Pachinko: An Escape From Everyday Life
Everyone who’s been to Japan knows this moment: you walk down a street and suddenly a door to your left opens and a massive noise fills the street for a second, before the door closes again.
While these places may be unfamiliar to most, they have a very fascinating yet unique feel to them. The sounds, the lights, the sensation and a drop of wickedness all add up to the fascinating Pachinko stores.
Pachinko stores are Japan's slot machine halls. 30 mil regular customers and 20 mil occasional customers are attracted to these halls, where you hardly can hear yourself thanks to the blaring pop music, advertisements and the metallic clinks of the rolling pin balls.
The Japanese love their Pachinko slots, and players of all age can be seen trying to double their money. Many of them see it as an escape from every day life, and a place where you can simply relax from the stressful working day.
The idea is very simple: players buy small pin balls that are then put into the slot machine, where they dazzle through a maze. Most of the balls are lost, but they occasionally hit certain fields that result in special actions, such as a achieving additional pin balls.
But not all that glitters is gold. Behind the colourful halls and machines are often the hidden fates of addicts, who lose all their money and social life to these machines. As in every other form of gambling, this is a massive problem is often the trigger to destructing lives & families. Therefore, Pachinko is often seen as a negative thing to many. The message here is clear: Don’t let the game play you.
As gambling, aside from horse, bike, and boatraces, is illegal in Japan, you can only win non-cash prizes with a value of max ¥10,000. But often found near Pachinko stores are small shops where you can exchange these prizes for cash.
