Originally Released: December 6th, 2014 ------------------------------------------ Yes, this is a thing that happened... :O In late 2014 I decided to spend a large wad of cash I was saving up to finally get myself an actual, full-sized, commercial-grade pinball machine! I went with Hollywood Heat, made by Gottlieb in the mid 80s using their System 80-B boards, which provided both an alphanumeric display and some delightfully retro synth sounds and music! For a time in 2015 after the fiasco with living arrangements, this ended up sitting over at a friend's place for some months, then once living conditions were stable in a new apartment I took it back. In early 2018 though, I finally decided to sell it as apartment living is not really suitable for playing real pins. Didn't get back ALL the money I invested into it, about 75% of it, but it went to someone who "shops" pins so I had no problem letting it go to him for a little less than I would've liked since I knew he was going to spruce the thing up and make it flawless anyways and not care about the flaws it had. :B Next time I buy a pin will be when I'm finally in a house again and my plan is to acquire Black Knight 2000! Fingers crossed that day will come! :D ------------------------------------------ Additional Information and Corrections: * Here's a couple links to the Pinside forum threads you can read through to learn more about my experiences with this thing. The first thread covers actually acquiring the machine while the second is about my first foray into maintenance: https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/the-heat-is-on-with-my-very-first-pin-d & https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/my-first-foray-into-pinball-maintenance * I talked about how I keep savings going... I really only spend about $20 frivolously per month on things like games or whatnot, so it leaves a lot left over to save up for awesome things. It just takes a lot of patience and a lot of not buying cheaper things I wouldn't mind having. I was actually ready to buy this machine five months before I did, but I still wasn't completely sure how Patreon support would pan out so I waited until my savings saw a significant boost from all the extra support before deciding the time was right. This even leads into why I don't collect stuff I don't intend to use and part of why I eventually sold it, since I could save/recoup that money and spend it on better stuff I would use. If there's something really expensive you want all it takes to get it is to reduce your spending and be content with what you already have for a time. Besides which, pinball machines kept in good condition don't depreciate all that much anymore, at least with the market how it currently is, so with a pin, you can always get back at least a sizable chunk of what you paid for it. ;) * The reason the grounding prong is removed from many of these old games is because they were put into locations that lacked modern outlets with three holes, so the only way to plug them in was to defeat the grounding prong in some way. Doing this does not actually harm the game, so long as it's working properly, but it creates a situation where ambient or shorted electrical current has no path to ground. What this means is that the person playing may feel a bit of a tingle or a small shock if he touches something else made of metal at the same time as a metal part of the machine, like the side rails where the flipper buttons are. Worse though, if something electrical comes loose in the game and shorts while someone is playing, without a proper ground in place the player may themselves act as a ground and thus will get a jolt of potentially lethal current. This is an extraordinarily unlikely circumstance, but not impossible! Thus it's always a good idea to properly ground any device that's had its grounding defeated and old pinball machines are prime candidates. Really old electromechanical pins don't even have grounding wiring applied inside and are thus an even bigger mess to ground properly. x_x; * I find it crazy how well the mechanical sounds are picked up compared to what was coming out of the speakers. I even had the game volume set pretty loud! I once again blame the acoustics in Dad's old house. * I had the settings on this thing set a little harder too so that the drop target values would reset after every ball. The reason for this is because with the default settings it's way too easy to advance the drop target values and get extra balls. I'd rather the game reach a natural end with extra balls enabled, rather than having it come down to how many balls in a row I can get extra balls from. :P ------------------------------------------ Pixelmusement Website: http://www.pixelships.com ADG on Pixelmusement: http://www.pixelships.com/adg Alphabetical Index of ADG Episodes: http://www.pixelships.com/adg/index2.html