@grandfireball1, even if we did that, wouldn't there still be a problem of collecting the stein from the open bar?

That is true, but at least it would be much easier to get the bar open, especially if you need 2 or more hits.

Hello everyone and Oktoberfest owners,

I want you all to be aware of the High Score Challenge we are running on the American Pinball Facebook page.

Simply post a photo comment of your best score and you will be entered into a random drawing to win some free swag.

Everyone who participates has an equal chance of winning. The contest runs through Monday, May 4th.

https://www.facebook.com/americanpinball/photos/a.1314917185199790/3274345329256956/?type=3&theater

I look forward to seeing your score submissions.

All the best,

Michael
Sales and Marketing Manager
American Pinball
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I just had my Oktoberfest delivered yesterday. I’ve been struggling with a “missing ball” issue. When I try to start a game, it goes into a ball search. In the switch test, with 6 balls in the trough, all 6 optos show open and each properly changes state after a ball is kicked out, so it doesn’t appear to be a trough opto issue.

One time I did manage to get it to start a game but the “Oktober” magnet was locked on so I shut the game off quickly.

Any suggestions would be much appreciated. I tried reseating all playfield cables with the game off. I will try that one more time.

Also I just updated to the latest code. It had been running the code it shipped with. The issue did not improve with the code update.

See message I sent, we will get this figured out.

05/01/2020

Press Release: American Pinball Hires Dave Brennan as Technical Services Manager

American Pinball is pleased to announce the hiring of Dave Brennan as Technical Services Manager. With over 7 years troubleshooting, fixing and restoring pinball machines of all eras, Dave brings his wealth of experience to ensure that all customer and distributor needs will be met when it comes to hands-on technical support and guidance.

One of Dave's immediate initiatives is to generate an ongoing series of instructional videos covering topics such as new game set-up, how to update code, maintenance tips and more. "I’m really looking forward to starting conversations with American Pinball owners and distributors to determine how I can best serve the pinball community," Dave offers. "I am extremely excited about this opportunity with American Pinball."

Dave’s passion for pinball repair and restoration, in addition to his skill set, will make him an asset to the American Pinball team and our customers. Dave has repaired over 100 games and fully restored over 25 pinball machines in the past several years in addition to assisting many collectors with troubleshooting technical issues with their games at home.

One of Dave's most recent and notable projects is livestreaming his progress in real time as he repairs and restores a Gottlieb Alien Star on Twitch and Facebook, while interacting with his viewers on his Twitch channel Twitch.tv/Turbografx7 and Turbografx7 Facebook Group as an affiliate of The Pinball Network. You can also find Dave on Pinside.com as brenna98

We welcome him to American Pinball.

Contact info:
Dave Brennan
Technical Services Manager
[email protected]
Phone: (833) API-HELP / (833) 274-4357

Didn't see that one coming. Nice! Congrats to all!

Well Done!
Excellent ideas!

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Great news. Dave brings a lot of knowledge and passion to American Pinball

They needed someone for instructional videos?
They didn't know Butch Peel was available?

They probably considered a lot of people.

Butch lives in NM, may have been part of the consideration if they wanted somebody close to home.

And they could still get him for manuals and stuff.

LTG : )

I hope they continue to make LTG available for service issues/questions. He is a terrific resource and a fine guy.

Bear in mind I'm not affiliated with American Pinball.

And I don't have any of their fine games on hand to check.

As always. I'll continue to help here, email and phone, where I can.

Best is always to ask their help direct - https://www.american-pinball.com/support/service/ and ask here. rosh and Ferret and Vegas9 are about. As well as owners of games that can check stuff on their games for you.

LTG : )

I’m excited to work with API and their customers!
As a community member, I know how valuable these club threads can be for information.
I’ll be getting up to speed with the company and the games over the next several weeks and will be reading the threads to see where I can help.
If you need an answer from API directly; [email protected] or 833 API HELP

Josh,
I have a few issues with the coding of Oktoberfest, I really hope they addressed this with the new update. For instance, My first stein collected was yours! Slosh Rosh Lager, I then played the tent and sent the ball 3 maybe even 4 times up the ramp! Still didn't get the tent win? I mean there is no way anyone is going to make this shot from the right flipper only more than 3 times to win the tent, even when you have a stein? Not fun even for amateurs.
2 weeks ago I was getting frustrated after owning this game after 11 months and wasn't getting anywhere. I dialed back everything to easy or extra easy on the menu and it started to be entertaining again. I hate to be on P*sy level but thats how it is in order to progress.
I loved listening to the Super Awesome Podcast that you mentioned this game was designed for bars and Houdini was too difficult. I think the problem with this game is not the art, layout, or theme but that no one in a bar (which this game was intended) after a drink or two or is going to be making any of these shots frequently enough to explore everything it has to offer.
Here is the number one quote review of this game. "I want to like this game".
Someone said that at Pincinnati last year out loud after playing it and it struck a cord with me and was exactly what I remember thinking myself after playing my first time. This is everyones first impression.
Josh you are genius when it comes to ideas and implementing into the theme, stuff I would have never thought of, but if the target audience is a bar with a few people having drinks or my friends who come over and have no experience in pinball it's not going to work. They flock to Metallica because they can hit Sparky and the tomb stones, hammer or snake mouth and feel they got pleasure from a multiball. That easy.
I recommend with the new code slicing everything in half so the default (operators normal)is what easy is now or more. To prove this, set up the game next to each other on location like the old days with extra easy and default next to each other and see what people have more fun playing. Filling 20 mugs in Tap It is hard enough even after collecting a stein. It's a tough line coding I get it. Too easy everyone walks away and too hard the same thing. I just think the setting need to be dialed back to draw a larger crowd. Especially for location and an average player like myself.
Take Care

Hey Viggin, thanks for your feedback! Even though I'm not Josh, I'll share a few thoughts on what you wrote...

Please note that the stein<->tent pairings don't make the tents any easier to win... the steins just multiply the scoring of their associated tent. If you're looking to make tents easier to win, probably the best stein for that is Engler Pale Ale, which gives more time in all tents.

Also, I think you probably know this, but you don't need to win tents to progress in the game... winning tents is just about running up the score. Whether you win or lose the tents, Flipper Meister is the same distance away, as are most of the other fun mini-wizard features (except Duck Derby, which does get easier to reach if you win tents, since winning tents gives you extra ducks).

But certainly, if locations -- or home owners, especially since no one is playing much location pinball these days -- want to make it a little easier to win modes, that's totally cool... as you mention, it just takes a few seconds to pop into the adjustments and load the "Easy" or even "Extra Easy" presets, and don't even have to wait for the next code release. One good news/bad news thing about the American Pinball software update system is that normally, installing a code update does not change the machine's adjustments... this is mostly a good thing, because owners of games from other companies often complain about installing code updates: "I lost all my settings! I lost all my high scores!" That's not a problem with American's games... but it does mean that even if we changed the default (medium) settings in a future code release, an owner would still have to go install those settings... but everyone can do that already; whether it's labeled "Medium" or "Easy" doesn't matter much.

Hope this makes sense, and hope you have a blast playing the game with whatever settings make you happiest!

Thanks Joe, I was under the impression winning tents created big points and winning them all was sort of the idea. I guess playing with the mindset that steins are just increasing scoring will help. Otto says "makes easier" I am under the impression its went for all the steins. I could swear Tap It can be accomplished with a stein rather than none at all. I do realize the Engler Pale Ale is valuable.
Luckily everything can be adjusted like you said but setting everything to easy and extra easy makes me feel like a wimp. Also if I have to adjust 14 different tent modes so they are possible to win thats a lot of figuring out specific play styles and not good for an operator. When Josh said Houdini was too difficult for most people the same can be said for Oktoberfest. In some tents its not challenging but frustrating. I played last night and sent 3 balls through the Looper "time limit using only the right flipper" and didn't win the tent? I was like you have to be freakin kiddin me.
Hopefully this stuff is improved with the next release. I would love to see a test done on this game with everything cut in half difficulty wise at a pin show and get peoples reactions compared to one out of the box. I think it would be plenty challenging enough. Thanks for clarifying, stay safe!

All Steins have two effects, they increasing scoring in a particular tent, and they each provide some other 'boost', e.g. more time in tents, easier to spell Oktoberfest, easier ball saves, etc. In both cases, having two or three of a stein will increase the effectiveness of it. Sometimes Otto will talk about the tent benefit and sometimes about the other benefit and if you take a it a couple of times, he will make a 'insightful comment' about it, typically a comment regarding the name/origin of the stein.

As far as looper, it is all about the rhythm, when you have it you can loop that shot over and over and easily get the win, but once you miss, it can be tricky to get back control of the ball and get the win.

As ferret said, objective is to visit each tent, and while winning will result in much higher scoring, given end of ball bonus, getting to all the last tent is the objective, and certainly easier said than done.

The game has dozens and dozens of adjustments, it's your game, set them as you want to get the difficulty where you want it.

Yep, winning tents generates big points, and that's certainly a great goal of the game (of any game!) ... I was just saying that failure to win tents doesn't block your progress toward the finale features... you'll just have a lower score if you don't win.

Re: steins... the "makes easier" applies to the non-tent-specific powers of each stein... e.g. "easier to increase bonus X" or "easier to collect steins". The tent-specific effect of each stein is always a "boosts", which really means "scoring multiplier".

Don't feel like a wimp if you choose to do a Preset > Easy or whatever... just enjoy the game however you enjoy it. If we were to do what you suggest, we would most likely just shift all the presets "up" one level, so that the values currently labeled as "Easy" were re-labeled as "Medium"... so basically, Preset > Easy today is probably the same as Preset > Medium in your proposal.

And I wish like hell that we could test anything at a show right now...

Yeah, having a line of 10 games playing at an expo right now doesn't sound too bad. Makes me miss it, hopefully "Oktober" in chicago will happen? It's too cold today to think of that anyway, how crazy is that!

Yeah that's probably not going to happen this Governor is nuts he will not open conventions, concerts, and so on till there is a vaccine on the market he said.

never say never

OF is home since few days, +/- 25 games on it now, and my best is 8 ramps on the Looper mode
to be complete/honest, think i was on level 1 with "more time in tents"

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others have also replied, as Joe & Josh...

now, something i've explained on the other OF topic, surelly also depend of how your game is playing or it is setp-up

when i got mine, did play directly few games for the fun, it was quite hard to climb the 2 ramps, pin was feeling a bit slow
i've than wax it, this made the game harder because of the speed, it was way faster, but than that speed also help when you can play "on the fly" (nice for the BB ramp), but not only : now shooting from a craddle ball on the right flipper, a perfect shoot on the left ramp, ball go up there without any problem

even more, i've set the back legs at mid level (that's too much for AP advices), all the rest is on factory settings, even the coils power

can i also say that i'm a good player (but not a wizard)

moi aussi/me too...

that's pinball
on the opposite (bad) luck here's the karma i've got yesterday :

- locked a ball, than a new ball is served in the shooterlane, ball saves are lit on the 2 outlanes...
- launch the ball, miss Otto, ball came down right side, few rubbers moves there, ball save target hit with ball out, drained...
- saved ball in the shooterlane, it launch the ball, ball came down right side, i nudge, rebound on the upper slingshot rubber, ball cross the all playfield to the left, outlane, while getting the other save ball, drained...
- saved ball in the shooterlane, it launch the ball, ball came down right side, few rubbers moves, no more ball save, ball out, drained, end of ball !

and than 3 balls, i havent flipped once !!! loooooooooooooooooooool
that's also why pinball its fun

as a martian says on RFM attract mode : "hahaha ! great fun for the all family !"

my father in law, 84 years old

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Think I found my new favorite mode... just had a 25 million Rockin Express. Feels great to stack steins and multipliers and get a huge pay day in a mode.

25 million... JUST from Rockin' Express? Daaaaamn. Lots of ducks, lots of lit orbit combos?

Yeah! Played after Flipper Meister so had like 130 ducks. 2 steins and 2x playfield. I definitely went for the lit orbit to boost value. Are you saying combos to the orbits like right ramp -> lit right orbit increases the value even more?

During Rockin' Express, repeatedly/quickly shooting the lit orbit before the arrow moves to the other side gives progressively increasing value. The arrow won't move -- and the value progression won't reset -- as long as the spinner is going.

Very impressive! Hope you had a monster bonus that ball too.

Ahh.. that’s interesting, didn’t know that! Don’t think my bonus on that ball was that huge but my biggest bonus ever on the game is 50 million lol.

ok, let's admit i was afraid to shot for the FOOD scoop, just because 1 ball out of 3 (4 or 5) will jump on the rail and finish in the drain
i must also admit that it was a bit my fault, as my slope is surelly to high
and than while pin is in my home, i've made a DIY protector for my playing pleasure, always time to remove it (or not) when pin will go later to a new owner...

my first attemps was more than bad, mainly because i thought the prob was at the end of the track , just above the inner lane
but it was not, ball is already jumping at the junction above
and also because i use a too thin/soft plastic, the bottom square part is enough, but not the other one, this is bullsh*t lol

i've than go for something more strenght & solid, the idea was to make something to cover around the ramp, to maintain ball inside
used a small bottle of water, with cuts here & there, and this proto n° 2 seems to make the job (even better, its quite invisible, check latests pics)
i will test it for some more time & be back to share statistics

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I don’t remember the details, but there is a technique to gently bend the wireform to largely alleviate the problem of balls jumping off the ramp there. Flip back through the messages here, or perhaps someone who’s done it can chime in.

in my case, again, must explain its also my fault (due to the slope)
in fact the rebound is so hard that ball even smash the glass (this is a White Water ramp easter egg lol)

Your post : Try lowering the power on the Food Stand VUK (Settings > Coils > VUK) just a touch to see if that helps. If not, it's possible to give the wireform a gentle bend near the bottom, and that seems to do the trick for everyone else. barryj can give you exact guidance for this if necessary.

Good luck and enjoy the game!

LTG : )

If the game is steeper than normal, the ball picks up too much speed coming down and will 'skip' off the wireform where the two wire forms connect and go airborne.

You can bend that cross wire down, and the loops that connect the two up, very slightly to reduce the skip, however, if you don't do it very carefully, you will break the weld. You should remove the upper wireworm before attempting the bend. Do this at your own risk!

The best solution is to lower the pitch as too high a pitch can create other issues as well.

A high enough pitch has even been known to break glass.

Besides the one stein, what else boosts the spinner value?

Also does the the base spinner value during normal play effect the value of Rockin Express at all?

Food Stand features. It's kind of a symbiotic relationship: spins qualify the Food Stand; playing Food Stand increases spinner value.

No, though the normal spinner scoring is not turned off during Rockin' Express.

Hi,
Multimorphic announced today the ability for their customers to play online head to head through internet. I find it's a great idea. I'm just curious with american pinball as I own both of the games. Would the existing hardware of the pinball machines be ready for such a feature ? It would be awesome to be able to play against an owner of the same machine somewhere else in the world. Do you guys think it could be possible, maybe by adding a wifi card in the machine ?

Joe, Josh,

have this happend for the 1st time :

* already got 1 ball locked in the BB

* start the DUCK DERBY (and get the 2 balls in play)
* shoot a ball in the BB ramp
* BB released 2 balls, that means i was playing DD with 3 balls
* when 1 ball goes out, DD ends, and than i was in "normal" play with still 2 balls
* when another ball goes out, didnt get the "end of ball", but i could play my last ball normaly...

* when i relock 1 ball in the BB, counter was than at lock 1 (and not lock 2)

log send to your mailbox

...

and something else : i just played SOBER that i never seen/know before ! this is crazy lol

You mean you played without having a drink! Whats it like?

i know, this will be a sacrilege, but only my bottle of water...

and more this morning, about gameplay :

* got RE-ENTRY : is a human already succeed in this ??? lol

* COMA mode : about this one, feedback in PM...

ok, its me, missunderstood, was thinking we needeed to put all 3 balls in the scoop... 1 out of 3 seems more doable

...

and than, just made the STEIN wizard, but played it poorly, not even 150.000 pts i think
meanwhile MEISTER wizard was also to follow, and of course even didnt start it
finished with 28M, my best for now...
and than seems i've seen all of the game than !? but still need to fully finish it, and more important master it tactically, that's another story (again seeing the 680M scored by Multibrawlr)

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and more feedback :

* about my DIY mod at the ramp to avoid jumping/ball drain : its 100% working until now
(see https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/joe-balcer-confirms-oktoberfest-as-american-pinbals-next-pin/page/88#post-5653573)

* about BB statistics, even if i agree its a difficult shot, its far from being impossible to do, see with 92 games played :

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and UPPER RAMP (is this the ROLLERCOASTER than ?) : 150 hits

Congrats on having some good games... getting Flipper Meister is moderately difficult but not too much worse than, say, LITZ on Twilight Zone... Stein Slinging can be a fair bit harder to reach IMHO, lots of bar hits required (or lots of ball locks). But you're right, exploring the different strategies for big scores is a big part of the game... especially if you're playing matches with someone of similar skill; can be very interesting to consider different approaches. I don't believe Oktoberfest is a game where there's one clear "The Thing" for high scores.

BTW, a stealthy side-effect of playing Stein Slinging, regardless of how well you do in it: it adds 1 to the maximum number of each stein you can have (i.e. after the first Stein Slinging, you'll now be allowed to have 4 of the same stein instead of 3). Use the extra stein wisely...

tanx

for sure, so much parameters linked all together, that's why this is a great & clever game !

and than, 1 more thing i didnt know about this pin, another good surprise

...

really, this pin deserve much more love than he's getting for now
you all guys did a very good job, not only on the design, but with the code, which as i player i really enjoy
may be the theme will be the prob for some, and than OF remind me DI, so good to play once you're "in"
let's hope soon or later, OF get all the credits it really deserve (i'm already explaining a lot & spreadings infos on french/belgian forums)

cheers !

Sober might be my favorite mode in the game, and the fact you don't get it often adds to the fun when you do (picking up Kernenmeister makes it easier to get).

Both were designed to be achievable, but since it is about getting your ball back, neither is easy. They were also designed with one being relatively short and one being potentially long and sober, if you can light the outlane again, will continue where you left off to see if maybe you are now sober.

reached again the 2 big wizards tonight, with this time a good (?) 12M on MEISTER (only 25 at the end)

let me i ask : could we beat these 2 wizards, i mean do you have an objectif to achieve (as SHOWDOWN on DI), or its only making points until you're back to 1 ball !?

sorry to ask, but i'm an old guy (lol), and when i'm alone on the pin, i can hardly watch the screen to know whats going on and in the same time keep control of the balls... (my son can do it !!! lol)

MEISTER : blue shots, get lots of add-a-ball...
STEIN : did succeed to 14 customers, but didnt reintry in the bar...

Similar to how all the tents work, Flipper Meister and Stein Slinging (and Duck Derby) can be "won" -- Flipper Meister by revisiting the other 13 tents, Stein Slinging by serving all 14 steins -- which moves you to a "Victory Lap" phase with elevated scoring until you drain down to 1 ball. None of these features end themselves if you win or time out.

Flipper Meister scoring is based on how you did on all the other tents... and since it's a tent itself, its scoring can be boosted by a stein (Pin Wiz Pale Ale), so of course ideally you'll pick up one or more of those before starting Flipper Meister. (Note that unless you've WON every other tent, you're not forced to start Flipper Meister even once you qualify it, so you can defer playing it and grab more steins first if you're gutsy.) Stein Slinging scoring is all hurryups.

Have fun!

ok...

and dont worry, i have fun with this pin