You never really know a pin until you've owned it a while I find. For that reason I'd just grab something that takes your fancy and has generally favourable reviews. There's plenty of good games within your budget. Have you played Baywatch?
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Buying my first Pinball Machine :)
- Thread starter benNinja
- Start date
I watched a video for it earlier and (aside from the theme) it looks pretty awesome! I've added to my 'watch list'. Would love to try one out.
I played through some of them. Objectively, I find the number of ramps and 'stuff' in the playfield a bit too small for my liking, the video play doesn't do it for me either and there are other machines I rather own over it. Maybe you're right and I would be in a better position if I've seen everything the video can do...
My apologies if you felt that way partly because of my posts; I don't mask my opinions and my assumption that you need to play more pinball is because in the vast majority of cases, once people start getting experienced in pinball, they start falling into one of about three or four camps of 'taste' for games, and your current listing of games and your descriptions of what is important (including the phrase 'unlockable areas' which I admit I don't fully understand) is just unlike anything I've seen before. For example, people that like progressive tables, lots of modes and unique elements/toys etc. are absolutely all over games like TOM, CFTBL, WW and MM... but you aren't.
An example of my difficulty in understanding your aims - I'm amazed that you ruled out CFTBL, for example, because it would have been one of my first bets for you - the multiball onset is an entirely different atmosphere and mode for the game; the game starts out as movie drive-in clichés and tropes, but the film 'starts' when you hit multiball and its a total mood change. Add in good modes and scoring and I thought it was a massive winner. Hence my comment about 'fixation' because the only reason I, personally, could see to rule out that game is that it's going to be really hard to find for your budget. Two flippers certainly doesn't harm it.
And people are also keen to help you avoid the trap of feeling like you only have one shot at this whole thing; you don't.
Those are the kinds of demands those games put on the player in order to do well. It's the other side of the spectrum to games like F-14 where after you trigger multiball, to get the top-scoring fighter jackpot, you just have to shoot an orbit three times. The fun in that game is because the entire universe is exploding in a ball of fire while that's happening, making it well hard to actually hit that orbit. And you have a Russian b'stard laughing at you.
An example of my difficulty in understanding your aims - I'm amazed that you ruled out CFTBL, for example, because it would have been one of my first bets for you - the multiball onset is an entirely different atmosphere and mode for the game; the game starts out as movie drive-in clichés and tropes, but the film 'starts' when you hit multiball and its a total mood change. Add in good modes and scoring and I thought it was a massive winner. Hence my comment about 'fixation' because the only reason I, personally, could see to rule out that game is that it's going to be really hard to find for your budget. Two flippers certainly doesn't harm it.
And people are also keen to help you avoid the trap of feeling like you only have one shot at this whole thing; you don't.
Of course personal taste is what it comes down to, but the point of the trio of games like MM, AFM and MB is that there is no particularly 'difficult' shot and proper skill on these tables comes down just as much to precision as any other table. Every shot is 'easy' if you aren't aiming for anything, but there is nothing easy about stacking up 2 out of 3 lights on all of your ramps, hitting all of those shots then sequentially without hitting the Merlin shot or the Castle door (or the multiball secret door too many times) and then once all lights are off, rapidly chaining 3 shots on a single ramp/orbit in order to keep the hurry up going.
Those are the kinds of demands those games put on the player in order to do well. It's the other side of the spectrum to games like F-14 where after you trigger multiball, to get the top-scoring fighter jackpot, you just have to shoot an orbit three times. The fun in that game is because the entire universe is exploding in a ball of fire while that's happening, making it well hard to actually hit that orbit. And you have a Russian b'stard laughing at you.
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Wait, what? People are saying this? Weird - TZ is one of my favourite games of all time and I think it's fine on TPA. It's infinitely better since they retuned it a couple of months ago, and it is now much, much harder on simulator, which is pretty accurate. But TPA certainly got the gameplay 'feel' dead on there IMO.
Then again maybe I'm just brain dead because I haven't found a game on TPA that made me actively dislike it, or rule it out of ownership. Of course I have a list of preferences, but I would own everything that's featured on TPA. The only exception would be Goin' Nuts but I would probably keep that for sheer rarity!
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Oh, and I don't recommend TNG for you as it is a nightmare to keep serviced, and once you've seen all the modes a dozen times, there's not a whole lot of.... pinball left.
EDIT: I need to learn to read everything very thoroughly before making a post. This is ridiculously poor web forum behaviour from me.
This is very true if you're buying from an arcade operator, or from a random listing on ebay/gumtree - but if you want the kind of games you're looking for in your budget, you'll only get them by getting them from pinball sceners, and you will miss every opportunity if you insist on playing them first.
Only pinball people trade their games undervalued compared to the rest of the market, and there's a silent understanding that all descriptions of pinball machines are genuine, and that unlisted minor faults are part of the charm and are not to get worried about. If you want to play them all before buying, a lot of people will simply sell to the guy who replies ten minutes later that he's 100% buying it sight-unseen, cash in hand.
If you aren't comfortable doing that on any particular game yet, ask people to play their not-for-sale examples and be prepared to pounce when someone does list games for sale - as nowadays not only do other people want to buy at not-insane rates, but all of the arcade resellers are doing what you're doing to try and make money. There's a lot of great people here and many will honour the first reply to sell, but if you turn up, play a game and decide it's not for you, you'll not be making a good name for yourself. You've a hard job ahead of you.
EDIT: I need to learn to read everything very thoroughly before making a post. This is ridiculously poor web forum behaviour from me.
Actually I want to make clear a very important point - probably the most important thing you'll read in the thread!
This is very true if you're buying from an arcade operator, or from a random listing on ebay/gumtree - but if you want the kind of games you're looking for in your budget, you'll only get them by getting them from pinball sceners, and you will miss every opportunity if you insist on playing them first.
Only pinball people trade their games undervalued compared to the rest of the market, and there's a silent understanding that all descriptions of pinball machines are genuine, and that unlisted minor faults are part of the charm and are not to get worried about. If you want to play them all before buying, a lot of people will simply sell to the guy who replies ten minutes later that he's 100% buying it sight-unseen, cash in hand.
If you aren't comfortable doing that on any particular game yet, ask people to play their not-for-sale examples and be prepared to pounce when someone does list games for sale - as nowadays not only do other people want to buy at not-insane rates, but all of the arcade resellers are doing what you're doing to try and make money. There's a lot of great people here and many will honour the first reply to sell, but if you turn up, play a game and decide it's not for you, you'll not be making a good name for yourself. You've a hard job ahead of you.
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Kind of but there are many folk on here who I would buy from unseen and have done before. Ebay on the other hand.............
not at all, I have found them quite helpful
To be fair, I only tried CFTBL on sim so I'm always open to trying one. I think it might be out of my budget anyway and again I just prefer having more than 2 flippers. Does the progression into a different mood introduce any new gameplay elements beyond target sequences, lights and scoring modes?
The central magic box element of TOM though really cool, just didn't do it for me. I much preferred ToTAN (had a similar feel in terms of theme) on simulator than TOM in the flesh so I ruled it out. I'll have to give WW another go also...
Okay so maybe I'm into progressive tables, I've actually put Roadshow back on the list due to mass suggestion haha. I guess the best way to clear the confusion is that I've enjoyed tables more when it has taken a lot of plays to see all it's features and shots, etc. (not just modes and multipliers). That's what I mean by unlockable areas. The example in Funhouse (and Roadshow) that you have to progress to a point to reveal the mouth shot, or JD when you get the dead world spinning. I liked it in MM where you had to hit the castle a few times to get the bridge down and then the gate open. Maybe this is quite a naive point of view and what you've said about star trek losing it's fun once you've seen everything is both helpful and concerning!
Could you elaborate on this a bit more? I don't mind a lot of servicing, I enjoy that sort of thing.
Thank you for all this. It is very useful info
The biggest example is that the whirlpool ramp return is never accessible except in multiball (film) mode, where each spin and trigger of the sensor in there awards letters for big scoring in that mode. Aside from that the multiball itself brings its own multi-restarting 'mode' of 'Rescue The Girl'. The multiball mode is also the only place with a playfield score multiplier that can be built up.
With all of that and the fact that the search modes replace a number of shots present in the 'normal' mode and that the game will literally suspend some modes for the duration of multiball makes it the closest thing I can think of for a game that has a major shift in gameplay once you achieve the goal - and to get to multiball in the first place, you have to light the letters in FILM, of which there are four objectives, one per letter.
I love that game!
Did you ever play the Pro Pinball line of pinball video games? Pro Pinball: Timeshock has been remastered for Steam/iOS/Android now if you haven't. I have a suspicion that it would be your ideal game in all respects. There is a company actually in the process of making that game into a real machine, but they're a quiet and slow company, and it would be a NIB, boutique priced pin, so this is more just an aside than a suggestion.
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It's a very heavy machine with a lot of coils. Especially the twin 'guns' on top of the slingshots are hard to keep running in top condition, ball launchers like that always are (Terminator 2 has one too.) It's also an early six-ball game and the opto sensors for the WPC six-ball trough are finicky. http://www.flippers.be/balltrough_problems.html
I figure that you're somewhat technically minded because you mentioned that your Funhouse experience was as part of an art project? In either case, there aren't too many jobs that are deal breakers when it comes to pinball repair, most are very doable by the average person. The only areas that make some people pause are circuit board resoldering and playfield/cabinet wood/paint repair, but that's just because they're a bit higher level than normal DIY. There's nothing unique about either of those to someone with experience with either.
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I absolutely love it but I probably wouldn't recommend Creature if it was going to be your only pin. It's out of budget any way but it's just too simple to exist on it's own. Great if you have a couple of games though.
Sorry, i meant if you could elaborate on the "once you've seen all the modes a dozen times, there's not a whole lot of.... pinball left." comment
Hey thanks for the input. Are there any others on my list that you would say are too simple to exist on their own also?
You've got a bunch of modes to play that basically amount to 'hit this shot', a couple of multiballs. a video mode (ignoring the secret input ones) and a 'everything lit' wizard mode at the end, and an orbit hurry-up. There's not much more than that left, and with those gone, you're left with a widebody pinball game. Widebody pinball games are always a little less fast and smooth flowing as there's more travel space, more angles and a whole lot more of 'nothing' to hit. TNG leaves you with two ramps to hit off the bottom flippers, the standard orbits, pop bumpers that you can't really shoot for, and two long, small hole shots with a lot of standing targets covering everything else. The third flipper gives you a mode hole and a ramp.Sorry, i meant if you could elaborate on the "once you've seen all the modes a dozen times, there's not a whole lot of.... pinball left." comment
That's not a massive lot to do on a widebody. Compare to Twilight Zone, Roadshow, Judge Dredd, Demolition Man... it just doesn't feel like there's much to *do* on TNG other than the modes. I don't recall the standing targets doing anything memorable either, unfortunately - nothing you want to go out of your way to shoot for.
I'm a Steve Ritchie fanboy but this is one of the few from him that I don't really go out of my way for.
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It's also worth noting that owning multiple pinballs can be a good thing....if I want a quick blast and no brain pinball then Flintstones is my first choice. If I want some more frustrating and thoughtful play, then Roadshow.....pinballs can happily reside in most rooms in the house with some furniture moving.....
I'm largely penniless and also currently living in a flat. Just ain't an option right now
Sadly prices have rocketed in the past 18m or so. 2k is now what perhaps 1.4k was back then.
18m ago 2k got a lot of nice titles, but the world has moved on. Just buy a wpc era game and see if you like it. If not, sell it on.
With a 2k budget you could just stand by for month after month and miss out on a lot of perfectly good titles if you are not careful.
I bought a fish tales 18m ago for about 1100 I think. I never intended keeping it. I bought it as it was a really good condition, low use machine that had stood untouched for 10yrs plus and needed some tlc to get it going again.
I was never a great fan of the game so had only played it about 10 times in my life. I thought I would get it, repair it, play it and just sell it on.
Back in the day this was alongside Addams and that wiped the floor with it. At shows there were games I much preferred playing.
But as I played 2 flipper fish tales, I actually grew to love it. Despite the theme. Despite the sounds. It is actually a really, really good game. And I love the multiball and your options for stacking this with rock the boat. Or leaving your super jackpots for the start of a multiball when you get ball save.
In the past year I have played this game more often than any of my others
My favourite flipper arrangement is three flippers. But it does not matter really. Until you own a game AND tune it so it plays properly AND get to truly know the rules, you will never really know how good it might be.
18m ago 2k got a lot of nice titles, but the world has moved on. Just buy a wpc era game and see if you like it. If not, sell it on.
With a 2k budget you could just stand by for month after month and miss out on a lot of perfectly good titles if you are not careful.
I bought a fish tales 18m ago for about 1100 I think. I never intended keeping it. I bought it as it was a really good condition, low use machine that had stood untouched for 10yrs plus and needed some tlc to get it going again.
I was never a great fan of the game so had only played it about 10 times in my life. I thought I would get it, repair it, play it and just sell it on.
Back in the day this was alongside Addams and that wiped the floor with it. At shows there were games I much preferred playing.
But as I played 2 flipper fish tales, I actually grew to love it. Despite the theme. Despite the sounds. It is actually a really, really good game. And I love the multiball and your options for stacking this with rock the boat. Or leaving your super jackpots for the start of a multiball when you get ball save.
In the past year I have played this game more often than any of my others
My favourite flipper arrangement is three flippers. But it does not matter really. Until you own a game AND tune it so it plays properly AND get to truly know the rules, you will never really know how good it might be.
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Thanks for this - it's hugely helpful
