Have played Bally's and William's EM's over the years but have always gravitated towards Gottlieb's. When looking at the #9 rating on Pinside I just didn't get it. How can this table get such glowing reviews when there appears to be so little to shoot at? One came up for sale locally and was lucky enough to grab it to see what this fuss was all about.
How can you make a hockey themed pin that actually works with the games concept? The backglass animation is cool and the rink provides a unique visual appearance providing a lot of depth to the look of the head. But in actual gameplay you really can't look at the backglass animation or you'll lose the ball. Like everyone else has stated, an incredibly fast game without using 24VDC on the pops or flippers.
As others have said, brutal left outlane but not uncommon on Williams/Bally's with the kickers right above the flippers. Set the tilt very loose to allow some supple nudging to help fight off that left outlane.
Goal Scoring: The "goal" of the game is to increase the steeper unit a total of 10 times to score a goal. The game logic on the A and B rollovers at the top of the playfield will increment the stepper 3 times when lit. This option stays lit until the goal stepper unit reaches the #5 position, from a hockey game standpoint you've enter the opponents blue line. Once the stepper is in position #5 the A/B advance of 3 is no longer lit. Like hockey, gets harder to score as you get near the net.
Didn't hit the A/B rollover on the plunger? The center pop is your next target to advance the goal. The goal Advance stays lit on the center pop until reaching position #5 on the goal stepper. Once past it no longer advances the puck.
Hitting any lit rollover button will advance the puck on step toward the goal. And the sweetest shot on this table is actually when the ball matches the arc of the rollover buttons to score a goal. With some finesse and a little luck you can get the ball to roll just right for this to happen.
Likely the only EM I can think of that needs a topper! Where is that red light when the goal buzzer goes off??!!!!!
Point Scoring: To rack up points the A/B rollovers are a must to get the pops lit up. When a goal is scored the center pop goes to 1K point instead of 100 after a goal has been scored. The center stays lit at 1K points until the puck is reset to center ice. But points-schmoints...this is hockey!
Also as people have stated, this game can get amazingly fast. From a gameplay point of view, awesome table design by the master!
And yeah, what happened to the budget for the art department on this one? I don't have an issue with "pointy people' but did William's run out of them for this pin? And who at William's got the great deal on the huge vat of green paint? I am a Marche fan but I can't believe he put his name on this one.
With that said, it works better in a dimly lit room. The green take on a more muted look versus what you when the room is brightly lit.
I was skeptical of the high ranking at one time. After playing this pin, brilliant!
If you have one and don't want it I'd love to have it to do a re-theme!!!