I apologize for posting this.

A modest crowd for this tournament so we did Double-Elim best of 3 matches, and then rounded out the evening with tommy dollar games, including an epic 8-dollar one-handed finale.

Next tournament is 8/23 and will award WPPR points.  I’ll have some more raffle prizes to give out.  See you then.

Professional Photographer Devon Kelly took this stunning photograph. Devon is available for weddings and bah mitvas.

1 Tj Beyer : $22.00 (+ t shirt)
2 Chris Heilig : $16.50
3 Jonny O : $11.00
4 Darren Ensley : $5.50
5 Chris Lindboe
5 Devon Kelly
7 Steve Frisvold
7 Eric Wagensonner
9 Debbie Cluney
9 Chalissa Parisi (+ t shirt)

This short fan-made documentary is really great.  It profiles one of my favorite players, Sean Grant.  The guys just wants it so bad.  He even hooked up a date while he was in Chicago!  The tournament is the Chicago Pinball Expo Flipout 2002.

Chris Kuntz is one of the most highly respected pinball technicians anywhere. In addition to his main business, Chris works with the Pacific Pinball Museum repairing and training other technicians.  You’ll also see Chris volunteering his skills at shows like Pin a Go Go to keep the 200 machines up all weekend.

His new business is called Pinball Pirate through which he does Sales and Repair work throughout the bay area.

The Benecia Times-Harold recently did a piece on Chris.  Check it out!

BENICIA — As one of the Bay Area’s last remaining pinball technicians, Chris Kuntz is helping preserve the colorful arcade games he loves — one flipper, plunger and bumper at a time.

Read More here.

Japanese girls do surf rock.  That’s a pretty awesome combination.

This is the sort of thing I think would really liven up future LCD displays.  And why not throw in a few virtual pop bumpers while they’re at it?

There’s so many possibilities with an LCD.  There could be mini pinball tutorials that show how to do flipper skills such as a drop catch which could be “unlocked” during gameplay or awarded as an alternate match award.  There could be a multiball which consists of playing real pinball on the playfield and a virtual pinball in the backglass at the same time.

Wizard of Oz is still very much a work-in-progress but so far I can’t say I like the direction they’re going in with the LCD.  Chopping it into four sections is basically the equivalent of having four DMD displays to follow. I think it will confuse all but advanced players.  The windows and graphics themselves don’t look particularly attractive, either.  Still, it’s a work-in-progress and a first effort with this new technology so we’ll just have to wait and see what the final product looks like, and where they take this technology in the future.

This song is about a mostly-forgotten type of pinball machine known as a Bingo.  Bingo Pinballs don’t have any flippers and were manufactured in the US from around the 1950s – 1970s (oddly enough, they are still made in China for Latin American markets).

Above: Three United Triple Play Bingos. Similar to slot machines, the more money you wager the more features become available. In this case, you could play up to three cards.   (collection of Dan Fontes)

Bingos were designed more or less exclusively for gambling and that’s why pinball continued to be illegal in most major cities for a long time even after flippers were invented in 1947.  They were basically slot machines with a plunger.  In many cases the lawyers didn’t differentiate between flipper and flipper-less games, they just banned them all.  Also, like all things gambling, the mob got in on the action, and the goal of making pinball illegal was often to take a swing at local organized crime syndicates.

Above: A roulette-style Bingo (collection of Dan Fontes)

Bingos tried to exist in sort of a grey area.  Everyone knew they were for gambling but they couldn’t be too obvious about it, so most weren’t built with a payout mechanism.  Instead, players earned free credits – A LOT of free credits (I’ve earned over 120 on the Bingo machine at the Pacific Pinball Museum but I’ve read of some that can go over a thousand).  You redeem the free credits with the bartender for cash or drinks.  The bartender would power cycle the machine or hit a knock-off switch to wipe the credits for the next player.

In Oakland, there are still anti-Bingo ordinances in the muni code.

Here’s an actual response to an Appeal from a Bingo operator in San Francisco in the 1950s.  Of course, the Operator denied the Bingos might have been used for gambling.  It says right on the machine: “For Amusement Only”!

Thanks to Jem for the song link.

A big THANK YOU goes out to Jeremy Williams for generously donating one his awesome TRON mini-arcade cabinet mods to the Pin a Go Go Auction.

This mod is frequently cited as one of the best pinball mods ever on the pinball message boards, and I can’t disagree.  In fact, I’ve seen a few posts of people who bought the mod before they even owned the game!  Put another way, his mod made TRON Pinball buyers out of non-buyers.  I don’t think a mod can be any more successful than that!

Jeremy even added a couple extra touches to this particular piece that will prevent the lights from burning out prematurely due to being over-powered by the screen.  So, in a way, it’s a limited edition.

So if you’re interested in owning one of these great add-ons to an already great game, make sure to enter your bid for it at the Pin a Go Go Auction the weekend of May 17th.  All proceeds of the show go to benefit local charities so it’s a win-win for everyone.

We still have two months until Pin a Go Go and I don’t want anyone to go into tourney withdrawal so I’m doing a tournament at the just-opened Legionnaire Saloon in Oakland.

Where: Legionnaire Saloon, 2272 Telegraph Ave, Oakland, CA

When: Tuesday 4/2 and Tuesday 4/23. I’ll be there by 6 PM.   The tournament will start at 7 PM.

WPPRs?: 4/2  is for cash only.  4/23 will also award World Pinball Player Ranking Points and kick off a 3-tournament series.  Even if you have never played in a pinball tournament before, by the end of the night you will be a world-ranked pinball player.

Kids ok?: No, the venue is 21+.  Sorry.

Food nearby?: Yes, burgers, taco bell, pizza, etc.

What Games?: Tentative games are Champion Pub, X-Men and Scared Stiff.

Entry Fee/Prizes: $5 + coin drop.  All $5 entries will be paid back as prizes.  5th – 8th: $5.  1st: 40% of remaining pot, 2nd 30%, 3rd 20%, 4th 10%.  I’ll try to get some T shirts and other stuff to award or raffle off.

How Long: If you make it all the way to the Finals, you should plan to be there until around 11pm.  Most people will be finished by 9 or 9:30.

Format: 4/2 will be group play with Finals.

Saturday March 16th marks San Francisco’s annual Brides of March event. The Brides of March is all about wearing a wedding dress, the uglier the better, and bar hop all over the city in your “virginal white” says FunCheapSF.