Getting into Pinball
tynan.com
tynan.com
> I’m fortunate enough to live near the biggest publicly accessible pinball arcade (Pinball Hall of Fame)
In danger of being rude, I'd say the Pinball Hall of Fame is about worth the price of admission (it's free to enter). Maybe I visited on an off day, but it seemed to be just a warehouse full of privately own machines, about half of which were operating. My local pinball place (Next Level Pinball Museum, outside of Portland, OR) has a very large collection which spans the history of Pinball from very early games to machines that have HD video displays on the backboard.
I strongly recommend if you've never given it a try, find a pinball place that'll let you pay a flat fee for admission and spend some time on some games. My personal favorites:
- Attack From Mars
- Cactus Canyon
- Medieval Madness
- Creature from the Black Lagoon
- Star Trek (based on the Abrams movies)
- Super Mario Bros (the full size table from 1992)
[1]: https://arcadeblogger.com/2018/07/06/arcade-holy-grail-the-p...
So while maybe not the best way to make money, the experience for fans at their shows was outstanding. The largest collection of pins and arcades I've ever seen, almost all in working order.
I was hoping to maybe grab one of the pins during the auction but the prices the machines were getting were way out of my range. I'm glad they made some money back, I suppose. Still trawling Craigslist hoping to find a deal.
Downtown Omaha, Nebraska has a venue with perhaps 50 or so machines (ranging in age).
Memorable games for me were more modest, such as "8-ball deluxe" with lots of targets or "black knight" with a second set of flippers.
Games nowadays seem to be too deep to play in an arcade on the way home from school (if any such venues exist anymore). Seems to me like asking you to play skyrim a quarter at a time.
- Black Knight 2000
- Whirlwind
- High Speed
- Arabian Nights
- Addams Family
- Star Wars
However, given the current drama around Unity, we're currently looking into Godot to evaluate how much effort it would take to port, and how Godot will support our needs.
Are you targeting Linux compatibility, by chance? My biggest complaint about the whole VPX scene is that it's locked to Windows.
But thanks to recent efforts, VPX also runs on Linux now! It's on the standalone branch[1], under actions you can download a build.
By the way prheezie, thanks for all the work you put into VPX. I hope to see VPE get some momentum behind it once again now that your DMD stuff is finished off. What do you think the likelihood is of moving to Godot, and what would you estimate as the impact on VPE?
TBH I just started looking into it, together with a few other developers from the community. I'll post something at the usual place as soon as we know more.
(Asking because I want to build a cab this Winter and not sure where to begin.)
VPX has the largest table collection, and the good ones play very well. But there is also Pinball FX which is a lot easier to set up, and they are catching up in terms of cabinet support (we're helping them, the next thing is force feedback support).
There is also Future Pinball which runs a few original games with mods pretty well now, but it's still closed source.
Pinball FX is pretty fun too, but it definitely feels more like a video game than VPX.
Not knowing about the author, I checked the About page [1] which states that Tynan is a "minimalist nomad", but perhaps that label is somewhat outdated? I mean ... owning three full-size pinball machines seems somewhat incompatible with both properties. Perhaps they are only minimalist when in nomad mode and not when at home, or something. Also, I have little clue about "nomadism", that is not my cup of beverage at all. :)
I minimise how many email subscriptions I have, so don’t keep pace with many writers. But I have an annual tradition going back maybe 8-10 years of over my Christmas break reading all of your content for the year.
It’s been fun watching the journey from Uberman sleep hacking to multiple properties with friends (an aspiration of mine), to more recently tea + relationship + Vegas.
Keep being you, and thanks for sharing.
Those first 2 are what got me into pinball, many many years ago. The last original Medieval Madness table I saw was $15k at the Chicago Pinball Expo -- it's probably the most beloved table, with the possible exception of Addams Family.
Virtual pinball is the future. If you're interested, the easiest way to start is with an AtGames Legends Pinball machine. It's the most easily moddable... for mine I went with these upgrades which made all the difference.
https://www.buystuffarcades.com/products/deluxe-backbox-2-0-...
https://www.clevelandsoftwaredesign.com/pinball-parts/p/styl...
https://www.atgames.us/products/arcade-control-panel-for-leg...
Yes, getting it all together takes quite a bit of time and money, but everyone who has seen it has been delighted, even if they knew nothing about pinball beforehand.
Unless you're very competitive, I recommend avoiding any kind of systematic effort to improve your skills, as this is likely to reduce the enjoyment you get from the game itself. The explanation is itself a kind of tutorial, so I've ROT13 encoded it for the sake of people having fun at their current skill level:
Cvaonyy vf n shaqnzragnyyl synjrq tnzr traer, orpnhfr vg erjneqf pbjneqyl cynl. Gur zbfg eryvnoyr zrgubq gb trg uvtu fpberf vf gb fybj lbhe cynl qbja, pbageby gur onyy, naq gnxr fnsr, ercrngnoyr fubgf. Vs lbh trg n zhygvonyy, vg'f orfg gb genc nyy rkprcg bar onyy, orpnhfr zhygvonyyf ner gbb hacerqvpgnoyr. Gur zbfg sha srngherf fubhyq trarenyyl or nibvqrq, orpnhfr gurl'yy chg gur onyy ba na hacerqvpgnoyr cngu. Gur bayl gvzr lbh fubhyq or vzcebivfvat vf jura lbh'er erpbirevat sebz reebef. Gur orfg qrfvtaref ner njner bs guvf ceboyrz, naq gel gb rapbhentr evfx gnxvat, ohg gurer'f bayl fb zhpu gurl pna qb jvguva gur yvzvgf bs gur traer. Gur orggre lbh trg, gur yrff sha lbh'yy unir vzcebivfvat naq ernpgvat gb gur onyy.
Great way to socialise and if you're competitive, tournament pinball is very deep and satisfying. Physics! Rules!
Take a quick peek at the last IFPA world championship
Since I have a virtual pinball cabinet now, as well as some friends who are pinball collectors with dozens of well-regarded, sought after machines - I've played everything in the top 100 (most on a real machine at least once) and IMHO - pretty much anything in the top 50 is worth a play, Also, my personal favorites are all in the top 50.
What appears to have happened is that between last time I checked and now, some great tables have been produced. I checked out a video of that Deadpool one and it looks amazing. It's good to see vibrant activity in the pinball space; I thought pinball had died off (again).
Fortunately, this is not (IMHO) due to some corruption in the ranking or declining standards. It's because manufacturers, especially Stern, have really managed to elevate the design and playability of new pins to an incredible level and do so more consistently than in the past.
It's extremely difficult to create a hit pinball machine that's initially accessible, fun to play and yet remains challenging over time with deeper rule sets. Many of the top-rated pins are still the "classics" from the 1990s (TAF, CFTBL, MM, TW, etc). Today's best new machines are still being designed by some of the same people who perfected their craft over time (or those who apprenticed at their knee).
I own a Godzilla Premium and it's popular because it really is just a super fun game and stands head to head with the greats of all time.
But TAF will probably still be my wife's favorite table.
I’m a pinball newbie but not a woodworking newbie. So a guide with details on the software and pinball-specific hardware included would be sweet.
I built my own pinball machine (I looked up specs of real machines on the internet, and just kinda copied their angles and sizes) and put a 43" cheap 60hz TV in it. I had a computer laying around with a 1080ti, but that was overkill I think.
I initially set it up with just a pair of speakers, but I soon added the "exciters" that make the sound come from the cabinet in the 4 corners, and that was a subtle but important upgrade, IMO. It also needs some amps, etc for that.
I already had a cheap arcade button/joystick set that I just used the buttons and controller from, and I splurged on a plunger.
The plunger was surprisingly optional in the end, though. A lot of the best games don't even use it! The plunger also had an accelerometer for nudging, but I soon disabled it because it was causing a slight angle to the virtual table and I haven't gotten around to bothering to fix it. It's also not really necessary.
I found that Virtual Pinball X was the easiest software to set up tables on and had most of the best tables. Look for "pinup popper baller installer" to get an easy installer that will ask you a lot of questions and just set things up.
You'll also want a second tv/monitor for the backboard, but don't feel the need to get a third screen for the DMD. Most (all?) game themes will just integrate it into the second screen for you.
My wife is a huge pinball fanatic and when I told her I wanted to make this, she rejected it out of hand. She said it wouldn't be good enough.
She has completely changed her mind. She played it a ton at first and still fires it up weekly at least. Of course, she still goes to arcades for real pinball.
The thing that matters most is having a 120hz screen, and I'd argue that 4k/OLED are equally important. When I first laid screens out on my floor to test I almost decided not to build one because the monitor was a 60hz IPS and it just didn't look that great. LG C1 48" is a little big but is what I started with. Excellent picture quality. LG C2 42" or KTC 42 seem to be the best. Don't worry too much about the bells and whistles, fancy buttons, etc.
Also they are not really meant for home use. These things are tanks. They weigh a decent amount. So moving them around to clean them up is a chore. Depending on the condition of what you get you may need to be doing a decent amount of that. If you move you need to set up some decent logistics on how you are going to get it out of your existing place and into your new one (seriously stay ground floor if you can if you own one).
Then there is maintenance. The machine I owned had at least 3 different parts that were decently difficult at the time to source (internet probably changed that). It had another 5-10 electrical/mechanical issues that needed to be fixed because of the previous arcade owners shoddy work. Also some of these things are getting up to 50+ years old. So they are going to need a decent amount of rework for parts that have finally given out way past their EoL. Some of them which no one makes anymore so you have to part scavenge more broken machines.
Also you really better really like that pinball game. As unlike a say a cab you where with some work you can switch out the game. Now with something like the VP tables with a nice screen and some decent switches you can get close to the real thing and switch the game out. Its nice but not the same as the real thing.
I drop a quarter into a machine every few years and remember why I dont buy these things and just rent them for a couple of quarters for a few mins.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxilHoceiNo&list=PLrqlHbqP7F...
I wouldn't do this to someone else's machine without asking, but the feet on a machine are easily adjustable to fix levels.
Also, I've been told that the bubble levels are notoriously unreliable in most machines.
At a small state school they saw me doing this and threatened to kick me out of the game room if I face it up (which had me playing more Xevious and World Heroes) but ai learned the meaning of social class when I was in grad school at an Ivy and nobody ever gave me trouble.
There was that time I put up a score on a Harley Davidson that was so high I’m sure people would have thought it was impossible and that was almost true.
In some games you can't hit some of the targets with the table in an elevated state because the flippers don't have enough power to hit a slow moving ball to the top of the table and up a ramp even with the reduced slope.
I think in some games with a working but insensitive tilt it makes the tilt sensor even less sensitive. Also I am pretty sure that I can nudge with stronger effect and better precision in the elevated state.
Now, there is a tilt sensor on most pins (and even arcade games) that is likely to be in working order which is the one on the coinbox. The coin mechanisms on most of those games is pretty rudimentary and if you hit the front of the machine hard repeatedly you'd be able to get free games if there wasn't something that would clear out all your credits for doing so. The thing is that there are techniques to get the ball back from the drain that involve impacting the machine at the right time and those techniques are pretty dangerous because they risk triggering that tilt sensor.
Furthermore, working machines come at big premiums as repairs are finicky, expensive, and time consuming - god help you if you own a machine and some targets or rollovers on your machine give out, as it’s challenging to find someone who’s even capable of doing the repairs, let alone pay their price. The expertise to do it is really thin these days because all the people who historically used to make a living from it are all getting old and retiring. This combines with a second problem: although widespread 3D printing helped a little with making repairs more doable, parts are hard to come by and often demand cannibalizing other old or dead machines - meaning a working machine is worth its weight in gold, and so is a dead one: Either it has interested players, or it’s of value for salvage. This “literally every machine is valuable” situation drives prices up, even if the machine is essentially dead.
Though todays' manufacturers already try the latter, otherwise those machines would be even more expensive. You should take a peek into the belly of a machine when you get the chance somewhere - ideally into a newer machine, manufactured after 2010, and into a 90s machine. That's a stark comparison: the 90s models have thousands upon thousands of individual cables, wiring hundreds of individual lamps and solenoids and sensors. On the newer machines, manufacturers tried to cut down on the number of cables, pre-fabricating larger modules with LEDs on large PCBs, or installing sub-controllers from which solenoids are driven instead of wiring all of them individually with hundreds of large cables into the backbox.
But there are limits to this kind of optimization. After all, pinball machines are mechanical contraptions that need to integrate lots of individual mechanical parts spread over a large area. If you can't replace them with solid-state elements (which is basically what a virtual pinball table does, by replacing almost all mechanics with a screen) or concentrate them into smaller areas, you can only gain so much using modularization.
There are Pro models for 7k new or typically 6k used, and also some Home models for 5k MSRP and often under 4k at street price. They have less stuff than the premiums, but you can get into a modern machine for way less than 9k.
Used machines in perfect working order from back when there were arcades are way cheaper.
But building it was pretty easy, and fairly cheap. I used a new 55" TV (with "game mode" to reduce lag) for the play surface, and old monitor for the backdrop. It does require a descent computer and graphics card, but not top of the line. My card is a Nvidia 1080, a buget card wasn't enough. The main structure is just 2x4's, then plywood tacked on. I used dimentions from a real pinball table, and real pinball table legs. There are a lot of artwork stickers available to make it look like less of a box (though I own a printer that can print large enough that I could do my own). Overall I would consider it a fairly simple project.
A friend of mine is internationally ranked, and he started out much like the author:
> What if I built a wall cutting it in half and built a pinball room in the resulting new room
Their small apartment is now full of pinball machines, tools and parts
In the last 5 years or so I've seen the amount of pinball spots in my area go from about 3 to 10+
I've also seen a LOT of new people showing up (and getting really good!). Regular tournaments/league nights have tripled since the pandemic.
Now I have a client who is asking to hire me to get their old table back in shape.
Would recommend!
90s machines are great, I love them, but they are 30 years old and are not where I recommend anyone to start... My first pin was a fixer upper Twilight Zone. Learn from my mistake! Haha
The most challenging part is the maintenance, especially the classics. Owning several machines taught me to fix them. My newer machines broke less often...
Every time I threw a decent party I'd end up buying minimum $200 in parts and spending half a day fixing them.
Lord of the Rings is one of my all time favorites. I highly recommend it. It's not ancient, and the game is really deep. It's pretty easy to work on and fix. Make sure you protect the plastics, I couldn't find after market ones. The Wizard mode is extremely satisfying because it is super difficult to achieve... There are a couple fun special modes you can unlock.
On modern solid state pins, you can adjust the difficulty settings to make the game more fun for friends.
Also worth noting is that games tend to hold their values really well, so you see most people trading/buying/selling regularly. The guy who sold me my Avengers only did it because he had a Godzilla Premium on order and had room for one game.
Both flippers, then 3L, 1R, 9L, 1R, 1L, 1R.
Then hold the left flipper button in before starting the game. Have fun!
(Source: I wrote the backdoor)
I have lots of early photos and stories going up on Mastodon. Go check it out.
That's the value in owning a machine, in my opinion. Keep it for as long as you can to beat the wizard mode. I actually owned a Metallica (Stern) for ~four years, but I was never able to get to the wizard mode ("End of Line"). It has a notoriously difficult wizard mode.
The other cool thing is that pinball machines really maintain their value. You'll likely be able to sell your machine for the same amount of money—if not more—than you bought it for!
Note that maintenance is a real pain if you're not comfortable with dealing with a lot of wiring yourself, so there's also some risk that something breaks (more of a certainty), and the machine just sits there until you can be bothered to get it fixed.
I'm in love with pinball since when I stopped worrying about losing the ball, as you also told in the article, but because of their price, I'm a little scared without knowing that much :(
There's something about mechanical devices that bring back nostalgia for me.
Especially in this day & age when everything is moving to digital.