What is Pachinko? A Guide to Pachinko Machines

You may not have heard of Pachinko, but it’s a game that’s hugely popular in Japan and is starting to gain popularity among online sites in the UK. It combines all the best elements of slot machines, arcade games, and pinball. You play the game on loud and colourful machines in dedicated Pachinko parlours.

And yes, despite Japan’s gambling laws, you can win prizes at Pachinko. So, let’s see what this game is all about and where UK players can find such an alternative!

What Is The History of Pachinko

The first Pachinko game originated in Japan in the early 20th century. It was a children’s game based on the Corinthian Bagatelle pinball machine games from Chicago and combined elements of traditional slot machines.

The machines were an instant hit and were available in every city in Japan, with Nagoya and Tokyo leading the way. But shop owners noticed that parents were playing Pachinko more than their children. As a result, by the late 1940s, the industry evolved to become more adult-oriented.

How to Play Pachinko: Rules and Mechanics

The main goal of a Pachinko game is to capture as many of the game’s shiny little metal ball bearings as you can. But to get started you need to buy some of those Pachinko balls so you can play.

You then load your balls into the machine and launch them into the gaming area of the game – much like you would in pinball. You control the speed and timing by hitting a button to release the balls, but it’s still a game of chance as it depends on which pins your balls hit.

The balls drop harmlessly into the machine’s inner workings, or they drop into special prize pockets. These pockets can trigger bonus rounds of the game or, better yet, they see you collect lots and lots of balls as your prize or payout.

When it comes to playing it on an online slot site in the UK, you will find a Pachinko alternative if you search in the Genting Casino’s titles. Basically, on this site, the game is called ‘Crazy Pachinko.’ The bets range from £0.10 to £50, and the RTP varies (95.01% – 96.04%). This game combines elements of slots, pachinko, and live casino. A professional dealer supervises this title.

In the Crazy Pachinko bonus round at Genting, a puck is released onto a large Pachinko-style board. As it bounces and zigzags down, players watch in anticipation. The puck’s final resting place determines the prize, which can include multipliers, extra drops, or other rewards. This might be a worthwhile game, more so since Evolution Gaming is its renowned developer.

Can You Cash Out Money from Pachinko in Japan?

Of course, there’s not much fun in trying to capture as many balls as you can with no reward. So yes, you can exchange the balls for prizes. But clever parlour owners use a loophole to pay out to customers.

According to Japanese gambling laws, any balls you win cannot be exchanged for prizes inside a Pachinko parlour. And you cannot take those balls outside.

So, once you collect as many balls as possible, you exchange them for a token. If you reach a certain number of balls, the token you receive can then be exchanged for yen in a separate building.

While you’re not technically cashing out money in the Pachinko parlor, you are collecting cash. This clever trick of having an intermediary convert the cash into cash allows parlors to operate around Japan.

The Anatomy of the Pachinko Machine

As you can imagine, the very first Pachinko machines were simple machines that had basic features, much like the Bagatelle pinball machine. These included:

• Loading area – also used to collect ‘winning’ balls
• Play levers to launch the balls
• Main prize pocket
• Smaller prize pockets
• Pins for balls to bounce off

Modern Pachinko machines are still essentially the same, but from the 1960s onwards, they started to include flashing lights and music.

Pachinko Parlors in Japan: A Glimpse Into the Gaming Culture

Pachinko is a national pastime in Japan, and parlors are embedded in Japanese culture. They are colourful, loud places where people from all walks of life play the game. The many different machines cover a huge range of themes and even special Pachinko titles.

The game of Pachinko is played the most by men aged 60 or older. These make up a whopping 21.5% of all pachinko players in Japan. While tourists make up a very small percentage of Pachinko players, they are still popular sights to see when visiting Japan.

Yet despite their popularity, Japanese people in recent times have started to look down on Pachinko parlors, thinking of them as gambling facilities.

In 1994, the pachinko industry in Japan hit ¥30 trillion (nearly £195 billion). In 1999, it was estimated that sales and revenue from Pachinko were responsible for 5.6% of the country’s GDP. By 2015, Japan’s pachinko market generated more than the annual gambling revenue of Las Vegas, Macau, and Singapore combined. So yes, it’s big business.

But despite remaining incredibly popular, Japan isn’t quite the Pachinko money pit that it once was. Revenues have declined and now average around ¥8 trillion (£39 billion).

Pachinko in Japan by the Numbers

Pachinko: Gambling or Just Entertainment?

Technically speaking, Pachinko and Pachinko parlors actually fall into a bit of a grey area. For the majority of people in Japan, Pachinko is a form of gambling, and they’re not wrong.

But by the letter of the law, the world of Pachinko is considered an entertainment industry thanks to a loophole regarding the winning of the balls and where you cash out. Once the collection of the balls and then the conversion are handled in different properties, it’s not classified as gambling winnings – something that would make it illegal in Japan.

It has the same status as lotteries, scratch cards, and even bingo titles in that it’s often thought of as not quite gambling. That said, and legal loopholes by having an intermediary aside, Japanese Pachinko is most certainly a form of gambling.

That means it poses the same risks as problem gambling. Yes, you exchange the prizes off-site, but you still need to buy Pachinko balls to play.

Pachinko Beyond Japan: Global Reach and Influence

Interestingly, this popular Japanese game has failed to take off elsewhere despite generating more cash than Las Vegas.

Taiwan is the one exception, and the game has taken root in a big way. The Japanese occupation of the island nation during the early 20th century saw the country adopt many aspects of Japanese culture, including Pachinko. Beyond Taiwan and Japan, you’ll struggle to find more than a handful of Pachinko parlours in any other country.

When it comes to online casinos, though, it’s a different story. Many leading software providers and casinos have jumped on the Pachinko bandwagon as they look to stand out from the crowd. In fact, you can even find a live version of the game in many of the industry’s live casinos, proving just how popular this Japanese game is.

It’s certain that we’ll never see the one-time children’s game Pachinko become a cultural phenomenon in other countries as it is in Japan. But thanks to the world of online casinos and new Pachinko titles, it will surely appear on many UK casino platforms.