Midwest Gaming Classic 2017

[Crawley]

So the Midwest Gaming Classic happened this weekend in Brookfield Wisconsin. This is an expo that focuses on old arcade games, pinball, and video games/computers. But there's plenty of additional stuff to do there. You can read my previous year recaps below:

http://digitalpinballfans.com/showthread.php/9984-Midwest-Gaming-Classic-2015-(Image-Heavy)
http://digitalpinballfans.com/showthread.php/10934-Midwest-Gaming-Classic-2016-(Brookfield-WI)

I'll try and keep this year relatively short so lets start with Houdini.



This game, or rather the company American Pinball, has been going through a bit of controversy about taking peoples pre-purchase money and not delivering games. For their game Magic Girl people plunked down a couple grand, the tables were not shipping after years of waiting, and they announced Houdini during that time. Magic Girl did recently get a limited release but it's a pretty incomplete game. Houdini has some additional controversy to it where they ended up changing the name of the table and I believe the layout.

So here it is at MGC.

I watched a few games and played one myself although it was over pretty quick. They had the game set up for 2-ball only play "to move the line". But after playing it I wonder if it was done to keep people from noticing there isn't much too the table. With tables like Pinball Magic and Theatre of Magic there are all these crazy toys and tricks with magnets the table does. So you would expect another table that deals with magicians would be pretty crazy too. Nope. Didn't see anything like that on this table. Was pretty much start a mission and make a lane/ramp shot or hit some targets. All the toys on the table were just for looks.

That said the table does look great. Some lovely LED lighting on there. Houdini's green glowing eyes are pretty neat at the center of the table. And the artwork is pretty decent.

But the video that plays on the monitor art is pretty generic and a bit uninspired. Same with the voice overs. And I'm not sure about the call outs. They're very detailed in explaining what you need to do. So that's good that you know what to do but bad that they're talking to you for quite a long time explaining what to do.

But it's a work in progress which is also why my game was so short as one ball that went down a habit trail rolled off it, went behind a toy, and right into an outlane.

I do have a video that for some reason won't post to photobucket at the moment. Will keep trying to see if I can post that as it gives a good idea of what the table looks like in action.

Should also mention in the picture, the guy to the right, I believe is the creator of the table Total Annihilation which Spooky Pinball just picked up to build in limited amounts - will talk about the table in a bit.

 

[Crawley]

A nice turnout for recent Stern games. Can see 3 Aerosmith's here along with two Batman 66's - one being a Limited LE. They also had one or two Ghostbusters, a Game of Thrones, and two Star Trek's on hand.



This was the first time I got to try out Aerosmith and Batman 66. I'm not much of a fan of Aerosmith but I have to say this table is a lot of fun. Very fast, really fun shots, and that toy box is great. Hope this one makes it to Stern Pinball arcade.
Batman 66' they debut at the Chicago Pinball Expo last year but they didn't let anyone play them. You just could look at them from a far. I played both the Pro and Limited LE and to my surprise wasn't blown away. They were just ok to me. It also didn't seem like the build quality on either of those machines was that great. Where Aerosmith felt solid Batman felt flimsy to me. Very strange.



Also on hand were two Dialed In's, a Hobbit, and a Woz. Didn't play any of these as lines were long and I'm lucky enough to have each of these at an arcade near by. Dialed In gets a big thumbs up though.



This is kinda neat. There were two new Pitch and Hit machines on hand. Essentially both were identical but this one was a zombie theme where the other was normal baseball. If you haven't played a Pitch and Hit machine you play both the pitcher and the batter. You choose what type of pitch to throw (curve, changeup, fast ball) and the ball is shot from under the table down the center of it. You then hit the swing button to swing your "bat". The ball is then batted somewhere on the playfield. Either in a hole in the back of the table which is either marked "single", "double", "triple", or "out" or somewhere on the table there are holes the ball can fall in for the same. If you're lucky you can bat the ball up a ramp and over the wall to get a home run.

As you make bases a player will pop up on the backbox and run to their base.

Simple but these can be a lot of fun to play.

The zombie theme looked great and it had a spooky announcer to call all the plays.

 

[Kolchak357]

My understanding is that John Popaduik and his company Zidware are the one that people paid for machines that were not delivered. It appears that American Pinball stepped in and helped 20 to 25 people actually get their Magic Girl pin. People also had paid money for two other pins (Alice in Wonderland and another) that most believe will never get made.
American Pinball then took the unused Houdini theme JPop was talking about using, totally redesigned it and then created 2 prototype pins in only four months. This is what you are seeing now.
Someone can correct me if I am wrong.

Thanks for the post and great pics. Looks like it was a great show. Love that someone is going to make a pitch and bat game again.

 

[Crawley]

Holy LEDed Medusa!

This Medusa looked fantastic with the new lighting. Even the flippers had lights inside them. If Farsight makes a Pinball Arcade 2 they need to re-negotiate the contracts to allow to add things to tables like LED lightning, new toys, alternative back boxes, colored DMD, whatever. Some of these older game makeovers are just fantastic to behold.



Black Knight and Swords of Fury look great too with some more minimal updated lighting and some great looking toppers.



Yes, we need The Shadow in Pinball Arcade. Fester out all the actors and put this back box art up instead.



Unfortunately I took a terribly blurry picture here of Jetsons and Total Annihilation. Jetsons is a new game from Spooky Pinball. I only had one game on it and didn't really watch anyone else play it so hard to give a good impression. But from what I gathered it didn't stray too far from their other table quality - which is kinda budget.

But Total Annihilation is worth mentioning. I played it at the Chicago Pinball Expo and didn't think too much of it. It wasn't until after I was reading some comments about people really loving it. I think part of it is the music of this game which is really fantastic. It has kinda a Bit Trip Running style music where when you start the game the music is pretty basic. But then as you play the game and get further in it the music builds up and you have these thumping beats coming out of some great speakers. This game just sounds phenomenal and you can't help but be pulled in.

I think the game may be similar to Pinball Magic where you have to do goals in a certain order. The only thing I was able to figure out was you first need to start a generator but getting the ball in the upper playfield area and hitting targets in there. Then shutting it down. Not sure what the second goal is as I only lasted to starting and stopping the generator. But didn't care that music was awesome and it drew pretty frequent crowds both days.

I also like that the table has LED display right below the flipper area that counts down how long you have left till your ball save is over. Really nice touch.

Its only a whitewood table at this point so look forward to see what the artwork looks like when its done.

 

[Crawley]

My understanding is that John Popaduik and his company Zidware are the one that people paid for machines that were not delivered. It appears that American Pinball stepped in and helped 20 to 25 people actually get their Magic Girl pin. People also had paid money for two other pins (Alice in Wonderland and another) that most believe will never get made.
American Pinball then took the unused Houdini theme JPop was talking about using, totally redesigned it and then created 2 prototype pins in only four months. This is what you are seeing now.
Someone can correct me if I am wrong.

Ah ok. So American Pinball are actually the hero's here for making these tables a reality. Thanks for correcting my misconception.

 

[Kolchak357]

That is one sweet Medusa. The last couple I played had blown out playfields.