Revenge from Mars playfield sketch

by design and concept guy George Gomez

It’s More Fun to Compete – March

Chances to win PAPA 13 registration and/or division entries can be found out on the competitive pinball tournament circuit this month at the following events:

7th Annual Fairfax Pinball Open – March 5-7 – Fairfax, Virginia, USA

Balac’s Pinball Party – March 12-14 – Alingsås, Sweden

Texas Pinball Festival – March 19-21 – Grapevine, Texas, USA

6th Annual Ohio Pinball and Gameroom Festival – March 26-27 – Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, USA

Midwest Gaming Classic – March 27-28 – Brookfield, Wisconsin, USA

Cupids & Canines 3 – March 27 – Scott Township, Pennsylvania, USA

And if you’re a tournament director interested in adding PAPA 13 certificates to the prize pool at your fine event, get in touch with us here at PAPA HQ.

Good luck out there.

PAPA 13 Registration Open!

Truth.

‘grats to Sweden’s Patrik Bodin, first player registered for this year’s World Pinball Championships!

A History of Pinball – May 29, 1943

This rather extensive piece ran in Billboard Magazine’s 1943 Summer Special, a full four years before the advent of the electromechanical flipper:

Pinball is a modern game developed from an ancient idea known for many years as bagatelle. The word pinball was probably first coined by a Kentucky circuit court and used in Kentucky newspapers; it was first used in an unabridged dictionary in 1940.

It is easy, of course, to imagine the gradual development of bowling and pitch-in-the-hole marble games from these humble beginnings, but history itself leaves a gap in the development of bagatelle…

Fill in the juicy gaps for yourself – read the Billboard Magazine article in its entirety via the Google books archive. Really is quite an exhaustive study.

Name that Pin!

Just getting into Where the Buffalo Roam, and at ~14:50, in the Blast Magazine(Rolling Stone) editorial offices, there’s this EM in the background:

Can anyone identify which machine it is?

Update: The think tank that is rec.games.pinball has identified the game as a 1973 Williams Travel Time

Props to the Internet Pinball Database for the flyer.

Case closed!

Cupids & Canines 2010 Rescheduled

The new date for Cupids & Canines 2010 is Saturday, March 27!

Online ticket sales are open again.  I know this event conflicts with some other pinball events in the area, but it was really the only date that worked for the shelter and the majority of our organizers.  We’ll schedule it more carefully in future years – I don’t think it will be a February event anymore, given our luck with the weather.

Anyone who has already purchased tickets, your tickets are still valid.  You should have received an email from me already, with details about how to refund or transfer your tickets, if you cannot attend.

Nothing else has changed except the date.  We will still run the tournament and give away a machine.  You can view all of the details here: http://papa.org/cupids/2010/

How Fast Does A Pinball Travel?

Investigation courtesy of Jeri Ellsworth.

West and MidWest, this Week in Pinball

Couple of events happening this week that we’re happy to make you aware of:

West
Opening Friday, February 5th, and running through March 2, at the Pacific Pinball Museum in the San Francisco Bay Area, is an exhibition defining pinball as art.

From one of the PPM’s associated websites,
Written by, Melissa Harmon, Curator, Pacific Pinball Museum:

A Short History of Pinball, Fine Art and Good Taste

Pinball Art: Fine Art is a study of pinball imagery and original artwork as shown in selected galleries from the 70’s through 2010.

As the folks from the PPM were the inspiration for PAPA’s own custom pinball machine project, we’re proud to have Michael Budai’s Freak Out and Brian Holderman’s Luther’s Vendetta backglass art on display as part of this first exhibit in the Pacific Pinball Museum’s new space.
—

MidWest
On Saturday, February 6th, at PAPA HQ just outside Pittsburgh, PA, we’ll be hosting the 3rd annual Cupids & Canines charity event, benefiting the Western Pennsylvania Humane Society and a proprietary charity operated by Camp Bow Wow International, Inc. called Bow Wow Buddies.

Detailed information regarding the event, including times and ticket pricing, written up by PAPA President Kevin Martin, can be found on the Cupids & Canines portion of the PAPA web site.

Running the tournament at this event will be 2005’s PAPA 8 World Pinball Champion Bowen Kerins. Trent Augenstein will be on hand defending his C&C 2009 title.

As this is one of only two times annually PAPA is open to the public, and considering the fact that the #1 question we’re asked about PAPA is “Why open only once a year?” Pinball player’s and hobby enthusiasts alike ought to seize the opportunity to access the PAPA collection for the only time we’ll open our doors before PAPA 13 – the World Pinball Championships, August 12-15, 2010.

What Makes a Wizard

This article has bounced around in my head a while, and I know it’s not entirely coherent, but here we go.

Often, when someone who knows very little about pinball asks me about expert players, they assume the experts have some kind of wizard skills to bounce the ball back into play after it drains (death save, or bang back), or perhaps that they can shake the machine in a special way that makes the ball walk back up the outlane.  In the novice’s experiences, the ball drains all the time, so their assumption is that wizards have to deal with that.  Well, there are such techniques, some of them even acceptable in tournament play, but they’re not what makes a wizard.

What makes a wizard, first and foremost, is not draining.  Once you have longer ball times, you can use that time to focus on everything else in your game.

So how do we increase ball time?  Through ball control, shot selection, shot accuracy, and nudging.  Ball control is obvious – using live and dead catches to get the ball under your control.  Shot selection is important because there are many risky shots, where your chance of a sudden drain is very high, or where the kickout from that shot is dangerous.  Think of the Axl hole on Guns n Roses.  Shot accuracy is important because when you miss a shot, the ball is out of your control again (which is why a game such as Bram Stoker’s Dracula is so high-variance – almost every single successful shot you make takes the ball out of your control).

And finally, we come to nudging.  Nudging, and knowing when not to nudge, separates the wizards from the rest.  A wizard player is looking ahead three or four bounces, in terms of when they should or should not nudge, and in what way.  Recognizing exactly which ball trajectories are dangerous, and which ones are already good and shouldn’t be nudged, takes a lot of time to learn.  For this, there is no substitute for thousands of hours of experience.  Experts are thinking things like “I have to push the ball up off of the top of the right slingshot so it goes into the left target bank instead of the left drain, but not so hard that it will come back down the center; preferably it will come to the left flipper for a live catch”.

The late great poker player Chip Reese once listened to a hand described to him by Annie Duke, where by the river, she was in an extremely difficult situation against two opponents.  None of her questions led to what was, to him, the obvious answer: “You should have pushed all-in on the flop.”  In that particular situation, that move was the equivalent of planning ahead several bounces in pinball.

Chip Reese also famously said this about the best poker players in the world: “When they are on their A game, they are all fantastic players, some probably better than my A game.  The thing is, my D game isn’t much different than my A game.”  That’s my definition of a pinball wizard, as well.

Tournament Approaches: One-Hit Wonders

When playing pinball in a tournament, the only goal is points.  In match play, of course, you just want more points than your opponent(s).  In qualifying, formats vary — some tournaments only reward the top 8 or 12 scores, so a high score is necessary.  At PAPA, you can earn points for as low as 87th place on a game, but you qualify by playing well on all the games in one “run”.  In PAPA qualifying, consistency is rewarded far more than a single high score.

A good tournament game has multiple strategies, so there are ways for players to “go for broke” or “play it safe”.  Unfortunately, some games (even very popular and successful games) are terrible in tournaments because they reward a single strategy far more than any other.  Then, of course, everyone just plays that one strategy… it’s boring to watch, boring to play, and the winner is the one willing to lather, rinse, and repeat more than their bored opponents.

Here are a few games where a single strategy can dominate, and what you should do to crush anyone who doesn’t do the exact same thing.  I hope some of these are a little surprising.

Star Wars (Data East): Probably the most obvious one-hit wonder, Star Wars has a center ramp that scores 3 million at 3 ramps… then 8 million at 8 ramps… uh, then 33 million at 33 ramps.  Even if the ramp didn’t also spot progress toward other game objectives, it’s an easy shot and hittable from either flipper.  Don’t do anything else, except when multiball is lit for free on Ball 3.  Many games fall into this “one shot all day” trap, such as Police Force and Hurricane.

Junkyard: The classic example of a one-hit wonder from PAPA qualifying.  Players realized at PAPA 6 that the game’s video mode was repeatable, and worth an increasing number of points each time (500k… 1m… 1.5m… 2m… 20m…).  In the end, this strategy dominated play on Junkyard, and the game dominated the qualifying table for the tournament’s A Division.  Several players qualified for the finals entirely on their Junkyard score.  Judge Dredd has a similar exploit, with its left ramp worth the same scores, but there is enough points in the rest of the game that “left ramp all day” doesn’t really pay off without making 30 or 40 ramps.

Earthshaker: The center ramp is worth 50k to 100k per shot, plus 2 miles — no big deal, except at 99 miles every further ramp shot is 200k.  If this ramp is easy enough, there’s no sense in playing for anything else.  (Whirlwind has the same ramp points, but plenty more points available in its modes and multiballs, so the ramp strategy doesn’t dominate there.)

Theater of Magic: Many players don’t play its one-hit strategy: the left loop!  Loop shots lead to bonus multipliers, and loop shots are part of the bonus!  This can make each loop shot, by itself, worth 4 million per ball in bonus.  Every 7 loops lights a 50m Hurry-Up at the trunk, but some players ignore it, especially if the loop shots are continuous, scoring COMBO points of 2m, 4m, 6m, 8m… with no limit until you miss.  This strategy makes end-of-ball bonus overwhelming, so don’t tilt.

Revenge From Mars: A surprising strategy can dominate all others on this game: shoot the lock!  Six shots start multiball, with three of them going to the bonus multiplier lanes.  Then, during multiball… shoot the lock!  Revenge’s multiball allows you to shoot any major shot, as long as you’re willing to wait for the saucer to reappear.  So keep shooting the lock.  It returns safely to the flipper for another lock shot, and you’re getting bonus multipliers (typically 1 million each, more on a long ball).  Then when the Super Jackpot is lit… hm, maybe shoot the lock!  This strategy works partially because multiball never gets any more difficult to start.

Cue Ball Wizard: Many games, including Cue Ball Wizard, have a set of modes with a “big mode” at the end.  If the next mode lights up automatically when one ends, consider “timing out” the modes (trapping the ball and waiting) in order to get to the “big mode” more safely.  In this game, it’s a 3-ball multiball where every target is 5 million.  Would you rather advance toward that, or shoot that Rowdy Ramp for 2 million?  Your choice!  No Fear also falls deeply into this category, with 5 modes followed by 3 “big modes”, as does Roller Coaster Tycoon.  These “timeout” games are especially boring to play in tournaments, but points is points.

Some other quick hits from recent PAPA qualifying:

• Corvette: combos, combos, combos, especially during multiball.
• Demolition Man: MTL lights “Claw”. Claw lights multiball.  Another claw starts multiball.
• Paragon: drop targets = bonus + multiplier + extra ball.
• Spider-Man (Stern): Octopus all day.
• Elvira: Right ramp all day, although in tournament the Jackpot is big enough to go for.
• NBA (Stern): Right ramp all day.  ALL DAY unless extra ball or special is lit.  And those come from shooting the right ramp.
• Tales of the Arabian Nights: Shoot the bumpers.  Make sure the “Harem” light is lit or it won’t go to the bumpers.  When multiball begins… shoot the bumpers!
• Indy 500: Loops, loops, loops, especially the left loop to “turbo” combo.

I’m sure I’ve missed many good examples, so feel free to add your comments.  The best tournament games don’t have single, exploitable strategies like these, and it’s one reason why you keep seeing the same rotation of games at PAPA.

- Bowen