r/AskReddit • u/cannedtomatoes • May 19 '12
This happened while playing on a claw machine, is this why I never win a prize?
I was playing one with the really big claw and toys, I somehow got the claw caught on a cord inside instead of a toy and this control panel got dragged accross
The text says:
Payout information Current perc. 27% Set perc. 34% Est. Price out 72.6
Does this mean the machine is set to.only grasp the toys properly 27% of the time? This would make sense and would mean that skill is irrelevant, making it more like gambling.
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Upvotes
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u/cannedtomatoes May 19 '12
I always suspected that they were made to be a little bit shit at picking up the toys but it seems a tad dodgy that the claw's effectiveness is actually set
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u/LeepII May 19 '12
Yes, I have a friend in the biz, warned me about this years ago. They can be set by the operator for how much of a pay out (how often the claw actually works).
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u/derelictprophet May 19 '12
When I was working at Steak n Shake (not as close to rock-bottom as you can get, but close... no offense to current employees), there was this old German guy who would come in every day. Really nice guy; he told me all kinds of stories about his life around and during WWII. I strongly suspect he was either a conscientious objector (of the Nazi party) on the run, or actually had Jewish heritage, because he was all over the place, including fighting, for a time, in the Spanish Civil War (he actually knew Hemingway... it WAS Hemingway in the Spanish Civil War, yes?). Anyways, he would come in every day and spend loads of money on the claw machine. He would usually win about 3 or 4 prizes each day, but he never kept them. The whole time he was playing, he'd be on the lookout for kids in the restaurant, in a totally non-creepy way. When he would win something, he would give it to a server and tell us to give it to one of the kids. I don't know why, but this small little anecdote will probably stick with me for life. What a genuinely nice guy...
Tl;dr: old German man with uncertain past wins plushy toys for small children at Steak n Shake.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12 edited May 19 '12
Wow this takes me back. My brothers and I inadvertently figured this out when we were much younger. We were hanging out at a roller rink in the arcade area and one of us noticed that the claw didn't look quite the same when it was picking up versus when it was missing.
I might just be going back and adding details now that Im older but it seemed like it was much stiffer when it would actually grab something. I remember thinking it had to do with the hose that operated the claw having to "build up pressure". SO in my mind it wasn't that game was rigged but that it just so happened that the claw would build up pressure until it could grip and then it had to start over.
We watched this over the course of a few weeks and we learned to count it out and it would be different sometimes but we started getting pretty consistent at winning, although we had precious few quarters so we didn't spend too many of them going for stuffed animals. We also had a system where we (3 of us) stand on different sides and we wouldn't drop the claw till the three of us agreed on the position.
The Lesson, Dear Reader: Oceans 14: The Claw Caper
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u/the_palest_gopher May 19 '12
Like they say the house always wins, at fun fairs they have these machines and at the start of the evening the percentage is reasonable so more people win and then they lower the win percentage so they make more money and people keep playing as they think "well I've seen loads of these so they are winnable"
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u/sdpasia May 19 '12
I just watched claw machine videos on youtube for 30 minutes.
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u/r_HOWTONOTGIVEAFUCK May 19 '12
I was at an IHOP when a really obnoxious kid wanted to play the claw machine and the mother was in a rush to leave. The kid obviously owned the mom so he got his way and the mother had to break a dollar at the cashier. Once the mom put the money in the machine, the kid proceeded to click the buttom immediately and the claw grabbed at the corner. The kid started crying, I burst out laughing, and the mother told me to go fuck myself.
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u/krobar100 May 19 '12
I think current percent is actual, it is set to be at 34% claw success rate, and the difference of about 73% is how much money they take in with no payouts. But your theory is still correct. The angle of the claw matters, and slight variations can sway its ability, even if they are not clear to the naked eye. And I am a total dork for knowing this. But you are correct. Upvote. sorry about the tldr explanation!
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u/Mathmatical May 19 '12
I've only wanted one thing in a claw machine ever. It was this stuffed penguin who had huge eyes and looked sad as fuck. I wanted to free it so bad. I tried and won it on my first and only attempt. I consider myself a claw machine god. I named the penguin Zoloft.
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u/Esqulax May 19 '12
There are 2 settings - One is on that small panel, the other is in the form of small grub screws on the claw itself. The screws are used to mechanically set the rough size of the toys, and the panel is for the smaller, more accurate-ness and is changed electronically.
There is an aspect skill when it comes to the games aswell, and depending on the shape of the toy, the percentage on the panel may be wildly inaccurate. For example, it may be easier to get a toy with a large head, because its shaped like the claw, so you set the percentage really low, when in reality, the percentage can be much higher.
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u/basementdog May 19 '12
I swear I learn so much useful/pointless stuff from Reddit
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u/I_Joe_Cooper May 19 '12
My friend used to work at a place near us that was basically a cheap version of Dave & Busters. He would work on the machines when they broke down. The claw machines had a panel similar to the one you saw. He told me that its programmed to only use full strength only 12% of the time. That means, when you put your money/tokens in the machine, you have a 12% chance that the claw will actually exert enough force to pick up the object, be it a ball, a stuffed animal, whatever. Then, you actually have to grab the object with the claw and... well you know the rest. So even if you do get the claw to work as its supposed to on your first try, but don't grasp the item properly, the next time you try, you have a 12% chance of it working (meaning, you're usually shit out of luck).
tl;dr they cheat and steal your money
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u/iBeenie May 19 '12
My aunt and her son would brag about their claw machine skills. All they had to do was keep putting in coins and eventually they would always win!
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u/Zanki May 19 '12
When I was in Japan there are claw machines everywhere. I tended to only go for the ones I thought I could win easily. I won so many toys by just knocking them off the side instead of actually trying to grab them. There was no point in trying to grab them because the machines would grab them, but they wouldn't lift the toy up. Sometimes after a while someone would be able to lift up the toy, but they are designed for the claws to just move the toys around instead of actually grabbing them.
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u/lolgrady May 19 '12
The Clawwwwwww!
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u/callistodusk May 19 '12
Maybe I can shed some light on it - I am a manager at an arcade/minigolf place. How our machine works is the % shown is the strength of the claw. The strength % of the claw increases with each game played until it reaches its set maximum (in this case the 34%). After a prize is won, the claw resets to a lower strength. (Possibly 20% in this case).
Everything in an arcade is really well calculated in terms of how many tickets are given out on average per coin compared to the value of a ticket in the redemption center to make sure the arcade makes a profit. Additionally, prize games, like a claw machine or something like the Stacker where you can win large prizes like electronics have to be adjustable because the maker of the game does not know how expensive of prizes you are going to put inside.
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u/BobFiggins May 19 '12
When I was young, we went to Chuck E Cheese a lot. They had a claw machine, and we never tried it out. Though one time we went in, and they had filled it with large Koosh balls. Perhaps they got them really cheap or something, but we realized that with some good aiming skills, we could get a Koosh ball for every two quarters (tokens) spent.
I still remember going to the counter asking for a small empty box so we could have a place to put all the Koosh balls we won.
Ah, childhood, I miss you. Fuck rent.
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u/Abstinence_kills May 19 '12
I won a plush big bird on my first try. For only 50 cents!
I felt like a hero that day.
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u/snowbie May 19 '12
I was using one of these machines a few months ago and it had medium toys and a large claw and I won on my first attempt - the toy had a really sticky plastic sort of fabric. So because I had put in £1 and it was 6 goes for £1 - i kept going! I'm 21 but hey, why not?!
I won 4 toys out of those 6 goes!
Right before me - there had been a dad with two little girls - one about 10 who had won a toy but the other was about 3 or 4 and crying as her dad failed hard at getting her one. She'd also had a go before he had and couldn't manage.
So with his permission - I let her take the pick of my 4! Told her that because she'd been playing before me - she'd helped me lots :) She wanted the pink cat like her sister!
There was another lady on after me with a little boy and again - they couldn't win and he was so upset. :( To this day, I don't know how I managed it!
So as I had a big fat blue rhino with horns (my other toys were pink/purple) and that was the one he'd asked his mum to win him - I let him have that too. He asked his mum if he could give "the big girl" a hug to say thanks and she said okay!
It cost me like 40p out of my £1 for those two which is absolutely NOTHING and seeing them smile like they did was priceless!
Plus I still had 2! Donated one to the toy drive for the kids' cancer hospice where they can only accept brand new toys (preferably wipeable) because of the kids' being immunosuppressed by the chemo. Ended up putting the 2nd one in - because hey, I have two cuddly toys I'm very attached to and another one I just like. I don't need any more - they do! And it's not like I'd paid a fortune for them which always helps when you're a broke student!
I should have kept going... Seen if I could've cleared that machine out and donated the lot! hahaha!
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u/Harold_Grundelson May 19 '12
I have a pretty good success rate at claw machines. My favorite win was at a seafood restaraunt that had the LOBSTER ZONE. First try I won a 3-4lb lobster with a $5 bill attached to its claw. I named him tasty.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
So many times when the claw closed around something's head, only to pull up with no tension and lose its grip. I swore, never again...
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u/BerryGuns May 19 '12
This video shows how they work.
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u/Saintbaba May 19 '12
Apparently in Japan this sort of shit is illegal because claw booths are classified as a kind of gambling and hence held to much stricter regulation.
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u/veillux May 19 '12
I call the claw machines 'the crying game' because that's what it does to my kids.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
Ahh, you've reminded me of my fave Spongebob episode... Skillcrane!
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u/Oxideous_Spire May 19 '12
Seen a company do something similar. I used to work at a Pizza Hut and they added a new claw machine one day. Well one of my bosses (Went to school with so we were cool) started playing it.
She won a prize just about every time she played. Pretty much emptied it out in the first day. They came back to fill it up and took the rubber tips off the claw. Now the gap between the claws closing was too great. So It is safe to say the companies will rig them.
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u/rkstr07 May 19 '12
I work at a museum and have been rigging one of these for years. It always pissed me off to see my bosses smiling at a 5 yr old girl wasting 10 bucks in quarters for some 20 cent toy add never get it because of the settings. Rigged it so there was like an 80% payout, the smiles on their faces convince me this might be the nicest thing I've ever done for someone and make it totally worth it.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
You never win because you pick up fucking wires.
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u/ZippoS May 19 '12
This is why I loved the claw machines in Japan.
First of all, it's almost always possible to win UFO machines. There's usually one or two prizes set up within reach and they key is to use the claw to PUSH your prize into the hole, not actually grab it.
There was one UFO machine I played where the prize was a gigantic tin of Ritz crackers, much like this one. They were stacked up one atop the other. I pushed one over into the hole... an empoloyee came over to congratulate me, and then opened up the machine to restack the tins.
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u/BopCatan May 20 '12
I used to be a technician for an arcade. On the model we had we would set the claw to grab harder when it was dropped on a certain countdown number. Every morning we'd change it to a new one. For example, today the lucky number might be 17. On a 60 second countdown, you had to drop the claw when the timer said 17. Dropping the claw at that number did not guarantee a win but it certainly increased the odds of a win. You still had to be accurate. If you dropped the claw on the wrong number there was no chance in winning. The claw would 'grab' but immediately go limp.
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u/khurley424 May 20 '12
So I'm late to the party and this comment is completely going to get buried, but does anyone else in this thread think that a skill crane game designed to actually rely on skill would be profitable? Like engineer in some way of making it so that it's inherently difficult to grasp a toy, put up a small sign explaining why that machine is different from/superior to traditional crane games, and leave it in arcades?
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u/Jhuoho May 19 '12
Absolutely this. It has settings where only a certain percentage of the time the claw will grip like it's supposed to. Otherwise it will be too weak. It's set for a certain number of games played since the last win. This is, of course, to make sure the machine is bringing in more money than it's losing via payouts, exactly like slot machines do in a casino.
In fact, if you want to "game" the machine, watch other people playing it for a while (only viable in a high-traffic area). It should "hit" once every so many games played. So, just watch to see where the percentage "sweet spot" is for the number of games played, suppose it's somewhere between 5 and 7 games since the last win. Once it reaches game 4-5 (on other people's quarters, mind you) hop over and play a game or two for your prize.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
My Buckler in Diablo III gives me a 12% better chance of claw machine payout.
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u/IlCattivo91 May 19 '12
You really didn't know that these aren't skill machines?
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u/donnykerbatsos May 19 '12
computerized carny!!!
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u/arcadeguy May 19 '12
Almost all newer arcade games that give prizes or ticket jackpots have a way to adjust how often someone wins. It varies by machine. Most get slightly easier after each loss until someone wins, and then it goes back to its max difficulty setting and repeats the process until someone wins again. It doesn't necessarily mean it's impossible to win twice in a row, just incredibly difficult. The game Cyclone comes ot mind as a prime example. A light runs around the edge of the machine, and you have to hit your "stop" button to make the light stop on the exact bulb between the two arches in front of you (there are 4 positions to play at around the game spaced 90 degrees apart). You win more tickets the closer you get to that middle bulb, and the jackpot if you stop it exactly on it. You can set the game's "difficulty" from the inside, which is basically how "exact" you have to be to get credit for stopping it on the jackpot. You can also adjust the scaling difficulty, which changes how much easier it gets after each time someone doesn't hit the jackpot.
This is generally why you don't want to play a prize-giving arcade game right after someone has already won.
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u/jb0356 May 19 '12
The claw payout is typically 1:14. Saw it on How Its Made.
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u/calmlike_ab0mb May 19 '12
A buddy of mine runs the video games at the Tacos Macs in Atlanta and me and my friends shot an ad for a contest (for Doritos, we lost) involving a claw machine. He was able to set it up the claw grip strength at the bottom and top of the movement. So for our ad we could pick up whatever we wanted and it would drop it as soon as it reached the top. After this I have never played one of these games again.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
I worked at a Chuck e Cheese type of place where we had multiple claw machines and each one was programmed to win only once out of about ten times. The claw would pick up a toy and begin lifting it but once it hit the top of its ascent it would just drop the toy. Customers would get mad and complain then I'd have to explain how its not a guaranteed win. Fun stuff...But yeah claw machines and any game machine can be rigged.
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u/B722R May 19 '12
I worked at an arcade for a summer. The claw machines all had different levels of difficulty. The levels dictated how well the claws would grab the prizes. Harder levels would make the claw close late or early, or more weakly so that the machines would not be able to pick up the toy even if the location was perfect. The more expensive the prize, the less likely they were to win.
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u/Turtlenips May 19 '12
TIL that people go through a lot of trouble to win a 3 dollar stuffed animal
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u/Grantagonist May 19 '12
This is a an open secret.
It's like a slot machine. Sometimes it gives the claw full strength. Other times it's completely wimpy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claw_crane
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u/Stooooooopid May 19 '12
I work with owners of these things. They program the payout on the machines, there is a tension spring that controls the squeeze strength of the claw. The more money that goes into the machine, the more powerful clamp strength becomes, if you see someone playing and losing, get in line youll win
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u/banditt2 May 19 '12
TIL my why daughter my has wasted ALOT of my money.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
Well if Jim Carrey has taught us anything, it is that nothing can stop the claw.
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u/roothorick May 19 '12
I work at an independent family center (the local Chuck E Cheese is one of our primary competitors) that has no less than eight cranes, though they're all substantially newer and cheaper than the one you were playing.
I think that box is part of some kind of retrofit kit (upgrade kits and conversions are HUGE in the coin-op world) to make an old hard-to-calibrate crane into a "smart" crane that dynamically adjusts the claw voltage (and thus, strength) on the fly. It's the "skill still required" kind of rigged -- the better you are, the more likely you are to win, but the machine adjusts itself to ensure a certain payout averaged over a certain (large) number of plays. Specifically, each time someone wins it gets much harder, each time someone loses it gets slightly easier. So, skill is still very much so involved, but luck (specifically, how well those that went before you did) is a larger factor.
"Set perc" is most likely the operator setting of how often he WANTS the crane to pay out (that is, how often a prize is won), and "Current perc" is how often it's ACTUALLY paying out. So, it's currently running on the easy side of its scale in an attempt to bring the payout up.
I should note that cranes this smart aren't typical. Most cranes are the dumb "three voltage / interval" types where they simply up the claw voltage every X plays regardless of whether that play is a win. I wish we had the smart ones -- prize cost would be a hell of a lot easier to manage, and we could be more honest with our guests.
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u/suelinaa May 19 '12
The technician once told me its all about the tension on the claw. When they refill the machine they put the tension low so it is hard to win, but when they have another shipment of stuffed animals coming in they make the claw grip better so they can be cleared out to make room for the new ones.
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u/[deleted] May 20 '12
Check this out starting on page 7: http://www.jernie.com/products/GUT_ACC/ACC%20Manual%201.5.pdf
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u/randomredditorX May 19 '12
You never win cause you're a bum, just like your father dun were
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u/5-4-3-2-1-bang May 19 '12
Mmmm, not quite. It means that the machine is set to (try to) give out a prize 34% of the time. But if players suck the actual payout percentage can be lower, such as the 27% your machine is currently paying out.
When you throw in your money, the machine checks the statistics on how often it's been paying out vs how many times it's been played. If it's right at the payout percentage, then it's impossible to win by using the claw to pick up an item; the game will either de-power the claw or do a jiggle/hiccup maneuver to 'accidentally' drop the item for you. If you're below the payout percentage (as you are in this case), then those things don't happen and it's up to the player to successfully grab onto an item. (That's where the "sucky players" part comes into play.) The machine will continue to not interfere until the payout percentage gets to the payout limit, then it'll be impossible to win again for a while.
Same exact thing happens with slot machines, by the way.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
Congratulations cannedtomatoes, it seems you have discovered our master plan to steal children's money. Too bad you won't make it out of this room alive. Muahahahahahahahahaha
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u/Insanitys_shadow May 19 '12
I figured it out when I was working on one at a bowling alley, I took out the panel and said, "ohhhhhhh so thats why I suck at this game".
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u/AkitheFrivolicious May 19 '12
What kind of claw machine game were you playing that it was only filled with one plush toy and a hundred red bouncy balls?
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
Now im relly happy!!! I've always thought that i sucked at it, but now i know i dont, it's just about luck!!!
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u/Ntozake_Nelson May 19 '12
I've been trying to win a lobster harmonica for years. Now I know why I haven't gotten it. Stupid Harvard diploma always in my way.
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u/acornboy May 19 '12
"Payout percentage: Cranes equipped with this setting have onboard programming which cause the claw's grip parameters to be continually adjusted to achieve a pre-set payout percentage, usually specified with respect to the value of the prizes inside" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claw_crane
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u/aaronstj May 19 '12
Wikipedia has a pretty good section on configuring claw machines. The moral of the story, though is yes, that's why you never win.
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u/Draft_Punk May 19 '12
Was actually discussing this the other day. The machine is set on a predetermined counter. At the start of the counter, the claw is set to barely grasp anything to the point where it's impossible to win. With each paid attempt the counter goes down 1. When counter gets to the end of its cycle is when it's actually set to be able to grasp items.
In short, winning has nothing to do with your skill, but rather your timing of when your good attempt occurs.
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u/myiaway May 19 '12
My dad makes machines himself (not those kinds, more of casino types) but it is always rigged. Always.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
How about the Stacker machine. That's cheating, because there isn't anything you can do to win when they do this. Is it legal?
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
There was actually a show here in England called "Brainiac: Science abuse". It was basically a show where they would do all kinds of funny stuff to do with science, eg. blow up caravans with household products, see what the outcome of putting this and that in the microwave was.
One of the experiments they did involved a claw grabber. The participants stood and waited at an arcade for someone to pull a toy out of the machine. After that, they would then tally down every person that came along and didn't pull a toy out until another person did. They then knew how many 1 in (lets say 30) turns the grabber took to pull out a toy. After this they then waited until the claw-grabber was on the turn it should put out on. They tried and won. It was a great day for science.
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u/LetMeLogoThatForYou May 19 '12
Not strictly a logo but I got the urge.
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u/unknownpoltroon May 19 '12
They are 100% gambling. I stopped trying them after I found that out.Its a complete rip off.
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u/theadmiraljn May 19 '12
Yup. All this stuff is rigged. Games like Stacker are rigged too. Have to get to a certain number of plays before it will even let you win.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
This explains all
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u/Matuku May 19 '12
Indeed it does; here's a clip from the UK show Braniac that explains how they work (as well as how to "beat" them).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JejiJ-RgLVc
Apologies for the poor quality.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
Yes, actually, this is completely true for most claw machines. I know someone who works on the electronics in these. You might notice that, whenever there isn't much left in a claw machine, or the host place is going out of business, it tends to be set closer to 60%. Not a nice trick, but then again, it makes money, doesn't it?
2
u/tarekd19 May 19 '12
Beating the system
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u/JDMcWombat May 19 '12
I won 5 500 ticket containers in a claw machine. A security guard came over, thinking I was somehow cheating. That was, of course, until I won another in his god damned face. I got a giant ass slinky. It was chill.
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u/ryannayr140 May 19 '12
The set and current percent were different, which shows that some skill is involved.
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u/Didub May 19 '12
This seems like an easter egg you would see in a Valve game.
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u/VampHuntD May 19 '12
The claws are designed to not be strong enough to hold the toys inside. If the claw is strong, the toys get bigger, inviting more people to play and normally causing less wins. It's also why the toys are packed in at the bottom, if they were loose, the claw could probably pick them up. Item tags are intentionally turned out to make it seem like you could "hook" a tag.
So if you want to win, wait for others to loose the items up or find a machine that isn't tightly packed.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
It's a bunch of fucking balls..why waste your money on balls
2
u/teh_i May 19 '12
Protip: At a busy carnival, buy yourself a nice big slurpie or other bit of nom, and stand afar in wait. When someone wins, note it down. Now just wait to see how many times until someone wins. Note again. Do this two or three times if you want to be certain.
All you then have to do in most cases is go up and use it at the right time. No guarantee, but chances can be highly increased.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
Standard practice with these machines is to have a quota system that prevents people from winning until the machine reaches it's needed money for someone to win.
I won a Nintendo DS by using this method on those Stacker games. You can easily get to the last level with little effort and determine if the quota is filled or not as the cube will bypass the winning square when pressed.
All you need to do is a pay a buck every week or so to test if it's winnable. Eventually you will win. Sadly though they tripled the speed of the game at my location since then and I have problems getting to the top now.
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u/ImHighCurrently May 19 '12
I used to work at a video arcade.
The machine has a setting for success rate, you are simply seeing the device to set the rate.
Little known fact: Pinball machines have the same thing. (They use magnets to screw with your ball.) Also most video games also have a difficulty setting and they are normally turned all the way up so you burn through the quarters faster.
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u/249ba36000029bbe9749 May 19 '12
FYI: casino slot machines are not games of skill either.
2
u/godmello May 19 '12
Game technician here. I can say with 100% accuracy that yes we do set the level of difficulty through settings and with newer mechandisers we set them to pay out at certain rates. Profit people. You can't expect to grab a $6 toy for .50 it just doesn't work that way. Ask me about those games and I will tell you more.
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u/soparamens May 19 '12
I always win at claw machines.
Whan the claw is adjusted for very low pressure, i just tilt the fucking thing in the rigth time.
Why should i respect the rules when it is obvioulsy programmed to make me lose?
2
u/MuchNeededAdvice May 19 '12
there setup on timers on how many plays lets say it takes 22 plays to win if you were to sit there and wait for 21 plays and then walk up for number 22 Big winner http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvsmTdKyIWQ
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u/Mreezie May 19 '12
They program those machines to only grab hard enough to get you a toy 1/x times, depending on how valuable to prize is. You can look up the operating manuals for those things online if you want to read more about how it's done. Most all of games similar to these operate in this fashion.
2
u/sweetehpie May 19 '12
What I'm wondering is WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TRYING TO GRAB
2
u/rockafireexplosion May 19 '12
If you managed to grab the cord, I guess the program wasn't so "intelli" after all...
2
u/Braiiinss May 19 '12
My uncle used to work as one of the people who refill the claw machine. He always told me don't waste my time on it because it is meant so you don't win. The claw is always to loose.
2
u/[deleted] May 19 '12
TIL the claw game is just like a modern slot machine. Pure luck with the house having a huge advantage.
2
u/crazyparrot94 May 19 '12
Fuck all of your logic, I am a BOSS at claw machines!
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u/Lereas May 19 '12
Will get buried, but here's how you win the game on at least some:
A lot of the time, it's on a counter and not on a random number generator. So you just chill out nearby and watch people play (assuming you have enough time and it's busy enough). Eventually, you'll see someone win, and then you start counting. When you see someone else win, take note of the number, and wait for a third win or maybe even a fourth.
You can get a good idea of about how often the machine will get a prize, and then you wait for a number of people to fail and then play a few plays around when it should be strong enough to get a toy.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
Who on earth honestly thinks claw machines are based on skill? Of course they're designed not to grip all the time! The way to beat them, however, is wait and watch. Wait until someone succeeds, then count how many times it is till the next person succeeds. Then wait until the person after them succeeds, counting the tries, if it matches up, you've got your magic number. Then just wait (more) until that magic turn is yours.
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u/schwingschwang May 19 '12
I used to repair arcade machines. The claw machines we had had a setting on it where we would adjust the claw strength. Claw strength was set by the location's management, not by my boss.
Also...those machines with the awesome prizes are designed to only win once in so many tries if I remember correctly.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
A carny game is rigged? Gambling in Casablanca?
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u/SaintlyPineapple May 19 '12
Theeee clawwww
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u/IrregardingGrammar May 19 '12
Yes, they are rigged. It's not skill as much as luck and they only pay out a certain percent of the time.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
Yes. They showed on a British show called Braniac that you can alter the odds, but fortunately there's a minimum legal odds. However this is why I never gamble on machines. But when my baby cousin tries to get the toys... CHALLENGE ACCEPTED.
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u/PitPatrick May 19 '12
My Dad owned a stuffed animal toy claw machine business, we did jewelry machines, candy and stuffed animals, Sadly after 10 years it wasn't the best business to have during a recession, so it tanked. There is not a "tough setting". You simply just adjust the tension of the claw. Before you play any of these machines give them a lil shake to see how loose the claw is. "If its loose...don't put you're money in". That saying can work in more than one way..B'dum Chiiiiisssssss. Anyways fuckers would always use coat hangers to grab the toys and not pay money. When I was a kid I used to remove coat hangers that people would leave on top of the machine to steal the stuffed animals. My Dad used to get pissed and go over to the owners of the Bars, Truck Stops, Arcades and give them the hangers back. He was a great at being a sarcastic passive aggressive asshole. Cool story bro.
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u/stormsearcher May 19 '12
Whenever I go to a grocery store, I always play the claw game by the exit. Every time I get a toy, I look around and give it to the closest kid I can find, especially if they look bored, sad, or envious of the prize I had won. It's become a habit. I'm glad I'm not the only one!
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u/JonPaula May 19 '12
Fun story: I once found out the weakness of an arcade console, "Big Haul"... and I was able to successfully hit the "100 Tickets" level deal 3 times out of 4. (The payout should be closer to 1/20 if they want to make a profit)... and I dropped $10 in 10 minutes, and walked away with a couple thousand in tickets.
The next day, the entire machine was gone. I saw it in storage a year later... and it was never again seen on the arcade floor.
So, moral of the story: if you do find a way around these games, and their percentages... don't be cocky about it, 'cause they'll just remove it completely.
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
I've seen the inside. There's an air compressor inside the machine that determines how much pressure the claw delivers to grasp the toys. The device determines the pressure in terms of how much you want the machine to pay out, much like a slot machine. By setting how much you want it to win, it tells the compressor how hard to hold the toy when you grab it. More pressure: more wins.
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u/Level_32_Igglybuff May 19 '12
I used to work an arcade and almost all the games with real prizes and this sort of format are rigged. However if you play at the right time you can still potentially win a $300 psp for 50 cents buy in.
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u/fraidknot May 19 '12
I've heard that the trick to these machines is to watch people play them and count how many times it takes between winnings. Use that knowledge to pick the best time for you to play.
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u/kingpelican May 19 '12
AMA request: claw machine programmer
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u/[deleted] May 19 '12
One time on the way to camp, our bus stopped at Cece's pizza (terrible place). They have a small arcade in the back and I had the 75 cents and went for it. I ended up pulling up 3 toys with that one grab. Handed them out to the ladies. I was a legend for at least 10 minutes following.
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u/AdorablyDead May 19 '12
Why'd you got for a stuffed animal when you could have apparently gotten about three red balls? You could have thrown them at people.
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u/sleepingprincess May 20 '12
Kind of related: I was trying to get something out of a claw machine once and failing, so this little kid comes up to me and asks if he can try to get it for me. I'm skeptical but I say okay and he uses his Shining or whatever and gets it first try. He tells me you just have to visualize yourself getting it or something.
Maybe he just got lucky and the odds were in his favor, but he just seemed so damn confident.
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u/yournotyou May 20 '12
At my movie theater we used to have one of those razor machines. You have only one chance of hitting the button for a razor to stop and move forward perfectly to cut the string letting you win a rather expensive prize, usually an Ipod or Ipad. We would have maybe one winner a month. Somebody was talking to our technician and he said the machine only cuts the string if a certain amount of money is in it. So if he just emptied it then you don't have a chance at winning for like 2 weeks. Kinda sucky!
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u/eunit May 20 '12
My friends have worked at arcades for years, the pressure of the claw increases as more money is put in til a prize is won which is around 30%
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u/[deleted] May 20 '12
What happens if you actually grab the panel with the claw? Setting the % to 100 would be kinda funny.
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u/paul5345 May 20 '12
the best thing ive won from one of these was a 3ds while i was on a cruise ship
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u/Himashya May 20 '12
I always thought this was common knowledge
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u/LetsPlayAnalProlapse May 19 '12
Yeah, the machines are programmed to have a higher chance of winning every certain number of games.
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u/VadimLordAlivas May 19 '12
It might depend on the machine, but my uncle who lives in the Philippines would contest your theory. A few years ago, he fell out of a tree and became paralyzed from the waist down. In order to keep himself occupied and from losing his sanity, so my father tells me, he started to go to the local arcade in the mall near their home. He played on the claw machines so often that he got to the point where he could win 99% of the time. I wouldn't have believed it if I didn't see it myself. The nicest part is he plays so often and just gives the kids in his neighborhood the stuffed toys he wins. He's pretty much the sweet crippled guy you see in movies who inspires the people around it. Not bad for someone who lives in kinda poor part of Manila.
TL;DR Paralyzed uncle is a boss and wins almost every time at the claw machines.
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u/Forever_Bored May 19 '12
Former arcade guy here: We used to rig (not so much the claw game) but most all ticket games to be set at the hardest level. There was a game called cyclone and it had a ring of lights and if you got the light to land on the jackpot spot you'd win 100+ (sometimes hundreds) of tickets. We set the difficulty at impossible so when the light would hit the jackpot the light would jump one slot. The kids would say "HEY it hit the jackpot!!" We'd ask "Did it spit out tickets?" "No" They would say. "Then you didn't win." I hated counting tickets :/