Great deal. While I prefer the backglass composition and replay gameplay of Hit-the-Deck (and its double entendre title), if I didn't have a HtD, I would buy this Neptune.

Best EM lot purchase ever.

I am down to only 5 wedgeheads: Blue Note, Hit-the-Deck, Strange World, Big Hit and Atlantis.

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I've been unable to resist most coin-op genres. Consequently, my pinball collection has traditionally shared real estate with EM arcades, solid state arcades, trade stimulators, prewar games, vintage soda, candy and stamp machines, hot nut dispensers and the like. I know that I'm not alone with that tendency (okay, obsession) here on Pinside.

The population of my basement is the United Nations of coin-op. I like it that way. The diversity is important to long-term interest, in my opinion, after 35 years in the hobby.

Here's a few photos of what I call the "Gottlieb" hemisphere, although there's at least one stray Gottlieb woodrail which remains in the "Midway" section. More recently, I've beefed up my Bally nook (not pictured).

My 17 year-old daughter is a high school senior, pictured here last week (center---gray shirt/white pants). This is the first year that she and her friends have fully discovered the unmatched fun of hanging out in an arcade with vintage games. My house has become the venue of choice for these young, future pinball hobbyists. At the moment, I have a The Beatles Gold and a 2006 Namco Rockin' Bowl-O-Rama in my line-up for those gravitating toward something modern.

Nevertheless, these kids love the sixties and seventies EMs. They really do appreciate the ingenuity involved in designing such complex contraptions with old technology. Lift up an EM playfield and have them photograph it with their smartphone. Then, explain that they have just captured the evolution of the computer age.

When they realize that Kasco's Star V (the environmental game in the foreground of the last photo) is an EM, with an actual physical rotating globe (and not a video projection), they're especially interested in learning more about the hobby. Then, I have them play 1933 Rockola Jigsaw or 1934 Rockola World's Series or 1934/35 Rockola Army Navy and explain that these games are purely mechanical. . .all springs, levers and pulleys. It's enlightening for them and gratifying for a passionate collector to witness.

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