Hey guys, I'm new to the board and not too overly familiar with the MAME community. So I thought I'd ask all of you, the experts, about my newest project before I go and destroy an original.
The original has pictures posted
here.
This is an original 1981 Centipede game in complete working condition. As it stands we can still put it back together and it will run. My buddy, Jay, got it at a yard sale last summer for $30 cause someone had run over the power cord with the lawn mower. He fixed the cord and brought it home because his mom loves Centipede.
On the main game board is a sticker with the date of June '98 on it. We think it was restored then because the monitor actually has a Pac-Man board burned into it and is mounted upside down.
Jay also has an old computer that I have recently fixed up. Our plans are to strip the box and use that for our new MAME machine/jukebox. We want to sell off all the old components in order to finance our little project. However, everyone I've told about this project so far has literally yelled at me for destroying an original. So my question to all of you is, should I do this?
Could we make as much money by cleaning up the original Centipede game and selling that as we could by selling off the individual components. Are the cabinets and original artwork valuable at all? I've already seen the same monitor we have in our unit on ebay for $65 and it didn't even work. Ours works and has the full chassis. I don't know if the rest of the stuff is valuable to people that are restoring these old machines or if they are looking to buy the things as one whole completed piece or even if they are that popular. I mean how much demand is there for an original working Centipede control board?
Help me out here guys. I'd really love a MAME box and am really looking forward to this project. But I'd feel really guilty, and stupid, if I found out I was destroying a valuable antique.
If it's worth it, I won't destroy the box but just take measurements and copy the design. If it's not really worth it I'll recondition the box and sell off all the internal components to people that are refurbishing their own Centipede games.