Terence Fawdington, vice president of international sales at Switch International, said: “It’s been quiet, but the quality of the customer is high.
"In the past you might have had a higher number of visitors, but a small fraction of actual purchases made. This year, if 10 customers visit a stand, they’re all buying.”
Magic Play’s Andrew Wojciechowski has a similar outlook, though he feels that the drop in numbers is not necessarily a negative. He said: “The amount of customers has been smaller than usual, but the few that have visited our stand have been focussed[sic] on a particular item.”
Sega Amusements, however, has seen no let-up all week, with its product offering of licensed brands proving a hit with customers.
Sega’s Justin Burke said: “Despite reports from other companies that this year has been quieter, Sega has been busy all week. This is the highlight of the European calendar for us, it gives us the chance to take advantage of the hype we built with the new products we introduced at IAAPA.
“Our theme this year has been big brands, from Ghostbusters and Angry Birds to Sonic the Hedgehog, and each one has been very popular with visitors to the stand.”
Overall EAG appears to have been another successful year for exhibitors, operators and buyers. Below are some of the exhibitors and products on display:
- ICE had their Classic Carnival range of products on display, inlcuding IceBall FX, Down the Clown, Gold Fishin', and Milk Jug Toss, as well Air FX Hockey Table.
- Sega had one of the biggest booths at the show with Storm Racer G, Zombie Snatcher, Plants vs Zombies, Ghostbusters, Angry Birds, Mario & Sonic at the Rio Olympic Games 2016 Arcade Edition, Sonic Blast Ball, Sonic Dash Extreme, Pink Panther Jewel Heist, Showdown, Transformers and plenty of prizes, payment solutions, tickets, etc.
- Adrenaline Amusements showed off their new transparent version of their video redemption game Crossy Road and another new game Snaky Tickets, as well as the tried and true Flying Tickets! Snaky Tickets is a revamped version of the classic game Snake, in which a player must eat fruit (or in the case of the old mobile or even older arcade games - eat the dots) to grow your snake and the player must keep going for as long as they can without running into themselves.
- Bandai Namco had their expected line up - Time Crisis 5 SD, Star Wars Flat Screen Edition, and the highly anticipated Point Blank X. Other games at the Namco booth included Ace Angler, Pac-Man Feast, Pac-Man Alley Ball, and the new Pac-Man Air Hockey table. Below is some gameplay from Point Blank X taken by Arcade Belgium at the show:
- Raw Thrills had some great products on show, including the World's Biggest Pac-Man and Friends Arcade Machine, Galaga Assault, MotoGP and more of their previous show line ups, such as Jurassic Park and Aliens Armageddon.
- Stern was quick off the mark with exhibiting their Ultimate Spider-Man Vault Edition Pinball Machine, which they only recently announced. They also had Game Of Thrones on display alongside an older but much-loved Star Trek pinball machine.
- ProGames was also on show with their range of Boxer punching machines. The Poland based company has one of the biggest ranges of sports redemption machines and has a great selection of punching and kicking machines.
The exhibit although apparently quieter than in previous years, by all reports had a much higher quality buyers attending and allowed exhibitors to lend more of their time to consumers at the show.
Images via Arcade Belgium, Las Vegas Arcade Twitter, Arcade Base and Sega facebook page.
