Expo Euphoria

Song of the Week

I’ve been spending time with the songs of UK punk group Lambrini Girls in between plays of Metallica’s early catalog. It’s a similar vibe to an artist we shared a few weeks ago, Amyl and the Sniffers. In fact, they toured together earlier this year! They have old-school riot grrrl punk tones with a biting, sometimes satirical lyrical edge. Their debut full-length, Who Let The Dogs Out, releases January 10, 2025, but they’ve been dripping out singles like this and Big Dick Energy, which is also a fun listen.

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Pinball News of the Week

Expo Euphoria: Seven Highlights and Other Extraneous Thoughts

For those of you who suffered through my poorly-edited newsletter last week (not my best effort), you know that I was at Pinball Expo in Schaumburg, IL most of the week. While my focus was on running our Pinball Media Mixer event, once that was over, I was able to spend a couple of days running around the Expo halls, exploring everything the show had to offer and spending some much-needed live time with my pinball friends.

In recapping my experiences, my instinct is to try to say who “won” the 2024 Pinball Expo. In 2023, the clear-cut winner was Barrels of Fun, with the launch of their debut game Labyrinth around that time. It’s not that others didn’t have a good showing, but to me they were the clear winners as game lines, buzz, and later game sales would prove out.

This year I don’t think there’s as much of a clear-cut winner. I think just about everything showed well (as in, most of the major new releases seemed to be up and running all weekend, and folks who wanted plays got them), and I think if I were to poll participating manufacturers, I’d wager most are happy with the outcomes of the show relative to their expectations.

That said, I did want to go through a few of my personal highlights and then cover a few additional odds and ends coming out of the show.

The Homebrew/Custom Games

If pressed to choose a winner, I’d have to go with the collective showing by the custom pinball community, with several individual standouts like SAW, Tony Hawk Pro Skater, The Greatest Showman, and Borderlands 2.

I spent most of my time going back to the homebrew area, and it was a brilliant idea to have that as an expanded section this year with a variety of projects in various states of completion. The creativity and passion on display there were truly infectious, and I hope manufacturers are taking note of some of the ideas that are being explored there (the Borderlands 2 machine in particular, with its motion-controlled playfield and other physical surprises).

A Successful Media Mixer

It’s a running joke in the pinball community that making pinball is hard. Well, running events is hard, too. Particularly when doing so from out of state. But we pulled it off, and based on the feedback I received, everyone had a wonderful time. So much so that I’ve already started thinking about what Media Mixer 3.0 could look like. Thanks to everyone who came out and supported this edition!

Pinball Friends

It’s nice to get time for all the new games at the Pinball Expo, but the real value (to me at least) is the ability to see all my pinball friends in almost one place over a few days. The community is so spread out that most of our regular interactions happen online, which, as most of you know, isn’t the same as an in-person hang. I saw many people over the weekend, many of whom I was meeting for the first time offline, despite having many online conversations with those same people over the years. Getting that face time makes all the difference!

Metallica Remastered

I provided some early thoughts last week, but a week later, I’m still thinking about this game. I think it was more of a surprise than anything, as I wasn’t expecting to enjoy the experience of playing it as much as I did. It feels and plays like a new game, which is owed to more than just its new packaging. New modes add important connective tissue to the rest of the gameplay experience, and engineering tweaks made by John Borg make it a much more satisfying shooter than the original version. Once copies made it out to the show floor later in the week, the lines were quite long!

FunHouse Remake

Another remake game that I was pleasantly surprised with was Pedretti Pinball’s FunHouse remake, particularly the LE edition with the new Brian Allen artwork and 2.0 game code. Even though I don’t think the game has the same level of engineering changes that Metallica Remastered does, it still felt like playing a different game from what I’m accustomed to with the originals. Build quality felt solid, the artwork was well done, and the new code makes gameplay feel much more modern.

Ninja Eclipse Progress

The last time I got a chance to play Turner Pinball’s Ninja Eclipse was at last year’s Expo, when they were still building around the concept of the smaller cabinet design. Even then, I was quietly impressed with the game, how it shot, and some of the ideas they were exploring (particularly around connectivity). Chris Turner has spent a lot of the last year iterating on that design and collecting feedback from the community, and I think it shows in the final product. Like others in this list, it felt like playing a different game and is one I’d definitely be seeking out to play more on location were it to show up near me. Unlike last year, the price point ($6,994) also feels like a steal in comparison to some of the other comparable offerings on the market, it just comes with the caveat on taking a chance with a somewhat unproven manufacturer.

More Space

Much was made of the show’s expanded square footage and with good reason. I liked the expanded selection of vendors (shoutout to Charles Acosta/Pinball Photos for his new project, The Pinnies, I’ll be wearing that shirt around a bunch), more dedicated gaming/community spaces (i.e. the free play room and homebrew section) and space to walk around and explore. Sometimes it felt like multiple shows in one.

Other Extraneous Thoughts

• I waited in the long line for a play on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. I even attended the panel session with its creators, all in an effort to make sure I was giving it a fair shake. Ultimately I found the experience forgettable. The game looks pretty in person (minus the cabinet art, which I still find to be on the gauche side), and the sculpt work is very impressive. It shoots much more smoothly than it may have appeared from some of the reveal videos. It was almost too smooth, though, which led to it feeling almost too easy to play, without any of the rules, depth, or feelings of kinetic satisfaction present in other modern releases. I was able to get up into the upper playfield area on one of my balls, but the magna flippers didn’t engage, so I wasn’t able to experience that part of the game.

• I was excited to see a copy of Hexa’s Space Hunt on the floor but it never seemed to work correctly on the chances I got to play it. The first time I walked up there were issues with the kickout to the plunger and it was either not leveled or there may have been some other playfield issues that prevented it from playing properly. Still, I liked the art, the ideas being explored in the playfield layout, and I love that a French company seems to be mostly focusing on the needs of the French market, rather than trying to satisfy American buyers.

• I got a few plays on Pinball Brothers’ ABBA. I liked the way it shot and would love to get it in a non-show environment with the sound turned up. When I played it, the flippers were a bit soft, but it was late and this issue often happens at shows. Still, I love they are taking a chance on a theme like ABBA that appeals to a different subset of the pinball public.

• If you need more evidence that Stern’s Insider Connected is gaining traction with users, I can point to a fun Expo-only integration that let users earn unique badges after solving a daily riddle and playing the associated game. Some of the longer lines in the Stern booth were for older releases like Stranger Things and Iron Maiden, which, without the incentive of the IC badge, wouldn’t usually see that much attention.

• Speaking of Stern, I got to check out the Stern Army party thanks to a friend’s unused +1, and I’ll just say that I was impressed and took some mental notes to hopefully apply to next year’s Media Mixer! I need to get someone to make a Kineticist beer.

Crank it Up: New Metallica Pinball Tutorial

James McFatter dropped a super timely tutorial on me last week with a detailed look at the OG Metallica game from 2013. We’ll revisit this tutorial once we’ve got some more time on the Remastered version and will update it as necessary, but for now, feel free to familiarize yourself with the deceptively deep rules of this game.

Pinball Map Location of the Week

Ryan and Scott from Pinball Map run a regular series that highlights one new pinball location each week. This week, Ryan writes about Revenge Of: Pinball Way Station.

I live down the park from a great spot in Los Angeles called Revenge Of. It’s a comic shop that has 26 pinball machines. They host lots of fun events. They seem to be masters of programming. Also, the place is decorated like an outpost on an alien planet. Additionally, for a while, it was the only place in the world that sold Pinball Map stickers. Furthermore, sometimes they sell these gigantic chocolate chip cookies peppered with salt, and they’re incredible. And finally, they regularly make fun little coin pouches. I have like 6 of them.

For the first year or so after they opened, I would often come and play on Friday or Saturday nights. Sometimes there wouldn’t be too many people there, and so it was a great place to focus and session before they closed way too early at 9pm. Times changed, though, and they got more and more popular, and began staying open later. Now there are quite a few people there at night, including tabletop gamers and miscellaneous others.

Sometimes, I wondered if they would open a second location. Los Angeles is large, after all. And now they have! Revenge Of: Pinball Way Station has, from what I can tell, taken over (?) the Secret Headquarters comic shop on Sunset Boulevard in the Silver Lake Junction. The Way Station has comics and, compared to their flagship location, a modest quantity of machines (7). I have not yet been to the Way Station, but I’m eager to check it out. Revenge Of is truly one of the best places I’ve played pinball at, and I have high expectations for the Way Station.

Revenge Of: Pinball Way Station
1816 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90026
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Links of the Week

Check out some of the other Expo recaps from our creator friends!

• Nudge Magazine recapped Expo in 4 games. 

• Don’s Pinball Podcast had a comprehensive recap with some additional depth for his Patreon subscribers.

• COOLTOY did a couple of recaps, but I liked his video focusing on the homebrew area.

• RetroRalph talked about his biggest surprises and disappointments.

• Pinball Profile had conversations with a ton of awesome people at the show (thanks for mentioning the Mixer!).

• The Pinball Show did their own in-depth recap of the show (another thanks for the Mixer shoutout!)

• LoserKids just published their Expo recap, and I always enjoy their takes.

• Pinball News / Pinball Magazine do such thankless work capturing videos from all the great seminar sessions at Expo, so be sure to check out the Pinball News YouTube channel as those get uploaded for some priceless pinball knowledge.

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