Loads of arcades and 100's of fruit machines, but my boy only wanted to play Eachway Nudger (1980's machine) which we found tucked away. This fact was strengthened from a recent family outing to a local caravan park with amusements. Nowadays with the £100 jackpot fruities, a £20 stake will be gone by the time you finish your first pint and not exactly there for 'amusement' as my boy (10 years old) quite rightly said - the machine looks too complicated with all the buttons and lights'. You could go there with a fiver and spend ages playing on the fruit machines as generally they had high RTP and regular payouts at lower amounts, meaning many hours of 'amusement'. As Dave (arcade chap) has pointed out, in the 80's they were 'amusement arcades' - arcades there for amusement and enjoyment.

I have been chatting to the owner who is selling a modern style old machine (out of place in his arcade) and during our chat and from looking at his website, it has dawned on me how vastly different the industry has become in the last couple of decades. Since my kids may use it, I have opted for a low £5 jackpot payout and whilst looking at fruit machines, stumbled across a vintage amusement arcade just up the road to me which has the old style (1980's era) machines.

Biggest dilemma was which one and at what jackpot level.

Bit of a step away from online slots with this post, but I am just in the process of converting half my garage into a games room (games table, dartboard, fridge, TV and games console, etc) and will be getting a fruit machine out there.

Vintage 4 reel club fruit machine