Finally, we near the end of the COVID-19 pandemic and it appears we are going to start returning to normal. In that vein, one of the new venues to have popped up during this period, Eightytwo at 1201 Saint Emanuel Street, hosted a pinball tournament on the evening of Tuesday, April 6.

The lineup for the tournament included the following machines: Attack from Mars, Disney TRON: Legacy, Eight Ball Deluxe (LE), Iron Maiden: Legacy of the Beast, Medieval Madness (Remake), Metallica (Pro), Star Wars (Premium), Taxi, The Walking Dead (Pro), Theatre of Magic, Wheel of Fortune, Whirlwind, World Cup Soccer, and World Poker Tour. Most of the competitors are people I didn’t recognize from previous tournaments/events, though notably Chris Low, Gina Low, Phil Grimaldi, and John Speights were there. The format was a two-strikes, heads-up tournament (loser gets a strike).

The first round would see me paired against Donovan Wade on Metallica. Donovan got out to an early lead, and I just never really got in a position to catch up. This was a very quick strike as I would put up a meager 3.44M+ to Donovan’s 10.7M+.

Round two would give me perhaps the luckiest break of the entire tournament. My opponent was a no-show, so I got to relax and play a single player game of World Poker Tour. I put up what I believe to be a respectable 9.83M+, which probably would have been good enough to win had my opponent actually shown up.

Next would be Taxi against Clint Warren. This wound up being an embarrassingly low scoring game, but I still wound up with the higher score: 594k+ to 310k+. (I’ll be coming back to this in a later post as I would do something absolutely amazing on this machine when just hanging out and playing one-player games.)

We’d move on to round four on The Walking Dead against Peter Ortiz. Now this is not one of my favorite titles, nor one I consider myself particularly good at playing. However, I did wind up posting a decent 13.3M+ good enough to win against Peter’s 6.8M+. Four rounds in, and I’m still hanging on with one strike. I’m starting to feel pretty confident.

Round five would bring up Whirlwind against Chris Low. (Finally, a familiar face.) In a game much too close for comfort, I put up a mere 2.69M+, which barely held up against the 2.42M+ Chris was able to manage. I can almost hear “Stayin’ Alive” by the Bee Gees in my head over whatever was playing in the bar at the time.

The close games would continue with round six, Medieval Madness against Khristian Singleton. It seemed like almost none of my shots would make, and it was starting to look like it would be a much shorter tournament for me at first as I signed off with 2.27M+ prior to Khristian’s last ball. Fortunately for me, Khristian was only able to amass 1.74M+, and so I was still in it.

On the other game in round six, Donovan Wade defeats Phil Grimaldi on Attack from Mars (I unfortunately didn’t make a note of the score). I was remarking to the other players watching that I’d rather play against Donovan, given Phil’s demonstrated skill level. This, after all, the guy that started running tournaments and leagues here only to win most of them himself in the early going. Thankfully, before I could get #sickofphilwinning trending on Twitter and Facebook, that changed…

Anyway, back to the current tournament. For some reason I thought round seven was the last one. I didn’t realize at the time Donovan had no strikes. I played World Cup Soccer as though this was it, and the score showed it: 643.2M+ to 520.4M+.

For the first time ever, I’m one game away from winning a strikeout tournament, something I’ve never been able to do. The last game would be Eight Ball Deluxe. Donovan starts out with a pretty good first ball. He would sign off with 826.7k+. I would have a much worse fortune: 67,500. All three balls would drain within about 30 seconds.

This is about as disappointing a finish as I could have. Second place beats the heck out of last place, but I’m really not in this to collect second place trophies.

(Pictures to be uploaded later.)

Recently, I learned the unfortunate news regarding the untimely passing of William Thornton in early April. I did play in a few tournaments and league nights alongside William, though his job in the transportation industry unfortunately limited his opportunities to play pinball in the Houston area. William was a great person and remained friendly to me despite our completely opposing political views. He will be sorely missed in the Houston pinball community.

If you have not already, now is a good time to go back and read:

• Still got that magic? Game Preserve Webster, 2020 November 14 (read this one if it’s the only one you have time for)
• Texas Pinball League Qualifier 2017 Houston: As Red would say, “It’s a dud”
• Space City Pinball League Season 6 Week 1: Seconds are meant for dinner
• Space City Pinball League Season 5 Week 2: Earning my wings
• Screenshot of obituary from the Indianapolis Star (added May 23)

So apparently I have some catching up to do. There have not been many tournaments; it’s mostly been “normal” trips to the arcade/bar, so I’m going to be posting mainly summaries. Some of them may be out of order, as there are some more recent events I want to give priority.

It is important to recognize that when I am documenting the highlights of one of my arcade visits, it is not necessarily a full-on endorsement of that facility. It’s the same with tournaments and leagues. I hope to organize tournaments and leagues in the near future but may find myself playing in whatever is available as there are only so many venues locally suitable for tournaments.

As much as I wish this were the case, not every establishment with five or more machines is automatically suitable for a tournament. Even then, not every establishment that meets the standards for what I’d consider to be a tournament/league ready venue will necessarily be willing to work with me or my league, or even to have such an event at all under the auspices of any league or tournament director. It’s disappointing but that’s the way it is.

As I get to documenting more recent events, I will have an important viewpoint to post; expect this to drop Wednesday at the latest (more likely Tuesday afternoon to evening) later this week, most likely Saturday (edit: due to some new information I’ve learned which I will need time to investigate). The full piece may not be on this blog; I will post a shorter summary with a link here if that is the case.

This is a very quick summary of what I was able to put up through the last three weeks of January give or take. This includes one post-tournament game on January 24 but the actual tournament will be summarized in a later post. So yes, this will be slightly out of chronological order, something I don’t really like to do but which is unfortunately necessary to get caught up in a timely fashion.

• TMNT normal game, 26.7M+ grand champion and Leonardo champion 1/24
• TMNT final battle challenge, 20.7M+ 1/23
• Iron Maiden, 321.9M+ 1/23 high score #1
• Munsters, 19.1M+ 1/21
• JP normal game, 254.8M+ 1/28
• JP Escape Nubular, 275.0M+ 1/26
• Deadpool, 205.5M+ 1/28
• Super Pac-Man, 76,040 1/15
• Q*Bert, 18,875 1/21
• Millipede, 78,394 1/28
• Track & Field, 96,110 1/23 (game has video issues but score is legible)

All in all I’m pretty happy with most of these, particularly Millipede, TMNT final battle, JP Escape Nubular, and Iron Maiden.

Not one of my better tournaments, so I’m going to go through it very quickly and summarize most of what I remember. TL;DR: I only lasted four rounds, meaning I avoided a strike in only one round; the rest of the tournament also went by fairly quickly.

Round 1 was Charlie’s Angels with Matt Rodon, Holden, and Fred Revnew (I would play first). We were playing this title as a two-player game since there were issues with the fourth player score display. On this game I’ve put up scores well into the hundreds of thousands on this game before, and even rolled over the score counter a couple of times. All of that meant jack spit this evening as I would put up a truly cringeworthy 36,610. Matt would put up a more respectable 205,420. Holden would put up a rather lacking 109,250, and Fred would seal the deal with a 327,910, most of it on one ball. So that’s strike one.

Round 2 would send me over to Star Wars with, Fred Revnew, Kevin Tooley, and Holden (I would be playing third). I never really had much of a chance. I was able to put up 84.7M+ after two balls, but Fred and Kevin signed off with 478.6M+ and 291.0M+, so my third ball would have needed to be a minimum of 207M and change for me to possibly be safe. It wasn’t, in fact, it was a real turd and I’d sign off with 98.4M+ good for third place and strike number two.

Round 3 would finally drop a bit of better luck on me. Holden, Dillon Neal, and Alyssa would be my opponents (I would play second). I was a bit worried at the start of ball 3 as it was a fairly close game. Holden had already wrapped up with 74.1M+, which could be no better than third. Dillon had 89.2M+ for the lead at that point, and Alyssa was way back with 21.0M+, both with a ball still left to play. I would call it a wrap with 132.8M+, Dillon would put a lid on it at 172.4M+, leaving Alyssa, who I had never seen play in a tournament prior to tonight, though to that point she had been the weak link in the group. I got a bit nervous, but finally got to exhale as she signed off with only 49.5M+.

Round 4 would bring on Game of Thrones, with Josh Merlet and Hunter Reed (I would play third). Hunter ran away with it posting a 288.4M+, Josh had put a lid on it with 17.4M+. I would start ball 3 with 7.2M+, not a high score by any means, but it should have been fairly easy for me to dodge a third strike here. Emphasis on “should”. I’d end the night with the third strike here putting up only 15.1M+ and give Josh another round that arguably, he didn’t earn (though he would bust out the following round anyway).

My finish: ninth place of 12 players. You’d think after the previous tournament I would have done better than that against many of the same players.

Eventually, Fred and Jack Revnew would agree to split first place after eight rounds, as it was getting late and they were the only two players left. I’d hang around and put in a few more games. Quick summary of the (better) non-tournament games that night:

• Frogger: 17,290
• Charlie’s Angels: 1,441,590 (where was this during the tourney?!)
• Guardians of the Galaxy: 109.7M+
• Centipede: 34,857
• Twilight Zone: 291.7M+
• Tri Zone: 212,960

Once again, most of these will be a bit light on detail but there will be a few highlights to comment on.

The Game Preserve (The Woodlands), January 1:

• Star Trek (Stern): 8.49M+
• Twilight Zone: 66.4M+
• Dancing Lady: 416
• Spy Hunter (pinball): 1.83M+
• White Water: 228.2M+
• Star Wars (Stern): 280.6M+
• Game of Thrones (Pro): 97.49M+
• Q*Bert (video): 29,835
• Charlie’s Angels: 392,380
• Rollergames: 2.23M+ (slightly blurry, but this game does not show previous scores easily)
• The Simpsons (pinball): 739,040
• Lord of the Rings: 6.10M+
• Metallica: 4.40M+
• Guardians of the Galaxy: 561.9M+, high score #4
• Marble Madness: 19,630
• Tri Zone: 347,050
• Arkanoid: 17,230
• Nibbler: 51,630
• Flying Carpet: 3,689 (may not be accurate, scoring reels are having issues on this game lately)
• NBA Fastbreak: 57
• Doctor Who: 428.4M+

The main highlights here were White Water, Spy Hunter, Doctor Who, and Guardians of the Galaxy. On White Water, I had a pretty good multiball run as well as getting a high bonus multiplier early on (and on this game, the bonus multiplier is automatically held for each succeeding ball). Spy Hunter was another case of getting key features lit and a high end of ball bonus to boot. Doctor Who, if I remember right, I had at least one good multiball, possibly two, with the jackpots helping immensely (it also helps that the bonus multiplier shot in this game is always lit and relatively easy to keep hitting). Guardians of the Galaxy, I remember having a good Groot Multiball run or two, possibly an Orb Multiball as well. All in all a pretty good evening.

Speedy’s, January 3:

• Quick & Crash: 7.735 sec (started off great but had a lousy stage 3 and 4)
• Iron Maiden: 102.8M+
• Deadpool: 21.15M+
• The Munsters: 13.22M+
• Jurassic Park: 108.7M+

The Game Preserve, January 8:

• The Simpsons (pinball): 1.76M+
• Paragon: 96,640
• Guardians of the Galaxy: 620.9M+, high score #2
• Star Wars (Stern): 100.3M+
• NBA Fastbreak: 31
• Tri Zone: 351,730
• No Fear: 276.0M+
• Charlie’s Angels: 896,750
• Back to the Future: 1.87M+
• Q*Bert (video): 32,845
• Revenge From Mars: 11.41M+
• Doctor Who: 262.6M+
• Twilight Zone: 283.2M+
• Centipede: 45,006
• Star Trek: 68.98M+
• Frogger: 13,700
• Flying Carpet: 2,129 (again, may or may not be accurate)

Guardians of the Galaxy, I remember starting Groot Multiball twice, Orb Multiball once, and Cherry Bomb Multiball (after getting four modes) which is a six-ball multiball with continuous ball save until the mode is over (60 seconds I think?).

Speedy’s, January 9:

• The Munsters: 8.7M+
• TMNT Final Battle: 7.58M+ (Final Battle champion at the time)
• Batman 66: 41.7M+
• Star Wars: 161.2M+
• Q*Bert: 31,600
• Super Pac-Man: 110,090
• TMNT (normal game): 22.34M+, high score #3
• Iron Maiden: 199.4M+, high score #3 (Hallowed Be Thy Name Champion 85.5M+)
• Airline Pilots: 64 points, 7:47 beginner; 74 points, 6:12 intermediate