Addams, TZ and AFM are all excellent choices. Theater of Magic seems like a game people get bored with after owning it a while.

Don't forget you can always sell/buy games too. Whatever you pick doesn't have to be forever.

The Simpsons Pinball Party

Star Trek the Next Generation .

Dude-AFM no brainer. Fast, funny and not easy to beat. Good stuff and hope you enjoy what ever it may be.

Star Wars EP1
RFM
Fish Tales
White Water
Party Zone
Apollo 13 !!

TAF ! Its show time!

White Waterrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Lord of the Rings.... Wizard of Oz. My sons favorite at 2 1/2 has been WOZ by far. I would pick a WOZ.

Indiana Jones (it's the game I've had the longest)

Whatever pin you pick, you then will become 1 Dad. 1 Son. 2 Machines.

Kids love AFM. That and Spider-Man seem to get the most play from little visitors to our place.

Lol. So true.

rjd2 - from your list I'd go for AFM. The playfield is a little more open and your three year old will get rewarded early on with shots up the middle. Overall fun game.

Another vote for spiderman, kids like him, and its a pretty fun pin also.

The only game my boys really liked out of 30 plus pins in my house was AFM. Heck, even my wife liked it. AFM all day long is my vote!

AFM also can be enjoyed at any level of experience but getting RTU is extremely hard so this game has it all.

Attack from Mars or The Addams Family... The other two might get a bit boring after a while if it's your only pin...

I would choose RFM over AFM. I have played the latter and it was a fun machine but after having owned/played/loved the former (for about 8-9 months now) and still digging it i would go RFM. These are the facts >>just as much fun factor as AFM if not more, a good machine for young kids to learn on without getting discouraged (this could of course be said for MANY machines), price is NICE not bloody ridiculous (which also includes Addams Family and Twilight Zone in that viewpoint) End of the day though, any machine will be amazing and fun for a 3 year old (at first anyway)

My kids have gone hot and cold on a ton of games, but the one factor that is the same is me... When they go to play (4-6 yrs old), they always ask for me to come play with them. So, if you are just getting one, get something you like (appropriate theme of course), and they will prob jump right in with you. I think my kids loved Monster Bash (Dracula was a hit) the most, it was known as the Halloween pin. Good luck, and have fun with your kids.

AFM or TZ on your list. Addams is just too easy and belongs in a bigger collection. The Simpsons is a good option and spider man isn't too bad either.

Funny enough one of the pins I miss most out of all that are sold is D&D. Really miss that 1987 pin...

Revenge from Mars

Can't go wrong with Addams.

Tip: If you hover your hover your mouse over any of the acronyms, it usually tells you what game it is.

I think the mistake people make is thinking one machine would be great but I only want to own one and I want to keep it for years is regardless of what machine you pick it will get old over time. If you have "X" number of dollars you want to spend on pinball and have the space I would spend that "X" number of dollars on 3 machines instead of just one.

When you have one machine it will basically never get played after a few months but if you have 3 in the same room they will get used all the time. Reason is fairly simple - you turn on the machine and start playing it and all of a sudden you wife or son decide that looks like fun, they sit and wait for you to finish playing and after a few minutes they get distracted by something else and they are gone. Now you get done playing and no one else is wanting to play.

With two or three machines (same thing happens as above) - other person or people turn one one of the other machines and start playing. Next thing you know one of you gets board with the machine you are playing and you move to the third machine. All of a sudden two hours have passed.

In a perfect world one machine isn't your best choice and if you have space I would pick having two or three System 11 or data east machines over having one more expensive machine. Maybe it is just me but one machine just will not have the stay power two or three would.

Who Dunnit when I owned a WD it had a novice mode you could pick with the flippers at the start of every game.The novice feature spit the ball out for two minutes unlimited drains good for kids

Star Trek the Next Generation. My 7 year old LOVES this game for the canons and all the cool ships. It's fun to mod too!

good call, +1. and if you were thinking about dropping 8-9K on a AFM you could easily pick up 3 nice machine. we should make a list of great games under 3K to check out.
I'll start here's 2 that I have and paid less then 3K for. Corvette, Road Show.

NGG or FT

Got to side with the "multiple pins" vs one pin choice. Better to have 3 2k pins than 1 6k pin.

That being said if you can really only have one (WAF) then I'd go for something with some depth....but definitely not something with very long ball times.

Therefore LOTR would be a horrible choice for a single pin......it's got the depth, but the ball times get so long that no one will EVER want to play with you.....horrible multiplayer game. This is from first hand experience; I owned a LOTR for eight years.

Better choice would be ST. ST has the depth but the average ball times are short enough (just) to still make it fun for multiple players. It got great sound, lights and call outs. It's also fast and has great flow.

Another great multiplayer game is Iron Man. In fact it might just be the ultimate multiplayer game due to being brutally hard. It's got the theme, it's got the sound and lights but it is not real deep so might not be the best choice for a single pin. Not sure about that though.

You might want to consider a new Stern pin. Price is in the ballpark of games you listed. I love the classics but keep in mind these are 20+ year old games that have been in arcades and bars. Part of the ownership of the classics is learning to fix them because problems are common. There are several really good Stern games of late. Look at the ratings and you will see which ones. My choice for kids and adults is Star Trek. It has easy to understand rules and not hard to get to features of the game like multiball. It has a great led light show and a lot of depth for any player.

Well with that being a good point, then Wizard of Oz is got to be the pick. deep rules great family theme light show lcd its got it all

Taf,SM, WOZ are great choices

MM

Just as long as it doesn't involve 2 cups, it doesn't matter what machine you get.

If you are willing to spend the coin, a Medieval Madness remake would be a great machine.

Addams Family could also give you a lot of enjoyment, but your son won't get any of the references or theme unless you watch the show/movies with him.

Attack from Mars is another good choice.

For me and my son, FT and WHO2 are by far the ones we play together. Solid games. Williams was a great manufacturer for themes for their games.

LOTR longer ball time for kids.

That's the reason I have 16 plus arcade games. Another reason to have more then one is because if one goes down you have others to play while the one gets fixed.

RFM will go the distance of owning only one pin.