Hey everyone. Long time lurker here. Long story short: I'm looking to open an arcade in Manhattan on 38th street between 5th and 6th avenue. The business model will be a little bit different: I'll have a mix of FREE console games and regular arcade games. There will be a $5 cover charge to come in, then you can stay and play as much as you want. If I spent the money on a TypeX+ or whatever and had TTGM (perhaps not the latest version, but TTGM in a real arcade setting), would YOU come play it? If my expenses are $3500 a month and I get $5 per head, that means i need 700 heads per month, or 23 1/3 heads per day to just break even on my monthly expenses. Thanks for your input everyone.
I don't live anywhere near Manhattan, but I've had a TGM board in an arcade before so here's my unimportant advice. These are the prices you can expect to pay for each version: TGM1: $150 (but this is kind of a boring game, most players don't like it that much) TGM2+ (TAP): $700 (most players think this is the best version) TGM3 (Ti): $1200 (many players like this version too, and it runs on TypeX hardware like you mentioned) It seems that $5 is a bit low of a charge. I've easily spent $30 in one trip to the arcade before, so you might want to change that a little. Still, it's great to hear that someone wants to both open an arcade and put TGM in it.
thanks for the info on the approximate cost of the games. does TGM2+ for $700 include the entire game board system, and all I need to do is hook it into a cabinet? tetris seems like a good game to have at the arcade. Does the TGM series have an appeal to both casual AND hardcore players alike? $5 is just to get in the door. There are tons of free XBOX360 setups with Super Street Fighter 4 (or whatever other game). Then there are arcade machines from $0.25 to $0.75. There will be nice couches and big screen TVs, so you can literally pay $5 and play all day. It's a good value, I think. The big question is whether I can get 25 people in the door each day to break even on the rent and expenses. If I can do that, and there's people in the place, I think the games will pay for themselves and then make money. If 25 people per day on average DON'T come, then I'm out about $15,000, heh.
Ah, okay. That sounds good. I think you'll manage to get 25 people in per day if you have a good selection of Japanese arcade games and interesting stuff. The cost is the entire PCB, and you just need to hook it up to a JAMMA based arcade cabinet. I suggest a Japanese sitdown style candy cabinet such as the Astro City, but ultimately anything will work. However, you must use a certain set of sticks and buttons in the cabinet (the Sanwa JLF joystick [set to 4 way mode, this is important] and the OBSF/OBSN buttons) as TGM players generally refuse to play on anything else.
TGM and TAP are regular JAMMA boards and will work in any JAMMA compliant cabinet, no extra hardware required. I personally would recommend a candy cabinet with Sanwa JLF (4-way restrictor) and OBSF-30 controls, this is de facto for the tetris community. TGM3Ti requires a VGA (31khz) capable monitor, a cabinet amplifier (to bring sound from line level to 8 ohm speaker level) and a JVS I/O board. A JVS cabinet like a Naomi Universal or Net City will have all of those out of the box - other cabinets may have the latter two (amp and JVS wiring) but possibly require a monitor/CRT chassis upgrade. Ti will work on a regular JAMMA screen using the 15KHz video port, but the image will be blurry and flickery and repel customers, so I strongly recommend a 31KHz monitor instead. For more details on arcade hardware and what will work with what, I've written up a fairly comprehensive post about the subject. As for casual gamers, you may want to look at TGM1 for that. The game is much easier and people will get further along in the game before dying. But I think the real appeal for TGM games in any real arcade, for both casual and hardcore gamers, are the multiplayer options. All three games have hilarious versus modes that are only as difficult to play as the player you're playing against, so two casual players will have as much fun playing as two hardcore players will. To get an idea, here's three videos of versus on YouTube: Casual gamers playing TGM1 versus at Arcade UFO in Texas Semi-hardcore gamers playing Death versus casually Hardcore gamers playing TGM3Ti versus Additionally, TAP has Doubles mode which is lots of fun for all. I think the games have casual potential, but you might need to market it a bit with a poster or leaflet explaining how to get the most fun out of the game. A proper Manhattan arcade sounds like an awesome idea to me, and like I said on IRC, if that arcade was there when I visited NYC in 2008, I probably wouldn't have seen much of the sights I did, but would have been stuck in that arcade all day. I really hope you can make it work out!
Oh my god this would be delightful. I live out on Long Island and it would be absolutely amazing if there was actual TGM somewhere near me. Maybe now we can get this East Coast meet together...
You are talking about NY, not a tiny village lost on the middle of the USA, 5$ is 4€, if there was such a place at this price in Paris, that would be insanely cheap ! Push to 8$ ! I remember a long time ago we had a place like this in my camping for holiday, there was (10 years ago) : - 2 SNES (10 games) - 2 NEOGEO (10 games) - 1 PSX (15 games) - 1 MEGADRIVE (8 games) - 1 ARCADE SYSTEM (???) - 1 PC for Duke Nukem mostly The price was 15 Franc (2€30) for 1 hour only ! And you are talking about 4€ for unlimited, in NY...anyway
I live in PA, and if you had TGM3, I'd go but not often, really. Being honest here, probably not even once a month. If I lived closer, though, I would go perhaps once a month. For TAP/TGM, I might still go if they were on freeplay, and the door fee covered unlimited play for them. I'm confused, is your business model a door fee, and we pay for each game we play on the arcade machines, but console gaming is free? Or will some (all?) arcade games be free as well? Just confused when you said there would be $0.75 and $0.25 games. I'm not sure if you meant that's the price we'd have to pay for each game, or the price they'd be if they weren't freeplay.
If you're looking to attract casual players a bit more, I would think Ti would be your best bet due to variable speed curve & SRS (which more people are used to, obviously.)
not living in the us but if I was a new yorker, for 5$ + 0,25$ a credit, I would certainly come at least two times a week (if not 4 or 5 times) there's a small arcade (actually, a game shop with a couple of cabinets) in my hometown (three versus cities with 3rd , blazblue and capcom snk2), one madonna with super street fighter 2x and an egret III with dodonpachi daiffukatsu black label. At the beginning, it was 3 euros for one hour of play (all systems set on freeplay), I used to play like 8 hours a week.
entry - $5 for everyone console games - always free arcade games - $.25 (things like CPS2, TTGM older version) $.50 - (marvel vs capcom 2, maybe KOF13) $.75 - (super street fighter 4, initially. you must buy *2* X2 and *2* game boards to set this up, very $$$) To everyone else's positive response - thank you! I am constantly trying to get more and more feedback to see if there is a real market for a place like this. Zircean - How many friends do you think would come with you to the arcade? Or go by themselves? How many times a week? Would they ever go during day hours or only at night?
I'm north of the border but I'd make it a road trip at least once if you get Starsweep, for old time's sake.
http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=10644 I'd have it on PS1 I guess, heh. Maybe I'd come across a PCB eventually... that'd be godly. Part of the appeal of this arcade, to me, is that while the centerpiece will always be the biggest current fighting game, there will be room for niche/smaller games, and there is the potential for "scenes" to develop around those games. For example, I could sponsor a TTGM tourney every 4th Wednesday, throwing $100 of store money into the pot, etc. But right now I'm just trying to do research to find out if I can get 25 people a day at $5 each. With that, I can break even on rent and expenses, and from there I can make money on arcade games and concessions. If you live in the NY/tri-state area or know someone that does, ask them if they think this is a good idea, and how many times a week they'd go there! I like TTGM, I'll get it there on a Japanese cab. Eventually
You're joking right? That site is ok for classic American arcade games I guess, but it's not good at all for the rarity of Japanese arcade games. After all of 2 minutes of searching Japanese used arcade PCB sellers I've found you a Starsweep arcade PCB for the equivalent of $25 plus shipping, enjoy. http://www.fujitacommunications.com/products.shtml I don't know the first thing about business, but I can tell you that arcades tend to have lopsided income. Things are definitely busier on weekends than weekdays. Like, night and day packed versus almost empty. You should take that into account with your planning.
>TGM1 and TGM2 Master speedcurves are almost identical up to 500. >TGM2 has Normal mode as well. Uh. If I owned a TGM2 board, that's probably what would have ended up in our local arcade instead of TGM1. It has more options, even if the grading as well as the speedcurve after 500 are easier in TGM1. If both boards were available, I don't think endgame difficulty is something that should necessarily sway a decision to install TGM1 over TAP. The nice thing is that TGM1 is comparatively inexpensive and still an excellent game. Given the choice of TGM1 or TAP to fill a cab in an arcade, though, I'd spring for TAP.
Haha, wow, this is an amazing webpage. All I need to do is buy that PCB and throw it into a compatible cabinet, correct? I can order a crate of those really decent Japanese style cabinets like the Taito egret 2 and with this site basically be done with everything. Just a stab in the dark here - do you know if candy cabs disassemble at all? The door to the site is kind of narrow and I'm concerned about getting machines in.
PS - I would have StarSweep on a cheapy cabinet as the one free arcade game in the place. People would play it and learn it and we could have a tournament
They come apart completely (I've seen enough pictures of people completely taking their cabinets to bits to be resprayed) - but for the purposes of getting them through a door you can usually simply take off the control panel.
