i dont really reply alot here but let me say that ball/williams games are valued and loved cause they are great. even to this day many of them still stand the test of time.
lets take an example here, cause this is the true test. take ur best bally williams pins and put them next to ur new sterns, let someone who has no idea about pinball come and play them and let them be the judge of whats best. i think alot of folks might chose the monster bash, the addams family, the medieval madness or the attack from mars. what does that say about bally/williams ? they had magic... but even better question what does that say about stern? has pinball even progressed in 20 years at all? not really, sure some of color displays and leds but thats not much in term of progress i guess.

i took a girl i know to the the arcade awhile back. there was a couple of pins, not the new stern stuff no. but there was a rolling stones, there was ripleys believe it or not, wipeout, elvis, cue ball wizard and a fish tales.
her fav out of the bunch was fish tales. now i could probably told her that fish tales is way older compared to ripleys, rolling stones or elvis but i doubt that would make much diff.

also in regards to pins breaking down, are u servicing them correctly... as in rebuilding flippers all new parts, reflow boards, replace caps... things like that go a long way.