frolic – Page 4 – Frolic's Arcade

April 11, 2014May 17, 2014

Behold…. THE sign!

I had a custom neon made to really make the new arcade something special.

March 5, 2014

Roller Coaster Tycoon

A new game joins the lineup.

Roller Coaster Tycoon from Stern. This is based off the computer game, features lots of ramps. a Pat Lawlor design. Currently held at my friend Luch’s place until my new house is ready.

January 30, 2014

Jukebox

We don’t take possession for another month but I bought a video jukebox to add to the atmosphere when we are ready.

January 10, 2014

Batman The Dark Knight Pinball

The new arcade will have room for many more machines. Batman The Dark Knight has already been added to the collection but will not be set up until the new arcade is ready.

January 10, 2014January 10, 2014

I’ve been living in the current rental home for 2 years, which is where we got our first pinball machine. We just bought our first home which will feature a much larger arcade. Below is a video walk through of the “before”.

November 30, 2013

Star Trek LE

Added a brand new machine to the lineup. Star Trek LE from Stern.

I added a blue DMD which fits the game quite nicely. The game itself is quite awesome. I am definitely hooked on “new” pinball that can deliver cutting edge light shows. Really amps the game up.

October 1, 2013November 30, 2013

Pinball Birthday!

Robin surprised me by inviting some people over for my birthday this year. I was ready to have a quiet birthday with my family when more guests kept showing up. Was fun to play some pinball! Represented by the guests were several parts of my life, from working in a video game store 25 years ago, my DJ years, and a new bunch of pinball friends.

Robin created a custom cake featuring a photo of my Tron machine!

A good time was had by all :-).

September 3, 2013September 3, 2013

Time to say goodbye

I decided to sell my Theatre of Magic. I don’t have enough space to keep every game I want, so it was time to start rotating the lineup.

I knew it would be an easy game to sell, it is a Top 10 game, and already had many people interested in it. A guest was over last night and made an offer on the spot so I decided to take it.

One game leaves, what will be the next to arrive?

May 16, 2013May 16, 2013

Pinballpalooza in Toronto

There was a “Pinballpalooza” today in Toronto promoting the musical Tommy. Robin and I went down to check it out.

They had 100 machines on free play, including a bunch of Metallica, the newest pin going. It was packed with people, tons of women and children playing. It was a great PR day for pinball.

May 2, 2013

I made some shirts for myself to wear at ToPL. I’m not a graphics guy, so I just used a Tron Legacy font to make it more modern, and kept it simple.

April 17, 2013

ToPL Fun Night

I hosted a “Fun Night” for the Toronto Pinball League. Regular league night was cancelled because of the big Pinburgh competition, so I had 12 people over. It was a test of the basement to see how many would comfortably fit. The 12 fit really good, I could probably push that to 16 (4 groups of 4 playing on 4 machines) in the future.

Regular ToPL nights have been attracting 25-35 people, way more than I could handle, so this Fun Night worked really well.

March 31, 2013

The “complete” lineup

Well, I’m definitely maxed out at 5 pins in my current basement. After some fast and furious acquisitions, I’m hoping I can be content and actually play them for a while. I’ve spent time on all of them, but some of the newer ones, like Simpsons, I’ve barely scratched the surface on.

I realized that the 5 pins are all by 5 different great designers, so it is a nice cross-selection:

Tron – John Borg
Theatre of Magic – John Popadiuk (Jpop)
Avengers – George Gomez
The Simpsons Pinball Party – Joe Balcer / Keith Johnson
AC/DC – Steve Ritchie / Lyman Sheats

Notable omissions would be: Dennis Nordman and Pat Lawlor…. hopefully I can add one of their machines in the future.

March 29, 2013

AC/DC set up and ready

Some video of AC/DC in the new lineup.

March 28, 2013March 28, 2013

AC/DC touches down.

Picked up my AC/DC Premium today. This hobby is quite the sickness, my 3rd new-in-box in 6 months. I decided on AC/DC because 1) it is a proven Top 10 pin and 2) I want to focus on newer machines, modern features like advanced lighting and rules. With AC/DC and my current lineup that kind of makes me “complete” at the moment until later this year when some new titles get released, like Star Trek.

I had to remove the head to get it down my stairs. My house is old and the basement was never made for fun stuff like pins!

Then I shuffled my pin order around to make space. I ran out of energy so I’ll finish reassembling ac/dc tomorrow.

March 23, 2013

Room for 5!

I can’t believe it, but we moved boxes and a 5th pin can now fit.

AC/DC is on its way!

March 22, 2013

Toronto Pinball League

A few months ago I finally came out to my first Toronto Pinball League (ToPL). I had resisted up until then because the distances to the various host’s homes seemed like a big drive. For a “Toronto” league, sometimes they are more than an hour outside the city, and none are currently IN Toronto at the moment.

I haven’t missed a Monday since. It’s been a lot of fun. To come out and spend a few hours with a bunch of other pinheads is a good time. Not to mention, the collections of some of the hosts’ homes are incredible, and I’d probably never get to see them otherwise.

It is a competitive league, so each night groups of 4 players are put together, and play on 4 machines. Scores are tracked and points assigned to your placement. This is done over a 15 week season. There is a end-of-season playoffs, but I’ve yet to be part of that.

The social aspect of pinball has been an unexpected plus. I’ve met lots of good peeps.

March 3, 2013