Strange Trip

Song of the Week

In the spirit of getting hyped for Expo, here’s the latest from clipping., the experimental hip hop group fronted by Daveed Digs (Hamilton). It’s a single off an album that’s not due to drop till 2025 but is a part of a long-anticipated hip hop meets cyberpunk themed effort (hip-hop cyberpunk sounds like a cool concept for a pin!).

It’s a fast-paced and high-energy track with a music video that’s its own exciting watch, featuring the band as central characters in a 1980s-tinged international spy thriller.

Thematically, it has nothing to do with this week’s major news, the release of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, but I’d like to think that range is a strength of this pinball newsletter!

Sponsor of the Week

Thanks to Pinball Expo for sponsoring our work this year on Kineticist and This Week in Pinball! We’re excited to attend next week for its 40th edition. Tickets are still available online. It’s shaping up to be a heck of a show!

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Pinball News of the Week

Dutch Pinball Exclusive (DPX) Launches Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

I’m not normally a hot take guy, but boy do I have some for this release. I’ll temper them for now since I haven’t seen or played the game in person, but to summarize my thoughts, this whole DPX project comes across like a misguided, cynical cash grab.

I’ve seen enough feedback from the pinball public that I understand roughly half of prospective buyers dig it, which is fantastic, good for pinball and good for those buyers. But it’s not clicking with me on a visceral, almost subconscious level. I have been trying to put my finger on it all week, and the closest I can get is that it feels like Bobby Bottleservice was part of the target buyer persona. Which is not my aesthetic and not the aesthetic I see in most of pinball, but I guess it’s a sizeable enough niche to sell 500 units of a premium game.

Not everything is for you, and not everything is for me. What a beautiful world we live in.

Regardless, as with all games, I look forward to trying it out myself and making my final judgment then.

Welcome to Bedrock! New Tutorial for The Flintstones

We’ve got a few new tutorials in various stages of production but it felt appropriate to lead with The Flintstones in the week that a pin inspired by the 90’s Bally/Williams era was introduced. Kineticist contributor Noah Crable takes a deep look at a game that’s a bit overlooked in the enthusiast crowd but one that can be hard to find on location and is super fun to play.

CLEPin 2024 Recap

Matt Owen traipsed the expo floors of the 2024 edition of CLEPin to give us a play-by-play of the whole event, tournament, and all. I really need to make it out there next time!

12 Pinball Expo Seminar Sessions We're Excited To See in 2024

The Pinball Expo seminar schedule is once again packed, so we took a close look at the lineup to pick out some of our favorites in case you need some help deciding what to see.

The Pinball Media Mixer is NEXT WEEK! HOLY!!!!!1111oneonetwo

Holy moly, I can’t believe it’s almost time for the Pinball Media Mixer!

We’re wrapping up final planning activities for the Mixer next week. Since our last update, we’ve upped the food order, finalized a bunch of printed materials, secured raffle items, and ordered far too many disposable cameras than we need.

As of writing, we’re sold out with 120+ guests on the list, which is… a staggering amount of people. Can’t wait to hang with y’all!

Even though we’re sold out, we do have a waiting list running in case we’re able to open up additional spots. You can join the waiting list here.

Product of the Week

Congrats to friends of the newsletter, The Electric Playground, on the launch of their latest project: an officially licensed pinball topper for Attack from Mars! They worked with artist Brad Albright on this piece, and what can we say? It’s stunning work.

The topper works with both the original Bally version of the game and the CGC remake. It includes 7 fully interactive light shows, dynamic GI that interacts with the game’s multiballs, a solenoid articulating alien, and a destroyed spaceship dome that moves in sync with the machine’s famous center saucer.

The topper retails for $1,279, and only 300 will be made. Orders can be placed now at teppinball.com/afm with a $100 deposit to secure your purchase.

Personally I love how this topper fits in with the character of the game while accentuating its most memorable strengths (i.e. the solenoid alien and destroyed spaceship) while bringing additional utility value to players and spectators alike.

Be sure to check out the interview the TEP team did with LoserKid Pinball Podcast for more info on this release!

Pinball Map Location of the Week

Remember when Ryan and Scott from Pinball Map did a monthly series for us about new (to the map) pinball locations? Those were fun! Well, Ryan and Scott are back with a new series where they will highlight one new location each week. This week Ryan writes about Antisocial Pinball.

“When one door closes? A second one opens.” - Winston Churchloads 

This will sound similar to what I wrote a few weeks ago about MOM’s closing and VÜK Pinball opening, except it takes place in Toronto and has the word “meeple” in it. Toronto had one glorious year of a spot called Meeplemart before the evil Meeplemen took away our mart. But like Dumbledore’s phoenix, who was named Fawkes, Antisocial Pinball has arisen anew from the ashes of Meeplemart a mere 2.4 kilometers away, as the car drives. If you still have unused Meeplemart tokens in your pouch, Antisocial Pinball will honor them! Because it’s the same owner and machines and stuff (and p.s. Meeplemart is still open, but just sans pins). 

But Antisocial is like Meeplemart on PCP, because while Meeplemart had 40 pinball machines, Antisocial has, as of this writing, 52 machines. The games are almost entirely from this century, from a variety of OEMs, and they all seem to be lovingly maintained. 

The owner states, “The focus is NOT on 100 different types of craft beer on tap, professional sports, or luxurious bottle service and décor, it is about THE GAMES.” And to further drive home the “antisocial” nature of this place, their website doesn’t load and they only post updates on websites where you can’t view the posts unless you have an account. There is a separate Lounge area dedicated to other gaming. Like with tables and you play things on the tops of the tables. 

Children under 14 are not allowed. Open Thursday - Sunday, but not open during Pinball Expo next weekend. In the future, hours may vary, alcohol may be added, and more arcade games will be coming.

Antisocial Pinball
570 Bloor St W. Toronto, ON M6G 1K1
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Links of the Week

• Pinball Spire, a Metroidvania/pinball mashup, dropped on Steam to favorable reviews.

• California’s Das Flipperhaus is doubling its pinball collection in a new expansion.

• Gary Stern and Seth Davis had a clarifying interview session at the Dutch Pinball Museum.

• Wormhole Pinball interviewed Bowen Kerins.

• An interesting statistical analysis of the cultural impact of the Avatar franchise has been making the rounds.

• For those of you attending Pinball Expo, Project Pinball has a variety of activities going on throughout the weekend. Too many to list here, but my favorites are the the second Freedom to Play pinball tournament with Inclusive Gamewerks and the opportunity to destroy an elaborate cup structure that someone named Elijah worked really hard on.

Poll of the Week

Last Week’s Poll Results

Weekly Feedback

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