Sega Sued For 'Rigged' Arcade Machine

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Polygon: Sega's Key Master arcade game is causing problems for the company once again. A new lawsuit alleges that Key Master is intentionally rigged against players. It's marketed as a game of skill, but players claim machines bar against awarding successful runs, making Key Master more of a chance-based game. Marcelo Muto filed the lawsuit on Monday in a California court. It's a proposed class action lawsuit looking for $5 million in damages to be distributed amongst wronged consumers. With Sega, Play It! Amusements (which is owned by Sega and now called Sega Amusements) and Komuse America (which co-manufactures Key Master) are named in the suit.

Key Master has been the target of multiple court cases in the past, dating back to at least 2013. This 2021 lawsuit, as well as the others, claims these machines are rigged only to allow players to win prizes at certain times -- specifically, at intervals determined by player losses. You've probably seen Key Master machines in malls or arcades, touting prizes like iPads, earbuds, and other pricey electronics. To play, you must navigate a key towards a specific keyhole by stopping the automatic movement by hitting a button. If the key goes in, you win the prize. The problem, according to the lawsuit, is that these machines are programmed to only allow players the ability to win after a certain number of player failures. If the machine is not ready to award a prize, it's allegedly programmed to overshoot the keyhole -- even if the player hit the button at the correct time -- and force the player to lose.

The problem here is that Key Master isn't marketed as a game of chance. It's portrayed as 'a simple game of pure skill with a straight-forward directive,' lawyers said. However, lawyers said that the deception behind the machine -- that it won't award players until certain settings are met -- is laid out in the game's manual, which was provided alongside the lawsuit as evidence. In the manual, according to screenshots, the Key Master machine 'will not reward a prize until the number of player attempts reaches the threshold of attempts set by [the] operator.' Lawyers for Muto said the default setting is 700, but that each machine can be programmed by individual operators. 'Key Master is no longer listed on the Sega Amusements website; instead, it's been re-named Prize Locker,' adds Polygon. 'It's the same design, but it's 100% skill-based, Sega said on the website.'

'In the lawsuit, Muto's lawyers said Prize Locker and the conversion kit (which 'allows an operator of a Key Master game to convert the game' to a skill-based one) are offered because Sega itself has realized that 'many areas of the world aren't able to benefit from this outstanding category [of arcade game] due to local or state regulations prohibiting their operation.' Lawyers alleged that this is Sega 'tacitly conced[ing] that Key Master is rigged.''

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