mpclemens
New member
- Jun 26, 2013
- 133
- 0
Just want to give a shout out to the fine folks who run and maintain the PPM in Alameda. I made my second-ever visit there yesterday, and left five hours later, and then mainly because my wrists had all but gone numb. The "DMD room" (as I like to think of it) is very popular, and fills up late in the day, but naturally I arrived at opening time -- OK, 20 minutes before -- and had the room practically to myself, playing Doctor Who for the first time, several times. Read that as "being brutalized by" Doctor Who, especially the video mode. Arrgh. Spent quality time with Addams Family, a table I played regularly 20 years or so ago as a student, and haven't encountered much since. There's a certain satisfaction in being able to hit the skill shot after so much time away. The sound design alone makes that table worthwhile. Where's the Kickstarter?
My unofficial mission of the day was to play every real-life version of the tables found in TPA. Dr. Dude is even less-forgiving in person, yikes. TZ was out of commission, sadly, as was Black Knight, but Funhouse was operating fine (except for one of Rudy's eyes... creepy). I'd forgotten how darn big everything is in FH; you lose the sense of scale when you're playing on a TV or tablet. Other tables I've seen mentioned around here got some playtime -- Earthshaker, Red & Ted -- and I was tickled to see tables that I'd spent countless quarters on during summer vacations at the beach with my family. Cyclone, High Speed... I was having some serious nostalgia trips.
The standout star was Stern's Seawitch, which either wasn't there last time I visited, or I overlooked. What a cool table! I see now that it's rated highly in the polls, and I can see why. Not a particularly deep rule set, but the layout is clever and the play is satisfying. I hope FS takes a hint from the polls and adds this to their non-DMD "must have" list. Pinball goes so much deeper than just emulated ROMs.
The high point of the visit for me, though, is always the EM room, right in the front, with lots of fine woodrails and other machines-of-a-certain-age. I love these: the sound, the feel, the smell even. By the end of my day the room was nearly full of players, old and young (PPM provides stepstools for junior pinheads) all desperately trying to get scores all the way up in the hundreds. A roomful of EMs all chiming and thumping and knocking and buzzing: a symphony.
I only wish my camera was better-behaved: the LCD screen chose yesterday to die, so I was shooting blind, and essentially in the dark. I blogged about the experience with what few photos were salvageable, but a memory card full of badly-lit and blurry handheld shots can't come close to canceling out the fun I had. Thanks, PPM!
My unofficial mission of the day was to play every real-life version of the tables found in TPA. Dr. Dude is even less-forgiving in person, yikes. TZ was out of commission, sadly, as was Black Knight, but Funhouse was operating fine (except for one of Rudy's eyes... creepy). I'd forgotten how darn big everything is in FH; you lose the sense of scale when you're playing on a TV or tablet. Other tables I've seen mentioned around here got some playtime -- Earthshaker, Red & Ted -- and I was tickled to see tables that I'd spent countless quarters on during summer vacations at the beach with my family. Cyclone, High Speed... I was having some serious nostalgia trips.
The standout star was Stern's Seawitch, which either wasn't there last time I visited, or I overlooked. What a cool table! I see now that it's rated highly in the polls, and I can see why. Not a particularly deep rule set, but the layout is clever and the play is satisfying. I hope FS takes a hint from the polls and adds this to their non-DMD "must have" list. Pinball goes so much deeper than just emulated ROMs.
The high point of the visit for me, though, is always the EM room, right in the front, with lots of fine woodrails and other machines-of-a-certain-age. I love these: the sound, the feel, the smell even. By the end of my day the room was nearly full of players, old and young (PPM provides stepstools for junior pinheads) all desperately trying to get scores all the way up in the hundreds. A roomful of EMs all chiming and thumping and knocking and buzzing: a symphony.
I only wish my camera was better-behaved: the LCD screen chose yesterday to die, so I was shooting blind, and essentially in the dark. I blogged about the experience with what few photos were salvageable, but a memory card full of badly-lit and blurry handheld shots can't come close to canceling out the fun I had. Thanks, PPM!
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I've never had that problem leaving there before but every other visit has been on Saturday's. I think I remember you because I saw someone playing Centaur a few times. I was on it quite a bit early in the day.
