Tales Of (my) Ordinary Madness

[Garrett]

So if you're feeling like you've done something a bit ill advised recently.. I hope this tale of my recent wtf was I thinking moment will help you feel a bit better about whatever it was you said or did..

It's probably a little bit of an understatement to say I'm a fan of Pinball Machines in all shapes & sizes, having pumped god knows how many coins into them over the years (I used to live in Blackpool/London & haunted all the Arcades back in the day)
Anyway I volunteer in a charity shop at weekends, and we had a donation of old 80s arcade flyers (which I bought.. there's gotta be perks right?) turns out the husband of the lady that brought them in used to own a fairly large independent arcade on the south coast & get this he still has upwards of 50 machines incl 20+ Pinball Tables (be still my beating heart) they've just downsized, he's pretty ill.. she wants to see the back of them & I pretty much fell over myself to promise I will take as many as I can.. err wait a minute brain, I have a partner (maybe not a prospective wife now though) a fairly modest sized flat (on the third floor) and a bank account that's a source of constant amusement.
Apparently most of the machines are in a state of disrepair, but I'm assured the issues are mostly cosmetic & missing lights etc.. going to take a look soon (hopefully.. the husband is very ill so it depends on his condition) I've absolutely no experience of reconditioning old arcade machines, let alone Pinball Tables (which I assume would be much more complicated)
Anyways just thought I'd share my fleeting (hopefully) moment of insanity with you guys, I have a sneaking suspicion though that it may return as soon as I go to see all the goodies (which is why I'm taking my other half)
I do know that there is a fully working bally Twilight Zone.. overdraft here I come!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R59ljVztIPY

 

[iprice]

That's really cool.


Good luck and have fun

 

[Prometheus]

I'm really sorry... I'm gonna be a REALLY bad influence here and say that you only live once.


There are plenty of resources out there for restoring old arcade machines and pinball tables, too.


If you do buy a table, just be sure to go with one that won't be difficult to re-sell should the need ever arise. I made the mistake of not doing that with a generic JAMMA cabinet (it was an Electrocoin Xenon, which, if you've never seen one, is an absolute behemoth of a machine that requires more room than one would expect for its size, given its slightly oddball structure of having a wider upper half even though there's no apparent reason for it) that I once owned, and found it very difficult to get rid of the thing when I needed the space.

 

[Macguyver]

The Twilight Zone table is insanely great. Weird coincidence, we actually have one of these in our office. I can hear someone playing it right now...

 

[mosschops]

I couldn't anymore due to wedding plans but I would have sold both my testicles for a twig light zone tables, esp one in good nick with the potential to upgrade.


I will go with Prometheus though, I have a jamma cab with bubble bobble in it on a conversion loom thing. These things can be big, heavy and a bitch to move and rehome should you ever want to get rid. I had a good job a few years back and had a gauntlet 2 machine that caused me no end of grief in one way or another till I got rid of in a move not to mention an I'll fated affair with an R360 and a sit down outrun cab. But like a woman who uses abuses and then dumps you I wouldn't have missed them for the world


Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2

 

[Nintendo]

@ Garrett


Do you also happen to love non-physical form (as in ones on Tablets and home consoles, etc) Pinball games, because I quite enjoy them?

 

[Garrett]

@ Garrett


Do you also happen to love non-physical form (as in ones on Tablets and home consoles, etc) Pinball games, because I quite enjoy them?

Yep, I use Visual/Future pinball, Zen pinball FX & FX2.. & the old DOS/Amiga ones (shame we can't run any of the Pro Pinballs on the Pandora.. c'est la vie!) they are about as good as virtual pinball is ever going to get..


As anyone who has ever hammered a real table or owns one will tell you, you just can't properly replicate that experience virtually & the ball physics however accurate they appear..just aren't!

 

[Nintendo]

Coolios~ I must have a look into those DOS/Amiga ones. Anyway, I'm currently playing Pinball Heroes: High Velocity Bowling Edition and Zen Pinball THD (it might be a remake of FX & FX2?) on my tablet, which is perfect for Pinball games, imo.


Also, I reckon that one day in the future they're going to perfect the overall balls physics.

 

[Prometheus]

^ Try out Pinball Dreams, and Pinball Fantasies, for the Amiga. Brilliant games, and legally freely available from Back to the Roots (the link is in my Legal Emulation Resources document, linked to in my signature).


[/off-topic]

 

[notaz]

shame we can't run any of the Pro Pinballs on the Pandora.. c'est la vie!

PSX ones should work in pcsx rearmed r14.

 

[Garrett]

shame we can't run any of the Pro Pinballs on the Pandora.. c'est la vie!

PSX ones should work in pcsx rearmed r14.

What I should have added was properly, if memory serves all the PSX Pro Pinballs have ball rendering issues serious enough to render them unplayable (can't remember what rev of pcsx i tried them on though)

 

[notaz]

PSX ones should work in pcsx rearmed r14.

What I should have added was properly, if memory serves all the PSX Pro Pinballs have ball rendering issues serious enough to render them unplayable (can't remember what rev of pcsx i tried them on though)

Have you actually tried it on r14? There was collaborative effort by mednafen author, me and Exophase to fix it. Note that it only works on NEON (default) plugin.

 

[Nintendo]

^ Try out Pinball Dreams, and Pinball Fantasies, for the Amiga. Brilliant games, and legally freely available from Back to the Roots (the link is in my Legal Emulation Resources document, linked to in my signature).


[/off-topic]

Thank you. I'll give them a go this weekend.