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What Pinball Looks Like When the Stakes Are High
siobHan writes "The PAPA World Pinball Championships recently concluded in Scott, PA (near Pittsburgh), as covered on Slashdot already. The organizers recorded full 1080p/60 HD video of the playfield during the final games, and have uploaded the entirety of the crucial deciding game, with commentary (direct link to just the video). The winner of this game received $10,000 for his skillful play."
Tilt: The battle to save pinball is a great documentary to watch.
Gottlieb electromechanical (EM) machines were #1 from the beginning of the flipper period (Humpty Dumpty - 1948), but lagged in features and complexity around the early 70's. But the latter EMs of that decade were unmatched - with classics like El Dorado. But once the games transitioned to solid state(SS) in the latter part of the 70's, Gottlieb never found their way back, and faded slowly from the scene until Barb Wire - their last pinball machine. Until the EM/SS transition, Gottlieb games had a well-deserved reputation for quality of components and reliability. This was all lost in the SS transition with the horrible System 1 platform, designed by Rockwell of all places. And even though they did bring up quality by the 90's it was too late for Gottlieb by then and they faded into obscurity.