UK AWPs/fruit machines - emulated on your PC (no catch!)

[ChopleyIOM]

Whilst this is gambling related the subject matter doesn't really fit into any of the other CM forums, so I'll post this in The Attic.

If you're not from the UK you might not be aware of our somewhat unique 'AWP' slot machine market. AWP stands for 'Amusement With Prizes', they're slot machines but they're not random, they do have an RTP but they're compensated, and they're a lot more involved than the average random slot. They can be found in arcades, pubs, service stations, bowling alleys etc, they're somewhat ubiquitous, in fact.

(They are a broad relation to the 'AWP' style slots at MG casinos, but the UK AWP has been around for decades, so they definitely precede the online flavour, and they're far more complex than the MG incarnation of the genre.)

A typical UK AWP looks something like this:

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The interesting part about UK AWPs is that they have been emulated, and thus can be played on your PC. The guy who wrote the emulator for UK AWPs is a genuine genius kind of dude, he used quite a bit of MAME source code to get up and running, but from there on he basically cracked all the various technologies used by UK AWPs over the years, which included some pretty mind-bending reverse engineering.

In addition to this, he has developed the emulator to allow for the use of 'real graphics', this means that through a combination of genuine 100% EMULATION (i.e. what you play on your PC is EXACTLY how the real machine behaves), and the flair of layout designers, it's possible to get UK AWPs running on your PC that look like this.

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The UK AWP fruit machine emulation scene has been going strong for over ten years now, and thanks to a concerted collective effort, the original program ROMs, artwork, photos and other resources have been gathered and pooled together for literally hundreds of machines, from the early 1980s right through to the mid 2000s.

This has fed through into all these machines being faithfully emulated, and provided absolutely free of charge to the emulation community. No strings attached, no-one wants any money for anything, it's all just done for the love of it and preserving history.

If you think you might fancy a go at this, here are the files required to get the 'GLADIATORS' AWP running on your PC.

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Just unzip the file to a convenient location, launch the 'MFME.EXE' application, then go to File > Load Game, and load in the Gladiators 'GAM' file, the machine's ROMs and layout will load, go through its boot-up sequence, and then you will be able to play.

You can either click on the 'mouse play' buttons for START / HOLDS / NUDGES / ETC with your mouse, or use what are generally the 'standard' shortcut keys, SPACE for start, 123 for holds/nudges, 0 to put a pound coin in, ` for cancel/collect, E for exchange, F for feature etc.

Resource site here -

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[vinylweatherman]

I had a go on these some while back, and I see the graphics have improved considerably since then. I have archive copies of the early emulators and layouts, as well as the ROM plugins.

There were several emulators, and getting them to run required a bit of technical expertise. To cover their asses, the emulators could not be bundled with the ROM plugins, but were hosted separately.

I had the Windows 98 machine then, and a few of these games were too big for the monitor, and some others had minor bugs.

I will renew my collection after I upgrade my gambling PC.

There were some games I wanted from my days going up the motorways, but couldn't find them.

 

[Nifty29]

Nice one chopley.

I've never tried one, so I'm gonna lose my UK fruity virginity lol.

Any tips?

 

[conker]

Thanks Chopley, there is quite a lot of nostalgia for me when seeing and playing these emulators. I grew up in a seaside town that had several amusement arcades to entertain the tourists. I spent many days in these arcades wagering small stakes on the 2p fruit machines and some of the higher stakes (10p) ones like the Only Fools and Horses fruity. Pretty much all my pocket money ended up in these machines, but it was good fun.

 

[ChopleyIOM]

@ vinyl - Any machines in particular you can remember that you'd like to play again? It's almost certain that they're emulated by now.

@ conker - Only Fools And Horses is emulated with a cracking DX layout.

@ Nifty - Bit more of an involved answer will write a separate post for that

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[ChopleyIOM]

Nice one chopley.

I've never tried one, so I'm gonna lose my UK fruity virginity lol.

Any tips?

The key thing to remember with UK AWPs is that they are compensated, that is to say, the machine actively seeks out its target percentage and doesn't rely on random numbers to get the job done.

(The RTP is generally a lot lower than you're used to with random slots, AWPs out in the wild are usually set to miserly percentages in the mid to high 70s, a real AWP at 80% or higher would be considered to be set to a generous RTP! For emulated machines we generally use a mid 80s setting, which is what the manufacturers themselves recommend for optimal gameplay. The real machines (and thus by extension the emulated machines) generally allow the operator to set to anything from 70% right up to 98%. There are some ferry specific chips that can be set as low as 60%!)

Where this makes UK AWPs unique is that every missed win or lost gamble genuinely makes the machine closer to paying out, and on the flip side of the coin when an AWP pays out big the code compensates the other way and will generally go on a really mean 'suck' period where it will basically refuse to pay anything of significance out. As such an AWP can genuinely be 'due to pay' unlike a random machine, many AWPs have 'shows' and 'tells' that a seasoned player can recognise.

From a player perspective this has meant that they're massively vulnerable to manipulation, methods, emptiers, code exploits and all manner of weird things - and indeed AWPs out on site today still often have all kinds of 'player advantage' stuff in them. (Sometimes by accident, sometimes by design.)

Also, AWPs often contain genuine skill features where the more skilful a player is, the better he can do.

Don't be deceived by the relatively small jackpots that AWPs have (over the years this has gone from £4.80 (circa 1990) to £70 (current day)), as AWPs have always had the ability to go on 'streaks' which equates to many large wins and/or jackpots in quick succession. Even the old £4.80 AWPs could streak to as much as £50 or £60, and the current £70 AWPs can repeat twice to make a 'true' jackpot of £210.

The Gladiators AWP that I linked to the files for in my original post can streak to around £40, but you need to cycle a lot of credits through it for that to happen. Gladiators is an old machine now, and harks back to the early 90s.

Here's a more recent machine called 'Maverick', this has a £15 jackpot and can streak to £60 on a good day but it's very rare. This is actually quite a skilful machine with loads of hidden features and quite a bit of strategy involved. Use the same 'MFME.EXE' emulator included in the Gladiators zip file in my original post to play it. Like Gladiators, this one has some funky sounds and music!

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[ChopleyIOM]

Oh yes, general emulator help:

1) You need to put money in! The '0' key usually inserts a pound coin, or just click on the coin mechanism with your mouse to achieve the same effect. Don't click too fast as the anti-fraud technology is also emulated and the machine may enter an ALARM state!

2) Either click on the machine's buttons with your mouse to play, or use keyboard shortcuts. These are usually:

SPACE - START

1, 2, 3 - Hold/nudge reels 1 through 3

` (To the left of 1) - Cancel/Collect

E/X - Exchange

F - Feature

C/T - Collect/Take

B - Bank

and so on, generally speaking they're pretty intuitive.

3) Try to get wins on the winline using holds and nudges, and from there use the hi/lo reel to gamble and exchange over into the features.

4) Either collect cash prizes or exchange for the features on offer.

 

[vinylweatherman]

What is missing is a nice long list of all available machines. They all seem to be scattered around the site in different sections. There is no overall "A-Z" table of what is currently emulated, certainly no neat game specific links like you have provided.

This, I recall, is how it was before, and it took a fair bit of searching around to build up my old archive.

I also remember that there were a few people who put all the different parts together onto a single CD and sold them on eBay. This did not go down too well with the EMU community because it meant others were making money from their hard work, which was intended to give these games away for free. I can see this happening still, until their is a free way to download the lot, and the latest versions, without having to sift through everything and put them together yourself.

My old archive will still work, but it will be woefully outdated compared to what is now on offer.

These even look good enough to run an online "real money" arcade, and this could happen if the original owners would agree a licensing deal for the obsolete games.

 

[ChopleyIOM]

What is missing is a nice long list of all available machines. They all seem to be scattered around the site in different sections. There is no overall "A-Z" table of what is currently emulated, certainly no neat game specific links like you have provided.

This, I recall, is how it was before, and it took a fair bit of searching around to build up my old archive.

I also remember that there were a few people who put all the different parts together onto a single CD and sold them on eBay. This did not go down too well with the EMU community because it meant others were making money from their hard work, which was intended to give these games away for free. I can see this happening still, until their is a free way to download the lot, and the latest versions, without having to sift through everything and put them together yourself.

My old archive will still work, but it will be woefully outdated compared to what is now on offer.

If you drop me a PM with a name and address vinyl (use a pseudonym if you want!) I can burn you off a complete FME DVD, the full collection just about fits onto a single-layer DVD these days.

(Same offer stands for anyone else, for that matter, if you think FME might be of interest to you I'm more than happy to send DVDs out, the whole scene is run on an entirely not-for-profit basis so in the case of international folks all I'd ask is to get my postage costs covered.)

 

[ChopleyIOM]

These even look good enough to run an online "real money" arcade, and this could happen if the original owners would agree a licensing deal for the obsolete games.

Yeah the work that goes into some of the layouts is really quite incredible.

In some cases the layout designers stitch together low quality photos from various sources, and then spend hours correcting lighting/perspective/flash burn/etc and sharpening up or redrawing to create a finished layout that you wouldn't believe was possible with the source material they had to work with.

Photoshop geniuses in some cases!

In some regards what the layout looks like is immaterial, insofar as the underlying emulation remains 100% accurate whatever the representation of the game is (some layouts are 'classic' style which simply use geometric shapes and suchlike to represent the game), but it's far better with a really good DX layout such as those pictured above.

The one I've pictured here was put together with some really awful photos, a lot of it was redrawn, but you wouldn't know to look at it.

 

[ChopleyIOM]

Nice one chopley.

I've never tried one, so I'm gonna lose my UK fruity virginity lol.

Any tips?

Did you have a go in the end Nifty?

 

[Seventh777]

Great work Chopley , I will have a good look at this later and see if I can trace some old fav`s from the past .

 

[butterflyboogie]

Thank you so much Chopley for describing those games; I had played them in the past when I could but never understood them. I will definately check them out.

 

[Nifty29]

Did you have a go in the end Nifty?

Not yet Chops

Thanks for the info though. I'll have a shot this week.

 

[ChopleyIOM]

I just thought I'd give this thread a bump, since we've got a fair few new members since I started it, and there's been quite a bit of interest in general about the nature of random games versus compensated games, and it doesn't get any more compensated than a UK AWP!

Here's a new game to play as well, a funky (officially licensed) Austin Powers AWP.

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[dunover]

Yes, many old memories of high-street arcades and 1980's/90's pubs

These AWP's had what is called 'EPPs' (enhanced payout periods) which meant the manufacturers could get round BACTA rules on the maximum jackpot size. In other words, if the compensation meant the machine was 'showing' or 'ready' it would indicate that the jackpot was coming by removing the 'block'. The block was a position on the feature trail/number gamble/win gamble whereby whatever choice you made whether higher/lower on the number reel, or cash up/down gamble or feature up/down gamble, you would LOSE. When this position allowed you to WIN it indicated the higher prizes were imminent. Once you had the jackpot, you often got a hold or more usually a 'repeat chance' whereby upon taking another credit, you would get it again. This meant a £15 jackpot effectively became £45 or even £60, to get around the rules.

When these emulators first appeared as Chopley described, some people were aghast that your high/lo gambles were fixed, i.e. not random and predetermined. Us players knew this for decades but when the emulators were able to give absolute proof, one chap went to the press and started a 'FairPlay Campaign' and indeed the press swallowed this story without realizing the true compensated nature of slots which meant nothing was 'random' on them. It was only when section 16 (later b3) slots with £500 jackpots arrived 8 years ago that we had random slots in the UK, and these were often predictable as the RTP cycle was over far fewer spins than say your online versions which can take millions of spins to hit TRTP.

Often these slots had 'emptiers'. This meant a player either through accident or passed info. knew of a flaw in the program which could be exploited to beat the compensation, i.e. 'force' a jackpot when the machine wasn't 'showing'. This could be bad programming, or in some cases deliberate fraudulent coding put in by bent programmers - indeed one programmer was imprisoned for putting a secret emptier in. The most common two were 'free wins' and coding bugs.

FREE WIN: Say when 'ready' the machine had you on second prize £15 and you had a number 12 or 1 on the hi-lo gamble reel. You have a guaranteed jackpot of 25 if you gamble! But you collect the £15. Mad! NO! The machine has assumed you will take this. So next few spins the machine indicates 'ready' again, and does the same as it hasn't added the £15 you collected into its programmed compensation, so is still trying to 'force' the jackpot on you. Repeat and rinse until dry.....

BUG: Example - in the early noughties we had a slot called 'snakes and ladders' by Bell Fruit with £25 jackpot. Very low down at £1.60 as I remember it, there was a feature called 'reel stepper'. There was no 'block' on this as it was very low down and you could get it every 3 or 4 pounds you played as it would only offer £1.00 or £1.20. This meant that the payline of 3 reels was visible as usual, with the 3 above and below symbols. So, as usual you could see 9 symbols in a 3x3 view. The feature meant the reels would step up and down one position, so say you had a cherry visible on each reel, you could line them up using the hold buttons to stop them on the winline. Then press start. The £25 jackpot symbols of BELLS were lined up for 'safety' lol at the back of the reels out of sight. However, if you let the 3 reels step up and down, held them all at once and literally within 1/2 second hit 'cancel hold' the reels would jump down all together 2 positions . Obviously repeat this and lo and behold! the 3 Bells would appear eventually, £25 j/p when the machine was only meant to pay £1.20........Repeat until empty of coins - IF you were f***ing stupid........

Because that would be the worst thing to do. Once news got out these slots were being emptied and switched off by owners as a result, you would kill the golden goose that could potentially earn you thousands in tax-free free cash. The hoppers usually held max of 125 pounds if no note-changers were present. The 'streaks' occurring naturally would not usually empty them so it stood out like a sore thumb. Very soon the manufacturers would recall them for a 'rechip' whereby the slots would be switched off until the coding had been examined for the bug or as more usually happened, some b*stard gobbed it off on a fruit machine forum so they immediately knew what to look for.

So, what many people weren't aware of is that all UK slots used the same generic 'refill key'. This was used to isolate the bank while refilling coins through the slot (as well as getting info. in the LED display by pressing the different hold buttons while turned, i.e. last bank or last win). So, if the slot was 'backing' in other words full and the coins were dropping down the back so you knew there was 125 available, you would take 4 £25 wins and leave a jackpot of 25 in there as 'cover' to leave machine functional. IF you accidentally emptied the slot, you would discreetly turn your key wherever possible and say the machine had switched off owing you £10 SPO (short payout) you would insert £20 of your free winnings, collect the 10 owing and then leave the remaining 10 in there as working balance to leave the machine operational with no suspicion. Wait a few days until Joe Bloggs and others have filled it up again and repeat. If you were clever, the above scenario wouldn't occur as before playing you would insert your key and press 'start' or 'collect' button and it would tell you the hopper balance (say 107 pounds) so you knew only to do the above trick 4 times and leave the slot with a working balance.

I haven't played an AWP in years, and emptiers are very rare now. There are 'forcing for value' scenarios like Chopley did in his AWP videos, whereby you can tell the £105-140 jackpot streak/top feature streak is very likely going to occur by putting a maximum of say £60 in and playing for it to make a few pounds profit.

I often go in a busy chain pub with 4 or 5 AWP's in and there are hundreds of people milling about and you won't see the machines being touched all night. The scene is definitely on the wane except for a dedicated few, as it is for high-street amusement arcades. Why play crappy AWP's on 80% when you can sit and play 95% from the comfort and privacy of your home?

The slots Chopley has shown used the old MPU3 or 4 platform. This is the chip/programme base and as he said could be switched from 70% to higher. The slots I used to have could be set from 72% to 88% payout via dip swiches by the processor. IMO one of the biggest scandals ever is the massive breach of BACTA rules (the old toothless UK authority for collecting slot licence fees and overseeing the payout and other rules they were supposed to follow) that occurred in those slots. On one I had, when set on maximum 88% payout it became IMPOSSIBLE to gamble the high-lo reel up to the bar stepper feature on the glass, yet it was possible on say 74%. You simply could not win the advertised prize. There were stories of slots in clubs with large jackpots that were never recorded as paying them out in literally years for the same reason - on certain percentage settings the programmes blocked some wins or features permanently. I had a £5 jackpot unit that when set on the lowest 72% on the MPU4 platform would NEVER pay the £5, only the £4 and then kill you. For ever.

I remember once a lad if the flat below me years ago looking glum when I passed him, and he told me he had lost over 200 on a £5 jackpot slot in a local arcade without getting the jackpot. I explained that in some cases these cannot pay it when on certain settings, illegally IMO and that these low-stakes machines are set low in arcades due to the lower stakes and revenue per hour. I actually went in the place and spoke to the owner and told him this and to be fair he gave the lad some cash back. How would I complain? Get an official from BACTA and get him to play it for 24 hours to see the fact the j/p was impossible?

AWP's and gaming machines were a minefield for the unsuspecting but some of us understood them - but very few.

 

[ChopleyIOM]

There are quite a few emulated machines that 'doable' - did you ever hammer Pie Factory + clones back in the day dunover? That's emulated with an exploitable chip revision.

Made a fortune off that back in the day.....

(Just for the record though, the machines mentioned in this thread run on Scorpion 5, M1a/b, Scorpion 2, IMPACT, and MPU5 MPU3 machines are really ancient, the tech was phased out in the late 80s, lots of MPU3 machines are emulated though.)

 

[dunover]

There are quite a few emulated machines that 'doable' - did you ever hammer Pie Factory + clones back in the day dunover? That's emulated with an exploitable chip revision.

Made a fortune off that back in the day.....

(Just for the record though, the machines mentioned in this thread run on Scorpion 5, M1a/b, Scorpion 2, IMPACT, and MPU5 MPU3 machines are really ancient, the tech was phased out in the late 80s, lots of MPU3 machines are emulated though.)

Pie Factory yes, the easy force, that was just before I lost interest permanently in AWP's several years back. MPU4 was what most of my experience was based on, Barcrest especially. Remember PCB?? BARCREST - 'Basically Any Retard Can Really Easily Streak Them' lol....

 

[ChopleyIOM]

Pie Factory yes, the easy force, that was just before I lost interest permanently in AWP's several years back. MPU4 was what most of my experience was based on, Barcrest especially. Remember PCB?? BARCREST - 'Basically Any Retard Can Really Easily Streak Them' lol....

Pie Factory wasn't a straight force, it was a manipulator that forced it into at least a double jackpot, and often a triple/quad jackpot - because of the way the machine maintained two internal 'pots', one for the feature column and one for the cash column.

Here's how I summarised it for someone else:

1) Play for cash wins only, totally ignore/avoid the feature (i.e. don't hold for it or nudge it in), gamble every win until you get it to a tenner or lose. If it just spins the feature in, kill it off however you can and don't collect a penny.

2) Once you've gambled up to a tenner, exchange for the feature. If the chefs are red (invincible) GOTO 3, otherwise RETURN TO 1. You might need to exchange over a couple of times for the chefs to go red. Once it's gambling to a tenner it'll gamble to a tenner on any subsequent climb and it'll be very happy by then anyway so offering wins all the time.

3) Collect the feature stack immediately, and gamble to UPPER CRUST (or equivalent feature, third from top basically), collect the feature, let it time out (this is the only feature you can get nothing off, which is what you want).

4) Play for a cash win, gamble it to jackpot, it will gamble out to the jackpot 100% guaranteed, but it won't repeat.

5) Now play for the feature any way you can (either gamble a win once and exchange, or get the three chefs heads, or get the feature off a bonus), this feature will 100% guaranteed be invincible (three chefs heads will be red), play for the three HOT symbols under the top set of reels, this is a mega streak that will pay at least the jackpot amount but can do more. (Best I ever had in the wild was the £25 jackpot and a £75 mega streak.)

6) Machine is now DEAD AS A DOORNAIL and will block at £2 on the cash column and the third feature from bottom for quite a while.

 

[dunover]

Pie Factory wasn't a straight force, it was a manipulator that forced it into at least a double jackpot, and often a triple/quad jackpot - because of the way the machine maintained two internal 'pots', one for the feature column and one for the cash column.

Here's how I summarised it for someone else:

Yes, the Vivid machines would do this on others too. They chipped this out if I remember and on the 2nd. chip you had to force JP off of the reels?

 

[vinylweatherman]

Pie Factory wasn't a straight force, it was a manipulator that forced it into at least a double jackpot, and often a triple/quad jackpot - because of the way the machine maintained two internal 'pots', one for the feature column and one for the cash column.

Here's how I summarised it for someone else:

I found that just letting "upper crust" time out for nothing would crash the machine. It would alarm and reboot, although it would then carry on. This could potentially draw attention, so I tried playing "upper crust" for just a pound before letting it time out (or pretend to cock up the higher prizes). It prevented the machine from resetting, but didn't seem to affect the manipulator. Taking more than a pound did seem to set it back a little.

It took me a while to get this one, but soon everybody was doing it and most machines had been done by the time I got to them. Oddly, the ones at Frankley and Cherwell Valley services never got "chipped", and lasted long after all the other Pie Factories had been neutered. I can only presume others just assumed they had all been chipped, so just didn't bother. No excuse for Frankley though, as this is right in Birmingham, and easily accessed from the city without the need for a car. Were there no brummie players around

I have to agree that after finding online casinos, I rarely touch the old AWPs any more. The main lure would be to travel the country and see the old motorway haunts, rather than expecting to have a chance at beating the machines, all of which now seem to be clones of "Deal or no Deal". It is my understanding that these are "doable", but I have not really put in the research. Finding a method or emptier from scratch can be very expensive.

I did manage to find a method for some Mazooma games that no-one else appeared to know (I rarely found I had been beaten to it). It was that if you forced out the jackpot, the next feature would be invincible, but often a "silent invincible" where you could lose, but would always get the streak feature if you only played it by spinning the reel, never using the hi/low gamble. It paid a similar amount to a Pie Factory when done this way, and then went dead. Like a Pie Factory, it was easy to assess how close to being ready it was from the first couple of features.

 

[dunover]

Yes, when they rechipped PF you could tell because the LED display had the word 'cash' added to it. You could still force the repeater but had to do it off of the reels via the pie symbols and kill off all other boards/wins. The worst they ever did IMO was introduce IM (invincible mode) - not only did it give even the dumbest player the big 'tell' but it seemed to attract every shark/voyeur and hanger-on into your personal space when the bloody thing lit up red or the top artwork started flashing..

 

[ChopleyIOM]

Relive the good old days, here's one of the PF clones, Giant Gems, on a £25 jackpot, one of the earlier chips so the original double jackpot method works.

I had a real one of these tucked away way past the point where generally they'd been chipped out and/or disappeared completely, was a reliable earner for many months.

Don't let it go into attract mode though, as it'll alarm (emulator issue).

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[vinylweatherman]

Yes, when they rechipped PF you could tell because the LED display had the word 'cash' added to it. You could still force the repeater but had to do it off of the reels via the pie symbols and kill off all other boards/wins. The worst they ever did IMO was introduce IM (invincible mode) - not only did it give even the dumbest player the big 'tell' but it seemed to attract every shark/voyeur and hanger-on into your personal space when the bloody thing lit up red or the top artwork started flashing..

I bet most were cursing that they had missed it, knowing that all but the very clueless would not take full advantage and get the jackpot. However, such clueless players DID exist, and sometimes took their usual level of risk, accepting a lesser prize and walking off. I also saw players hit a jackpot and walk off, not checking whether this was a one-off or the start of a streak. A couple of quid would determine which

A skilled "shark" would NOT be so obvious and invasive as to get noticed by the player. Even playing the machine next door was too obvious, so I would either play a machine up the other end, or better still retreat to the café and select a seat with the best possible view of the machine area, where I would have tea or coffee, and read some newspapers whilst slyly watching which machines were getting filled up.

There were some players who would ask me if I knew which machines were "due", even odder, some even BELIEVED my reply

A decode

"I had the jackpot from that a while ago" (yes, last week, it's possibly ready again, but I just haven't gotten around to checking it yet this visit).

"that one hasn't paid out yet" (I think it needs a bit of a refill before it might be ready to go).

"some chap was playing that, and didn't win a thing" (he put a tenner in, and it was dead, too early to use MY money to see if it is showing, but be my guest, I'll just watch)

"that one is stone cold" (... but it's backing now, so I don't really want a "player" on it who might force it all the way)

I did get known by a few regulars, but I had a distinct advantage over most of them - I had a car

 

[dunover]

Yes, the funny things people come out with. I remember putting £1 in Monty P or Neptunes, can't remember which. Pressed spin once, next spin it flashed the IM. Lad sidles up to me "I filled that up for you are you going to give me a fiver?" I said "yes, but out of the £20 I'm just going to get from Ladbrokes over the road as a refund for a horse I backed yesterday which came in last." He went quiet, watched me get 45 quid, then 6 'afters' and walk out.

Remembering back, these machines seemed a magnet for lost, lonely and sad or uneducated individuals, and I actually used to feel sorry for many I encountered on my visits. I was working so had money, plus profits (mostly) from my play and these people just waited itching for their next payday, whether from a poor job or more usually a giro, whereupon they would spunk said funds in a few hours or less. They repeated this futility week after week, month after month. I would safely assume that most revenue in arcades came from a hard core of addicts.