Does anyone here own a machine ? is it worth the money or do you find you are bored with it after a few months ?

things to consider:

- how much is it worth to you
- can you re-sell once you get bored (if yes, then should be an easy decision).
- if there is not much competition for pinball machines on ebay, it should be easy to resell.

had a fooseball table once... and loved it... until i ran out of space... but it was easy to resell on ebay...

world cup 94 (very easy to clock but super addictive)

tales of the arabian nights (highly recommend)

scared stiff (awesome fun, easy to play, cheeky and captivating)

just sold dr who (darlek screaching every multiball jackpot got the better of me, and button plungers piss me off)

tales from the crypt would be better than white water in my opinion (even though it has an auto plunger), i loved white water when it first came out but played it to death recently and it kinda got boring real quick.

if you are going to get one and only one, make sure it is one with a real depth of play or you'll clock it easily and will get old quick.

search the data base

www.ipdb.org

my two cents,

bally and williams made the best machines, asthetically speaking they really are works of art

twilight zone and adams family are over rated and over priced

indiana jones is expensive to but would take forever to tire of

theatre of magic is the most beautiful machine with amazing flow, is written off as too easy, but has plenty of features and depth of play (will be my next machine hopefully)

the real question is...

do you wanna save a grand or two and buy privately and maybe get a machine that becomes a project or a nightmare, full of gremlins and ghosts which require constant attention?
or, buy from a dealer (there a couple of good ones in melbourne) which might cost a bit more but will have been given some degree of a going over to ensure atleast some modicum of garanteed reliability?

they will break down, you can't aviod that but if the circut boards are strong then its basically just limit switches and solenoids, springs and levers.

stern are making some great machines now (and some dogs, e.g dark knight, pirates of carribean) and the price compared to some of the collectable nineties machines makes buying a brand new machine a considerable option. spiderman (2007) is awesome and big buck hunter pro (2010) is my latest fave, trying to get the missus to buy it for me for my birthday (she'll cave soon).

my top 5 (ok 10)

1. tales of the arabian nights
2. theatre of magic
3. monster bash (there is a good example at crown casino- was last time i was there)
4. cirqus voltaire (over priced but)
5. indiana jones (1993)
6. big buck hunter pro
7. tommy
8. spiderman (2007)
9. junkyard
10. apollo 13 (only because it has 13 ball multiball)

i could really blow this list out to about thirty, i love pinnies...

I love Williams pinnies.

Favourites are Jurassic Park, Lethal Weapon and Indiana Jones. I think every Williams I've played has been good.

Other brands just don't feel right.

I can imagine pinnies need a lot of maintenance.

I used to play this for hours n hours in my youth at the local chip shop where i worked at the time.
It used to make this bang sound when you got a free game and my boss thought it was me diddling it.
Great game, love pinball.

oliver said...

My favourite is pinball is fish tales. How do you rate that one doc?

fishtales is definately up there, pretty simple though... left ramp, right ramp, left ramp, right ramp catch a fish, tell a lie...

the matahri in kuta used to have half a dozen pinnies, fish tales was one of them. I'd spend countless hours there while the rest of the boys went clubbing and looking for love long time. bali has never been quite the same since timezone shut down....

like i said its a pretty simple game, if it wasn't for the lightning flippers (shorter version than standard flippers), it would be virtually impossible to lose a ball.

the audio is ok but the background music grates on you pretty quick and the fishing reel lock mechanism is renown as a nightmare to maintain

there was a pinnie expo in stanmore last year and a bunch of us got to stay back after hours and go nuts on some of the three hundred odd pinnies there, it was the first time i played fishtales since matahari bali years earlier, i guess maturing pinnie tastes and skill gave me the impression that fishtales was too simple and repetitive to take seriously, but maybe i'm too critical, the video mode blasting jetski riders alone surely has to make fishtales credible of collection...

if only i could justify the up to three grand asking price and find the space, i'd own one (but i'm saving the moolah and the empty spot for theatre or big buck hunter)

i used to have one.

they are pretty cool.

I saw one on Ebay just recently.....a kiss that is....not sure it was a project machine though.....

Craig66 said...

Legion said...

I can't believe KISS hasn't been mentioned .

So with you there, i grew up on that one

The Kiwi Fush & Cup shop in Morley have got that one

I used to have a Star Trek Next Generation. Great game. Never got bored with it.
Had it for a few years. Sold it for about what I paid.
Wife told me it could go in the garage/ carport (open to the elements) but had to get out of the living room.
Last year she decided that she wanted to have one again.
A lot more expensive now though!
There are companies that rent them. You could give that a try if uncertain.
So many good games to choose from.
I like World cup soccer "Goal!", Funhouse,
I would like to get one of the Pirates of the Caribbean new tables but a lot of coin.
Have a look here to get your juices flowing.
www.bumper.com.au/