There have been some fresh feeling ones recently, but some not so fresh.

It does seem to me like there were some really creative designs in the 80s, with weird flippers, strange layouts, completely separate sections of the playfield (or upper/lower PFs)...however VERY few (if any) of those games are well regarded by modern standards for gameplay. They're seen as gimmicky, and rarely used in tournaments. On location, people would give them a few plays, but wouldn't be dumping quarters into them like they would with the more well regarded games in terms of gameplay and rules, which are generally the more standard layouts.

Might be a coincidence. Might not.

I don't generally go by Pinside rankings, but...

Maybe what I meant is that they generally don't have the same lastability? If I'm thinking about location play and tournaments, most of the games with bizarre and unique layouts are rarely seen.

I love Title Fight, but I suspect it's only because I play like 3 games on it per year, if that. I have no desire to own one...but maybe it would be fun long term.

I won't have time to post much more in this thread today, but I'd love to come up with a list of some of these crazy/unique 80s layouts, and then debate if the games are good or not.