Talk:Claw vending machine
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[edit] History
The history must be wrong, these machines were in use a long time before 1987. I can't be precise about the dates, but I remember them from my childhood, and I was born in 1956. They used to contain mostly trinkets, but usually one expensive thing, like a packet of cigarettes, (can you believe!), or a wristwath which looked expensive to my childish eyes. Of course, the grap never quite would fit around the cigs or the watch, but it didn't stop us trying! Assume I was 11, 12, maybe 13 yrs old, that must be some time in late 60s. I saw them in amusement arcades at Butlins or Pontins holiday camps, which were very popular in England at the time. Also in Blackpool... I think maybe some more research is required, because my memory is fallible of course....... Orelstrigo 03:21, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)
- Right you are, sir; this article is full of factual errors and omissions... I'll see what I can do for it...
- —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.218.239.57 (talk • contribs) 17:54, June 7, 2005
- They were popular in the US as well. I played these machines in the early 70's. They were a lot easier to win, although the prizes were cheaper. They were still interesting things to a kid. I always tried for moderate things, things like the watch were nearly impossible. I played them at the midway of carnivals and fairs. They were set up in a trailer, with small fishtank sized games on the sides. I've never seen anyone win one of the modern games, although I'm sure it happens from time to time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by RLent (talk • contribs) 18:51, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Skill?
Also, these machines aren't skill. http://www.cromptons.com/pages/pagetext.php?pg_name=XFactor says "Audited % Payout" which implies that it's not skill based. Possibly by varying the strength of the claw. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.19.57.138 (talk • contribs) 20:25, September 15, 2005
- When they say "Audited % Payout" they mean the actual statistic of wins and losses, not a target percentage. Like any other audit, it's something checked after the fact. With every prize a different size, shape, and wholesale price, the operator doesn't know the final win percentage until after a certain number of actual attempts by real customers.
- You are still correct in part... some games have a fixed claw strength which is expected to drop a certain number of prizes, particularly those not picked up correctly. Sadly, in the USA I'm seeing more and more of a different type (mostly imported from Asia) in which the operator sets the number of wins (1 in 20, e.g.) and the claw stays strong only after 20 failures. With US manufacturers importing and selling these alongside their own product, it's hard to know what you can trust.
- —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.129.221.102 (talk • contribs) 20:08, March 27, 2006
[edit] Stub?
This Article is a Stub? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.142.234.138 (talk • contribs) 00:29, July 7, 2005
[edit] picture
it needs a picture of one —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.200.116.131 (talk • contribs) 13:00, October 12, 2005
[edit] East Asia
Live animals in UFO Catchers in East Asia? Never seen that in Taiwan, China, or Japan. If there is such a thing, I don't think it's such a widespread phenomenon that it requires special mention in an encyclopedia entry! Citation?
[edit] Ew
horrible writing and unencyclopaedic too. *bookmark* Blueaster 20:41, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Kids getting stuck in the machine
Maybe someone could do a section about all these kids that have been getting themselves stuck inside the machines...GodSka 19:41, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Skill
The game is entirely skill. I am an employee of America's largest supplier of these games, as mentioned in the article, and I can tell you, there is no box that says Grab Power on it, and doles out a prize only one in ten or some such nonsense. Perhaps this is the case overseas, but if you see a machine with my company's logo on it, you can rest assured that is not the case. There is a way to make the claw more or less powerful, but as is mentioned in the article, we have settled on a fair ratio that we can adjust afterwards if necessary. We do not adjust the machine to make people lose, we simply adjust it to make the game more challenging.
Nyabinghi43 00:44, 14 March 2007 (UTC)Nyabinghi43
[edit] Success rate
In the section title "success rate" it says "In general, while getting the claw to pick up a prize is relatively hard, having the claw hold the prize long enough to bring it to the opening is easier." I disagree with this, many a time have I got the claw to pick up a toy only to have it drop it again. --Candy-Panda 12:17, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Controversy link?
"The video can be found on Youtube." - Someone please supply a link for this one. Supermagle 10:00, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Bias
This article contains a lot of bias, particularly in the 'success rate' and 'controversy' sections. I'm flagging it as such. Orkie2 12:10, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
- That's putting it lightly, especially since the claw haters offer absolutely no proof of their claims. The American vending machine industry is very powerful and I doubt that Wikipedia's shoestring budget will be able to stand up to the lawsuits that will be thrown at them if this article continues to be hosted in its present form. 58.107.102.215 13:09, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
- I've rewritten the "Success rate" section extensively in hopes that it is now more neutral, with both viewpoints represented. After the rewrite, I didn't see too much of a problem with weasel words in the remainder of the article, so I've removed that template. I did add an unreferenced template, since there are no actual sources given, and this might be helpful if any such sources exist on this subject; my internet connection is unfortunately too poor to look into this at the moment. *Vendetta* (whois talk edits) 05:52, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
[edit] British theme to them?
Just wondering if there is a tune pinned to these, I've heard it many times and just a random thought wondering if it had a name to it, especially in Britain at the seaside, where I would predict the theme is well known and wondered if it should be included in the article.
As an employee of Coinstar Entertainment Services (the largest provider, servicer, and manufacturer of these games), I can say definitively that they do not have a yellow box here in America that defines the number of wins and losses. We do audit the payout, and that is supposed to be in a certain range, but we almost never get it in that range. I have found on my machines that more often than not people are good enough at these games to buck the ratio we shoot for. My machines are not fixed, as people seem to think, but they do have a certain tensile strength they have to adhere to, and it is adjustable, but the idea is to get rid of the toys, not let them sit there. I don't know about anyone else, but when I go to my stops, I want as many toys gone as possible, and adjust my machines thusly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.79.212.4 (talk) 09:25, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Guaranteed payout version?
When I went to Taiwan, there were at least two different locations with several arcades in which the machines had a sticker on them with a price. If you spent at least that much on one machine without getting anything, someone would open it and give you the prize. (They would also move everything back to where they were before you started messing everything up.) --68.161.148.207 (talk) 09:41, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
