What's the block? 300 rooms? Hotel gets $50k a year in advance in non-refundable deposits. Wow.

I left about 7am and got back about 9am on Saturday and was able to park about five spots away from where I'd left at. Admittedly, around lunch time I wasn't anywhere near the room - it sucks that you weren't able to find anywhere to park.

What's amusing to me is that without the TPF negotiated free parking, the hotel charges guests ten dollars a day to park - but it was all open for five dollar parking both Saturday and Sunday.

Booked at Embassy Suites. Woot!

Booked.

Their event rates are much lower. QuakeCon is only $185 a night. Much more then I want to pay, but again, I'd rather spend my money on games then a room I will only see for a few hours every night.

Sounds like a plan. I'd offer to bunk with you... but know your have a drinking hobby.

Emily and Dr John are booked at the Embassy! Catch you and that party girl you call a wife there Beelz - I'm sure you'll be close by during the happy hour....

Suggestion for next year.

Any chance we can get a side tournament added next year and also, for final brackets. I really think they should add the limitation that you can only pick a game once. Adds to the strategy and would do away with the same games being played over and over and over and over and over.... I really like the strategy it adds too.

Maybe make the side tournament a pump in dump thing with the majority of the funds being paid out to those that completed in that format. May get a few more people into tournament play since it's less financial output upfront. Maybe just a bank of 3 or 4 games since it's a side tournament.

That picture is me, but in reverse.

If "blue"="fat", then all I can say is I'm trying.

I'm blue da ba dee da ba die...

More tournament recommendations:

Have a time to check in by so he standby players will have an answer by a certain time. This didn't affect me but did some friends.

Also, and I'm not sure if there's any truth to this, but I heard about people scalping their tournament entry. This shouldn't be allowed. If you don't play, the entry should go to the waiting list.

Not sure I favor that, because what if you don't get in to Texas until Saturday? You shouldn't be required to play on Friday. Maybe people want to wait and rest up before starting.

That said... I recommend playing a few entries on Friday (at least) so that you don't run up against the deadline. I had one entry left (played 19 of 20) before the deadline hit on Saturday.

That's a tough one as someone has every right to show up at noon on Sat and put in just 8 games and qualify if they are capable of doing that. Not everyone can get there on Friday and it actually felt like this year a lot of players did just play on Sat. I get there early and do most of my playing Friday so i don't have to sit in the long lines on sat though. Good point though but not sure how they can accommodate it.

Agree 100%. You register for the ticket to play so they know whom should be playing so not even sure how that could have occurred unless they were updating players. If someone wants to back out then it should go to the waiting list so that's a real good suggestion IMHO.

I don't disagree. If you're not attempting to qualify by noon on Saturday, you probably won't. I played 7 qualifying games on Friday and 13 on Saturday.

Maybe an email from the TD asking people to confirm their spots by a certain time?

Just opened our rooms at Hilton Garden Inn, just across the street. Rates: $139/$149 http://hiltongardeninn.hilton.com/en/gi/groups/personalized/D/DFWFRGI-PIN18-20180315/index.jhtml

You mean another email asking you if you really really want what you just paid for? Not sure that's fair, either. If you paid for it, it's yours. You shouldn't have to depend on getting an email to make sure you secured your spot after paying for it.

Then why have a waiting list? I'm not offering answers, just throwing out ideas. I pay so I don't have to worry about the logistics.

If people on the list wish to cancel, I would guess. Personally I hate the hassle of having to confirm (or re-confirm) something I've already confirmed with my dollars.

And call me crazy, but I don't remember there being a time at this year's TPF where the lines were very short for the tourney. The dang bank of games was booked solid the entire time. Individual machines may have had lulls on them, but getting even more people into that tourney on the same number of machines this year would have been very difficult. It's not like there was a whole lot of "lost opportunity" in terms of people who wanted to pay in late not getting to play.

That's because there were grumblings about people scalping their tournament entry and that this was allowed. As I indicated, what I heard. I've got no personal knowledge.

Only 2 tourney entries were transferred to other players. We do not know if they were "scalped", but we never really thought about that happening. All others that backed out were refunded to the original purchaser and the next person on the wait list was contacted and charged $60.

I was told $100.

The reason I brought it up is that, while at the show, I heard people talking about purchasing tournament entries for the sole purpose of flipping them next year.

Such a shame that people in this hobby are always trying to take a buck out of their fellow hobbyist pocket.

I'm of the opinion that if their is a "wait list" that no transfers should be allowed. Just a refund to the original buyer and the next person on the wait list gets the spot. You should be able to give to a friend but since their really is no way to police that and prevent exploit then that really should be the policy (no transfers).

It is a good thing that that's the only issue from the tournament now. Just goes to show just how good of a Job Ken and Colin have done getting it on track!

Wait, I thought some of those were mine.

Ironically, he just got a Gorf cabaret which had the parts we needed to fix the hacked up one we sold.

Would rather have Tetris.

Looking to buy a hat from the 2016 show. My dog ate mine. I see on the website there's a place for past show merchandise but nothing is listed.

You should be looking to buy a dog.

Bwah-ah-aaaaah! Nyuk, nyuk nyuk! Nanna-nanna boo boo!
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Can't help but forgive that face..

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Still wearable right??? At least when the wife's not around

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Ignoring the pinball logo, you'd fit right in most of Texas with that hat...

Yep, people pay good money for that look. On our vacation to Big Bend a few weeks back my wife wanted to buy a hat from the bookstore, but all of the caps were of the "distressed" style, which is not what she was seeking. Butch2099 should rent out the dog as a "distressing tool!"

The dog has amazing modern fashion sense! The cap is now worth over $100 in NYC.

Think she was referring to the UT colors, not the physical condition.

labnip hasn't posted in 19 hours. I do hope he's okay.

LTG : )

Fly the friendly skies of United. No need to wait to get beaten in the Texas Pinball Festival tournament. We can make that happen before you even get there.

LTG : )

Still missing the fish hook but it's getting closer to acceptable.

Colors didn't even enter my train of thought. It was the condition. You forget where I grew up at. o.o