Console Management

HandyCafe manages gaming consoles alongside PCs, giving your gaming center or esports arena a unified system for tracking sessions, pricing, and revenue across all devices.

What Are Consoles?

Consoles in HandyCafe represent gaming stations such as PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo Switch, and other custom device types. They are managed separately from PCs but follow the same session lifecycle. You can start, pause, resume, and stop sessions with full pricing and billing support.

The Consoles page displays all registered consoles as status cards, giving you a quick visual overview of which devices are in use, available, or have pending payments.

Console Status

Each console has one of three statuses:

The status cards on the Consoles page use color coding to make it easy to identify each state at a glance.

Adding a Console

To register a new console in HandyCafe:

1. Navigate to the Consoles page.
2. Click the Add Console button.
3. Fill in the console details:
   • Name: A descriptive name for the console (e.g., "PS5 Station 1", "Xbox Area - Left", "Nintendo Dock 3").
   • MAC Address: The network MAC address of the console. This must be in a valid format (e.g., AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF). The system validates the format before saving.
   • Console Type: Select from the predefined console types (PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo, or Custom). This determines the icon and category displayed on the status card.
   • Pricing Type: Choose how this console is priced:
     • Default: Uses the global hourly rate defined in your pricing settings. If you change the global rate, this console's rate changes automatically.
     • Custom: Set a specific hourly rate for this console only. Useful when premium consoles (e.g., PS5 with VR) should cost more than standard stations.
   • Custom Hourly Price: Only visible when Pricing Type is set to Custom. Enter the per-hour rate for this specific console.
4. Click Save to register the console.

The new console appears on the Consoles page as an Idle status card, ready to accept sessions.

Console Sessions

Console sessions follow the same lifecycle as PC sessions:

Starting a Session

Select an Idle console and start a new session. You can optionally assign a member to the session for wallet or time-based billing.

Pausing a Session

If a customer needs a break, you can pause the session. The timer stops and no charges accumulate during the pause.

Resuming a Session

Resume a paused session to continue the timer and billing from where it left off.

Stopping a Session

End the session. The system calculates the total charge based on duration and the applicable hourly rate. The console moves to the Unpaid status until payment is collected, or directly to Idle if payment is processed immediately.

Console sessions are identified by the console's name rather than by a MAC address connection (as with PCs). This means the cashier manually starts and stops sessions on consoles, rather than the system detecting connections automatically.

Console Pricing

Each console can be configured with its own pricing or use the global default:

• Default Pricing: The console inherits the global hourly rate from your pricing settings (Settings > Pricing). Any changes to the global rate are automatically reflected.
• Custom Pricing: A fixed hourly rate specific to this console. Changes to the global rate do not affect consoles with custom pricing.
• Startup Fee: Console sessions can also have a configurable startup fee that is charged once at the beginning of each session, separate from the hourly rate. This is configured in the pricing settings.

Pricing Example

If your global rate is $2.00/hour and you have a premium PS5 with VR:

• Standard consoles (Default pricing): $2.00/hour
• PS5 VR station (Custom pricing): $4.50/hour

When you raise the global rate to $2.50/hour, standard consoles update automatically but the PS5 VR station remains at $4.50/hour until you manually change it.

Filtering and Sorting

The Consoles page provides tools to quickly find the console you need:

Filter by Console Type

Narrow the view to show only specific console types (e.g., show only PlayStation consoles, or only Xbox consoles). Useful in cafes with many different console types.

Filter by Status

Show only consoles with a specific status (Online, Idle, or Unpaid). Helpful for quickly finding available consoles or identifying unpaid sessions.

Sort by Name

Sort consoles alphabetically by name to quickly locate a specific station.

Member Assignment

Members can be assigned to console sessions to enable wallet-based or time-based billing:

• When starting a console session, select a member from the member list.
• The session charges are deducted from the member's wallet balance, just like PC sessions.
• If the member has a time-based membership, their remaining time is consumed during the console session.
• Session history for the member includes both PC and console sessions.

Unregistered (walk-in) customers can also use consoles without member assignment. In this case, payment is collected manually when the session ends.

License Limit

Consoles count toward the total device limit in your HandyCafe license. If your beta license allows 50 PCs, that limit includes both PCs and consoles combined.

For example, if you have 40 PCs and 10 consoles, you have reached the 50-device limit. Adding an 11th console would require upgrading your license.

Console Count and Statistics

The Consoles page header displays aggregate statistics:

• Total Consoles: The number of registered consoles in your system.
• Online: How many consoles currently have active sessions.
• Idle: How many consoles are available.
• Unpaid: How many consoles have sessions awaiting payment.

These counts update in real time as sessions start and stop.

Required Permissions

Access to console management is controlled by the Consoles permission category in the cashier role system:

A cashier without CONSOLE_VIEW cannot access the Consoles page at all. A cashier with only CONSOLE_VIEW can see the console status but cannot add, edit, or remove consoles.

See Cashier Roles & Permissions for details on configuring role-based access.