(Topic ID: 330375)
Last photos of the show floor before opening!
20230602_110514 (resized).jpg20230602_110524 (resized).jpg20230602_110537 (resized).jpg20230602_110549 (resized).jpg20230602_110558 (resized).jpg20230602_110607 (resized).jpg20230602_110625 (resized).jpg20230602_110632 (resized).jpg20230602_110640 (resized).jpg20230602_110655 (resized).jpg20230602_110923 (resized).jpg20230602_111020 (resized).jpg20230602_111046 (resized).jpg20230602_111104 (resized).jpg20230602_111148 (resized).jpg20230602_111154 (resized).jpg20230602_111207 (resized).jpg20230602_111216 (resized).jpg20230602_111450 (resized).jpg20230602_111457 (resized).jpg20230602_111505 (resized).jpg20230602_111513 (resized).jpg20230602_111544 (resized).jpg20230602_111602 (resized).jpg20230602_111608 (resized).jpg20230602_111617 (resized).jpg20230602_111624 (resized).jpg20230602_111630 (resized).jpg20230602_111641 (resized).jpg20230602_111649 (resized).jpg20230602_111659 (resized).jpg20230602_111709 (resized).jpg20230602_111715 (resized).jpg20230602_111723 (resized).jpg20230602_111731 (resized).jpg20230602_111735 (resized).jpg20230602_111748 (resized).jpg20230602_111807 (resized).jpg20230602_111814 (resized).jpg20230602_111819 (resized).jpg20230602_111824 (resized).jpg20230602_111836 (resized).jpg20230602_111844 (resized).jpg20230602_112243 (resized).jpg20230602_112248 (resized).jpg20230602_112251 (resized).jpg20230602_112259 (resized).jpg20230602_112308 (resized).jpg20230602_112311 (resized).jpg20230602_112318 (resized).jpg20230602_112326 (resized).jpg20230602_112331 (resized).jpg20230602_112341 (resized).jpg20230602_112344 (resized).jpg20230602_112355 (resized).jpg20230602_112817 (resized).jpg20230602_114448 (resized).jpg20230602_114503 (resized).jpg
Enumclaw, WA
Had a great time at the show. Lots of people, especially later. All were enjoying themselves, i did not see any problems.
For me: highs-james bond is a ton of fun and we found several titles to add to the “i want” list. I got high score #4 on Iron Maiden (as of noon) but it was so loud there i have no idea how it sounds
Lows: foo fighters didn’t do anything for us and I never got to try a pulp fiction as they were all several people deep all day
IMG_7710 (resized).jpegIMG_7711 (resized).jpegIMG_7713 (resized).jpegCouple follow up pics of some very gracious dudes that I had the pleasure to meet and chat with. Thanks for making it out to the show! It was a highlight for me to be able to show Jack a video of my young daughter playing and enjoying a game he created.
20230602_170622 (resized).jpg20230602_175416 (resized).jpgVideoCapture_20230602-174844 (resized).jpgI walked the floor and did a game count, looks like 415 games including the tournament and vendor games!
Surrey, BC
Two surprise likes for me was Pulp Fuction, and Punny Factory. Both games felt retro to me in a good way. Way easier to understand rules than say modern Sterns or Holy crap JJP rules. Single level games, no ramps, just plain fun shooters. I definitely recommend trying them both.
Cheers and have fun flipping.
To all the folks who put in the hard work thank you. My daughter and I had an amazing time. We came away wanting a Cactus Canyon or a Foo premium (she liked the Comet too). I came away finally appreciating EMs a bit more, Grand Prix and the 2 next to it were beautiful.
I didn't see it here in the forum but what was the tournament stream?
Quoted from PaulCoff:Anyone play Swords of Vengeance in an SOF cabinet? Any comments, reviews, pictures, videos, or possible delivery date?….asking for a friend. thx
Thanks for coming by and checking it out! You can catch up on the latest here: https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/swords-of-vengeance-a-conversion-kit-sequel-to-lionman and I’ll have some more dates for testing and release info soon!
I brought my kids to the show for a few hours this morning. We had lots of fun, but in addition to playing games, I was on the lookout for one to buy - we are getting our basement remodeled with a slot for a pin (the first I will own in more than a decade).
Boy was I stunned a few hours later when I got a call saying I’d won the Grand Prize raffle for a Godzilla (Premium)!!!!!
It’s now sitting in my garage. My basement will be done next week and I can’t wait to set it up and play!
Thanks so much to the organizers and especially to the guys who delivered my prize to my home in Seattle! You rock!!
70762199305__4CDAC7E7-AAA7-4B68-A8C1-370333D8B891 (resized).jpeg
Quoted from barndawg:I brought my kids to the show for a few hours this morning. We had lots of fun, but in addition to playing games, I was on the lookout for one to buy - we are getting our basement remodeled with a slot for a pin (the first I will own in more than a decade).
Boy was I stunned a few hours later when I got a call saying I’d won the Grand Prize raffle for a Godzilla (Premium)!!!!!
It’s now sitting in my garage. My basement will be done next week and I can’t wait to set it up and play!
Thanks so much to the organizers and especially to the guys who delivered my prize to my home in Seattle! You rock!!
[quoted image]
That’s awesome! Really happy this went to someone with kids. I hope you and they enjoy it 
Quoted from MiniPinHead:That’s awesome! Really happy this went to someone with kids. I hope you and they enjoy it
They are very excited. The older one is getting into pinball and the little one loves anything Kaiju-related
Congrats Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show team - a great experience. First time attendee - was great to play all the new games, play older games you don't normally get to play, and all the old EMs were cool to play. The "Fun With Pinball" exhibit was particularly cool. Great job!
Quoted from barndawg:I brought my kids to the show for a few hours this morning. We had lots of fun, but in addition to playing games, I was on the lookout for one to buy - we are getting our basement remodeled with a slot for a pin (the first I will own in more than a decade).
Boy was I stunned a few hours later when I got a call saying I’d won the Grand Prize raffle for a Godzilla (Premium)!!!!!
It’s now sitting in my garage. My basement will be done next week and I can’t wait to set it up and play!
Thanks so much to the organizers and especially to the guys who delivered my prize to my home in Seattle! You rock!!
[quoted image]
How awesome is that?!?!
Quoted from dtrimberger:To all the folks who put in the hard work thank you. My daughter and I had an amazing time. We came away wanting a Cactus Canyon or a Foo premium (she liked the Comet too). I came away finally appreciating EMs a bit more, Grand Prix and the 2 next to it were beautiful.
I didn't see it here in the forum but what was the tournament stream?
Some tournament streams are here from NW Show:
https://www.twitch.tv/spspinball
Events and so forth, maybe other stuff is here:
https://www.twitch.tv/geekgamertv
Both really well done.
Quoted from barndawg:I brought my kids to the show for a few hours this morning. We had lots of fun, but in addition to playing games, I was on the lookout for one to buy - we are getting our basement remodeled with a slot for a pin (the first I will own in more than a decade).
Boy was I stunned a few hours later when I got a call saying I’d won the Grand Prize raffle for a Godzilla (Premium)!!!!!
It’s now sitting in my garage. My basement will be done next week and I can’t wait to set it up and play!
Thanks so much to the organizers and especially to the guys who delivered my prize to my home in Seattle! You rock!!
[quoted image]
Sounds like the machine went to a great home! Congratulations, what a way to end the show!
Quoted from barndawg:... Boy was I stunned a few hours later when I got a call saying I’d won the Grand Prize raffle for a Godzilla (Premium)!!!!! It’s now sitting in my garage. My basement will be done next week and I can’t wait to set it up and play!
Thanks so much to the organizers and especially to the guys who delivered my prize to my home in Seattle! You rock!!
[quoted image]
Although I was secretly pulling for Todd MacCullough to win (yet) again, this is very cool too! 
Congrats man and enjoy! Truly! 
Quoted from Tuna_Delight:Although I was secretly pulling for Todd MacCullough to win (yet) again, this is very cool too!
Congrats man and enjoy! Truly!
I was pretty happy to see some people that weren't volunteers and more involved win prizes. I love getting more people in (or back in) to collecting games! I saw the winners of the Firepower 2 leaving and they were also loading an EM pinball game into their truck, so they went home with two new games!
Was there Saturday. Skipped last year so it was the first time I've been back since 2019. I enjoyed myself. There was a little bit of a dearth of games from the late 70s and 80s (when talking about pinball). But the variety for the most part was good. Still waiting for someone to someday bring a Banzai Run. One of the few games left I've never seen or played in real life. All the games for sale were surprisingly reasonable too. Maintenance and playability was a little hit and miss. But I'd say 80 percent of games were good to go.
Yeah, great show again this year! So many smiling faces. I had 8 pins on the floor this year and found it was my most stressful in keeping them up and running.
DP had a scoop micro switch terminal break off. Thankfully the vendor at the show (forgot the name!) had one close enough and I bodged the actuator arm to work.
TBL lost a spotlight bulb that ended up in the ball trough and jammed things up a bit. There was a VUK that wasn't loading cleanly and a couple of times and had to extract balls from.
GB turned out to be the biggest headache. I had a coil wire snap off of the right scoop plunger. That was a mobile solder repair. Also had the other scoop switch go out of adjustment and stopped detecting. And to cap it off, I came in to Day 3 to find node board 8 had died. I didn't carry a spare with me, so unfortunately it was down the rest of the show 
The rest were pretty solid. R&M broke a rubber. I think MMr lost a bulb as well, but not sure if it was actually down or not. Metallica had a weird ball trap that I hadn't seen before. KISS and TSPP didn't go down at all from what I saw! These were the problem I found just floating around and keeping an eye on my games.
I'll post my game audits once I get a chance to unpack and power on the games.
Special thanks to all of the game Medics for spending the whole weekend running around keeping things running!
Quoted from RobF:Yeah, great show again this year! So many smiling faces. I had 8 pins on the floor this year and found it was my most stressful in keeping them up and running.
DP had a scoop micro switch terminal break off. Thankfully the vendor at the show (forgot the name!) had one close enough and I bodged the actuator arm to work.
TBL lost a spotlight bulb that ended up in the ball trough and jammed things up a bit. There was a VUK that wasn't loading cleanly and a couple of times and had to extract balls from.
GB turned out to be the biggest headache. I had a coil wire snap off of the right scoop plunger. That was a mobile solder repair. Also had the other scoop switch go out of adjustment and stopped detecting. And to cap it off, I came in to Day 3 to find node board 8 had died. I didn't carry a spare with me, so unfortunately it was down the rest of the show
The rest were pretty solid. R&M broke a rubber. I think MMr lost a bulb as well, but not sure if it was actually down or not. Metallica had a weird ball trap that I hadn't seen before. KISS and TSPP didn't go down at all from what I saw! These were the problem I found just floating around and keeping an eye on my games.
I'll post my game audits once I get a chance to unpack and power on the games.
Special thanks to all of the game Medics for spending the whole weekend running around keeping things running!
I think I was responsible for the Metallica stuck ball on Friday. 
Playing a multiball, one ball took to the air, bounced off a ramp just so, and landed on top of the headstone that rises. Thanks for sharing your games; this is something I should try to do next year.
Quoted from Flyfalcons:I think I was responsible for the Metallica stuck ball on Friday. Playing a multiball, one ball took to the air, bounced off a ramp just so, and landed on top of the headstone that rises. Thanks for sharing your games; this is something I should try to do next year.
Ah...so it was YOU! 
There is a deflector plastic that is supposed to prevent that. The rising cross isn't normally on the pro, however I made a mod to add the functionality. Although my rising cross mod not participate in ball search, I did power cycle the game to make the cross go up and down, but the ball still refused to let go. This was interesting to see.
I like bringing my games to the show. It makes me happy seeing people enjoying them.
My row of eight from TBL down to MMr:
PXL_20230603_215704860 (resized).jpg
Quoted from RobF:Ah...so it was YOU! There is a deflector plastic that is supposed to prevent that. The rising cross isn't normally on the pro, however I made a mod to add the functionality. Although my rising cross mod not participate in ball search, I did power cycle the game to make the cross go up and down, but the ball still refused to let go. This was interesting to see.
I like bringing my games to the show. It makes me happy seeing people enjoying them.
My row of eight from TBL down to MMr:
[quoted image]
That Big Lebowski machine seemed like THE machine that everyone wanted to play (myself included)!
got a few pics of Pulp Fiction at the show.
managed to play three or four times on Saturday morning and i quite liked it.
PXL_20230603_155349816 (resized).jpgPXL_20230603_155358685 (resized).jpgPXL_20230603_155402828 (resized).jpgPXL_20230603_155405874 (resized).jpgPXL_20230603_155410710 (resized).jpgPXL_20230603_155416292 (resized).jpgPXL_20230603_155440565 (resized).jpgQuoted from NWPinballshow:Check out this rad photo from the catwalk above the main room! I have a big photo dump coming soon.
that is a great shot!
If you post pics of the show, please post them full-sized, I like to download them and use them as a screensaver!
Mark
I finished collecting all of my audits. I always find the numbers fascinating.
Screenshot 2023-06-11 123245 (resized).png
Some observations;
1) FF was a show game setup at the Marco/Next Level area. I am skeptical of the results. Like a ding dong, I forget to get starting audits from the game during setup before the show opened, so I can't be positive that it didn't come to the show with some plays already on it. Jordan said the two other FF Prem he had on the floor had between 700 and 750. It's also possible it got a lot of play by the volunteers on Th and in the mornings before the doors opened to the public.
2) GB lost a node board sometime after 8pm on Sat and was off all Sunday. My conservative estimation is that it would have ended up around 540 had that not happened. That would have put it at the top spot (sans FF).
3) KISS and GB have consistently been the top played games over the years. KISS is a work horse and just never goes down.
4) R&M essentially tied for the top spot with KISS. Last year I had the launch coil short out and blow a fuse, so it was out of commission for a few hours before I could get it fixed. This year it had no problems and the precision flipper upgrade seemed to keep it shooting nice and snappy the entire time.
5) TBL had a line the entire weekend, but tends to be a long player so I am not surprised it ended in the middle of the pack.
6) I am not sure what's up with Met. Interest sure seems to have dropped off over the years.
6) TSPP and MMr while played constantly can be REAL long players so they always are at the bottom.
My world stops for four days during the show dates. Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It was busy for me this year. Lots of fixing (and teaching) but not much socializing and no technical talks. I hope the "junior medics" got what they wanted out of the program and sign up again next year.
I (finally) got to processing game play statistics. I missed two machines (Safe Cracker and Indiana Jones) as they were being played when the power was cut. Fortunately, I loaned these out to a good friend and got the numbers when they were set up. Otherwise, they probably would've stayed wrapped up until the show next year and promptly forgotten. Note to self: get the numbers 15 minutes before closing (have a few machines to work through) and turn them off. Of particular importance is machines such as Twilight Zone or Star Trek (TNG) as there are balls in the Gumball machine or subway that need to come out and need power to do this (easily).
Since Pinside is going to alter the formatting I will present the information in its simplest form. The machine and total game plays over the 3 days. I do have daily breakdowns if there is interest for this level of detail. In order from lowest count to highest count (2022 for comparison):
- 2023
- Dirty Harry = 253
- Twilight Zone = 407
- Lord of the Rings = 436
- Indiana Jones = 461
- Safe Cracker = 470 (75 tokens dispensed with 6 tokens returned)
- Black Knight 2000 = 495
- Bram Stoker's Dracula = 497
- The Addams Family = 558
- 2022
- Safe Cracker = 197 (over Friday and Saturday, Sunday not available)
- Whirlwind = 229 (over Friday and Saturday, Sunday not available)
- Lord of the Rings = 410
- Indiana Jones = 421
- Bram Stoker's Dracula = 433
- Black Knight 2000 = 471
- The Addams Family = 511
- Twilight Zone = 560
I am always stunned at the game counts. Difficult to explain why some are high and some are low. BSD is always high because the game is brutal and the game times are short. Dirty Harry is low. Not sure why. Is the game not approachable? It's almost never seen at the show (which is why I bought one) and I was hoping people would take the opportunity to play it. Safe Cracker was rode hard with a line almost always present. The game times are longer than average due to the board game but the game play count is still high. People seem to love this game. I guess it's the prize you can get from it.
My Whirlwind didn't make it this year and therefore there was no Whirlwind at the show. Nobody (except me) seemed to miss it. I did have someone ask me about bringing my Theatre of Magic back to the show. It wasn't present in 2022 and this year so I guess it was missed, though mc300baud did volunteer his this year.
Quoted from DumbAss:My world stops for four days during the show dates. Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It was busy for me this year. Lots of fixing (and teaching) but not much socializing and no technical talks. I hope the "junior medics" got what they wanted out of the program and sign up again next year.
I (finally) got to processing game play statistics. I missed two machines (Safe Cracker and Indiana Jones) as they were being played when the power was cut. Fortunately, I loaned these out to a good friend and got the numbers when they were set up. Otherwise, they probably would've stayed wrapped up until the show next year and promptly forgotten. Note to self: get the numbers 15 minutes before closing (have a few machines to work through) and turn them off. Of particular importance is machines such as Twilight Zone or Star Trek (TNG) as there are balls in the Gumball machine or subway that need to come out and need power to do this (easily).
I agree making a hard power cut at the close of the show causes some small annoyances. R&M keeps a ball staged in the subway too and I have to remember to fish it out with a magnet without power. It would be awesome if we could get the facility to kick the power back on for a short time after the floor is cleared. As always, thanks for the audit info Victor!
Quoted from DumbAss:I did have someone ask me about bringing my Theatre of Magic back to the show. It wasn't present in 2022 and this year so I guess it was missed, though mc300baud did volunteer his this year.
i'm pretty sure nobody would mind if we had 2 TOMs at the show next year, but as for mine, that'll depend on if it's on location or not. My CV was out and DWho didn't make the cut (I could only take so many) so we didn't have either on the floor this year.
i also need to do the Leon mod to keep the trunk from getting confused before i put it out for the public again, whether at the show or on location.
Quoted from mark532011:numbers look a little larger than last year overall, how were tickets?
I think the ticket sales were about 10-20% higher than last year, and we will have good numbers soon. But there will be a gray area, last year we let kids I think 6 and under in free and didn't track them, this year we upped it to 12 and under for free, but did track it. There were definitely more kids this year because of that change, as well as upping the youth 1/2 price rate to youths 17-13.
Quoted from DumbAss:I am always stunned at the game counts. Difficult to explain why some are high and some are low. BSD is always high because the game is brutal and the game times are short. Dirty Harry is low. Not sure why. Is the game not approachable? It's almost never seen at the show (which is why I bought one) and I was hoping people would take the opportunity to play it. Safe Cracker was rode hard with a line almost always present. The game times are longer than average due to the board game but the game play count is still high. People seem to love this game. I guess it's the prize you can get from it.
My Whirlwind didn't make it this year and therefore there was no Whirlwind at the show. Nobody (except me) seemed to miss it. I did have someone ask me about bringing my Theatre of Magic back to the show. It wasn't present in 2022 and this year so I guess it was missed, though mc300baud did volunteer his this year.
Safe Cracker was a big hit this year, I definitely think in part because of the tokens, that was part of the show experience for some people, trying to win a token. Thanks so much for doing those! I also saw you over buy it coaching people sometimes, which probably helped peak interest.
There was a Whirlwind with a 2.0 kit over in the Planetary Pinball tent, along with 3 other 2.0 games. But I didn't get a chance to play it. I forgot to do audits before the show, but I think the Northwest Pinball Collective tracks them, so I'll check in with Adam for my games that went from there to the show. My Fishtales was down a few times, but I think my Ripley's was up the whole show. And I may have finally fixed the sound in Creature yesterday, but I need to play it more since the sound change problems seemed random. This is the first year I've had all my games unwrapped and playing within 2 weeks of the show, usually they sit for most of the Summer!
2023 Northwest Pinball & Arcade Show stats:
Total attendance: 3,200 estimated (purchased tickets + free tickets to kids 12 and under, volunteers, game donors, satellite tournament winners, sponsors, vendors, speakers, media, etc.)
Purchased tickets: 2763 (+13% from 2022)
Total games: 440 (down 5 games from 2022)
Self transport games: 188 (44% of the total registered games)
Show transport games: 236 (56% of the total registered games)
Not registered games (mostly in booths): 20
Unique game donors: 80 (+16% from 2022)
Sponsors: 14 (+40% from 2022)
Open tournament: 180 players
Classic Matchplay tournament: 168 players
Women's Championship tournament: 71 players
Rookie & Armature tournament: 60 players
Revenge Knockout tournament: 60 players
Total volunteers: Over 150 volunteers! (includes all volunteer staff, tournament staff and game owners that volunteered games)
Quoted from mc300baud:and in case you missed it, a nice piece from the local news magazine about our show!
Nice report!
This segment must have been edited by a pinball enthusiast too as there wasn't a single use of the much hated "pinball wizard" in it! 
4 weeks later
NWPAS Volunteer Party this weekend! If you didn't get the invite and volunteered time or games, check your spam folder or hit me up for the info. I just ordered over 50 pounds of bbq, we will have a bunch of games on hand, including some local homebrews and their makers.
Quoted from nwpinball:I just ordered over 50 pounds of bbq
sweet! i plan on eating at least a half pound of that bbq. maybe a pound. yum.
Reply
Wanna join the discussion? Please sign in to reply to this topic.
Hey there! Welcome to Pinside!
Donate to PinsideGreat to see you're enjoying Pinside! Did you know Pinside is able to run without any 3rd-party banners or ads, thanks to the support from our visitors? Please consider a donation to Pinside and get anext to your username to show for it! Or better yet, subscribe to Pinside+!
