A. Winning a Wii on Stacker
B. Getting screwed when winnng a Wii on Stacker
The Wii is still one of the most in demand consumer products at the moment and incredibly hard to find. So if you were to win one from a prize machine, in this case a Stacker, it would make you extremely ecstatic (see case study A), I apologise for the foul language. Now take a look a case study B, imagine all those excited feeling knowing you’ve just won a Nintendo Wii only to see it drop and get stuck on the prize chute, add to that the fact that the mall’s staff don’t believe that you won it and refuse to do anything about it.
I had a similar problem with the stacker machine at my local mall. If anyone knows who I can direct my complaint to, or clue me in on what might have went wrong I would appreciate it.
This is what happened. I went to the arcade with a friend and saw the stacker game. I have never played the game before, but I understand the concept. So I feed the machine my 2 bucks and do my thing. Well Lo and Behold, I actually play it to the top and win! Having never played the game, I don’t know right away how I am supposed to claim my prize so I look around the arcade. There’s no one in there but a Hot Topic kid. After I calm down I follow the directions to claim my prize (an XBOX 360 core unit). I hit the button, still very stoked about just winning a 360 for 2 bucks and my friend is freaking out and cheering.. then it happens. I watch my prize, waiting for it to move..but it doesnt. Then the game resets itself!
I ask the Hot Topic kid if he has seen any employees here after alot of yelling and banging on the back room door. He points him out, one middle aged man oblivious to the whole scene, lying on the floor with his head up some kiddie game doing maintenance. He seems quite annoyed that I interrupted whatever he was doing, and tells me he can’t do anything about it because the manager is the only person with a key and she won’t be in for two days.
This brings us to today (sorry for the long post, btw). I talk to her and she basically tells me I didn’t really win anything because if there was an error, the machine would lock up and be unplayable until the problem was resolved. She also said no one actually saw me win, and I reminded her that Someone would have if I could have found an employee when I was looking for someone to guide me through claiming my prize. Of course my explanation was futile, so I asked her to check the prize arm to see if it was on the blink. She says they are working fine and the machine shows no record of any prizes won, so sorry for the inconvenience.
Now I have accepted defeat, but I still don’t know what exactly happened. My only guess is that upon winning, you only have a certain amount of time to claim your prize or it resets. can anyone confirm/deny this or give me an idea what could have happened? I plan to reap vengeance on the unholy machine the next time I have a couple 20’s to burn, and aside from making sure everyone and CNN is there to witness the whole thing, I’d like to know what to look out for.
sorry that that happened but there are four things you should know,
1: The games are rigged, they have a box inside them telling them that they should only let someone win every 800 times or less(the manager can change that setting). If you try again and your not the 801 person to try, you will at least lose on the last row every time.
2: Most people buy these machines to jack money off people, it is impossible for them to lose money, so they probably have no matals.
3: If you want to win, here is how. Wake up early and go to the same place, sit there until someone wins.(make sure you have a pen, paper, and a day to waste) Then mark how many times someone loses until another win happens, once you have that number, once you see a win on that machine start counting after the number off loses happens, walk up win and walk away with your prize, if you can have a freind video tape it just incase it restarts again.
4: this has already worked for me 5 times.
p.s on 2, i meant they have no morals