Live data from Hacker News

Pinball Map: Crowd-sourced worldwide map of public pinball machines

pinballmap.com

31–40 of 133 posts

Re: Pinball Map: Crowd-sourced worldwide map of public pinball machines

#31

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.

Folks in the industry bought licenses, tooling, and parts for games from manufacturers that shut down. Others were reverse-engineered after the fact. Between https://www.pbresource.com, https://www.pinballlife.com, https://www.marcospecialties.com, https://www.actionpinball.com, and https://www.planetarypinball.com you can find parts for many machines going all the way back to the 50s.

Re: Pinball Map: Crowd-sourced worldwide map of public pinball machines

#32

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.

Re: Pinball Map: Crowd-sourced worldwide map of public pinball machines

#34
post #20

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 (li…

I had to look up the large ball machine you mentioned, it sounds amazing. I found it's called the "Atari Hercules". Adding it to the bucket list! https://www.reddit.com/r/gamecollecting/comments/1dkoox/this...

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.

Re: Pinball Map: Crowd-sourced worldwide map of public pinball machines

#35

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.

Yeah, it's really peculiar.

Re: Pinball Map: Crowd-sourced worldwide map of public pinball machines

#37

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.

Re: Pinball Map: Crowd-sourced worldwide map of public pinball machines

#39

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.

Yeah my local barcade paid for it, just waiting for it to show up! Have you played it yet? The premium looks rad, but ready to play any of them.

Re: Pinball Map: Crowd-sourced worldwide map of public pinball machines

#40
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

It could be fun to use this data to build a visualization of new games rolling out to locations across the world.

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.
Post reply on HN