— QUICK HITS —
Spooky Pinball Teases Road Trip, Announces Expansion
Last week Spooky Pinball went on a road trip, with a little tease that “You’ll know why and where this spring / summer…”:
Spooky also announced that they are expanding again! They stated “Our goal is to increase quality, make more games, and get them to you quicker”:
Can’t wait to see what Spooky has been up to!!
The Pinball Show Interviews: Ben Heck Interview
Last week The Pinball Show Interviews interviewed Ben Heck – here are just a couple highlights:
On his next game with Chicago Gaming Company:
Ben: Right now, CGC has two games ahead of me, they have their next remake and then their first non-remake game. So right now we’re taking my design and figuring out how to do things, and changing some things with the upper playfield…
On Spooky Pinball’s Timeline:
Ben: We’re developing the new driver board system for the Spooky game…we’re getting the final prototypes and then we have to do the full production run because Spooky is starting their new game in June.
He also talks about:
- parts shortages
- the new driver boards
- flow and stopping the ball
- theme integration
- a Bible pinball theme
- deeproot
- licensed vs non-licensed themes
- tracking down bugs in programming for pinball
Check out the full episode here!!
Last Week’s Poll Results
Dead Flip: How To Make Your Own Pinball Machine In Visual Pinball
Last week Dead Flip released a crash course on making your own pinball machine in Visual Pinball – check it out!
TWIPYs Coverage
Slash from Guns N’ Roses shared about his TWIPYs win on Instagram last week to over 3.5 million followers!!
Jersey Jack Pinball also shared their Game of the Year acceptance video:
Trophies and plaques are shipping this week!!
Abe Flips: How to Ski Pass
deeproot Pinball Update – Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland Update
Dear RAZA Customer:
We hope all is well. As promised before we want to provide a timely update about where things are now…
The latest we have from the lab is that the UL for the U.S.A. and Canada reports are being prepared. We have passed the SAA requirements and 95% of the CE requirements. While product safety have passed, the emissions and interference tests metrics for a few of the CE countries require additional modifications. We are still being told it will take 4-5 weeks for the final CE certification reports after our fixes pass the tests. The UL reports should be herein in the next few weeks which allow us to move forward on those machines.
We continue to appreciate many of our vendors being able to timely get us quality parts to spec. Unfortunately some vendors are still having issues with global and regional supply chain disruptions. We thank you again for your patience. Despite the past, we don’t want to be known as the company that customers can rely on for delays. Our entire team is very cognizant of that and are working hard to be accountable for lead and time lines. As we are coming up on five months now since we opened up orders, when our teams were confident they could delivery by February to March, we definitely are frustrated at our inability to follow through and overcome internal and external obstacles. While some things are outside of our control, we understand the importance of delivering on the promises made. As such, it now doesn’t make any sense to make more RAZA machines than orders.
With current lead times on the certifications and parts, there will not be any significant updates in the next 6 weeks. Our goal is to update in mid May and at that time (if games are not imminently ready to start shipping) to offer some financial relief for the delays in the form of a return of store credit, discount of the RAZA purchase, or allow customers to rescind RAZA purchases for a refund with nominal interest.
To those on this mail list that are not RAZA customers but are waiting for surplus machines, we are so sorry that there will no longer be surplus machines. However, if some RAZA customers decide to rescind their contracts, we will offer those first-come, first serve machines to the list for the original prices. Please do not contact us about this yet. We will only be able to provide an idea of availability closer to end of May once purchasers decide if they want to rescind their purchase.
Best!
Homepin Update
Last week Homepin shared that “we shipped out the very first “Made in Taiwan” Homepin pinball machine”:
There was some speculation as to what this machine was, and Homepin said this in the comments:
This post was more about the fact that FINALLY, after a year of hard work and basically having to start again from scratch, we are up and running again and making finished machines that are leaving the factory. This one was the first to leave of several from this small run of corporate machines. Our new Pinball title coming soon but not for several months.
Pinball Expo New Website
Pinball Expo released a cool new website last week – check it out!!
Buffalo Pinball: 12 Games in 12 Hours
It’s back! After a 4-year hiatus, “12 GAMES IN 12 HOURS” returns for round #3. Tune in for a day full of your favorite BP streamers and a bunch of great pinball machines.
LAST DAY: Support North Star Pinball Bar
HELP SAVE LOCATION PINBALL!!
North Star opened in 2015 and openly flouted a bylaw that forbade pinball machines from being operated in places that served alcohol. Pinball was essentially illegal in Montreal, and after 2 years of lobbying we were able to change the laws and build a thriving pinball community. To celebrate, we had a prohibition party where we gave away a pinball machine with special guests Roger and Ellen Sharpe.
We recently expanded our operating business, and just before Covid launched a project with the Montreal Canadiens NHL team to operate an arcade at their home arena. Here we exposed tens of thousands of people to a stellar lineup of pinball machines, and a short few weeks after, Covid hit and completely destroyed our business.
So they got Johnny Crap (artist: Jurassic Park) to make them some awesome shirts – please buy one to help this location, click here!!
Pintastic Announcement
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Pintastic New England 2021 Will Be Later in the Year
(Charlton, MA, USA) – Pintastic New England announced Saturday (April 3) that the 2021 show will be a full-featured pinball and game-room event on November 18-21, 2021. The show will be back at the Sturbridge Host Hotel, which is undergoing substantial renovation. The hotel is in Sturbridge, Massachusetts, just a couple miles from the junction of I-90 and I-84.
The Pintastic show has free play rooms, tournaments, seminars, a vendor hall with commercial booths, and entertainment for kids. If weather permits, there will be an outdoor flea market for casual sellers.
Updates and answers to FAQs will be posted on the pintasticnewengland.com website as needed.
Only available THIS month from The Super Awesome Pinball Show!!
High quality pinball apparel!
#pinballforall
— Cool and Crazy Stuff —
Ghostbusters Pinball on Saturday Night Live!
Happy Retirement Wally Welch!
Amazing Star Wars Pinball Topper
Drone Footage Soars Over Thousands of Pinball Machines
Other Quick Hits:
- Happy birthday Craig Bobbie, Anthony Kurkowski, Kyle Spiteri, and Joe Fox!!
- IFPAburgh coming 2022 unless it is an April’s Fools Joke…
Other Manufacturers
More
Team Pinball: The Mafia
Circus Maximus: Kingpin, Python’s Pinball Circus
Homepin: Thunderbirds, Chinese Zombies
Suncoast Pinball: Cosmic Carnival
Great Lakes Pinball: Exposé
Dutch Pinball: Bride of Pinbot 2.0, Bride of Pinbot 3.0 (on hold), The Big Lebowski (production/legal issues)
Silver Castle Pinball: Timeshock
Phénix Pinball: Goblin Contest
Pinball Adventures: Punny Factory, Sushi-Mania, Ninja Mania, First Class, Canada Eh!