There is zero (0) reason I don't currently own a pinball machine. There are several listed on my local Craigslist right now for between $500 and $2500 USD. I could simply play pinball whenever my heart desired. The fellas who bankrupt early and rode with someone else when we play cards could have something do. I could maintain it obsessively, finding original manuals and schematics. They don't depreciate significantly if maintained. Am I a moron for not owning one? Why don't you people own one?
I picked up my first two last year - they require a decent amount of maintenance -- more the older they are.
Home use only machines will be in better shape - my 2018 Stern pin (3rd owner, home use only) has only really needed replacements of the coil stops and sleeves for the the upper flippers.
On the other hand, my 2002 Stern machine (3rd owner, but first was on location in a Century theater where it saw thousands of plays) required in just two months of ownership:
- diagnosis and replacement of a bad bridge rectifier for the controlled lights,
- new plumb bob (machine info showed it had never reported a tilt before - looks like it had been removed before ever been played),
- clear mylar patch on the playfield near the plunger lane exit,
- replacement of the main power cable -- someone had ripped out the third/ground prong (which is apparently very common),
- redoing the connections inside the power box -- someone had decided all the connectors should just live in giant solder balls.....,
- replacement of the coin door lock mechanism,
- replacement of a flipper return spring
and it has a few cracked pieces of protective plastic that just aren't worth trying to find replacements for.
In total all together that's still less than $50 in parts, but figuring out the lights issue took weeks, and some of these required soldering. (And desoldering! I strongly recommend the Hakko FR301 desoldering tool instead of mucking about with copper braid.)
For the prices you listed, I would guess you're looking at older machines, which will probably have more issues sooner than new (but not brand-new!) pins. I suggest pinside.com for the classifieds and also the "_X_ Machine Owner" forum threads which might have game-specific info for you. Stern has very detailed manuals, and pinballlife/marcospecialties have just about every part you might need when you do have a problem.
This is the best, most helpful message I've ever received in response to something I've typed on the Internet. I'll take it to heart, thanks boss.
Edit: to further take advantage of your kindness, let me ask you a question: it looks like an old bowling alley near me has several machines reported to be non functional, including an Elvira and the Party Monsters. In your humble restoration opinion, would it make sense for me to stop by and give them the old "eh it's busted? Maybe I can do something with it. Sell it to me for $400?" type spheel and see if I can dump ~$700 into it to get a functional machine for a good price? I wouldn't be looking to resell.
https://pinside.com/pinball/machine/elvira-and-the-party-mon...https://www.afpinball.com/restorations/system-11b-mpu-batter...
Aww I'm glad it helped! I wanted to illustrate the amount of upkeep it takes to even keep a machine that was already about 99% working from disrepair.
I think you could give the offer a shot, but it looks like the market is a good bit higher - the bigger the discount the more you're probably going to have to work to get it operational. It looks like you've already got a headstart on that, so if none of this is scaring you off, I say do it! My two machines are Whitestar and Spike2 systems, and are from Stern, which is still operating. My concern going for Party Monsters would be that System 11(B?!) boards and replacement parts may be in short supply, and I can't comment on the quality of documentation for it all.
Watch out though - I see posts about mods in the game thread. My newer machine came with 6-7 already installed by the first owner, which got me hooked. At this point I've added another 25 or so... I think I spend as much time working on these machines as I do playing them (but my goal is to make my own machine, so every piece of work comes with learnings and better understanding of what's in store for me.)
Post back here later and let me know what you end up doing!
You're making good sense about the pitfalls, and I think these might be great for me to bring up when negotiating price. It looks to me like the machine is in pretty good shape for its age and being a bowling alley machine. It also has a topper (that I didn't get in the photo) and seems stock. https://ibb.co/pZV1Vx5
When I arrived the lights in that area weren't even turned on in that section of the building because, as they said, most of the machines are broken. It can't be making him money if it's not even worth it to the run the lights. The out of order paper in the machine looks like it has been there for 5+ years (it could be used on different machines when they go out but I don't think so).
If I can swoop in and buy it for $500 or less I think I'm going to. I have to keep it low on the off chance I end up with a paperweight. My wife won't be thrilled about the booby lady pinball but at that price she can't get too mad. I'll home it at a buddy's house for now if it comes to it.
I'll keep you posted about any developments, thank you again for your help.
To get that game for $500 I think the owners would need to be at a point where they're sick of it and just want it gone.
A couple of thoughts:
1. Games on location are often not owned by the location, but instead owned by a third-party operator that is responsible for maintenance and splits coin drop with the location.
2. Since the game is on location it was probably playable at some point recently. It may be off because of something simple like a rubber ring breaking and the ball keeps getting stuck or an important switch not registering, but the operator hasn't had a chance to fix it. If it was recently and only needs minor work, its value is more likely to be $5,000 than $500.
3. Even if it has been broken and not working for years, its value would heavily depend on the cosmetic condition. A non-working machine with a great cabinet (artwork without fade, no dings) and no wear or damage to the playfield would still probably be worth closer to $2-3,000.
You're making good points.
1. I neglected to mention that I confirmed the owner owned the machines. The employee I spoke to said she was going to approach the owner about purchasing the pacman machine herself.
2. The location seems like it's being kept alive by bowling leagues. I wouldn't be shocked if it wasn't there in five years. They quite literally do not turn the lights on in this section of the building.
3. You're right that I'm off on the price, but I'm starting with 400. If he wants to try to sell it online and ship it or deal with the arcade two cities away he can, but it's a question of how much it's worth it to him. I bought a grandfather clock six months ago for $100. It never hurts to ask. I won't weep or be rude if it doesn't work out. I've found I can get great prices on low volume stuff.
I don't particularly think it will work out, I just need to try so I can throw my hands up in the air and answer my original question in this thread with "I don't own one... because they're too darn expensive".
But dag on I want it. Elvira is calling to me.
You've also given me great information in this thread, thank you.
Idk, once fixed my machine the first time after buying it, I haven't had to fix a thing in 7yrs.
Star Race, 1980
Hired a tech to resolder some switches and then replace the main board with a maddog and I literally have done nothing to it since 2017ish and even then that was just putting new flipper rubbers on...
I got a virtual pinball machine which gives me all of the fun of owning a pinball machine with almost none of the maintenance. My machine is the size of a normal wide body pinball cabinet and works like a normal machine does as far as tilt/bumping, flippers, coin door, etc go. If you have the time and passion for keeping up a regular pinball I would go that route. If you want something a bit more easy to maintain but just as fun to play I would look for a virtual pinball setup.
They're big and heavy and have a lot of wear parts that are expensive to maintain. Standing in one spot not blinking isn't great. I can play pinball in VR and have about an equally good experience these days.
My father had several of these mechanical machines during my early adulthood. It was one of the few things we "did" at family reunions, and was always worth a few hours playtime...
but damn if they didn't require a "first name basis" with the repairman, and they were absolutely not able to be transported without a team of helpers. When we sold the house most of them were "given" to the new owner [sort of white elephant?].
--
I could never get in to the virtual pinball machines [it's been about a decade], but I guess they "play" identical to a "theoretically perfectly-operating" mechanical type?
I've had a 1986 Bally Motordome for decades. It's fun. There are many techniques and tricks to get better, detailed in books and online, and when you have a machine at home, as you say, you can play whenever your heart desires and practice. Playing for a long time has a meditative quality, too, and is a good metaphor for life - a mix of skill and random factors.
As others have noted, maintenance is a bit of an issue, though not overwhelming. The machines are beautifully crafted - maintenance can be fun.
As an apprentice electrician decades ago, I remember the first time I viewed the innards/underside of a pinball table/machine: absolute insanity.
Running my own shop a decade later, my favorite way to describe horrific residential electrical panels was "it looks like a drunk pinball machine in there."
That's how mine started getting out of control. I had one non-working machine that I rescued from a family friend's barn. My wife decided we should get a newer, working one so we would have something to play while I kept working on the first. A year later and I'm at over a dozen…
I've bought non-working pinball machines from Facebook Marketplace or Craigslist for great prices and brought them back to life. They cover a range of the pinball spectrum from electromechanical games from the 1970s through 1990s games with dot matrix displays. I fix these up, play them until I get bored of them, then sell them to make room for future projects or trade them for something new-to-me.
Separately from that, I've bought, sold, and traded to end up with a set of games that I enjoy playing. There are a couple of modern Stern games in the mix along with some mid-90s Bally/Williams games.
If I may ask, are you making a worthwhile profit on the machines you sell, or are you doing it for the love of pinball? I used to know a guy who claimed to have done this with claw machines and made a lot of money. (Yes he had a ponytail)
I'm not really making any money doing it. I learn a lot and enjoy the process.
As an example, I picked up a 1978 Bally Strikes and Spares machine from Marketplace. It'd sat in the owners garage unplayed for 10 years and no longer worked. I bought it for $400, put somewhere between 20-30 hours of work into it and around $600 in new parts. If I'm lucky, I'll be able to sell it for around $1800.
Some months ago Visual Pinball was on HN's front page. I took the impetus to actually build a full size virtual pinball cabinet.
It turns out the wife actually enjoys it more than I do. Instead I enjoyed building it, and now I've been deep diving into fixing the scripting on some of the older EM (electro-mechanical) tables (virtual ones) that are out there.
Learning Visual Basic (or a variant of it) was never on my Bingo card....
I grew up having pinball machines in our house (my dad bought and fixed them as a hobby, sold or gifted them to friends). I have my childhood Black Knight pinball with me now. Love playing it, the kids and their friends love it. Honestly it’s great.
Repairs and maintenance is very DIY able at least for this age of machine. Luckily I can still call dad when I’m stuck troubleshooting.
No idea if they hold their value. Never thought of selling.
My parents had a Black Knight 2000. when I was growing up. As an adult, walking through an arcade and hearing that theme song is like running into an old friend you haven't seen for years.
The organizer of a pinball tournament league I used to participate in expressed regret about buying his own machine. The up-front price of buying one isn't terrible, no. What he disliked was that he felt committed to that one single machine, and ended up playing it so much that he was thoroughly bored of it within a year.
You're not committed, though. It's not that hard to resell and buy another one, or even find a partner to trade machines with. I've done that quite a few times. I have 5 machines at home, but have rotated through close to a dozen this way in the last couple years.
My quota for stupid nerd space things is already taken up by my DDR pads that were taken from a 7th-gen cabinet. Not to mention the PC gaming space I have upstairs with 4 comps and enough space between for VR...and the retro gaming area next to it with a CRT.
I've had the rare privilege to meet the Pinball map creator (or at least one of them), an awesome person that has been maintaining this project for a long time. Definitely give them some support if you're a Pinball fan.
Portland was the original base location and then IIRC they expanded to other cities. Portland's reputation as the pinball capital of the world is well founded.
It was for manufacturing. It's not as great as one would hope for actually playing. The city has an ordnance that says that you need a special "public place of amusement" license if you have more than 3 machines and are open to the public, and it can be rather expensive. So places to play are generally limited to a relatively small number of barcade-type venues that tend to be loud and crowded.
I prefer the pinball scene in Milwaukee. Seemingly every neighborhood has at least a few relaxed, cozy bars with a decent number of machines in the back room, and there are also a few decent venues that are open to minors.
I don't know Portland as well, but based on what little time I've spent there it seemed like the situation was more similar to what it's like in Milwaukee. I've stumbled across some great old classic machines when I was there.
Seattle is like this too. There seems to be one or two machines in a lot of bars, particularity the sleepy ones. There are a few dedicated pinball bars as well which are always fun to kill an hour or two in.
One of the APIs powering the Pinball Map is the excellent Open Pinball Database (opdb.org).
OPDB came about because an older site IPDB doesn’t have an API (and doesn’t want to have an API) in order for various pinball software to communicate with each other. I'm in some pinball leagues with the developer, Andreas Haugstrup, who also makes matchplay.events, pintips.net, and other sites that serve the pinball community.
Pinball map is brilliant, I use it everytime I travel. So many new pinball machines coming out. The latest one I've been searching for is Labyrinth. Only in LA at the moment, but looks super fun.
Once you create an account you can make a note if the machines aren't working well and the owners will usually get someone in quick to fix too.
Jaws just came out too and I've had fun checking Pinball map every day to see it spread out from Chicago (Stern's HQ) and populate more and more of the country.
I am super curious about getting data from Stern since they have added Stern Insider. They record all your scores and give you little icons for achievements etc. I don't know what other data they store, but it would be pretty rad to do some stats on it and look at the time of day when balls get drained, and multiball run times against a population. So curious to see if any outside factors influence gameplay. Outside of proper leveling, operation etc.
They collect a lot of information, but make very little of it available. What is available isn't exposed in a particularly friendly way. Some of the extra data they gathered makes it into the Year in Review stats they make available at the start of the year. https://social.bdash.net.nz/@mrowe/111779120066480793 shows an example of this.
I'd love to be able to see a moving average of my score on a particular game so I can see how I'm improving (or not) over time. Beyond that, I'm not sure what data would be useful other than as a curiosity.
Our locations are sourced from Pinball Map; scores can be tagged with locations which allows us to maintain leaderboards for specific machines (in addition to global/social/event leaderboards).
If you are ever in Portland, Next Level Pinball Museum is bonkers with over 500 machines. About half of them are pinball machines and all are in top notch condition. Portland in general has a huge pinball scene with several large arcades in and around it.
Pinballz on 183 in Austin also has both DDR and of course pinball machines. I can’t remember if the other locations in Austin and Buda also have DDR but I know that one does for sure.
Between this and the brewery map a few days ago I'm curious why these aren't rolled into OpenStreetMap. You could still have a dedicated site and project like this, it's probably a good idea for the specifically motivated people to be in charge of that data. Just use OSM as your data backend and have bigger reach.
Perhaps the database started too long ago and there's a licensing issue.
I really like pinballmap. I try to add gigs and machines all the time. But another app that has way more pinballs is Pin my balls (at least in France).
Regarding pinballs I recently built a self-hosted app to track scores between friends.
Yeah, pinside is a great resource. Surprisingly, the pinside map was created four years after pinball map (source: wayback machine; disclosure: I'm a pinball map dev).
I spent a lot of time playing Bally Twilight Zone at the Munich Maker Lab a few years back. I still miss the tungsten bulbs which lit the ball consistently, as opposed to LEDs which tend to "blink" rapidly (at 60Hz?). It makes the ball much easier to track at high speed, and has such a nostalgic soft glow which gently fades off into nothing.
I also miss reading the manual and fixing little things every so often.
It looks like this machine has either moved on from MuMaLab, or was never listed in the first place.
It would be nice to be able to filter machines here by what kind of lights they use. I imagine most places tend to use LEDs to save on electricity. At least that's been my experience checking the barcades I've found from this site.
I would believe it - I just don't think I've seen it. All it would take is better PWM controllers right?
I wonder if the places I've been to just don't know, or just haven't upgraded yet (waiting until the originals die?), or are trying to save pennies on the dollar on repairs?
a lot of places switch because it produces less heat damage as they stay on for long periods of time and make a lot of heat. this can negatively impact longevity of the backglass and plastics
I played on the ones in Maui just before they were lost in the fires. Not a great tragedy in the grand scheme of things, but still a pity. Star Wars was a delight.
It would be great if you could find the machine that is closest to 2 or more different locations, like if I want to challenge several friends across the country to post our high scores in a group message, and we needed to know what the shortest drive each of us would need to take in order to play the same make and model machine. Maybe it’s in the app, or I missed it.
Worth noting the performance characterizations of an individual machine can depend on how it’s maintained and how the operator chooses to set it up - so this may not be a completely level playing field.
On the other hand, if you’ve figured out which Medieval Madness in your city you play best at, you can leverage that information to your advantage :)
there’s an api you can use to get machines near a gps location and then you can look through that for machines that are the same. not a feature of the website proper but something you can do if you know a little scripting
Oh man, we have a place nearby that has easily 40 machines, and some serious classics (they had the Elton John machine with the recalled artwork). They've been around for a few years -- simple setup: $20 gets you a wrist band and you can play for 4 hours[0]. And I think that's the crux of it: I am unwilling to pay a buck a play for pinball only to -- often -- find out that it has multiple mechanical imperfections (like a side bumper being dead) that make it nearly impossible to play.
There is a bowling alley nearby that bills itself as a Pinball Museum (with 20 or so machines) but they're all quarter driven. I went once, dropped $15, got annoyed and never returned. My kids and I go to the other place every other month or so.
[0] Except for one machine -- they have this giant thing that uses a pool cue as a ball -- it's a Sega game ... Mammoth or something, and apparently very rare
It’s a terrible game, very slow and boring, but you must play it once. I really appreciate the dedication of any collector who brings that behemoth to pinball shows and keeps it running.
What amazed me on my trip to Seattle was just how many pinball machines are available to play there. And not only that but just how insanely well maintained 50 year old machines are. These are machines getting played on a daily basis. Where are they finding parts for these machines? It's just crazy to think about.
Seattle is great for pinball, most of the bars with 8+ machines host a team or two that play in the Monday night league. Ton of parts available at https://www.marcospecialties.com
Yeah AFAIK Seattle is the top pinball spot in the world for some reason. You would think Chicago since that's where it started and where most of the big companies are based. But Seattle has the most machines I'm pretty sure.
I made a 4 hour trip to https://www.pasttimesarcade.com/ in Gerard, OH. Includes an incredible collection of tables from the 60s and 70s and a few from even earlier. I've been to Next Level in Portland too. It rocks.
If you're ever in Vegas, I highly recommend a trip to the Pinball Hall of Fame museum south of the Strip across from the Mandalay Bay convention center. My family put it on the list as just some rando thing to do between the "real" Vegas events, but our expectations were very much exceeded!
As I come to the comments to advertise my hometown pinball museum, I’m surprised to see there’s so many! Cool to see an old arcade game live on so strongly.
Anyways, to anyone who finds themselves in Southwest Virginia and wants to relive old pinball and arcade games, the Pinball Museum of Roanoke, Virginia has a floor dedicated to pinball, and another to retro arcade games (in the cabinets). Everything is free too after the entrance fee!
Most cities have at least one pinball bar with a weekly tournament. The same sorts of people go every week, and there are always beginners joining. If you're in a new place and need some social exposure, look for a pinball bar.
I've met people at pinball tournaments who have found the confidence to move because they knew they'd meet new friends at the pinball tournament in wherever they're moving to.
I keep seeing these little niche sites, like "map of pinball machines", which is for some reason not just a filter or data layer or set of metadata tags on some larger mapping infrastructure.
Likewise, there's the "internet movie firearms database", and the "internet movie cars database", and several others, which are not just object classes in some larger internet movie attribute database.
Presumably because the `larger mapping infrastructure` doesn't deem a filterable list of pinball machines to make monetary sense, or fit into their overall product without adding clutter.
I presume the same is true for the IMDB. They have their own list of things they are interested in, and firearms or cars may not be on that list.
It's almost like different people/organizations have different interests and priorities.
It's easier to build a community when you're running your own site. Also, it's just easier to get started. You don't have to figure out someone else's data format and object classes if you just start from 0, and most people working on these kinds of niche hobby sites don't always care what an object class is anyway
Is there an internet movie song database? I'd like to look up a song and see what movies and tv shows that song has been in. I thought I saw something like that many years ago... but wasn't exactly what I wanted.
because the pinball map serves a purpose that would not fit well in a larger mapping thing. people want to know what pinball machines are nearby them so they can go there and play them. very different in scope than a movie gun/car database. they also don't share the same playerbase that a more general arcade machine app might have; people like pinball and will seek that out in a different way that people who like arcade machines will not do the same.
Pinball Hall of Fame is the only place in Vegas I've found The Addams Family, and it is the only place on this site with that game. The problem with the Pinball Hall of Fame is not only do they have the rear studs at max height, they put blocks of wood under the back feet. It just isn't fun.
I do only see the one listed in Vegas which is strange since it's one of the most popular tables made. The webpage returns 483 Addams Family machines in other places though.
Vegas doesn't have a lot of arcades. Outside of the PHoF there's two in reasonable driving distance and neither of them focus on pinball machines. One is pretty much only rhythm games.
Yes, as a fan of arcades Vegas is disappointing. You'd think casinos might be interested in people who put money in machines without expecting a payout. The rows and rows of fancy slot machines with HD monitors do nothing for me.
As a fan of arcades, Vegas is better than most other cities.
The one rhythm place has all the Bemani stuff that I like and I can spend a day getting Drum Mania out of my system.
Then the other one has a 2 screen Darius, Bishi Bashi Champ and other goodies and then PHoF has me covered for the rest.
Maintaining old arcade machines is a pain in the ass and CRT (especially those that can sync down to 15Hz) days are numbered. 25 more years and you won't find any classic cabinets anywhere if I'm honest.
I have two pinball machines in my basement waiting to be fixed up and restored. But I don't have the motivation to do the work, probably because I was never nostalgic for this era, I'm too young. I do find them fascinating from an engineering perspective, however.
This is pretty great not just for finding pinball machines but finding venues that I never even knew existed. I found a small vinyl shop and a barcade close to me that I never even knew were a thing til I searched locally on this site.
My wife is very into Ghostbusters pinball -- just found it at a combination pinball arcade/all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ, that seems to also have fried oreos covered in nutella.
This is going to be a very unhealthy weekend for me.
Two nearby venues in North London have The Getaway: High Speed II. I wonder if that's true, or if it moved from one to the other, and the map reflects an inconsistent state.
it's crowdsourced so it may not have been removed from the other location. it's possible though that they have the same machine though... you can call them and find out if you're motivated to update it
There's a municipal airport less than an hour drive from me that has a pinball machine from 1975. I'll have to check that out next time I drive through there.
One of my favorite aspects of pinball is finding and playing those odd machines tucked away here and there, thanks to some enthusiast at a local business, or because it’s always been there. Fond memories of an old laundromat in CNY that had a machine of similar vintage..and an equally old coke vending machine.
What is the best way for an amateur to synthesize a similar site? I have used Google My Maps for a much smaller, manually updated map of air hockey tables.
