As an Air Force brat in the late 1950s, half my friends had pachinko tables. Talk about an attractive nuisance-- flashy, noisy, clattery moving parts, things that seem to happen at random-- we loved them. Dad wouldn't bring one back when he solo TDY'ed to Okinawa in 1961, said he wouldn't have one in his house-- crushed me, still want one but the wife agrees with Dad. I think the Flashy-Noisy requirements of modern youth is met by TV and cell phones, but I showed my grandboys one and they were duly impressed. And I broke down and gave my lucky pachinko ball to my teenage granddaughter.
In Japan it was illegal to make direct payments on games of chance, which was pachinko's legal status-- so you won little fuzzy Teddy bears instead. When you were done you took the bears down a few doors and there was a shop where you redeemed the bears for cash. Somehow this satisfied the requirements of Japanese law at the time--