(Topic ID: 267839)
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Quoted from arcyallen:Are the 2022 dates and location set in stone, or still in the planning stages?
Just talked to Dave and he said they’re all set for the June show. Gonna be a mad rush to put the show on again in 7 months!
Mermink and I had a great time! The show was excellent, our first Pintastic. Had a lot of folks recognize us from the Saratoga Silverball show! Thank you so much for the support. The most touching was a gentleman who brought his family. He tracked me down and told me how the humble little Saratoga Silverball back in August was his first show, and he enjoyed it so much he decided to visit Pintastic after seeing the flyers in the arcade!
That was a really special and touching moment, to be able to share pinball and get an entire family into the hobby. The gentleman then setup two of his buddies, one who lives in Florida, in the hobby. It feels incredible that our show was able to bring 3 people into the hobby! That’s what it’s all about.
Thanks to everyone who stopped and talked to Kate & I. The tremendous support and kind words inspires us. Going to work on some promo material and announce the date for next year in the next couple weeks!
Quoted from Wizkid93:Not going to lie, it was my first time bringing a game, I brought the oldest game, a 1932 pure mechanical game, and it didn't hit me til the day of the show, that this thing could be really abused.
But I was astounded by how everyone played my machine, when they did play it, they were very respectful.
On the last day, I felt a little let down because I felt the machine wasn't getting a second glance, but after moving it next to card whiz, while I was playing it, a little girl was enamored by it, with her mother saying don't you wanna play something else?
She said no because she'd loved it.
That moment cemented the game bringer experience for me, and I'm glad to have a wonderful show to bring it to, I'm eager to bring that and my Oktoberfest for next show.
Cheers to staff, I've been to every pintastic and every single one has been a solid show, and cheers to David S for making my first real volunteering an smooth experience.
And cheers to all those homebrew game makers!
[quoted image]
That was yours?! The second I saw it, I thought it was hilarious! Love those silly little Pure Mechanical games.
My only question is why was it so short, is there a reason, was it meant to be a bar-top game?
I played several games and really really had fun. The only issue is the ball was getting caught between the shooter lane lip where it meets the playfield and the flap that covers it. Didn’t wanna keep plunging balls but there was no other way to free it up.
Thanks for bringing a delicate antique like that. Always enjoy them!
Quoted from dannunz:Your welcome Cirqus Voltaire, TOTAN, and Houdini were 3 of 30 games i brought to the show!
Hope you don’t mind. I unplugged the Halloween that I’m fairly sure was yours. The trough switches must have had some issue. It wouldn’t detect the balls at all and kept searching. I witnessed about 3 people go up, flick the power a few times and shake the piss out of it. Finally I couldn’t take it anymore and tried finding staff. Couldn’t find anyone and it didn’t have the QR code on it and I didn’t know where the out of order signs were. Even tried texting the number on the sign for Demoman next to it. I stood by it for a while telling people the issue while Kate was holding our spot for different games.
Every minute or two someone would appear out of nowhere and immediately shake the absolute HELL out of it. Like god damn people think they’re the first in the world to try shaking a ball loose?
I ended up unplugging the cord from the back and out of view so it wouldn’t get so badly abused. Something about watching a brand new Halloween get hoisted up 3 feet in the front to try and “free up” the ball issue started making me feel sick!
Quoted from jrpinball:I know the story. Some kid bent or broke the shooter assembly. That's another show that I won't bring any push-up game to. Well, it's kind of a moot point now.
I encourage you to consider it for the Saratoga Silverball! A lot of the feedback from other shows was taken into consideration and the volunteers were all briefed and aware. At the top of the list was behavior and treatment of the machines! Without game bringers there is no show. Good games bring good crowds. It’s not worth it to allow abusive, disrespectful people to ruin the show just to make a buck. We did a pretty good job this year and everyone who did bring a game seemed pleased with the experience. Next year we’re working to make it bigger with more vendors! Hope to see many new AND familiar faces.
Pintastic was great, hopefully my other post about Halloween wasn’t misconstrued. The games were all treated pretty well and I saw several volunteers/staff throughout the show.
There were TONS of newbies, and the shaking of some games was probably a bad habit picked up by watching techs and experienced pinheads coupled with newbies not understanding the nuance and finesse involved.
My only complaints and suggestions would be to make it more obvious how to report issues and where to find staff. The online portal was awesome, I reported Robo War was out of credits. However, if you watch Todd’s stream, Pinball New’s stream and myself spending 6 hours Saturday in the freeplay room, it was nearly always empty. That was a mega bummer, it was one of the games I really enjoy playing when given the chance! In the future folks who bring Gottlieb's like that should consider adding a simple credit button running the wires through the coin return. It’s easy, reversible and harmless.
Not sure if there was a tech area or staff booth, couldn’t find it. In the future it would be awesome to have something prominent to report issues, check the status of past reports, and a general good place to answer questions. The main place I went to ask questions was the box office, they tried their best.
Realistically those are small qualms and the show was EXCELLENT! I really, really enjoyed it and will definitely attend all 4 days in June and bring a game or two! Almost brought Target Alpha and regret seconding guessing myself and not bringing it!
Quoted from somenerd:Yeah I also wasn't clear on if the club room was just for club members so I sorta just walked in, took a peek around, and walked out because I didn't want to chance having any sort of awkward confrontation... Guess I know now for next year!
Same situation as many other stated. Went in and asked if it was okay to be there, lol! Saw a lot of familiar faces so that helped too. Club room was great, thanks to whoever brought Time Fantasy. Finally got Snail Time for the first time ever after spending 5 hours playing the one at Allentown!
What a blast!!
Quoted from gdonovan:Much bigger font needed along with YOU COULD OWN THIS GAME.
Green color means nothing to most people.
Was it color coded, green for sale?!? I didn’t even know that. And the prices were so small!
I wanted that Caribbean Cruise. Poor thing was is terrible shape with rotting rubbers. Really sad!
Damn thing reeked so badly of cigarettes I thought it was gonna ask me for a pack of Newport’s.
Quoted from Grandnational007:I was the Robo-War guy...
It was a last minute bring, as travel plans/airport runs for Thanksgiving ALMOST got in the way, but I was able to make other arrangements; I admittedly had to leave the show for a few hours a couple times during the weekend to ferry people from BDL to my home in central CT who were arriving for the holiday, then back to Sturbridge...
That said, it was the first time I've ever had it out to a show, and I THOUGHT I had all the bugs worked out of it from nearly a year of heavy play testing and fixing it at home and parties, and it played flawlessly Thursday/Friday. I made sure to check the game every hour as to load credits (you can only load 20 at a time being an 80b), and I forgot to throw a diode jumper on to add credits at will (If I bring it to the next one, which I probably will, I'll print out a sign that says "Press HERE to ADD CREDITS", as it's not intuitive to those not familiar with the game/system.
I experienced the old gottlieb ground issue sometime on Saturday (as I acquired the game from a guy who previously had it for 28 years and it's still bone stock without the ground mods done, but has otherwise been flawless without the harnesses being all cut and bundled for reliability), and a tech found me in the tournament area to notify me. I ran over and traced it to a flaky trough switch, which caused the game to lose track of balls (As reproduced and correctly fixed at home). I was able to get it jerry-rigged and back up and running pretty quickly, and I found that a simple power cycle after adjusting the switch would unlock the game, but then it would obviously be out of credits if I wasn't standing there to add more. I appreciate the tech staff for notifying me when this occurred. I believe the quick fix had it running for the remainder of it's time on the show floor, when it had credits.
Since getting it home and re-setup and fixing the trough issue correctly, I have not since experienced the issue, after having a hundred or so games played on it by guests that were in for the holiday.
I watched the TNT stream later, and of course when Todd came by RW, it was out of credits on the stream (DOH!). Anybody that wanted to play it when it was out of credits, I sincerely apologize; I really did make the effort to check it hourly when I was on the premises, even late or early in the day, and left my personal key with others who checked it when I had to leave. I guess you could say I underestimated how popular this seemingly indiscrete old Gottlieb/Premier would be! This will be a non-issue in the future, I promise. (As many know, I'm a man of my word...)
All in all, I'm glad I brought it; being on the rarer side, I figured it was a quirky game that many people have never seen or played before, and those that did, told me how much they really enjoyed it, and even made a few offers to buy it, haha (Even though it wasn't for sale). I was even able to grab, what may be one of the last NOS translights for it, from Mayfair to replace my faded original.
Chances are, that it'll be back, and ready for 72 more straight hours of play.
Haha, don’t sweat it! If I’m in the area, expect a PM! You owe me some RW games! It’s probably one of my favorites sys80s. Just a fantastic game with some of the most incredible sound design of the 80s. I wish Gottlieb gave the sound guy credit.
You selling the old RW translite?
I was very close to bringing Target Alpha and was musing on bringing Caveman. I love Caveman, and it’s now a rare game since people hated it so much they all ended up in the trash heap! At my show it was a blast! If it wasn’t so obscenely heavy, I’d cart it to every show on the east coast. Caveman is truly a blast and unlike any other games out there!
5 months later
Quoted from dmarston:We've had a big surge in Gottlieb titles registered for Free Play, plus some Bally titles that I really want to spend more time on. We still need more Jim Patla designs, and you get 3 Bonus Points for any game he designed.
.................David Marston
I’ll see if Truck Stop can make it! One of the final Jim Patla machines and incredibly underrated.
3 weeks later
Quoted from ForceFlow:I caught a large spider in my room. If you want, I could bring it over to take care of your bug problem
Nature’s pest control!
If anyone see’s a Shaq VUK wireform at a vendor booth let me know! I have a WTB ad in marketplace.
1 month later
Quoted from dannunz:What no one sees is the nightmare we have gone through with the hotel for the last 2 years. Only because of the great team leaders and volunteers of Pintastic are we able to over come the issues with the hotel. This year was extremely challenging and pushed us to our limits. If there is a better option we need to consider it. Stay tuned.
I used to attend another convention held at a hotel that made Sturbridge look like the Ritz.
It had the same issues. Bugs, mold, mushrooms growing on carpets in the rooms. Several hallways were crumbling like the pictures posted earlier in this thread. Parking lot was like a wild garden. Active water leaks down the walls in some spots.
It was horrifying. The hotel was “renovated” by building smaller and smaller wings within the formerly very large hotel and slapping additions overtop of severe structural issues. One of the rooms had a ceiling collapse and inside the massive ceiling was the old balcony of that wing which was covered by a renovation.
The place was essentially the Sturbridge Host Hotel within the next 5 years.
They ended up having a business conference booked just 3 weeks after our con, and the hotel was abruptly and completely shutdown right in the middle of the event on Friday night as the state revoked their license. Police were involved, workers and patrons were locked out. Utilities were simply turned off. Hundreds of thousands of dollars were wasted. It was insanity.
The hotel was then demolished later that year and the owners ended up in prison. The business conference also defaulted due to contractual obligations and the massive loss of revenue.
I’m glad to hear the show is moving.
There’s a strong possibility that perhaps this “renovation” situation isn’t on the up and up. When hotels start to nosedive like that, you might get totally screwed by powers outside of your control. The state could very easily step in and shut them down and wouldn’t care about anyone else impacted by such action.
Quoted from Dwboca:So whats stopping it from Albany NY or Burlington Vt? On the burlington vt note. I wemt to a conference at the double tree.they had a ton of conference space, a shuttle to downtown and there's a pinball place just up the road
Albany is stopping it from being in Albany.
I do business in the area and New York’s capital is about as hostile and unaccommodating as it could possibly be! And they want to charge you outrageous prices for trash.
Saratoga is way better, but prices can be very high
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