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Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

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Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#21

Post by dsfyu404ed »

sheepdog wrote: post #17

Perhaps this is just my inner poverty showing, but how does something like this even happen, from a monetary perspective? I'm assuming the owners had investors or loans or some other financial reasons that would prevent them from spending a lot of money and then simply parking it forever. And wouldn't property taxes or city nuisance abatement fines nibble away at the property over the years? It can't be completely fr…

>Even if there is no ongoing cost for the ship, wouldn't the owners rather have sold the furnishings rather than leave them to rot?

Organizations with more lucrative things to spend their man hours on tend to let abandoned projects just sit rather then liquidate them because the ROI of whatever they usually do is better than the ROI of liquidating a failed project. Property tax and other upkeep costs often wind up buried somewhere in a long list of similar costs from all the other real-estate the organization owns or leases or has to otherwise pay for. Things tend to finally get liquidated when a property needs to be sold or turned over like happened here.

Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#22

Post by ChickeNES »

pwg wrote: post #7
jackhack wrote: post #2

I can't help but wonder what sort of maintenance might these machines require before starting up again? I imagine, at the very least, cleaning corrosion from the contacts of all mechanical switches and changing out the filter capacitors in the power supply and CRT. What else? Would every capacitor be suspect? Are the boards salvageable or would the cabinets just be gutted and a modern (MAME?) machine be substituted (…

> changing out the filter capacitors in the power supply and CRT. What else? Would every capacitor be suspect? Given the timeframe the article quoted for the most recent cabinet (1980-1981), they all predate the capacitor plague [1] by nearly two decades. It is possible that the capacitors in the PSU's of these games might still be close enough to spec. to not need any replacement. But given the folks who picked them…

That's more true for early 1980's and earlier electronics with through-hole caps (though a shorted cap could easily ruin your day), but I've seen a lot of mid-80's and newer vintage computers and game systems destroyed due to leaky SMD electrolytics.

Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#23

Post by videotopia »

lostgame wrote: post #19

What on earth is with this website? Literally half the page is covered by a massive photo. I expected scrolling further down the article would rid me of it, but it doesn't - furthermore, it's aligned to the right instead of the left, which breaks my brain while I'm trying to read it. I can't imagine any benefit to this layout. Shrinking the screen causes the article to display properly, I learned, and I couldn't find…

Better? https://arcadeblogger.com/2016/05/06/arcade-raid-the-duke-of...

Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#24

Post by ngold »

sheepdog wrote: post #17

Perhaps this is just my inner poverty showing, but how does something like this even happen, from a monetary perspective? I'm assuming the owners had investors or loans or some other financial reasons that would prevent them from spending a lot of money and then simply parking it forever. And wouldn't property taxes or city nuisance abatement fines nibble away at the property over the years? It can't be completely fr…

There's a great 8-Bit Guy video, of him walking around a massive warehouse of brand new computers from the 70's through the 90's. Owner had a super sad story and was inviting anyone with an interest around the Houston area to take all they could. But how many can you fit in your car?

Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#25

Post by newnewpdro »

sheepdog wrote: post #17

Perhaps this is just my inner poverty showing, but how does something like this even happen, from a monetary perspective? I'm assuming the owners had investors or loans or some other financial reasons that would prevent them from spending a lot of money and then simply parking it forever. And wouldn't property taxes or city nuisance abatement fines nibble away at the property over the years? It can't be completely fr…

I don't know about this particular case, but it's not unusual for scenarios where an insurance or some other claim is made rendering property largely frozen / illegal to liquidate as anything but salvage.

Maybe if you sit on it long enough the statute of limitations can expire and you can do something more interesting than incur the costs of transporting a massive thing only to have it cut up for scrap, especially if you own land where it can just sit idle in the mean time.

Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#26

Post by samplatt »

lostgame wrote: post #19

What on earth is with this website? Literally half the page is covered by a massive photo. I expected scrolling further down the article would rid me of it, but it doesn't - furthermore, it's aligned to the right instead of the left, which breaks my brain while I'm trying to read it. I can't imagine any benefit to this layout. Shrinking the screen causes the article to display properly, I learned, and I couldn't find…

It's a readability thing. Many designers are taught (or organically arrive at the conclusion) that the ideal width to read an article at is roughly "book" width. There's some merit to the idea; it's easier to keep track of where the last line ended by seeing the shape of the words without needing your eyeballs to dance all over the place.

Once readability is founded, their argument is "who gives a rats arse about the rest of the page?" It's not the BEST design philosophy, but it's far from the worst one.

Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#27

Post by codebje »

jackhack wrote: post #2

I can't help but wonder what sort of maintenance might these machines require before starting up again? I imagine, at the very least, cleaning corrosion from the contacts of all mechanical switches and changing out the filter capacitors in the power supply and CRT. What else? Would every capacitor be suspect? Are the boards salvageable or would the cabinets just be gutted and a modern (MAME?) machine be substituted (…

There's a good series of articles on the restoration and maintenance of a pinball machine, which has many of the same characteristics as video games, plus a few more mechanical issues.

https://blondihacks.com/johnny/

Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#29

Post by enobrev »

ngold wrote: post #24
sheepdog wrote: post #17

Perhaps this is just my inner poverty showing, but how does something like this even happen, from a monetary perspective? I'm assuming the owners had investors or loans or some other financial reasons that would prevent them from spending a lot of money and then simply parking it forever. And wouldn't property taxes or city nuisance abatement fines nibble away at the property over the years? It can't be completely fr…

There's a great 8-Bit Guy video, of him walking around a massive warehouse of brand new computers from the 70's through the 90's. Owner had a super sad story and was inviting anyone with an interest around the Houston area to take all they could. But how many can you fit in your car?

Found it. https://youtu.be/rvM82T3C2Ik

Re: Rescuing vintage arcade video games from an abandoned ship (2016)

#30

Post by nebtune »

lostgame wrote: post #19

What on earth is with this website? Literally half the page is covered by a massive photo. I expected scrolling further down the article would rid me of it, but it doesn't - furthermore, it's aligned to the right instead of the left, which breaks my brain while I'm trying to read it. I can't imagine any benefit to this layout. Shrinking the screen causes the article to display properly, I learned, and I couldn't find…

More about optimal line lengths if you're curious.

With line lengths that are too long, the user may have a hard time tracking back to the next line. Line lengths too narrow, the user's pacing and rhythm is thrown off. https://baymard.com/blog/line-length-readability

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