lot's of folks *sob have similar sentiments about the Long Playing record....the analog recording, digital audio reproduction.....Poor pinball guys....shoulda' seen the writing on the wall, babys..

I still really like pinball, the 80s kind that I grew up with. There's just something about it . . .

I totally miss pinball--but I disagree with Choggie's implication that it's just about nostagia. Now that we all have decent computers/game consoles, I figure it's coin-operated video games that are obsolete, but not so for pinball, which doesn't translate well to video. Pinball is great because it's there, physically. You can bump it, press it and feel the vibrations of the ball and bumpers. I think that's why "fusball" kept going strong before, during and after the "video-game arcade revolution". Of these, the pinball games with all of their fiddly moving parts, must be the most expensive to maintain, which is probably also a big component of their doom. Personally, I'd refuse to play a pinball game if as many as one single feature could be seen as not working (unless of course it turned out for the player's advantage--but it almost never does).

I remember when those "holographic" types of games mentioned in this video showed up (I've tried both "Mars Attacks", seen here, and "Star Wars, Episode I"--both are lame). My first thought after playing one: "this is the end of pinball". Already, new/working machines were rare and these were an obvious last-chance try at getting back into the game. Trouble is, all they are is a crappy pinball game combined with a crappy video game--i.e., crap squared.

yeah wazant, but there are purists of pinball like there are the same for lp's......there just ain't a viable new market for it....yer best bet for profit in pinball machines, is to repair and service them, or have a shop that caters, specialty-wise......The market is dried up for pb, hence this viddy post......

My favs are Starship Troopers, Firepower, Mars Attacks is cool.....old school pinball-lovers can reminisce here
http://www.pinballmuseum.org/

and this cat's got a great set of photos from there, all on flickr
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pmtorrone/sets/72057594124018534/

I remember, what seems to me, the first time they combined video games and pinball with Baby Pac-Man. And yeah, it wasn't good. The pinball was weak, the video game was basically just Pac-Man.

But still, there's nothing like a really good pinball table. The art, the lights, the gameplay all coming together. The problem is that really good ones are rare, and there's a lot of tables that are just mediocre. I'll always have my college days hanging out at the bar playing Indiana Jones and Bride of Pin-Bot.

My favourite pinball of all time is the Terminator 2, pinball game. I'm probably a bit biased by my age at the time the movie was released, etc.

http://www.tilt-movie.com

http://www.mameworld.net/easyemu/pinmameguide.htm for emulated pinball from old days on your PC. Of course it's not the same the real machine!

I love pinball and frankly I don't think the prospect of it seeing a comeback someday as all that farfetched.

It's a physical game (albeit with differing "rules" from model to model) like pool and as wazant said, not effectively recreated in video form.

I have several pinball games in my house and when kids come over let me tell you they gravitate to those machines and want to play 'em. It's really funny because it's just something they don't see anymore so they have a real novelty aspect to them.

Yeah, I could see pinball making a comeback...all that is old is new again.

I'm glad to see there is interest in this subject including wazant's kicking the dead body of pinball generally. I've seen this documentary- I agree with its hype that its about our American economy in general. We have too much stuff. Should I buy a new Stern pinball game that doesn't seem as cool to me as Funhouse, for example- especially comparing the prices ( $4699 vs. $1300 on ebay). People didn't used to have as many choices for stuff to blow money on. Now, we also have too much information via this internet. It sections us all off in these pretend worlds where we're too obsessed about any one subject. People don't go out anymore because we have home entertainment. Also, people sound like little brats when they talk hatefully of each other on these forums because they don't risk getting their faces punched in if they talked smack in person.
Ask yourself, is music better because of mp3s? Is your enjoyment of it better? I miss hearing about new music from my friends instead of Pandora. I really am impressed by Pandora but its old music that I'm hearing. Don't we have to take seriously the gravity that forces us to consume retro fodder because this is a new option brought to us by DVR's and the internet. If I can rummage through the best music of the latter half of the past century, doesn't that make it harder for new music to move a whole nation like the Beatles did? Obviously, we have to accept that there are up and downs in cycles. Music is definitely in a down one. Hannah Montana is the biggest selling live show. Now, I'm 31 so its easy for younger people to discard my perspective as outdated. O.K. but have you condidered that if acts like Beck, The Beastie Boys and whomever from the 90's are already done compared to the Rolling Stones who performed well into their 50's, how do you think My Chemical Romance of your new metal act will fare in only 5 years? If we follow this trend music and everything else will be marketed to children in the womb and we'll all have to tolerate Barney type music "I like you, you like me...." In a similar observation, can we all celebrate Britney Spears going the way of the do do bird? Now, I'm genuinely worried about her life because she has been manufactured used and thrown away by the corporate machine that made her right after two sorority ditz's narrate her suicide on live paparazzi video. This is what I'm talking about. Half the country loves American Idol, the other want to shove a karaoke mic up the fat slob pitifully trying to seduce a girl by singing the Righteous Brother's "You lost that loving feeling". In the 80's my Dad turned me on to Boston. Everybody listened to the same music- even if you grew, evolved and quested for deeper "alternative" acts- you started out at the Beatles or something. Although, I did despise my folks popularizing Santana and that Matchbox 20 dude... Gawd! No.

Anyway, a little more back to topic. The nintendo wii grows affection for the physical play of pinball but pinball will gain no traction unless the tykes taste it and like it. We should appreciate good design because the ancient past is full of it and we are often too ignorant or jaded to pay respect where it is due. Also, don't get too excited about throwing broken stuff away so much that what makes America good is thrown out with its formerly dominant auto industry.