For my bagatelle, I wanted it to be themed based on the classic horror film franchise, Hellraiser. More specifically, the franchise’s mascot/ icon commonly known as Pinhead. I always thought his design was incredible, as the pins in his head make him incredibly uncomfortable to look at it. My thinking was that he would make for an excellent way to implement the pins on the play field organically into the theming of the bagatelle, while also using an aesthetic not very common in bagatelles.
My initial design (pictured below) was tried to include both Pinhead and the puzzle box; however after feedback from classmates, I decided to use only pinhead’s head to better focus the bagatelle and also reduce empty space. I also toyed with the idea of including one character on either side of pinhead, but feedback made it clear that with the size of the PinBox 3000 that would be very difficult. The most valuable piece of feedback I got on this design was the placement of the pins. I was told to more consider the flow of the ball and to focus less on matching the aesthetic of Pinhead. This is something I tried to keep in mind when it came time to redesign the play field.
When I redesigned the play field, I tried to focus more so on the three destinations (the eyes and mouth). The location of the pins is meant to accentuate the path to these destinations. I look forward to the playtest session to see how the class will feel about the pin field.
When I first entered the pinball room at the strong, the first machine to catch my eye was Atari’s Hercules machine. The sheer size of the machine caught my eye. So when Jeremy told us that Atari machines were prone to catch fire, I was incredibly curious.
Atari entered the pinball industry in 1975. They had been regarded as very influential in the video game industry at this point, but video games were still much less profitable than analog games. Atari intended to highball traditional pricing for machines by being more technologically advanced than their competition. However, their innovation often came with problems.
The biggest problem with Atari’s pinball efforts was there inexperience in the field. Infamously, Atari placed their circuit boards below the play field in their first generation of pinball machines. This often led to screws and misc pieces falling off and catching fire on the circuit board. This made these games far less popular with vendors. Atari was also very inexperienced in manufacturing. They often faced issues with their machines. Former Atari vice president Don Osborne said it took Atari four months to do what Bally could in two weeks. This combined with the company’s insistence on being innovative and changing the industry led to a crop of technical issues.
First generation Atari pinball machines also displayed the score of games on the apron (the corner of the play field). This was a huge mistake because, as Steve Ritchie (Former designer at Atari) put it “A player’s score needs to be displayed and celebrated.” This made these games much less popular with players.
With the less than anticipated sales number due to the above factors, the decision was made to close the pinball decision in 1979 after producing only 7 machines. While they certainly faced their problems, many pinball enthusiasts have
Pepper’s Ghost
While watching the documentary, I was fascinated by the illusion technique used for pinball 2000. After some research I learned all about Pepper’s Ghost. The effect essentially works by using a glass to reflect someone(or something) from a hidden area to the area where the viewer/audience can see only the reflection. This leaves the reflected with a hologram like appearance.
In 1862. Henry Dircks used the technique to develop a machine called the Dircksian Phantasmagoria. When John Pepper saw this device, he knew that with modifications it could be used to display a ghost on a stage. This was done successfully in a showing of Charles Dickens’s The Haunted Man. Upon great reception, the technique was named after Pepper, despite his wish to give Dircks credit. The technique has had many modern implementations since it’s inception. It’s used with live actors by Disney Land’s Haunted Mansion and Phantom Manor attractions to give the appearance of ghosts in the attractions.
The technique was also famously used at the Coachella music festival in 2012 to have Tupac Shakur perform “live” with Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg more than 15 years after his death. The way this implementation worked was a very high quality CG animated video of Tupac was created which was then projected onto a glass which reflected it onto the stage. Despite all the press referring to it as the “Tupac Hologram” it actually wasn’t actually a hologram at all! Although it was the most famous example, this isn’t actually the first time the technique was used for a live concert. That accolade actually goes to the Gorillaz. In 2006, the virtual band performed live at the Grammy Awards. A CGI animation of the band’s performance was created and then spliced with live-action footage of Madonna performing. This was then reflected from a projector onto the stage. This gave the illusion of Madonna actually playing live on stage with the cartoon band. The Gorillaz have gone on to use the technique on many of their live tours. It’s often done to have the animated band members appear live on stage with the actual musicians performing live versions of their songs.
Bumper Controversy
I had never really thought before as to how bumpers worked in pinball, but after Martin’s demonstration of the inner mechanisms of a pinball machine, I was fascinated. From martin, we learned that when the ball touches the bumper, it depresses a small ring which then activates a solenoid that then quickly pulls down a metal cone. The conic shape ensures that no matter how it interacts with the ball, it will push it away from the bumper (and quickly, too).
Although the debut of the bumper is often credited to Bally’s 1936 game aptly titled Bumper, the game Bolo‘s use of the bumper actually predates this by 5 months. The game was designed Raymond Kay and the bumper for that game was developed by W. Vonstoeser. This early version of the bumper was a pin that was mounted on a spring that could move the ball in any direction.
In the 80’s a New York pinball operator stated in an interview that in the 30’s, Bally president Ray Maloney had stolen the idea for the bumper from Bolo and then patented it after improving upon it. This caused the manufacturer of Bolo, Pacent Novelty Manufacturing Co. to file for bankruptcy in 1937.
However, the controversy regarding the bumper does not stop there. In 1960, pinball designer Harry Mabs claimed he invented the bumper in his game Washington made in 1934 in Miami Florida. This however has yet to be proven. Mabs has not publicly stated what company manufactured Washington. There has also been little information found online about the game. On IPDB, it’s speculated that only a few copies of the game were made to the local Miami area. Although some are hesitant to believe Mabs claims due to the lack of evidence, some do believe his claims based on his reputation. Mabs was the designer of Humpty Dumpty, and is subsequently credited with introducing the flipper to pinball. Personally, I think I believe that Raymond Kay and W. Vonstoeser are the true creators of the bumper, but I don’t think I can say that with certainty
NBA Fastbreak
Manufactured in March 1997
by Bally
IPD link: https://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=4023
What initially attracted me to play this machine was Jeremy’s recommendation. He said he thought it was an incredible integration of theme and mechanics within a pinball machine. I was intrigued by that but what really caught my eye was the backboard. The multi-layered art was interesting. When in idling, the machine will use it’s flipper in the backboard to launch the ball into the basket there. This is referred to as Mechanical Animation and it really caught my eye and had me fascinated to how the game worked.
The game felt very responsive. The flippers were quick to move on a press of the button. The flippers were parallel to the slope that led the ball into them on the sides (as opposed to the more downward angle some machines there used) which gave the ball a nice sense of movement when rolled down to them.
I played this machine 3 times and I noticed I did better each time. By my last play I managed to score over 40 points giving me an extra ball. I ended with a score of 62. At one point, I had also spelled out “SHOOT” and started multi-ball. Finally, I got the ball in the “Pizza Power Shots” hole, which let me actually control the backboard flipper and gave me a limited amount of time to shoot the ball into the basket as many times as I could. Usually I’m not very good at pinball, so that was probably the top game of my life-time pinball career thus far.
I really enjoyed NBA Fastbreak. I’m not a huge basketball fan truthfully, but the way the theme is used in the machine is incredibly enjoyable. Between the tiny basket and flipper, the play-by-play announcer (performed by Tim Kitzrow), and the basketball animations done on the small LCD display give the game a lot of charm. It makes the machine really stand out in a room full of pinball machines. I absolutely loved this machine and I am itching to play it again. I like that the scores for the game are much lower than other games. In my opinion, it makes it feel like every point matters a little bit more. I’m really motivated to return to the strong and try to best my high score.
