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Underground network imports Japanese video game arcade machines for US buyers

When Japanese arcades close, the machines are either junked, broken down for parts or sourced by grey-market entrepreneurs in the US to sell to obsessed gamers

Reading Time:15 minutes

Part of Phil Arrington’s arcade machine collection in California. An underground network of gamers salvage game machines from Japan for willing buyers in the US. Photo: Julian Berman

Published: 7:15pm, 20 Feb 2022

Last October, Phil Arrington precariously balanced a dream on the cargo bed of his 2002 Ford Ranger pickup. It was a stupid dream, but it did not deserve to die on a dolly cart behind a beige warehouse.

Arrington was hunched over the dolly, gold chain dangling over a tight grey T-shirt. Between his arms, leaned at a 45-degree angle, was a video game arcade machine; its title, Museca, could be glimpsed over his shoulder. The machine had come a long way – from an arcade in Tokyo, Japan, to an anonymous warehouse in Osaka and then, after a long wait on a container ship outside Long Beach, in the US state of California, to Arrington’s warehouse in San Pedro.

Arrington carefully wheeled the six-foot-tall (1.83 metres) cabinet towards the pickup’s hatch. On the concrete three feet below lay a thin, blue blanket. Nearby, a phone was recording.

Scuttling, repositioning, crouching, grunting, Arrington pushed the machine’s weight centimetre by centimetre, second after second. Suddenly, the dolly’s wheels slid off the edge. His whole body spilled forward and the arcade cabinet plunged to the ground with a fractious crash.

Phil Arrington playing Pump It Up on his Japanese arcade game that came from an arcade in Tokyo, now located in California, United States. Photo: Julian Berman

Under the video Arrington uploaded to Twitter, gamers expressed their alarm. “This is the scariest thing I’ve seen on the internet,” said one. “I don’t think my a**hole has ever puckered harder,” said another, vividly.

Watching the video from across the country in Brooklyn, New York, I screamed. It was my machine.

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Underground network imports Japanese video game arcade machines for US buyers

.css-1mniedq{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;}When Japanese arcades close, the machines are either junked, broken down for parts or sourced by grey-market entrepreneurs in the US to sell to obsessed gamers

When Japanese arcades close, the machines are either junked, broken down for parts or sourced by grey-market entrepreneurs in the US to sell to obsessed gamers