Excellent thread, some really interesting stuff!!

I've gravitated towards rare Spanish stuff for some reason... here are some backglasses I picked up recently that will make it to the gemesroom wall one day (after the gamesroom is built!!):

Backglass full.jpg
Backglass full-695.jpg
Illuminated backglass.jpg
backglass.JPG
backlit backglass.JPG
backglass full.JPG
Backlit backglass.JPG

The lower the number the lower the number of score displays so you get more artwork... that's kinda how it works

Some close ups of some of these and some others, there's some great detail on 'Golf' that didn't come out well on the backlit overview shot...:

Blue people.jpg

backglass full.jpg

Backglass.JPG

Backglass trees.JPG

backglass club heads.JPG

Spain... through a contact I have there... All of those came from the same seller... I actually have 2 of the 'Fighter' if anyone wants one

Isn't that the usual size DMD for that game... or am I missing something...?

I couldn't agree more, I fell in love when I saw this game, and I'm still in love after having it for ages... I like the backglass 3D-ness, and those 'coloured ball' lights in the backglass are connected with gameplay... not played enough games on it to figure out how it all works yet though... got that to look forward to!!

I think this one's quite a rare game... the IPDB didn't even have the game listed 'till I sent pics if it about a month ago... Another from Spain! What's interesting about this game is that the score displays have the artwork going over the top, so the scores shine through the thinner paint... Not seen that on any other pin!!

backglass.JPG
Cab right.jpg
Playfield full.jpg
lower playfield.jpg
playfield looking down from top.jpg
backglass showing overpainted score displays.jpg
Board set.jpg

Castle plastic.jpg

playfield skull.jpg

Couldn't agree more! They hit the spot every time in satisfying my craving for interesting and obscure games!

I'm sure it is, yes... the Videodens name is on the game also...

That's a good question. I had this game shipped from Spain to France (cheaper than shipping to my home by half), and then collected it from France while on a business trip... There were a few games shipped at the same time, and I could only fit 2 complete games plus either the head or the cab from another game, so I beheaded Ator and sqeezed the cab in... I took pics while I was there showing the boards so I'd not make any mistakes with the connectors while re-connecting the head, but didn't think to photograph the side of the bb, which got left there... When I got the cab and backglass home I took more pics for the IPDB, but no bb side art... I've now got the bb home following another recent business trip, so can fill that void... You've got me wondering what's on there now... Watch this space

All pin heads welcome!! Ones with technical repair knowledge could even get their flight paid for Best to wait 'till my gamesroom is all done and the games are set up tho... That will be at LEAST another year, probably closer to two!!

3/4 Czech... so I guess it means one of your parents is Czech and the other is has one parent that's Czech... I'm not sure how much Czech I am... both my kids are half Czech, so I guess I must be part Czech... but both my parents are British...

Well, Germany is next door to Czech, so you get some Czech credit for that, so maybe your 9/16th Czech

Mmmm, in that case I should probably speak Czech... something went wring there then

It's shameful but true... My kids are trying to teach me... occasionally... My excuse for not learning is that if I can speak Czech then I won't be so insistent that the kids speak English, and that won't be good for them for the future (English being the world language and all that)... The more realistic reason is that I'm a lazy ass!

True... pinball does have the strange ability to pull me out of my lazyness! The truth is that if something stimulates my mind, I get very active in it... Everything else tends to take a back seat... which includes learning Czech, which is a shame bearing in mind I live here!!

I wish just half were set up!!! Sadly I only have 4 games set up, 2 in my flat (Transformers and Mach 2), and two in my girlfriends flat (Big Town and IO Moon)... the rest are in storage, which is an absolute shambles at the moment!! I know it's off topic, but here are some pics of the mess... I also have about 50 pins stored at work!! I tried 2 remove all the backglasses because the store has no heating!! I simply can't wait for my gamesroom to be finished!! (it's progressing!!). The last pic is from my previous store where things were a bit more ordered, and which wasn't as cold! Excuse the mennequins

New store large room.jpg
New store mid room 2.jpg

New store mid room.jpg
Overview.jpg

Oh, and here is the bb side art from the Ator:

Head side.jpg

This game is at my girlfriends flat about 4hrs drive from where we live... we'll be going there for Christmas where I'll finally have time to play some games on it (dropped it off on a recent business trip so I'd have something to do over Christmas while the 'in-laws' visit )

Well, I can never say no to an offer like that!! The rear wall is being erected as I type!! (that last bit isn't in response to your offer by the way... it's just happening anyway... I don't want you to feel I'm building the room quicker to take you up on your offer )

It's a very long way from Austin, Tx!

Iron Maiden... I'd struggle to let that one go... such a beautiful game!! And the one I have is flawless... When it hits home that I simply don't have space for all these, a lot of what were keepers will suddenly become sellers...

Yes... that under-water sea nymph's relationship with that monster fellah seems to be more than platonic if you ask me!! And even though she has a green tinge and can breath water... she's still hot!! In my opinion the artwork on this game simply can't be beat!! There's even art in the shooter lane and under the light shields!! (see below). I also love how the plastics on this game just have seaweed as art, making it look like the ball is actually 'IN' the sea! 'SEA' below!

I'd love to shoot a gameplay vid, but the game is folded away at the moment... it will be my goal in life to achieve this one day!

Shooter lane.jpg

Upper rollovers.jpg
Right sling.jpg
Right kickout.jpg
Right standup.jpg
Upper playfield.jpg

Thanks for the offer... I may take you up on it when I'm dead

Good point... the USA has enough games already

Steering back on-topic... here's another game that I picked up a few months ago... The IPDB had a page for the game (at least the NAME of the game), but when I went there to see if I should upload more pics, I saw a completely different game, but by the same manufacturer... the game they had on there was called Galaxy Play 2... the photo's and game features matched GP2... so they'd mis-spelt the name of Galaxy Play 2 as Galaxy Play (the '2' is very small on the backglass, so it's understandable!)... So they didn't actually have any knowledge of the game that was ACTUALLY Galaxy Play... Anyway, that's all been corrected and the below game now occupies the rightful slot 'Galaxy Play' by Cic Play. Sounds confusing, but it was quite a simple error... So, this game also wasn't listed on the IPDB 'till I sent pics in... well, the name was, but the game wasn't

I will get round to re-rubbering and cleaning these things one day so they look all pretty!! (I feel slightly ashamed to put these dirty pics up here!!)...

Backglass full.jpg
Playfield birds view.jpg

Flipper view.jpg
captive ball area.jpg
Speaker pannel.jpg
mid playfield.jpg
upper right playfield.jpg
drop targets.jpg
Upper rollovers.jpg
Instruction card area.jpg

_{Post edited by pinballslave: Just saw how dirty the game is!}

Backglass lit from rear.jpg
Spaceship over skyline.jpg

That series sounds like it HAS to be seen!!

Sorry for going OT, but which release (year) of V is the one to watch, or are they all good?? Wiki says:

It debuted in 1983 as the two-part television miniseries V, written and directed by Johnson. It was followed in 1984 by a three-part miniseries, V: The Final Battle, and a nineteen-episode weekly television series, V (sometimes referred to as V: The Series) during the 1984-85 television season. ABC ran a remake known as V: The 2009 TV series which ran for two seasons for a total of 22 episodes between 2009 and 2011.

Yes, it certainly looks like Galaxy Play was copied from this... the logo on the space-ships is almost identical...

V comparison.jpg

Yeah, I found out that the 2009/11 follow up series was cut short due to low ratings... So I'll be looking for the original 83 series

This game is one of my favourite rare finds, it was love at first sight! Clearly the gameplay isn't going to be up to much, but for some reason the sparseness of the playfield made it even more alluring... This game will never leave me! As you can see, what look like standup targets are actually drop targets! The company that made this game only made one title... (this one, just to clarify ) I'm sure there can't be many left... Spanish law meant that operators had to destroy machines once they came off site... absolutely crazy, but true!! The survivors were the ones that only law-breaking operators kept hold of...! To me, that makes them even more special...

backglass.jpg
Overview.jpg
Playfield.jpg
Head side.jpg
Playfield mermaids.jpg
Front overview.jpg
Backglass mermaid.jpg

I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to being able to do that!! I've got so used to the frustration of waiting that when it finally happens I'll have lost interest!! (nah, that will never happen!!). The Siremar backglass mermaid has to be the hottest mermaid in the world... or is it just me... I actually have the head from this game in my office at work so I can gaze at it when I get sick of the chore of the daily grind (i.e. almost constantly )

Ah yes, well spotted Progress at last!! hahaha!! Seriously, it took over a year to get council approval to start digging!! In the battle between nature and pinball, pinball won in this case...!

Siremar is an EM game...

Yes, my house is on a hill... and the only place the build the room was by digging into it!

The main pin-room will me 8m x 8m, not enough for all the games I plan to keep (I hope to fit about 40 in there)... so quite a few will go into the basement of the house too...

Madness isn't it! It actually fueled my enthusiasm to get hold of these things even more!! I have to admit that I've become a bit Spanish pin obsessed!!

Yes, it's gonna be a squeeze! I couldn't make it any bigger or the front would end up eating too much of the drive... and the back ended up taking too much land away, plus I started to hit rock, so the builder started complaining it was too hard to dig! It's going to have a sloping roof and will be 2.5m (8.2ft) at the front and 3.68m (12ft) at the back, so I'll have a nice display wall for backglasses

Not yet, it was supposed to be working, but I just didn't have chance to try it out... I'm really looking forward to seeing how it plays though!

Which pin is this?? I googled 'After the fall of New York' but didn't recognise any images from a pin...

Your enthusiasm for this game seems to even exceed mine... just... I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to fiddling with this one and eventually (hopefully) getting it all going and playing it!! Yes, those flipper gaps are B I G !! The seller said it was a worker, but sadly I haven't even had time to plug it in since I got it!!

Here's a pic of the cab side art closer up (and in better focus than above!):

Cab side art.jpg

Player 1 score display has obscured an interesting part of the art I see... that's a real shame!

Actually, it's also from The New Barbarians...

TB.jpg

An interesting variation of the artwork

WOTWL.jpg

I might buy it and make a good one out of the two

I doubt he did that... I guess he screen dumped it... Anyway, time to show my ignorance again... How do I see if he did that? You mean by changing the image in my post and seeing if it changes his image...?

I don't even know how to change the image in my post... I only seem to be able to delete it...

I THINK you can only do this if the images are hyperlinked to your own site, I'm sure it's not possible through the pinside attachments... but I'm a moron when it comes to this sort of thing!

It's a real shame you can't keep the original playfield in there... Good luck with the project!

As requested previously, here's some pics of my IO Moon that I was able to play and photograph over the Christmas break

Backglass and display.jpg
Full playfield.jpg
Flipper view.jpg
Glowing rock pops.jpg
Upper playfield.jpg
Full view.jpg
Dead astranaut on playfield.JPG
Upper right playfield.jpg

Wow, you're quick

I wrote a write-up about it on the review page for the game by the way...

Here:

https://pinside.com/pinball/archive/io-moon/ratings

Doesn't spin, just looks pretty

There is a diverter underneath it to lock balls...

They look even better in the flesh

Not that I'm aware of... I've never video'd a game before, and I didn't have a way to do it when I was with the game... When I get a few more set up at once and get my act together then I'll make some vids of a few games that aren't that well known...

It's coming along, thanks for asking... no new pics yet, but the main supporting wall's doubled in height since I went away for the Christmas break! (main rear wall is now 4.5m high!! (almost 14ft!!). I think they've gone too far.

I didn't start a topic about it... I might add some pics occasionally to the gamesroom thread

Hi Matt,

have you managed to figure out if there's much more to the gameplay than I wrote on the review page for this game?

https://pinside.com/pinball/archive/io-moon/ratings

By the way, I found out why my targets weren't dropping on the first hit, but would just latch back and then all latched targets would drop at once... the target bank plunger was sticking in the coil sleeve, so the mechanism wasn't retracting... A coil firing somewhere else on the game would set it loose, so they'd then all drop at once... changed the sleeve and it fixed it... I love it when a fix is that easy!! Feel somewhat dissapointed that it wasn't a neat feature of the game though Also, have you worked out what the game says when you get an award from the Monolith? That voice is the deepest I've ever heard on a pin!!

Also, do your flippers have moments when they don't respond during the multiball start sequence? I thought it was a dodgy flipper switch at first, but found that it happens to both flippers and ONLY during multiball start, so it must be a bug in the logic...

To me it sounds like: "I have observed monolite mission"... Doesn't make a lot of sense though, but it is the Spanish speaking a kind of English I suppose...

I tend to hold the flippers up 'till it's got all three balls in play, and before then just fire them if I'm at risk of losing a ball... it's crazy that they wouldn't bother to fix this clear bug... That's the Spanish for ya I guess... Manana

Balls were passing around the planet on mine when lock was lit at one point, it turned out to be the switch...

By the way, do you know what the player is supposed to do after getting to 40mil and 80mil jackpots?? Is there another JP that becomes available after this? I get lost at this point re what to do!

Here's another game you don't see so often... in fact I've only seen it once! I love the captive ball system on this one and the way the energy from the playfield ball is transferred to it! I was very confused when I first got it because I thought the captive balls had been removed... I was also puzzled why the targets were so high up... then the penny dropped and I realised the captive balls aren't half as captive as I thought!!

full view right.jpg

Data section on backglass.jpg
front overview.jpg
left captive ball.jpg
Lower playfield viewed from head.jpg
Playfield birds view.jpg
Ramp entry with spinners.jpg
right captive ball from side.jpg
upper flipper looking from head.jpg
Under ramp plastic upper left.jpg
Upper playfield from head.jpg
upper flipper play area.jpg
right captive ball and pops.jpg
View from lower arch.jpg
Right sling from above.jpg
ramp exit diverter.jpg
Plastic under ramp upper right.jpg
Playfield lady right.jpg

Backglass-522.jpg

middle targets.jpg

Upper playfield lit.jpg

upper rollovers.jpg

I should have probably got my finger out and made a vid when I had it set up, but it's now in storage and another game is in its place... when I set it up again in the gamesroom I'll definitely do it!

I bet so too! I feel very lucky that this ramp is in great condition!! Amazing really when there's no protection for it at all!! I actually feel a bit nervous playing it in case I damage it!!

That's about right, yes You need a good and hard shot to give the captive ball the energy needed to hit the target hard enough to register!

The rules are OK, nothing amazing... to be honest it's a while since I played it... the big downside is that every ball starts from the same place... no carry-over of any feature at all... One cool thing is that when the ramp shot is primed for some special shot (not even sure if I really figured out what would cause it), but it would ring a quite loud bell, a bit like the bell in Black Knight, but louder.

It's actually no higher than a standard machine... maybe a touch... it looks high because it's relatively narrow, and it extends down the side of the cab... it's also quite thin because the boards are in the cab... all add to the illusion of it being tall.

I hear you... but the snag with a ramp guard is that it would distract from the beauty of the naked ramp... Although I'd be really upset if I knocked a chunk out of it!

I got it from my contact in Spain... I gave him a list of games I'm looking for, and he found this one (amongst others)

Not sure what you mean by this... it was actually made by two different manufacturers (Juegos Populares and Automatico MonteCarlo, the latter being the version I have and made under licence from JP). I can't see anywhere where either listing says either of them are unique...

http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=5952

http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=4104

Neither listings state a production quantity... I guess this information isn't available!

Ah yes, that all makes sense now, sorry, I should have spotted that... I didn't realise AM only made that one game... kind of weird... they only make one game, and it's simply a copy of the game made by JP, but with the AM 'M' logo on things like the spinner, DTs, stand up targets, bottom arch, pop-caps, backglass and shooter lane!

Weird how they had to make another version of the playfield just to get the 'M' logo in the shooter lane!!

Shooter lane with makers logo.jpg

You can edit the post and delete one of the pics if you want

I sent these pics to the IPDB, but for some reason they didn't put them up... so here they are... I love the artwork on this beast!!

Upper pf and score area.jpg
upper rollovers.jpg
upper left plastic.jpg

Top left plastic.jpg

mid left playfield.jpg

Correct... The playfield rests on small brackets at each corner and has a small steel ball set inside a holder for ease of playfield movement... Unfortunately the photographed game is missing its handles, but they look easy enough to make.

Yes, I noticed those too... pretty hard not to

Sometimes Jay is quick, but I'm starting to see that on other occasions, more recently, it seems to simply not happen... maybe there was a bug in the system... I just looked, I can see that I submitted the pics on Sep28th 2014, still not approved! I've done the whole lot again!!

WOW!! So I guess this was a kind of prelude to Banzai Run... Amazing!! How did you get hold of this?

There's always that 2nd one I have I mentioned in our PMs that prompted me to post these pics

I really don't think Jay has anything against foreign games (or should I say 'non-US games ), maybe he's just overloaded...?

Thanks for clarification Jay, I do remember that mail now, I was overloaded at the time and didn't get chance to take the full backglass photo... I guess I didn't realise that you were holding back on putting the other pics up 'till the full backglass photo was submitted... Anyway, all's well that ends well