What PINBALL have you been playing?

So I know a bunch of you get down with Pinball FX and a few folks like to drop quarters into the real machines once in a while. I love playing some pinball despite not really having any real skill at the damn machines. Last weekend was the Michigan Pinball Expo and despite being stuck with food poisoning Friday/Saturday, I managed to recover and squeeze into the Sunday session. Had about 100 games on Free Play when I was there, most of them in pretty great shape. It has been quite some time since I had played any newer tables, prolly since like 2005 or so, and it was fun to try out the new ones and catch up. Just some highlights and tables I'd say you should at least drop a few quarters in, even if you have a passing interest.

AC DC Premium Luci: This was the star of the show for me so figured talk about it first. I can't say I love or hate AC DC as a band, but as a backdrop/theme for a pinball machine they are awesome. Great variety of targets, allowing players to choose music really added to the game and would change some of the game play features depending on what song was playing. Lots of cool toys on the field like the big bell and the little mini flippers in-bedded into the playfield. Also slightly biased since my best game of the day was on this table just over 50 million, that likely helped me enjoy it so much. I could see this being an all time favorite of mine with more plays.

Wizard of Oz: This table is pretty new (last year or so?) some crazy stuff going on like low scoring and ability to "save a ball" by basically playing on the table for a while without actually adding to your score. Lots of interesting stuff going on and seems like a fun but not too crazy difficult game for the novice. Looking forward to their Hobbit table, which the dude from the company told me likely would show up late 2014 or early 2015.

Metallica: Pretty fun table lots of cool stuff, but I think this style is done better with the AC DC table.

There were a few other of the newer Stern tables but were set aside for the tourney play that was going on that day - X-men, new Star Trek, Iron Man, and Tron. All looked kinda cool but hard to say as I didn't play any of them.

Also got to play some old favorites. had a decent score on Attack from Mars and Fish Tales, and did my usual novice under-performing but enjoyed a lot of others Star Trek: TNG, Scared Stiff, Stargate, X-Files, Shadow, Corvette, Jack*Bot, and World Cup.

Couple of cool "new to me" oddities in Haunted House with its reverse playfield cellar, Rocky with its crazy 4 flipper set up, and Orbitor is so different its almost not even pinball. There was a custom Predator table there that was worth at least one play or two.

Also having a good mix of tables ranging from way back was a nice break and fun diversions from the modern stuff. There is something great about the satisfying "thunk-ding" sounds off the bumpers and non-electronic rotating style scoreboards of the vintage games.

The event's game selection isn't as extensive as a trip to Vegas' Hall of Fame or that New England museum place you guys talked up here a ways back, would've loved to play some Medieval Madness or Twilight Zone, but if you are a within a few hours away and enjoy pinball I don't think you should miss it next year. I will definitely try to make it back.

That Tron table rules. I got to play a few games on it last year at Disney World.

I rarely see pinball tables here in Atlanta anymore...when I do, it's ON. Doesn't matter what it is.

70's rock is ALWAYS a great pinball theme. Nothing brings to mind the era when arcades were dark, smoky (ashtrays built into the games) and regarded as places of ill repute.

Wizard of Oz looks awesome.

TNG, X-Files, World Cup ('94, right? With the dog?), Twilight Zone...all great ones.

Judge Dredd is still probably my favorite table of time, so much so that any Judge Dredd that does not have the voice from the pinball machine is automatically disqualified for me.

A friend of mine was thiiiiiiiis close to a mint condition Firepower a few months ago. God, I wanted him to get that so bad.

All I'm really playing these days is the SW tables on the iPad...not on Xbox Live anymore, so the horrrible specter of Space Ghost isn't pummeling me into the ground on the leaderboards.

Some new SW tables are coming soon A New Hope, Han Solo and something else.

Aww mannnnn! I'm in Ohio, and I've never heard of this Michigan pinball expo. What city, he asks... hoping to not hear Detroit.

Heh, in Detroit the whole thing would be overrun by scrappers who'd strip the machines down and sell them at the scrap yard.

Don't really think Atlanta or anywhere in Ohio can piss too much on old Detroit.

Its just a bit north (30 minutes or so) of Detroit in Rochester at Oakland College. Really the space is just a multipurpose room, pretty small time, not a large industry event at all.

www.mipinball.com/

If anyone is gonna be around next time or finds themselves in Detroit for whatever reason, let me know and we can try to throw down some board games too. You can stay in my makeshift guest room in the basement, I've been told its cold down there.

I have an ST:TNG in the basement. It's been on the fritz for a while, but I finally got it fixed. And in the meantime I apparently have forgotten how to play pinball, as I got some of my worst scores ever over the weekend.

Just embarrassing!

I'm a huge pinball fan, although I haven't been able to play as much over the last few years.

A couple of months ago for my birthday my buddies and I went to an arcade/bar that's only open on the first and last Fridays of the month. Got in a LOT of pinball that night! Sadly, I also got in a LOT of drinking, so my memory for the details isn't so good.

Wizard of Oz was definitely good, but I wasn't able to spend as much time with it as I liked.

The new Star Trek machine was really neat, with a lot of cool stuff going on.

I didn't care for the new Metallica machine as much. I don't remember why, exactly, it just didn't click with me.

Also got to play old favorites like Monster Bash, Haunted House, and Bride of Pinbot.

I don't enjoy playing video pinball, but I still fire up some of the simulators on the Xbox just to get my fix every once in a while.

That expo is tempting. How do they pry folks off of Eight Ball Deluxe?

My favorite is either the first ST:TNG (with the phaser handle ball launcher and turrets) or Safecracker.



I actually worked at an arcade in downtown Minneapolis when this came out, I spent a lot of my free tokens on it.

I was in Vegas for a conference a couple years ago, and while I didn't get to the Pinball Hall of Fame and Museum, the Annex is at the Riviera and there are about fifteen good machines there.