Now, we’re not talking Space Invaders, PacMan or Galaga here… these were technically skill games, but the prizes on offer included high-value items such as televisions and iPods. Of course, no one just won the big prizes. You had to win small prizes first, and then risk them to go for the big ones. And these machines could be programmed by the operators to only pay out a small percentage of the time… just like poker machines.
Tag: arcade games
a step in the right direction
There was a lot of coverage in the media a week or so back about kids games in gambling venues. The style of the games, and their proximity to gaming rooms and poker machines, gave rise to the very real concern that kids who played these games would be “groomed” for the pokies; desensitised to the concept of risking small prizes to win big ones, and accepting of the pokies as a reasonable way to pass the time. That’s not to mention the parents who would leave their kids to play these machines while they spent hours on the pokies.
