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> I dont believe there are any arcade rentals being done in arcade, and if there were, > it would be outrageously priced to the point of not even wanting to bother with it.
There's a company three blocks away from where I live called Video Juegos Maxi. They've been around since the early 1990s, first as a movie rental place (I used to rent the Rambo cartoon series there!), but they closed that up and started renting arcade games to various locations in the city - arcades, stores, malls, and so on.
Twenty years later, they're still running, and still making a profit. And their customers? All happy with what they do.
And this is in a country where people can just get a PC and farm it out as a MAME machine. Mexico.
What in the World is your point?
Firstly, I live in the USA. I can tell you for fact, that arcades are pretty much extinct. While working for Namco, I heard of at least 3 store closings, and then my store, and two other local stores closed.
Namco of Japan was so disapointed with USA arcade income, that they thought that all of the USA arcade managers were stealing money. And thats just the Namco mall arcades. There are other non-mall arcades that shut down.
Our city used to be an Arcade hot-bed. Some of the larger arcades you have ever seen. At least 2 mega-arcades, and 3 mall arcades, all in one small city. Only One arcade stands today, and its mostly filled with kids ticket games.
I can also say that Arcade game rentals in USA is pretty much non-existent, and is extremely expensive. If thats not the case in Mexico, so be it, but its different here.
If arcades are doing well in Mexico, there may be a reason for it... such as that the majority of people there are a lot more poor, and dont have a PC, or decent enough PC + fast internet connection to play mame (and download +24gb of roms). And or that theres less other things to divert their attention and spending money.
Heck, maybe its just that there is nothing remotely close to the arcade experience in Mexico. For example, there are many PC games that are superior to arcade games... but if Mexicans PCs are incapable of running them, then the arcade is pretty much the Go-To place to be. Here, where technology is cutting edge to the general masses, an arcade machine is graphically 'dated' almost as soon as it comes out... and in 2yrs or less, a new PC graphics card will surpass its graphic ability easily.
And, are these Brand new arcade games? Or are they used machines from the 80s-90s that they got for dirt cheap & fixed them up? Its a huge difference from buying a $40,000 game, to a $200 Sega Turbo, or ancient SFII cab + putting a cheap game kit into it.
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