Your Favorite Pinball Designer?

[ND3G]

Who is your favorite pinball designer?

My apologies if I left off your favorite designer.

At the very least I should have added Dennis Nordman - (White Water, Scared Stiff, Elvira, Dr. Dude)

 

[bavelb]

Voted JP. But Mark Ritchie (Taxi, Diner, Indiana Jones, Sorcerer, Fish Tales) deserves an honourable mention.

 

[Jeff Strong]

Who is your favorite pinball designer?

My apologies if I left off your favorite designer.

At the very least I should have added Dennis Nordman - (White Water, Scared Stiff, Elvira, Dr. Dude)

Added him for you.

 

[Nik Barbour]

Voted Pat Lawlor, but think they are all brilliant!

 

[Mike]

Too hard to choose. I guess I don't really have a favorite. I would say a tie between Popadiuk and Lawlor. As everyone else said, these are all pretty amazing characters.

 

[Brian Clark]

Too hard to choose, though I wish Ted Zale (Fireball, Four Million BC), John Trudeau (Creature from the Black Lagoon, Judge Dredd, Silver Slugger, The Machine Bride of Pinbot), Barry Oursler (Pinbot, Bad Cats, Space Shuttle, Cyclone), and Ed Krynski (Royal Flush, Big Brave, Bank Shot), and Wayne Neyens (Queen of Hearts, Square Head, Slick Chick, Sittin' Pretty) were on here too. I think Steve Kordek (Space Mission, Triple Action, Triple Strike) should be on the list too, but I haven't played any of the actual machines of the games he designed.

 

[ND3G]

Added him for you.

Thanks Jeff

 

[Rudy Yagov]

This is actually kind of tough. I'd say that Lawlor is the "best" as far as making a vast number of good games, but Steve Ritchie is responsible for a much greater number of my favorites.

Also, I'd add Barry Oursler, Mark Ritchie, and John Trudeau.

 

[superballs]

Bob5354 from VPForums

No Brick & Mortar tables by him but his originals are top notch for VP8 and VP9

 

[Shaneus]

Steve Ritchie all the way. Eddy is great but... not *quite* as good as Ritchie IMO. Lawlor is unreal as well, but leans too much toward a stop-start style of play (IMO!) with ever-so-slightly busy playfields.

So many great designers, but when it comes down to it, if you picked a random table from any of those listed, there's a better chance i'd enjoy one of Ritchie's more.

 

[jrolson]

Where's the "all the above" option? To many good designers listed to choose only one...

 

[Richard B]

As much as I like Medieval Madness and Attack From Mars, I had to go with Ritchie, because he has the depth. In addition to those already mentioned, he also designed the original Black Knight, Firepower, F-14 Tomcat, Rollergames, the Getaway, Indiana Jones (Williams), and No Fear, as well as several recent Stern tables.

 

[FurVid]

Definitely Ritchie - the others made some great tables, but Steve was responsible for almost every important innovation. Shame none of his tables are released yet, or in the next DLC batch, but I guess this is an "Arcade", not a "Hall of Fame". I usually consider Lawlor second based on the large number of awesome tables he did, but I'm knocking him down a notch since after a session of RBION I'm just sick of that style of skill shot where you have to launch the ball really lightly across the center of the table and hope it doesn't go down a side drain if you miss (I know on Ripley's it at least gives it back, but it didn't on WPHOF Whirlwind and No Good Gophers). So Popadiuk is second.

 

[Rudy Yagov]

As much as I like Medieval Madness and Attack From Mars, I had to go with Ritchie, because he has the depth. In addition to those already mentioned, he also designed the original Black Knight, Firepower, F-14 Tomcat, Rollergames, the Getaway, Indiana Jones (Williams), and No Fear, as well as several recent Stern tables.

Indy was his brother, Mark Ritchie. He also did Taxi, Diner, Fish Tales, Sorcerer, Big Guns, and a handful of other Williams games, as well as Kingpin for Capcom.

 

[Daniel Osborne]

I voted jpop. Love totan and tom, only two flippers too, so i prefer not to have to concentrate too much on the upper play area during multiball! Need more tables quickly!

 

[BStarfire]

Rudy Yagov did mention him above, but the recent release of Space Shuttle reminded me of the great Barry Oursler.... the aforementioned Space Shuttle, Space Station, Gorgar, Comet, Cyclone, Pinbot, Bram Stoker's Dracula that all come top of mind, and he has plenty of others.

 

[Kolchak357]

Almost a coin flip between Ritchie and Lawlor for me. I voted for Lawlor because of my TAF addiction that I have struggled with for years.