1977 Pachinko Parlor

[MrGneiss]

I saw this magazine from 1977 had a story about pachinko so I had to get it to see what it was about!! Here a a few bad pics.. I figured I could try to scan it if others are interested in reading it.. It's only a short article, but it was fun to read.. I'll have to figure out how to scan such a big magazine with my crappy scanner..

It's mostly about how much pachinko has changed and how easy it is with its shooter knobs, chairs and air conditioning now!!

I really liked the mention of sticking a coin in the knob for hands free shooting, who knew that started in the 70s?!

Sadly no discussion of "special prizes" cashing out etc..

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One interesting thing about the parlor in the story is that it all looks to be Nishijin machines with shooter knobs.. I think the first electric shooter knobs came out in '72, but I guess I always picture most 70s pachis in parlors having flippers.. and going by late 70s pics I've seen until now, I assume most still were until the 80s, but maybe not as many as I thought?? Wonder what the real percentage was of knobs vs flippers by the end of the decade..

Probably have a skewed idea about it because 99% of pachis brought over here by the importers in the 70s didn't have knobs, probably so they didn't have to bother messing with the electric stuff, and then the stuff (including all the knobby ones) left in Japan mostly ended up in the trash so mostly what we have left are flippy ones!!

[Drunkenclam]

Sure. And the horse racing stats had nothing to do with you buying it. Just in case you pull a BttF2

[lotsoballs]

I’m not sure what the real percentage of flipper vs electric shooter was; but based my anecdotal evidence of watching 70’s pachinkos listed for sale in Japan on yahoo auctions the past several years; 95-99% of them have flippers. It’s somewhat rare for electric shooter models from the 70s to show up for sale (just like the US market).


Now of course it’s the opposite scenario and flipper handles on machines are super rare! It’s about time A-gon brings back another retro standard play pachinko with flipper!