|
| Owning a Medieval Madness table has become one of my
| "boy, if I ever won the lottery" fantasies, and will
| likely remain that way.
| vikingerik wrote:
| There are pinball distributors that will do short to
| medium term rentals, a few hundred dollars for a couple
| months. Medieval Madness is probably in short supply for
| that, but there are quite a few other options for newer
| games, often ones a few years old that just came off a
| public location. Renting could be a way to go if you
| really want it but can't swing ownership.
| epiccoleman wrote:
| You know, that's actually an interesting idea. Probably
| still the kind of expense that I couldn't currently
| justify, but it's also sort of nice to think that I could
| "subscribe" and have some rotating pin in my basement if
| I wanted to without having to take out a car-sized loan.
| videotopia wrote:
| Discs of Tron cabinet have changed hands for $10K+ in recent
| months. This one appears to be in fabulous condition too.
| mustacheemperor wrote:
| Per the placard over the Tron pinball machine at the Pacific
| Pinball Museum, the licensed arcade games made more money than
| the original Tron movie!
|
| These cabinets are so rare, I have to wonder how it wound up on
| the curb. I'd imagine there's no way it's a happy story,
| unfortunately. Someone apparently felt that was worthless.
| egypturnash wrote:
| "Tim decided to knock on the door of the owner. A woman
| answered and explained that the EDOT had sat in her garage
| for many years and she wanted to get shot of it. Tim was
| welcome to take it away for free, but she didn't really want
| to discuss the machine's provenance - Where was it from? Who
| acquired it?"
|
| I'm gonna guess "belonged to former husband". Dead or
| divorced, who knows.
| justin66 wrote:
| > Per the placard over the Tron pinball machine at the
| Pacific Pinball Museum, the licensed arcade games made more
| money than the original Tron movie!
|
| That might be due to movie accounting. There are times the
| producers of the movie have an incentive to make sure a movie
| has little or no profit, even if it does okay at the box
| office. For example when someone _other than_ the producers
| will contractually get a percentage of the net proceeds of
| the movie.
|
| It's not a great example (I have no idea about his specific
| motivations), but one example of how to tweak those knobs is
| when Kubrick's films had to use special equipment that was
| literally only available from a single company. A company
| that Kubrick happened to own, and could decide how much it
| charged the production. You can see how anyone involved in
| the production who had a piece of the film's net would have
| the size of their piece impacted by however many millions
| went to Kubrick's company.
|
| (there's a play in which greedy producers joke about how
| "there is no net!" but I can't for the life of me remember
| much about it beyond that joke)
| robinduckett wrote:
| "Always ask for a piece of the gross. Not the net. The net
| is fantasy." -- Freakazoid!
| justin66 wrote:
| The producers of The Fellowship of the Ring were so
| anxious about the production, having sunk so much into it
| even before filming, that they offered Sean Connery the
| part of Gandalf. They offered him a percentage of the
| gross. Reportedly, he wasn't familiar with Tolkien and
| didn't care for the script (what the fuck is a hobbit?),
| and of course everything worked out fine for everyone
| concerned. Ian McKellen was great, and worked cheaper
| than Connery. Connery retired to a Carribean paradise
| with a good golf course.
|
| I calculated it out once, and if he'd taken the deal they
| were offering, Connery would have - based on what the
| movie grossed - made a decent slice of a billion dollars.
| philistine wrote:
| Sean never managed to figure out which projects to join.
| Of course, being fucking Sean Connery, every script with
| a semblance of an older, wise but cranky man were sent to
| him. But he never got it right. He turned down Morpheus
| in The Matrix. He turned down Die Hard 3. He turned down
| Jurassic Park.
|
| He really needed someone savvy to guide him, which he
| never got. At least he made The Rock .
| User23 wrote:
| Divorce is my first guess.
| whinenot wrote:
| >Someone apparently felt that was worthless.
|
| There is a significant probability that mom was tired of
| hearing "I'm gonna move it out of the garage, soon" and just
| said to hell with it.
| bovermyer wrote:
| That's awesome.
|
| When I was a kid, my dad acquired an Eight-Ball Deluxe pinball
| machine. He restored it, and for years it was a regular fixture
| of our house. We moved a ton, but it always came with us, for
| about a decade. Then my dad finally sold it.
|
| I played that game a lot. I have fond memories of the lights,
| sounds, and feel of it. It was a very different experience than
| modern pinball machines.
| peter_d_sherman wrote:
| Commentary:
|
| I am reminded of a quote:
|
| _" The best things in life are free!"_
|
| (Usually those things are such things as sunlight, oxygen, trees,
| water, flowers, grass, friendly small animals, human beings that
| express the best of humanity, etc., etc... but in this case it's
| sort of like a very specific subcase of a very specific subset of
| a very specific subcase of all of those other best things in life
| that are free... this specific subcase happens to be that of a _"
| Discs Of Tron" arcade game(!)_ -- probably from the 1980's --
| with its own (highly immersive!) full "environmental" (arcade)
| cabinet -- left on the curbside, for _FREE!_ )
|
| _So the best things in life -- really are free!_
|
| (Up to and including a "Discs of Tron" full cabinet arcade game
| -- with its catchy tagline: _" Become the most powerful video
| warrior of the computer world"_... :-) <g>)
|
| I mean, _what 's not to love about all of that?_ :-) <g>)
| Aloha wrote:
| In the same vein of thought free _anything_ that you want
| always is more enjoyable than the same thing you had to pay
| for.
| nhggfu wrote:
| wow. sick
| mattmcknight wrote:
| I used to play the Intellivision version. Not quite the same
| experience. https://www.retrogamer.net/wp-
| content/uploads/2013/12/tronde...
| orev wrote:
| So a guy who just so happens to specialize in old games, and just
| happens to have an exhibition going on specifically about Tron,
| who happens to have a friend who owns an arcade and a network of
| people who know how to evaluate and restore arcade cabinets, just
| happens to be visiting people in a place (it sounds like) he
| doesn't go on a daily basis, hears an offhand comment from his
| young niece who happened to be riding a bike a few blocks away,
| happens to find a perfect condition game cabinet that's been
| sitting out in the weather for who knows how long, that was put
| there by a random old lady who was apparently able to drag the
| thing to the curb but doesn't want to discuss anything about it.
|
| Look, I'm willing to accept that rare things can happen, but this
| is pushing the bounds of belief. There are so many coincidences
| and this story needs to at least be viewed with some skepticism
| toward the details.
|
| It's not unreasonable to wonder if the goal here is to generate a
| viral story, which seems to be working at some level.
|
| Occam's razor would suggest that they obtained the game "somehow"
| and the provider just doesn't want any publicity.
|
| P.S. And if they decide to sell it, the decent thing to do would
| be to at least checkin with the old lady and offer some of the
| proceeds.
| [deleted]
| cpfohl wrote:
| You wildly underestimate how willing people are to avoid lose
| money in order to avoid the time and effort it takes to get rid
| of some kinds of stuff ;)
| parpfish wrote:
| The hard to believe part isn't that somebody was putting this
| cabinet on the curb to toss it.
|
| The hard to believe part is that this specific guy found it
| at this precise time/place
| kemayo wrote:
| The specific guy being who he is was essential to him
| finding it, mind you -- the story says his niece mentioned
| it to him after seeing it a few blocks away, presumably
| _because_ everyone knows he 's "the Tron guy".
|
| Imagine how many random time-limited opportunities exist
| around you like this that you just never hear about.
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