I'm a newbie to the hobby (first pinball purchased in March 2013). I'm 40 and a child of the 80's arcades. When I saw the movie The King of Kong several years ago, I thought about those video games and pinball machines I had played as a kid, for the first time in decades. I saw that there were these guys that had games in their house (you can do that!??!?). I never thought about owning my own game, let alone multiple games. But now I have a little money and a little space, so I've amassed a small collection in the past year and a half. I'm hooked. I'm looking to move to a new home and one of the main factors will be the size of a basement game room area, so I can fill it with pins.
The best part is watching my 10 year old son so into this hobby. A year and a half ago he had never played pinball (and probably had never seen a real machine before). Now I can't keep him off the Metallica. He said to me the other day that he can't wait to have his own house, so he can buy his own machine.
My only regret is that I didn't discover this hobby 10-15 years ago, back when the prices were lower.