Great idea if your looking to grow your collection.
Bad idea if your looking to start your public arcade.
In reality the deals are still to be had, they are just harder to come by.

Thanks
Blake

you can spawn pinball gremlins by getting them wet.

pinballgremlins01 (2) (resized).jpg

This. This all day.

Just being honest: I don’t think we’ll see pinball grow much beyond its current state unless games are designed to be more simple. I say this based on obvserving both kids and adults that have been in our game room over the years. The vast majority find it confusing and intimidating, which is a bad mix for folks that couldn’t really care less as a baseline approach.

TNA, in my opinion, is the perfect modern game because of its simplicity. You can explain it in a minute. Games from Stern and JJP are too damn complicated.

Start explaining modes and multipliers to the average person (let alone a teenager that totes a phone around like a life support system) and you’ll see their eyes gloss over as their mind retreats to a distant place in a matter of seconds. Hell, even I find complex discussions of modern sterns and JJPs to be boring - having to listen to the game breakdowns of the new JJP Pirates was a turn off to me. It’s just too much of a good thing.

Pinball keeps trying to justify high prices with this silly chase for “depth” when it should be more focused on having simple fun.

Simple = better for the public.

JMO, of course

I agree and think there should be game depths and rulesets designed for different consumers. Also there is always the ability to make pins quick to learn but hard to master. Should do that with rulesets and depth.
Thanks
Blake

Why do people care so much about including everyone In their niche hobby anyway? I think one of the cool things I've always liked about pinball is that it's not mainstrean. Outside of keeping a certain level of the pin economy going for parts or new games, who really cares about growth, outside of the vendors??
If anyone wants to join you in your hobby , great!!!! If not, why worry about it?

Question number one on a game’s display (after inserting coins) should be:

Are you new pinball? Press the righ flipper.

If they press the right flipper, a simple 30 second tutorial should appear on the screen, highlighted by some inserts flashing and a few toys being activated.

“Shoot for this, this will happen, watch for this, that will happen, then shoot for this for a big score”

Done.

What’s happening is the exact opposite... just go watch Tim Sexton’s Star Wars stream where he explained the game. For .01% of players, that might be enough to get a tingle in their loins, but for a lot of players (let alone anyone else), it’s too much

Growing pinball. lol.

You guys are seriously dreaming now.

It's been on life support for years now, and if you can't see thru the current capitalistic venture to take advantage of and grabbing rich dudes longing for their youth's cash, then I don't know what to tell you. Once that novelty wears off, it's game over.

Seriously. Look, I know there's a lot of back and forth and people taking sides on shit but the reality is they are charging the shit out of us for games, and tons of us are buying them. They're doing more than well enough to survive for a long time.

Heck yeah they are!

If they are banking all the profits coming in on these novelty games, it should provide a nice little nest egg that will last years after the last game rolls off the line.

Are you implying that building the hobby will reduce prices? It seems that It's already been proven it won't.

HAHA! No I'm currently at work not drunk.
My point is there are 2 sides, one that thinks the companies are getting rich, and the other that think they're barely buying lunch and doing everything for the love of pinball. I'm sure the truth is in the middle and they're doing just fine and we don't need to "grow" anything to sustain where it is for some time.
EDIT: Just a guess of course. like everyone else.

Include the legs.....

Gotcha!!

Speaking of game design, I hope for better art packages in future pinball games. The art on Iron Maiden or POTC2 cannot hold a candle to games like Sorcerer or Tales of the Arabian Nights. I'd bet that neglected Aerosmith would have attracted more attention if the art package was nicer. It's not exactly aesthetically pleasing to the eye, to say the least. Then again, half of you are pinball curmudgeons who want the hobby to die out so maybe we should keep the machines as ugly as possible.

This and this and more of this. So well said.

This is why I’m now doing free lessons monthly at my main loc, My Parents Basement.

You are kidding, right?

Yeah it would have sold much better with the "Stevie on the beach" translite for sure.

i put the Aerosmith art on the same level as the Metallica art. I like ghostbusters better yet.

Thanks
Blake

I understand that most people nowadays were raised by their mothers, and could not change a tire if their life depended on it. I can't blame them for not knowing which way to turn a bolt.

But without a doubt, Pinball has more pricks in it than any other "money hobby" by a factor of 100x.

More than the Audiophiles, more than high-end Camera guys, more than guitar collectors, more than amateur astronomers or even those weird aquarium guys.

I have friends over occasionally. The problem isn't that people don't like this stuff.
The evening starts with "wow", all smiles and even a few "holy $hits!".

As the night goes on, I always hope that nobody asks me the question, maybe I'll get lucky this time.
Then finally somebody asks "So how much does one of these cost?".

I reluctantly answer, and then the jaws drop and the staring starts, and I try to justify it somehow.

Prices are too high.

Why not both?

Problem with this is that people already can't figure out "Push to Start" and likely don't want to see or read instructions to play a game.
Although I do agree that deep-deep-deep code and mega modes is not the way to attract newbie players.

Your friends are just too poor!

And when I get that question, I always answer you can probably find a working game for your basement for around 600 bucks. Jaws generally do not hit the floor with that information.

I've asked myself a few times when this all started.

It's become a far cry from when location pinball ruled, and it was cool people hanging out in there with torn jeans and cigs hanging from their lips, to now, a bunch of anal retentive nerds with OCD.

Cause I don't work at an arcade anymore

You forgot Lawyers.

I don't often thumb up Odin but I would thumb up this post several times if I could.
Pinball growing... lol.

Then it WAS worth getting out of bed today.

Best way is just invite people over to play, or visit local barcades for a night out. You don't need to be rich to enjoy pinball. A pocket full of quarters makes for a pretty fun night. I think it's partially getting people over the stigma of the arcade being a place to keep the kids busy while the adults are having fun doing something else.

Personally I've seen interest in pinball go from "what's pinball" or "I thought they stopped making those" to "That's awesome" or " I just went to the local barcade last week". when I first started out in the Hobby there wasn't much local interest and anytime I mentioned my hobby it was met with confusion. I think between the local League, Barcade, and Co-op interest is the highest I've seen it amongst the general public.

Doesn't hurt that a pinball machine is featured on an arthritis medicine TV ad either.

I think getting some television coverage would be helpful; think of what ESPN did for poker when it started televising events. There are lots of problems with televising pinball events; would likely need to not be live to speed up the down town between balls.

Manufacturers making machines easier to work on or service would also help expand the hobby.

Even in the 90s I don't remember pinball being huge. Any arcades always had far more vids than pins. Crowds were always around vids. Same now. Most people don't really get pins but may play a game or two. Same goes for today. Doesn't help that pins are very expensive. I think pinball will always be a niche thing and that isn't necessarily a bad thing.

It is interesting. Sure you had the hardcore fans and some walk ups, but purely against vids they would lose. Of course they costed a bit more for standard cabinets, but you can fit at least 2 vids for every pin.

It was and wasn't at the same time.

TAF/TZ's success really rode the resurgence of arcades that Street Fighter II kicked off. TAF did just about as well, but TZ's production numbers did not indicate its poor location performance. TZ is a game that's far too complex for the casual arcade patron and is better suited for the HUO environment of collectors who can put all the time they need into learning how to play a game that punishes newbie playing habits even more severely than the average pin.

I should get to play TNA for the first time in Chicago when I get shifted over there. It's nice to hear about games I don't need to read up on to feel like I know what I'm doing. Shoot, score. Games like that are built for location play like the old days. Deep code and deep modes are for collectors springing nine grand for NIB.

If only pinball could do for the swimsuit issue of Sports Illustrated what it did for World Poker Tour.

I feel sorry for you. My experience in the pinball community has been 99% prick-free.

The man does have a point.

After all, there's good reason why there's been cleavage somewhere on just about every other pinball translite for the last 60 years, even when it has to be forced into the theme (e.g. ToM's magician lady).

This is a problem at a barcade that I go to. I enjoy helping others and don't mind showing them which button to press to start their game, but it is quite a silly issue.

Do you do service calls to repair pinball machines, or just sell led bulbs to those that aren't happy with the way the game came from the factory?

Excuse me, but I'm still cracking up over vid's Straight into Compton jingle. Was I the only one that got that?

Do you know how many people I've seen come to our local co-op simply because "I played it on my phone and saw a real one existed down the road"? That's how I started you know. That's step one. We owe a lot to the Pinball Arcade for putting it on cell phones and giving away a game for free. If more tables existed online, I think we'd see more growth in real life. I'd be willing to bed that if the PB Arcade gave away FULL access to a table every 3-4 months, not only would pinball grow, but more people would also buy more tables online. I think Pinball Arcade has a huge amount to do with the current growth of the sport.

Also yes; leagues & tournaments. I'm a guy who started playing online just for the hell of it, and then searched the internet and found a place that had a dozen that I could play. But after visiting this place maybe 20 times, I didn't want to show up just to play and hang out, I wanted to compete. Without competition, I stopped showing up as often. When I joined a league... and I didn't know one existed for 2 years after... I got hooked for good.

TL;DR
-- (1) Access Online (Go Pinball Arcade!)
-- (2) All-Year Leagues & Tournaments

Some quality pinball seeds from Amsterdam,shipped to you in a CD case?

You are right, those aquarium guys are pretty fing weird.

Magic: The Gathering people though. Especially the Standard tournament crowd and the 40-somethings who bought a bunch of packs in 1994 and obsess over the "reserved list."

Just sold my 94 cards for a chunk and bought a pin

While pinball has been growing in the collector community, it has been declining in other markets for various reasons. I think the biggest growth can be gained by getting operators back into pinball. That will require games that have short ball times, an easy to understand goal, which is difficult to master. Hence why TNA does so well on location. Of course, it helps that the game looks cool and has a great soundtrack. If a game like TNA could be priced at $4k and earn as well as it does right now, I think a lot more operators would be into pinball.

What would be interesting is if an established manufacturer would run a second line of simpler games that match the above. Even encourage some out of the box thinking: not every game needs an Italian bottom, it may not even need a traditional cabinet. It may be possible to design a great game using less than 5 coils, but is anybody trying? If a design team would be allowed to explore new grounds, that could be interesting. They may come up with a total clunker, or with a game that revolutionizes pinball again.

Another way to grow pinball is to tap into markets that don't know pinball at all. Think, China, India, territories like that. However, to break into those markets games need to be simple. Iron Maiden or Dialed In are great games, but not so necessarily entry-level games. To enter a new market, you need a game that market can understand and grow from there. Again, simple easy to understand objectives, which are difficult to master and as such a fun challenge.

A local place is building an arcade. They have some good pins so I try to make it over there as I can. From talking to the owner, I get the impression that I am one of very few that come to just play the pins. Also obvious when I put my initials up on a not so good game and win replays frequently. He complains how much pins cost compared to your average arcade game. Throw in how much space pins take up and the maintenance it just doesn't make sense to have pins unless you are passionate about them. Hell, I sometimes feel a bit silly having pins in my house knowing how much I spent on them. Totally ridiculous but that's one of the things I like about the hobby.

Yeah for the same amount of monies you can buy a bunch of cheap toys and a claw game...people eat that kind of crap up.

Perfect reason for a Stranger Things pinball machine. A "current" theme that also plays off nostalgia, thus bridging the age gap.

Otherwise, I agree with "local shows" or local tournaments. While there's a nice barcade here, we don't have a league or anything similar.

My previous big obsession that I'd travel for was MtG, but if I couldn't have played locally, my involvement would never have expanded, and perhaps not started in the first place.

Done right, a hit movie or tv show that had pinball as a major plot device could do more to popularize the game than anything else could.

I'm not talking Tilt, or Tommy, or for godsakes The Accused. Has to be a HIT -- upbeat, feel-good, heartening.

Someone else will have to worry about actually writing and producing such a beast. I'm just the idea guy. Message me for my PayPal address so you can send me my cut!