We've all seen over the last couple of years pubs replace their quiz machine with a fruit machine/grabber machine etc. but while that's still happening in a drip-drip fashion, over the last few weeks,I've also seen a few pubs put their machine back in,and also some pubs that have taken their machine out and there's simply just a space there now.What do I conclude from this? Well,that there's still quite a few pubs that would like to have a quiz machine in,but the bottom line is that they're not taking enough money (combined with the problems with them which we've discussed on here).
So,what could be done to encourage more people to play the quizzy? I'm not sure that putting the same machine back in will necessarily work,it might need a new unit.Cool has already suggested this on here,but maybe the answer is a standalone.I wasn't sure he was right but the more I think about it,the more it makes sense.I envisage it working in one of two ways:either a guaranteed amount of time for your money,or the option I quite like would be something along these lines: a sizeable jackpot (say 40 or 50 quid) and a very small number of questions to win it (a maximum of 8,say and the number to reduce by one every so often as it takes money).I'd protect it from being emptiable by having a whole new question set (and since it's a standalone that could be a massive amount of questions) and rather than having 3 or 4 options for the answer,I'd have up to 8 options.So,hugely unlikely to guess your way to a win after a jackpot has been recently won.
My thinking here is that punters would have a decent prize to win which would seem genuinely available.I'm envisaging people trying the odd quid to see how many questions required,and then perhaps persisting and chasing it if it's only a few.I would want a brand new unit to house the game so it didn't look dated,one that would accept all coins and notes (including new pound coin design if that's been finalised) and I'd pay the prize out in notes.I'd also have a prizeboard so if a regular won,they could proudly display it.
I am reasonably confident that this would be viable.I don't think that the quiz machine has had its day - I still think the nation of Britain likes quizzes - but the industry perhaps needs to try something different.Any thoughts?
Standalones
If Carlsberg made quiz machines....... LOL. Multi game units were almost inevitably going to get us to where we are now. The whole was always going to be less than the sum of the parts. Why don't you write the GWHL and the rest and suggest it. Or try and tempt someone like JPM to come back into the market as they don't too well with fruits these days. An ideal game for this would be Pointless with a decent sized prize.
Give Us A Break 30th Anniversary
Great idea but let's face it - when Pointless is getting plays off a 60p JP there's not a cat in hell's chance of them risking a £20 JP never mind a £40 one.
It amazes me that most games dont get sued for false advertising. One of the worst culprits is Pop Quiz. Get on there at the wrong time and after you've got £3 in it's '?' amount of questions to get to the next stage. Same with the current BAM. Shocking and should be illegal. IF the bookies tried these stunts they'd be out of business.
It amazes me that most games dont get sued for false advertising. One of the worst culprits is Pop Quiz. Get on there at the wrong time and after you've got £3 in it's '?' amount of questions to get to the next stage. Same with the current BAM. Shocking and should be illegal. IF the bookies tried these stunts they'd be out of business.
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tonkarentino
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The best we can hope for IMO is a return to the days where multi game machines only have half a dozen or so games on them. Some paragons have only one screens worth of games and these fill up far quicker but in the minds of the companies the biggest threat are the pro players-in stopping them they have switched off the rest of the population likely to have a dabble. We've been down this road before with WWTBAM with prizes up to £1000.00paragoon wrote:Great idea but let's face it - when Pointless is getting plays off a 60p JP there's not a cat in hell's chance of them risking a £20 JP never mind a £40 one.
It amazes me that most games dont get sued for false advertising. One of the worst culprits is Pop Quiz. Get on there at the wrong time and after you've got £3 in it's '?' amount of questions to get to the next stage. Same with the current BAM. Shocking and should be illegal. IF the bookies tried these stunts they'd be out of business.
On Pop Quiz: one of my best subjects is pop music,so I thought I would have a go at learning the questions on Pop Quiz.I'd learnt a few,and had won the occasional fiver and tenner,so all going well,until I was first confronted by the dreaded '?'.I gave up the idea of learning the questions immediately.I strongly suspect that the number '?' refers to is one more than the number of questions you've currently answered,and is,as you say,outrageous.paragoon wrote:Great idea but let's face it - when Pointless is getting plays off a 60p JP there's not a cat in hell's chance of them risking a £20 JP never mind a £40 one.
It amazes me that most games dont get sued for false advertising. One of the worst culprits is Pop Quiz. Get on there at the wrong time and after you've got £3 in it's '?' amount of questions to get to the next stage. Same with the current BAM. Shocking and should be illegal. IF the bookies tried these stunts they'd be out of business.
Lol quizard,I suppose I might well be designing a quiz machine for Fantasy Island there! A standalone Pointless with a decent prize wouldn't work though,it would just be won too often.To reply to paragoon's point that why would they risk offering a decent jackpot when they're getting enough plays with a 60p jackpot:I take your point,but it seems like they're not getting enough plays,and even with a popular title like Pointless,the drip-drip of pubs taking their machines out is continuing.
Yeah, music's my strongest point too and is what got me into this game in the first place with the ole Pepsi Chart Challenge, although I won my first JP on a standalone Weakest Link - a day that changed my life - probably for the worst lol!muddle wrote:On Pop Quiz: one of my best subjects is pop music,so I thought I would have a go at learning the questions on Pop Quiz.I'd learnt a few,and had won the occasional fiver and tenner,so all going well,until I was first confronted by the dreaded '?'.I gave up the idea of learning the questions immediately.I strongly suspect that the number '?' refers to is one more than the number of questions you've currently answered,and is,as you say,outrageous.
But to go back to Pop Quiz, your suspicions are correct. I was once playing, up to £3 and got the '?'. I usually just let the game kill me but I got into a weird spell of accidentally getting the questions right for about 8 answers barely looking at the screen. EVentually I got the question wrong but it's obvious you're just finished at the sight of a question mark.
how much do you reckon a really well positioned quiz machine coould take in a week in a decent pub? if you owned a pub, would you have a quiz to provide a service/entertainment or to make money? i just can't imagine it's really worth it financially to give a fuck about quiz machines? fruits must take, what 10, 20 50 times more?
Going skint....
That's a good question bubbles,I don't really know how much fruits take.If I were running a small pub,then financially I'm just putting in a couple of bandits.There must be a service/entertainment way of thinking by some landlords as you suggest as some small pubs do have a quizzy.If I were running a big pub,like some Wetherspoons and chain pubs,then I might well have 7 fruities but I'd still want a quizzy in too because as well as the entertainment angle,however little it took,I would argue that that money would not have gone into one of the fruities.Talking about how much money a fruity can take,do you know how much one takes on average? You have quite rightly pointed out before how quickly money can go into one,but there is another side of the coin,and that is that people like yourself can take it out quite quickly too!bubbles wrote:how much do you reckon a really well positioned quiz machine coould take in a week in a decent pub? if you owned a pub, would you have a quiz to provide a service/entertainment or to make money? i just can't imagine it's really worth it financially to give a fuck about quiz machines? fruits must take, what 10, 20 50 times more?
I agree with you entirely quizard.Yes I have a vested interest,but I cannot understand why the SWP world has been so tightly regulated compared to the AWP world.I've got nothing against fruities (though I can't understand why punters merrily keep on losing on them - it's funny but people have a vague awareness of a quizzy pro but seem to be blithely aware of the vast number of bandit pros) but the proliferation of grabber machines irritates me.So a machine that encourages kids to put money into machines to try and win prizes is acceptable,is it? And the government in their wisdom decided that those machines weren't dutiable as a bar of chocolate/Frozen figurine etc as they weren't actual money.Win 60p on a quiz game though? No,that's a proper prize.Grrr..quizard wrote:In their heyday they used take plenty. But since then government policy seems to have been to positively encourage people to play fruits. If the top prize on a quiz machines had increased at the same rate as that of that of fruits today it would be £250-£300!
Having had a look at this I read it that they are dutiable but at 5% rather than 20% provided the cost per game is 20p and the prize value isn't over £10. I wonder if the quiz people have considering halving the game cost and the prizes then pocketing the 15%.muddle wrote:And the government in their wisdom decided that those machines weren't dutiable as a bar of chocolate/Frozen figurine etc as they weren't actual money.Win 60p on a quiz game though? No,that's a proper prize.Grrr..
4.8 in https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/excise-notice-452-machine-games-duty/excise-notice-452-machine-games-duty#duty-rates says that a machine isn't liable for duty if it only pays out tokens which can't be redeemed for cash. I'm wondering why they haven't made a machine that gives out literal beer tokens. The operator would save their 20% and the publican might end up with more of the money retained behind the bar.
Or you could just do something like... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pachinko#Prizes
Cant agree with you here. Until very recently there was no duty payable on quiz machines and no one bothered to check whether they contained genuine skill games or not. Unlike AWPs, there are still no restrictions on where they can be sited or on who can play them. Quiz machines were effectively unregulated until a few years ago.muddle wrote:I cannot understand why the SWP world has been so tightly regulated compared to the AWP world
Fair enough,Sloach,you are right,I think I was just feeling a little cheesed off when I wrote that!Sloach wrote:Cant agree with you here. Until very recently there was no duty payable on quiz machines and no one bothered to check whether they contained genuine skill games or not. Unlike AWPs, there are still no restrictions on where they can be sited or on who can play them. Quiz machines were effectively unregulated until a few years ago.