A positive invasion of UK players travelled to Boras in Sweden to take part in ECS 2024, great to see such a good turnout and to have so many players able to make it into an event which is only open to those that have placed well enough in the qualifying events through the year.
Had an awesome weekend at a really great venue in Boras. Many thanks to Christian and the whole team there for organising such a great weekend. If anyone has a chance to go (only 30min from Gothenburg) then it’s well worth a visit: https://www.pinballseye.se/
Great UK turnout with Gene, Yuen, Josh, Will, Peter and Jeremy all in the main ECS tournament with multiple qualifiers into the finals of both the ECS and Classics Open.
The weekend opened with the JAWS launch party, which for some reason didn’t include playing JAWS - that was taking coins in a ‘winner takes 50%’ high score game that was being led by Arvid on 900M when we left on Sunday.
In the launch party comp, Jeremy qualified outright, leaving Josh, Will and Yuen in an eight way playoff for the single sixteenth finals spot. Eight single player games of TNA later, and Will’s opening score of 700k was enough to get him into the finals, which went on late into the night.
The BPO Classics qualifying took place Friday and Saturday and was tough as it involved playing three games on eight machines in one of two banks with all scores counting - 24 games - so an odd bad game was OK, but consistently ‘good’ was better than extremes
In classics, Josh and Gene both qualified but lost in the first round
Jeremy made it through to the round of 32 as did Yuen, only to meet Jorian who was in Yuen’s words “on another level”
Will having aced qualifying got a bye and then faced Paul Jongma who he beat 3-2 to make it into the last 16 where he lost out to Johnny Martensson
With Gene having got into the main ECS, Dave Dutton and I went to the consolation tournament a few km away and he made it into the finals of that. My best game of the weekend (getting to Final Frontier on STTNG) and two wins after some really good pizza for lunch still left me well down the rankings (again) and the only one of us not to make a final.
Gene made the Sunday Cool Down tournament final, with a great set of wins in target match play.
In the Main ECS Tournament, Yuen had won 12/15 games in qualifying and entering as fifth seed his reward was picks against Julio which is where his great run unfortunately ended.
Will progressed past Frederick but faced Arvid in the round of 16 and exited there
Josh started 5-1 in his group but a run of 1-5 that followed left him needing to win his final three games to stand any chance of qualifying, which he managed to do to take the last spot in his group.
He faced local Jonas Valstrom in the first round, losing the first game on Dr Who being unable to find the loops.
That was followed by a brilliant first ball on his pick of Turtles of 47M leaving Jonas little chance to catch him.
Funhouse left Josh 4M behind coming into ball 3, which Josh managed to grind out to take the lead 2-1
Josh’s second pick was The Walking Dead, which started badly for both players on ball 1, but on the second ball, Josh put in a 40M Barn to push ahead after Jonas managed 25M. On ball 3, the usual STDM return from the pops left Josh moving the machine a full 3 inches (on carpet) to the left, follwed by a nervous wait to see only two warnings come up (somehow). Bloodbath with CDC allowed him to make it onto 110M which proved too much for Jonas.
Needing to win, Jonas picked Johnny Mnemonic, starting with a great save and a 120M video mode. Josh managed the same in the video mode followed by Cyberspace MB pushing him to 700M. Jonas second ball got him just past Josh’s score and on ball 2 Josh again used both his warnings for another big move to keep the ball in play, finishing on 1B. With Jonas unable to catch up on ball 3, Josh progressed 4-1
The round of 16 opponent was Johan Genberg, another local who picked Iron Man as the first machine with neither player doing much on their first two balls. On ball 3, Johan swapped to the relative safety of the ramps, with Bogeys leaving him finishing on 13.7M. Josh started on 2M, and got his MB going but that only added 7M. He then also switched to ramps but a missed ramp shot once again left the ball heading towards the drain. Yet another two danger save allowed Josh to ramp out to take the win.
On to Turtles again, but this time Josh wasn’t able to make anything in Turtle power, yet again (theme!) moving the machine a few inches to save a STDM drain which allowed him to start the Pizza MB though again he struggled to make many shots, setting a target of 6M which despite several Mondo JPs proved just about sufficient with Johan finishing on 4.2M
Mousin Around again ended up being all on the third ball. Johan collecting a 2M JP which eluded Josh, taking the score to 2-1
Back to TWD and both players got the STDM feed. On ball 2 Josh again used both dangers getting control of the ball, before starting Barn and getting to 50M and then Bloodbath on ball 3 ending on 67M. Johan was aiming for Prison, but was unable to deal with the STDM return leaving him 3-1 down.
Funhouse was the next game and Johan worked his way through to set Josh a daunting target of 13M coming into ball 3 with very little score of his own. Several saves and controlled play to pick away at the score allowed him to gradually catch up, finally getting past the target score and, like last year, booking a place in the last eight.
Timber Engelbeen provided a much bigger challenge. First up was Led Zeppelin, with Timber on ball 2 making several great saves with two locks in place to get control and start Zeppelin, having already selected his tour. Once the first MB ended, the next shot was to start 1975 Tour MB setting a target of 116M. Josh was unable to save his first ball, which went straight to the outline (zero ball saves on these games) and Josh wasn’t able to find the shots to catch Timber’s score.
Turtles next and Josh again got Turtle Power and Pizza MB, but whilst he was backhanding the right ramp fine, he wasn’t finding the other shots as reliably, the 40 Pizza slices button adding to his final total of 13.2M. Timber got his own, ‘straight to outline’ feed on ball 2 and on ball 3 needed to use his tilt warnings to make his own save with Pizaa MB ready to go. Controlled play in the MB allowed him to pick off enough shots that a final 2M Mondo JP took him past Josh’s score to lead 2-0
On Dr Who both players struggled to find the loops on ball one, with Timber switching to Who Loops on ball 2. Josh managed 28 loops including sonic booms to end on 179M after two balls which Timber was unable to catch.
Back to TWD and Josh qualified a mode on all three balls, every time getting a bad sling feed back from the final drop target. On ball 1 a great save sent it into the slings and out, with similar on balls 2 and 3, meaning he was unable to catch the 7.5M Barn that Timber had put on on ball two.
STTNG was Timber’s next pick, putting up a very fast 473M after selecting Warp which was increased to 1.4B by the third ball. Josh wasn’t able to catch after an early drain and so he lost 4-1 with Timber continuing on to beat Peter Andersen to claim his place in the final.
Josh’s dream of winning a NIB machine was gone, and he ended up in an identical position to last year once again managing joint 6th overall. However, because all other quarter finalists had already qualified thought country rankings or tournaments, Josh claims the ECS spot for the IFPA19 World Pinball Championships in California this June! I suspect that’s one tournament Dawn may just about be prepared to come to with us, being slightly more appealing than a weekend in Croydon, Birmingham or a basement in freezing Boras!!
In the ECS finals, Daniele battled his way through the youngsters of Paul Englert, Viggo Lowgren, Arvid Flygare and Hugo Ritter to face Timber in the final which he went on to win 4-1 continuing the controlled accurate shooting he’d been dialled into all weekend.
Had an awesome weekend at a really great venue in Boras. Many thanks to Christian and the whole team there for organising such a great weekend. If anyone has a chance to go (only 30min from Gothenburg) then it’s well worth a visit: https://www.pinballseye.se/
Great UK turnout with Gene, Yuen, Josh, Will, Peter and Jeremy all in the main ECS tournament with multiple qualifiers into the finals of both the ECS and Classics Open.
The weekend opened with the JAWS launch party, which for some reason didn’t include playing JAWS - that was taking coins in a ‘winner takes 50%’ high score game that was being led by Arvid on 900M when we left on Sunday.
In the launch party comp, Jeremy qualified outright, leaving Josh, Will and Yuen in an eight way playoff for the single sixteenth finals spot. Eight single player games of TNA later, and Will’s opening score of 700k was enough to get him into the finals, which went on late into the night.
The BPO Classics qualifying took place Friday and Saturday and was tough as it involved playing three games on eight machines in one of two banks with all scores counting - 24 games - so an odd bad game was OK, but consistently ‘good’ was better than extremes
In classics, Josh and Gene both qualified but lost in the first round
Jeremy made it through to the round of 32 as did Yuen, only to meet Jorian who was in Yuen’s words “on another level”
Will having aced qualifying got a bye and then faced Paul Jongma who he beat 3-2 to make it into the last 16 where he lost out to Johnny Martensson
With Gene having got into the main ECS, Dave Dutton and I went to the consolation tournament a few km away and he made it into the finals of that. My best game of the weekend (getting to Final Frontier on STTNG) and two wins after some really good pizza for lunch still left me well down the rankings (again) and the only one of us not to make a final.
Gene made the Sunday Cool Down tournament final, with a great set of wins in target match play.
In the Main ECS Tournament, Yuen had won 12/15 games in qualifying and entering as fifth seed his reward was picks against Julio which is where his great run unfortunately ended.
Will progressed past Frederick but faced Arvid in the round of 16 and exited there
Josh started 5-1 in his group but a run of 1-5 that followed left him needing to win his final three games to stand any chance of qualifying, which he managed to do to take the last spot in his group.
He faced local Jonas Valstrom in the first round, losing the first game on Dr Who being unable to find the loops.
That was followed by a brilliant first ball on his pick of Turtles of 47M leaving Jonas little chance to catch him.
Funhouse left Josh 4M behind coming into ball 3, which Josh managed to grind out to take the lead 2-1
Josh’s second pick was The Walking Dead, which started badly for both players on ball 1, but on the second ball, Josh put in a 40M Barn to push ahead after Jonas managed 25M. On ball 3, the usual STDM return from the pops left Josh moving the machine a full 3 inches (on carpet) to the left, follwed by a nervous wait to see only two warnings come up (somehow). Bloodbath with CDC allowed him to make it onto 110M which proved too much for Jonas.
Needing to win, Jonas picked Johnny Mnemonic, starting with a great save and a 120M video mode. Josh managed the same in the video mode followed by Cyberspace MB pushing him to 700M. Jonas second ball got him just past Josh’s score and on ball 2 Josh again used both his warnings for another big move to keep the ball in play, finishing on 1B. With Jonas unable to catch up on ball 3, Josh progressed 4-1
The round of 16 opponent was Johan Genberg, another local who picked Iron Man as the first machine with neither player doing much on their first two balls. On ball 3, Johan swapped to the relative safety of the ramps, with Bogeys leaving him finishing on 13.7M. Josh started on 2M, and got his MB going but that only added 7M. He then also switched to ramps but a missed ramp shot once again left the ball heading towards the drain. Yet another two danger save allowed Josh to ramp out to take the win.
On to Turtles again, but this time Josh wasn’t able to make anything in Turtle power, yet again (theme!) moving the machine a few inches to save a STDM drain which allowed him to start the Pizza MB though again he struggled to make many shots, setting a target of 6M which despite several Mondo JPs proved just about sufficient with Johan finishing on 4.2M
Mousin Around again ended up being all on the third ball. Johan collecting a 2M JP which eluded Josh, taking the score to 2-1
Back to TWD and both players got the STDM feed. On ball 2 Josh again used both dangers getting control of the ball, before starting Barn and getting to 50M and then Bloodbath on ball 3 ending on 67M. Johan was aiming for Prison, but was unable to deal with the STDM return leaving him 3-1 down.
Funhouse was the next game and Johan worked his way through to set Josh a daunting target of 13M coming into ball 3 with very little score of his own. Several saves and controlled play to pick away at the score allowed him to gradually catch up, finally getting past the target score and, like last year, booking a place in the last eight.
Timber Engelbeen provided a much bigger challenge. First up was Led Zeppelin, with Timber on ball 2 making several great saves with two locks in place to get control and start Zeppelin, having already selected his tour. Once the first MB ended, the next shot was to start 1975 Tour MB setting a target of 116M. Josh was unable to save his first ball, which went straight to the outline (zero ball saves on these games) and Josh wasn’t able to find the shots to catch Timber’s score.
Turtles next and Josh again got Turtle Power and Pizza MB, but whilst he was backhanding the right ramp fine, he wasn’t finding the other shots as reliably, the 40 Pizza slices button adding to his final total of 13.2M. Timber got his own, ‘straight to outline’ feed on ball 2 and on ball 3 needed to use his tilt warnings to make his own save with Pizaa MB ready to go. Controlled play in the MB allowed him to pick off enough shots that a final 2M Mondo JP took him past Josh’s score to lead 2-0
On Dr Who both players struggled to find the loops on ball one, with Timber switching to Who Loops on ball 2. Josh managed 28 loops including sonic booms to end on 179M after two balls which Timber was unable to catch.
Back to TWD and Josh qualified a mode on all three balls, every time getting a bad sling feed back from the final drop target. On ball 1 a great save sent it into the slings and out, with similar on balls 2 and 3, meaning he was unable to catch the 7.5M Barn that Timber had put on on ball two.
STTNG was Timber’s next pick, putting up a very fast 473M after selecting Warp which was increased to 1.4B by the third ball. Josh wasn’t able to catch after an early drain and so he lost 4-1 with Timber continuing on to beat Peter Andersen to claim his place in the final.
Josh’s dream of winning a NIB machine was gone, and he ended up in an identical position to last year once again managing joint 6th overall. However, because all other quarter finalists had already qualified thought country rankings or tournaments, Josh claims the ECS spot for the IFPA19 World Pinball Championships in California this June! I suspect that’s one tournament Dawn may just about be prepared to come to with us, being slightly more appealing than a weekend in Croydon, Birmingham or a basement in freezing Boras!!
In the ECS finals, Daniele battled his way through the youngsters of Paul Englert, Viggo Lowgren, Arvid Flygare and Hugo Ritter to face Timber in the final which he went on to win 4-1 continuing the controlled accurate shooting he’d been dialled into all weekend.
